Documentary tells dark tale of triplets separated at birth

NEW YORK » The first time that brothers David Kellman, Bobby Shafran and Eddy Galland were in the public eye, it was joyous. The then 19-yearold identical triplets, separated at birth, had just learned about the others’ existence.

Despite growing up separately, the three big-smiling, curly-haired kids smoked the same cigarettes and finished each other’s sentences. They appeared on shows like Phil Donahue, became early ‘80s tabloid regulars and even made a cameo alongside Madonna in 1985’s “Desperately Seeking Susan.” They opened a restaurant in New York’s Soho called Triplets Roumanian Steak House.

“We were sort of falling in love,” Kellman recalls in the new documentary “Three Identical Strangers.”

Their second go-around has been more complicated. Galland killed himself in 1995. And the disturbing reasons for their separation only emerged after that initial glow of reunion. “Three Identical Strangers,” directed by British filmmaker Tim Wardle, is the stranger-than-fiction tale behind their story, one of the more disquieting cases of separation at birth.

Since its Sundance Film Festival debut, the film — a real-life rollercoaster ride into a dark and twisted history — has astonished and infuriated moviegoers in equal measures. It has renewed pressure on a prominent child development center to make the study transparent. And it has returned the remaining brothers to the spotlight under far less festive circumstances.

“When we went through the limelight before it was celebratory. It was all fun,” Kellman, now 57, said in an interview. “Is this somewhat enjoyable? Yeah, but it brings up a lot of pain too.

“Seeing it in the theater really got me,” he added. “I cried like a baby.”

“Three Identical Strangers,” which opens in theaters Friday, is about a much-documented case that had