Men Before Ten A.M.
French photographer Vial invited Houston, best-selling author ofCowboys Are My Weakness(1991), to write the text for a collection of photographs of men taken first thing in the morning, before they "put their masks on," because she sensed that Houston loved men as she did, that is "for all the ways they are not like women, instead of the ways they are." Her instincts were correct: she and Houston make a great pair. Serious about photographing men at their most honest and vulnerable moments, Vial would literally wake her subjects up, and her black-and-white pictures embody the muzzy warmth of morning as sleep still clings to these good-looking, intense, still-dreaming men who gaze at the camera wryly, a bit chagrined and amused as they loll about, shave, drink coffee, or simply stare, slowly getting reacquainted with the world. All are actors, film directors, musicians, or artists, including Peter Falk, Robert Altman, Kiefer Sutherland, Lou Diamond Phillips, Gary Oldman, Wim Wenders, and John Singleton. This is one classy, sexy, and oddly intimate book.Donna Seaman