Peter Hujar's Day

Synopsis

How do people spend their days? This question drove writer Linda Rosenkrantz to interview some of New York’s most prominent artists of the 1970s.

Director Ira Sachs adapts a transcript from a December 1974 conversation between celebrated photographer Peter Hujar (Ben Whishaw) and Rosenkrantz (Rebecca Hall). Although Rosenkrantz’s project was never completed, Hujar’s transcript resurfaced in 2021 when it was published for the first time.

Hujar recounts the previous 24 hours—mundane details like phone calls, naps, financial worries, a Chinese takeaway order, and a surreal photoshoot with Allen Ginsberg—interspersed with anecdotes about Susan Sontag and William S. Burroughs. The film unfolds as an intimate dialogue between two friends.