Nancy Perl Benderoth
Nancy Ann Reals Perl Benderoth, an artist, designer, and producer of a documentary film that was nominated for an Academy Award, died at her Jericho Road, East Hampton, house on Feb. 6. Her family, who were with her at the end, said the cause of death was cardiac arrest brought on by pneumonia. She was 84 and had been in declining health for several years.
She was born to Barney Reals and the former Annabel Whitney in Brooklyn on April 26, 1933, and grew up in the gated community of Seagate, adjacent to Coney Island. A lifelong painter, she attended Cooper Union and the Art Students League, both in Manhattan. Locally, she studied at the Art Barge on Napeague with Victor D’Amico of the Museum of Modern Art. Ms. Perl also worked as an assistant to other artists and as a stylist for such well-known photographers as Bert Stern and Irving Penn.
At one time, she had a career in advertising, working for Mary Wells Lawrence at Wells, Rich, and Greene.
Her husband had been collaborating with James Baldwin on a dramatic production of the life of Malcolm X, which eventually became a film. It was was incomplete when Mr. Perl died, and Ms. Perl, a producer on the project, stepped in. Working with the editor of the film, Mick Benderoth, the film was completed, and was nominated for an Academy Award in 1972. Ms. Perl and Mr. Benderoth began collaborating both professionally and personally. They formed a film production company, called Benderoth-Perl, and were married on Christmas Eve in 1990.
She and Arnold Perl, a playwright, screenwriter, and producer were married in 1956. A former member of the Communist Party, Mr. Perl had been blacklisted and sold television scripts through a front. Though not a member of the Communist Party, she shared many of her husband’s political beliefs.
They met in the world of theater through Bernard Gersten, co-founder along with Joseph Papp of the Public Theater in Manhattan. She was an informal consultant on costumes and props for the 1953 stage production of “Sholem Aleichem,” which her husband wrote. Mr. Perl also wrote “Tevya and His Daughters,” a basis for “Fiddler on the Roof.”
In the early 1960s, the Perl family began summering in East Hampton. They were attracted by the many artists and writers and found many kindred spirits here. The family rented a house on Jericho Road for the summer of 1964, with the understanding that the rent could be applied toward a purchase price. They bought it for $36,000. A few years later, the couple also purchased a townhouse on East 18th Street in Manhattan.
East Hampton became the center of their family’s life, however, said Sarah Perl, one of the couple’s daughters, and enjoyed living year round here. They were not religious and celebrated both Jewish culture and heritage as well as Christmas. Ms. Perl said yesterday that when the family spent a Christmas away from Jericho Road, in a house without a fireplace, she asked her mother how Santa would get in. Don’t worry, was the answer, “I will let him in.”
Ms. Perl Benderoth loved spending long days at Georgica Beach or Louse Point, going in the morning and staying until sunset. Her daughter said her mother would frequently take a black skillet and a stick of butter to Louse Point, where they would seine for and fry minnows. She would often stuff plums into the bottom of an ice-packed carrier. “You would stick your arm in up to your elbow, and pull them out,” Ms. Perl recalled.
Her mother opened the Boutique at Enrico Caruso at 110 East 55th Street in Manhattan in 1965, where, her daughter said “she sold ‘the best of everything,’ including Viennese pastries made by her 70-year-old mother in a tiny kitchen in the Stuyvesant Town apartment complex.”
In addition to Sarah Perl, Ms. Perl Benderoth is survived by her husband and her daughter Rebecca Perl, as well as two stepchildren, Rachel Garson of Seattle and Adam Perl of Ithaca, N.Y., and two grandchildren. A stepson, Joshua Perl, and a brother, Martin Elliot, died before her.
Donations in Ms. Perl Benderoth’s memory have been suggested to Planned Parenthood, P.O. Box 97166, Washington, D.C. 20090-7166. A memorial service will be held for her this spring.