Eszter Balint (born 7 July 1966) is a Hungarian-American singer, songwriter, violinist, and actress. [1] She made her film debut in Jim Jarmusch's Stranger Than Paradise (1984). She went on to received a Independent Spirit Award for Best Female Lead nomination for Bail Jumper (1990). She also acted in American Stories: Food, Family and Philosophy (1989), Shadows and Fog (1991), Trees Lounge (1996), Downtown 81 (2000), and The Dead Don't Die (2019). She has a recurring role as Amia in the fourth season of Louis C.K.'s FX series Louie in 2014.
Eszter Balint was born in Budapest, Hungary, to Marianne Kollar and Stephan Balint. [2] She was living with the avant-garde Squat Theatre troupe in New York City, founded by her father, when she first met Jean-Michel Basquiat. They became involved while he was filming Downtown 81 . [3] In 1983, Balint was brought into the studio by Basquiat to play violin on the influential hip-hop record "Beat Bop" by Rammellzee and K-Rob. [4]
Balint made her cinematic debut in 1984 in director Jim Jarmusch's independent film Stranger Than Paradise . [2] In 1985 she made her TV debut in Miami Vice as Dorothy Bain in the episode "Buddies". She appeared in the 1990 film Bail Jumper. [5] Roles in The Linguini Incident (1991), Woody Allen's Shadows and Fog (1991) and Steve Buscemi's Trees Lounge (1996) followed. [1] Balint's albums, Flicker (1998) and Mud (2004), both produced by J. D. Foster, were praised by The New York Times , The New Yorker , and Billboard . In his review of Mud, Jon Pareles writes: "Miss Balint has her own film noir sensibility as a songwriter. She puts arty twists into back-alley Americana... but the cleverness is not the point. She slips inside her characters to project their restlessness and longing." [6]
Balint has appeared on recordings by Michael Gira's group Angels of Light, Marc Ribot's group Los Cubanos Postizos, John Lurie's album The Legendary Marvin Pontiac: Greatest Hits, Dayna Kurtz, and with the Swans. Her cover of the Serge Gainsbourg song "Un Poison Violent, C'est Ca L'amour" appears on the record Great Jewish Music: Serge Gainsbourg on John Zorn's Tzadik label released in 1997. [7] She was a featured guest member of Marc Ribot's group Ceramic Dog, touring Europe throughout 2009 and is featured on their 2013 release Your Turn.[ citation needed ] In 2014, Balint appeared as Amia, a violin-playing Hungarian love interest for Louis C.K. on the latter's FX series, Louie . [8] In 2015, Balint released her third album Airless Midnight, produced by J. D. Foster. [9] That same year, Paste magazine premiered Balint's first official music video, "Trouble You Don't See". Josh Jackson wrote: "Paste named Eszter Balint an artist to watch back in 2004 after she released her second album Mud. And while she stepped back from music to focus on parenting soon after, she's delivered on that promise with this year's long-awaited follow-up Airless Midnight, which comes on the heels of a recurring role as a Louis C.K.'s love interest in the most recent season of Louie." [10] Balint played Fern in the 2019 film The Dead Don't Die . [11]
Balint's most recent album I Hate Memory! came out in 2022 and was called a song cycle that is "a fervid tour of her avant-garde youth." [12] Stew co-wrote man songs and sings too, Syd Straw also joins her on the album. [13]
Balint has also been in the news for criticizing the rampant commercialization of Basquiat's work and image, telling The New York Post, “This kind of flattening and fetishizing takes people further away from the art.” [14]
Year | Title | Role | Director | Notes | Ref. |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1984 | Stranger Than Paradise | Eva | Jim Jarmusch | [15] | |
1989 | American Stories: Food, Family and Philosophy | Actor | Chantal Akerman | [15] | |
Wonderland USA | Herself | Zoe Beloff | Short film | [15] | |
1990 | Bail Jumper | Elaine | Christian Faber | [15] | |
1991 | The Linguini Incident | Vivian | Richard Shepard | [15] | |
Shadows and Fog | Woman with baby | Woody Allen | [15] | ||
1996 | Trees Lounge | Marie | Steve Buscemi | [15] | |
2000 | Downtown 81 | Fashion Show Model | Edo Bertoglio | Documentary | [15] |
2016 | A Woman, a Part | Heidi | Elisabeth Subrin | [15] | |
Poor Boy | Missus Waxman | Robert Scott Wildes | [15] | ||
2019 | The Dead Don't Die | Fern | Jim Jarmusch | [15] | |
Year | Title | Role | Notes | Ref. |
---|---|---|---|---|
1985 | Miami Vice | Dorothy Bain | Episode: "Buddies" | [15] |
2014 | Louie | Amia | 6 episodes | [15] |
Year | Association | Category | Project | Result | Ref. |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1991 | Independent Spirit Award | Best Female Lead | Bail Jumper | Nominated | [16] |
Serge Gainsbourg was a French singer-songwriter, actor, composer, and director. Regarded as one of the most important figures in French pop, he was renowned for often provocative releases which caused uproar in France, dividing public opinion. His artistic output ranged from his early work in jazz, chanson, and yé-yé to later efforts in rock, zouk, funk, reggae, and electronica. Gainsbourg's varied musical style and individuality make him difficult to categorise, although his legacy has been firmly established and he is often regarded as one of the world's most influential popular musicians.
Jane Mallory Birkin was a British-French actress and singer. She had a prolific career as an actress, mostly in French cinema.
Charlotte Lucy Gainsbourg is a British-French actress and singer. She is the daughter of English actress and singer Jane Birkin and French singer Serge Gainsbourg. After making her musical debut with her father on the song "Lemon Incest" at the age of 12, she released an album with her father at the age of 15. More than 20 years passed before Gainsbourg released albums as an adult to commercial and critical success. She has acted in many films, including collaborations with Lars von Trier, and received two César Awards and Cannes Film Festival's Best Actress Award 2009 for the movie Antichrist, among many nominations.
Stranger Than Paradise is a 1984 American black-and-white absurdist deadpan comedy film directed, co-written and co-edited by Jim Jarmusch, and starring jazz musician John Lurie, former Sonic Youth drummer-turned-actor Richard Edson, and Hungarian-born actress and violinist Eszter Balint. It features a minimalist plot in which the main character, Willie, is visited by Eva, his cousin from Hungary. Eva stays with him for ten days before going to Cleveland. Willie and his friend Eddie go to Cleveland to visit her, and the three then take a trip to Florida. The film is shot entirely in single long takes with no standard coverage.
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Elysian Fields is an American band based in Brooklyn, New York, founded in 1995 by the co-composers Jennifer Charles and Oren Bloedow (guitar). Their music has sometimes been described as "noir rock", due to its sultry, dark and mysterious inflections, be it sonically or lyrically. The band uses mainly acoustic instruments, predominantly guitar, piano, bass and drums, with the occasional appearance of eastern instruments, classical strings, and subtle electronics, the focal point being the voice of Charles in the forefront.
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