Frank Zappa
So, the Zappas were at first extremely resistant to having anyone take Frank’s portrait. Option magazine gave up and turned it over to me. I was polite and persistent, and finally, Gail, Frank’s wife, relented and said that he would sit for ten minutes at 8 AM the following Monday. I asked that they leave an extension cord on their front lawn so we could get power to plug in our lights.
We arrived at 6 AM. When Frank came out at exactly 8, he saw that we had built a small studio out of foam core on his front lawn. I made this portrait in 9 ½ minutes, and it was then that he invited us in for coffee and some breakfast. He said, “I’ve never been photographed like this before. Will it work?”
Deb and I met the family and spent hours eating, drinking coffee, talking politics, music, Tipper Gore, Edgar Varese, Stravinsky, and technology. He played some things he was working on, and we had a remarkable time. He was certainly a great person for all the things he did in music and politics, but for me, he was also a really generous and very sweet guy underneath it all.