Filmhaus Vienna/Schatzi Productions Mark Reay poses on the apartment building roof he called home for six years.
If you were to see photographer Mark Reay on the street, or at a runway show, you'd think that he lived like anyone else who works in fashion: comfortably. Shooting for high-end magazines, dressing in well-tailored clothes, hanging out with models - what could be so bad?
The truth is, however, that Reay is homeless. For six years, between 2008 and 2014, he actually slept on the roof of a lower Manhattan building. Not in a swanky penthouse apartment, but under a tarp on the floor of an apartment building's roof.
When film director Thomas Wirthensohn found out about Reay's living situation, he knew he had to document it. A week later, Wirthensohn began production on "Homme Less," an 87-minute documentary about Reay's life that premeired at the Doc NYC festival in 2014. With glowing reviews from The New York Times and RogerEbert.com's Mark Dujsik, it's begun screening at various locations worldwide.
We caught up with Reay and Wirthensohn to find out more about their story.