Bret Easton Ellis

The only amusement I derived out of it was the fact that the entire time I was reading it, I was painfully, consciously aware of the fact that it was the WORST novel I had ever read, and the only reason I kept reading it was to see if it coule possibly get any worse. And it always DID!!! Astounding!

Maybe this gets explained later in the novel, but it's bothering me now. I find it hard to go further with such discrepancies.

I like BEE. HE is nice man. I not read any of his book tho cos I not like reedin. Troo.

I ssen the flim where the man in the suit kut up the ladees tho

--------------------

Only read American Psycho which is amazing and made me feel superior to just about everyone I know who had read it who didn't get it or didn't understand what was happening and assumed it was meant to be taken as literal narration.

I love the conversation where Bateman is seems to be saying all the vile things flitting through his head but his female companion is just responding as if he's saying small talk (which obviously he is in objective reality).

And the record reviews are brilliant. Very well utilised in the film - though I heard there's an exploitation sequel which again assumes its all real.

I'm really enjoying The Informers. It's great. I just love the atmosphere.

Here's me with my pal Bret

http://krakow.zenfolio.com/img/v4/p721520122-3.jpg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BB08qDd1PVw&feature=player_embedded#!

Teaming up with Paul Schrader.

http://www.businessinsider.com/bret-easton-ellis-american-psycho-sequel-2012-3?op=1

its like dude is making a mockery of himself. some of those are genuinely funny, tho. any sequel sounds couldn't go beyond the realm of fan-fic, even if by the author himself. i'm just not seeing how much "newness" we can derive from p. bateman... rather ellis set up all this current pop-culture homages in some other affordance, or with new characters. plus bateman would be, what.. in his 50s? we've done this shit already, gordon geccko/shia lebouf

after the Less than Zero sequel, this is the lit equivalent of all these "classic album" shows

brett easton ellis is really clever with what he does. In fact is he like one of the best American Writer's or what? I thought American pycho and Glamorama were his best books, some of the best one's out there in tghis short of stile. He writes so well, his character's come alive. There not just about violence, Easton Ellis get's some real messages across. EG Money versus reputation, and vice versa. I thought Less than Zero was sort of shit, just boring but written in a fun style, the only thing that kept me reading it. You appreciate it more when you read his later stuff. Rules of attraction is pretty much the same, just bigger and maybe more to it, story line that is. Oh yea and Don Dalillo rules, he's like one of America's greatest writer's as well, along with Pychon, thou his stuff is just totally a head fuck or what? It's so crazy it leaves you feeling punch drunk, recommmended. I want to get my hand's on David Foster Wallace cause I hear he's got some good stuff. Oh yea and Chuck paliniuk is a fucking great writer as well, read all his stuff, loved all his stuff. just read it for crying out loud, this is what it's all about. If you don't like the way Brett easton ellis writes that's okay but once you get it you got it and I loved it. Can't wate for the next book, I'll be camping out for it. See ya
― Tony, Tuesday, January 15, 2002 1:00 AM (10 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

lol

brett easton ellis is really clever with what he does. In fact is he like one of the best American Writer's or what? I thought American pycho and Glamorama were his best books, some of the best one's out there in tghis short of stile. He writes so well, his character's come alive. There not just about violence, Easton Ellis get's some real messages across. EG Money versus reputation, and vice versa. I thought Less than Zero was sort of shit, just boring but written in a fun style, the only thing that kept me reading it. You appreciate it more when you read his later stuff. Rules of attraction is pretty much the same, just bigger and maybe more to it, story line that is. Oh yea and Don Dalillo rules, he's like one of America's greatest writer's as well, along with Pychon, thou his stuff is just totally a head fuck or what? It's so crazy it leaves you feeling punch drunk, recommmended. I want to get my hand's on David Foster Wallace cause I hear he's got some good stuff. Oh yea and Chuck paliniuk is a fucking great writer as well, read all his stuff, loved all his stuff. just read it for crying out loud, this is what it's all about. If you don't like the way Brett easton ellis writes that's okay but once you get it you got it and I loved it. Can't wate for the next book, I'll be camping out for it. See ya
― Tony, Tuesday, January 15, 2002 1:00 AM (10 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

lol

what the hell, I didn't post that twice

See ya.

read Less Than Zero and hated its guts, liked American Psycho quite a bit but absolutely couldn't stomach the first ~5 pages of Glamorama that I read...he's a boring starfucker with intellectual insecurity issues, but with cool aesthetics. idk...i keep up with his twitter. really wish he got the gig for the 50 shades of gray movie.

I wish he'd write a book length treatise on empire/post empire since he's clearly done with novels for now

http://img.gawkerassets.com/post/39/2012/12/tb_aa_2.jpg

http://img.gawkerassets.com/post/39/2012/12/tb_ab_1.jpg

Burrrrn

fuck this doucherocket who writes shitty books

You know, they called Jesus a doucherocket too.

But Jesus didn't write shitty books or send assy tweets AFAIK.

Jesus probably preferred Point Break to Hurt Locker.

Jesus OTM if so

I wonder if Jesus would have even bothered reading Glamorama.

Jesus is still wondering why they took the vampires out of the movie version of informers.

I think Jesus is kidding himself by thinking of that film as some kind of missed opportunity. He's basically alone in his enthusiasm for the book and I think he's self-conscious about it.

Jesus just wants to see vampires terrorize LA because his betamax copy of lost boys is worn out and JHWH won't pay for decent enough broadband to torrent anything.

JHWH experiences time differently from us. He doesn't realize how essential high speed internet is now.

JHWH definitely on the Empire side of Empire/post-Empire.

He just doesn't get that Charlie Sheen doesn't want to be his goddamn prodigal son.

https://twitter.com/BretEastonEllis/status/277295977113739264

^B.E.E., like Jesus, letting us know that he is one of us after all.

Anybody see The Canyons?

theres a thread my man

Paul Schrader's THE CANYONS, starring Lindsay Lohan and some porn star

has anybody listened to his podcast yet?

yes - I had to turn it off after 5 mins, i'm just not used to hearing an "interviewer" shoe in his own cliched views in the discussion

yeah there is some serious ponitificating going on in all the interviews. they have all been particularly annoying so far tbh.

WRONG

They have all been pretty great.

the fred armisen/carrie brownstein episode was amazing so icy

um u do know they're all fred/carrie episodes?

oh shit thought this was the portlandia thread!

Haha!

I think BEE didn't know how reticent an interviewee Armisen is:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d1tX54iDJLY

lol it's funny actually i think armisen did it in character and brickwalled BEE after the overbearing intro on gender and how carrie brownstein was the first woman on the podcast

got that feeling listening to it the first time, that he had completely offended them and was struggling to get by the whole hour, and he did a whole intro about how armisen looked 'disgusted' during the taping but was perfectly nice and normal before and after… great stuff

*did a whole intro on that the following week when Ivan Reitman was a guest, and like all BEE's guests, was just sort of like "yeah…I'm sorry about that" after his intro rants. LOVE IT

adam carolla on this week p good he usually bugs the shit out of me

He should drop the intro rants, theyre terrible. If he has something to say about someones work, isnt it better to say throughout a conversation? The guest is just left there going "ummmm, ok" and being slightly reticent for the rest of the interview, which I found was the case with Malkmus's interview as well.

malkmus sounded blazed/burnt out as hell

yeah he did sound a bit stoned

Also it's funny how, say, Marc Maron and Carrolla record their long intros without the guest present--whereas I picture BEE's guests staring into space for 10 minutes as he goes on, with them sitting there waiting to speak.

it always throws me on the Champs podcast when they start out with their upcoming dates, and i assume it's recorded separately but the first thing they say to the guest is usually "how about you, got any dates?"

i love how no one ever agrees with his opening ahahaha

God, what an ordeal this is to even listen to. He is probably the worst interviewer EVAH. And so hugely, aggressively BORING. Ugh! Unbelievable. Fuck him. Why would any want to guest on this show?

Each episode rails against message-driven movies, while each podcast shoehorns the interview into BEE's messages. He's a lot like Mamet in that way.

BEE's messages are so rambling and broad that it's hard to take anything from them. It's like he wants you to know he understands all the views on the issues so he spends minutes outlining those. He'll state very confidently his view, then walk it back by acknowlegeing an opposing viewpoint, take in three or four other extraneous things then when he finally relinquishes the microphone to the guest, whatever "question" he might have had has long since evaporated and the guest is pretty baffled as to how they are supposed to respond.

hah you really nailed it

http://www.vanityfair.fr/culture/livre/articles/generation-wuss-by-bret-easton-ellis/15837#.VCfzaoCUDMs.twitter

This is why if anyone has a snarky opinion of Generation Wuss then that person is labeled by them as a “douche”—case closed.

i don't understand how Ellis can't see how severely psychologically damaging the context of the Clementi case is. how tf could he think of that as a "harmless freshman dorm-room prank"? other than that, spot on essay...

Watched Less Than Zero for the first time. Surprisingly dreary, like most films about addiction. Ellis didn't seem to have any involvement in the movie.

(One small problem a function of my own timeline: found it hard to see Jami Gertz as anyone other than her Seinfeld character.)

Memorable only as RDJ's first eye-opening performance; he's better than the book's conception of his character.

It's been over 20 years since I read the book, but doesn't the book's Julian character live while the film's Julian character dies? Duh, Hollywood needs to make a point about hedonism and depravity, but killing him off was a hard swerve.

Actually found Downey one of the harder things to take in the film; really overwrought throes-of-addiction stuff (for which I blame the filmmakers, too). Yes--dies in the film.

I think the best film ever about drug addiction is primarily about something else: Jungle Fever.

kim gordon on the podcast today, another great interview

just catching up with the Mark Z. Danielewski interview from monday, v good

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/read-bret-easton-ellis-excoriating-monologue-on-social-justice-warriors-and-political-correctness-a7170101.html

tl;dr version: "Why can't girls just shut up and let men talk about their tits, Sky Ferreira I'm looking at you?"

(Bonus: "God, that dumb Stanford chick couldn't even get raped right.")

milo and bret leading the misogyny pack

I like parts of Glamorama and Lunar Park, but he's been a caricature of a caricature of himself for so long.

And he's back

https://www.patreon.com/breteastonellispodcast/posts

great episode. sounds drunk in the second part.

Jeselnik owes this guy royalties for taking his shtick

Did Bret blow through his savings? Why is he going the poortreon route?

"poortreon"? dude is already famous & has a fanbase. he says in the second part that the company he was with for four years (podcast one) really wanted him to stay, and that he was being courted by audible. if you're already established patreon is by far the best way to do a podcast: no overhead, fewer middlemen (patreon takes a modest cut), the podcasts can be totally freeform.

If you're independently wealthy, it's even easier and more freeform not to ask people for financial support.

yeah, he has 633 patrons at $1.50 apiece, so he's making about $1000 a month. that would be an enormous help to a lot of people but seems like chump change to ellis.

the weirder thing is, only those 633 people can listen to his podcast. i'm not sure what his audience would be if it were free, but probably much much larger, which you'd think would be the most important factor for him.

EDIT: since starting this post he now has 636 patrons, so maybe he's still rapidly building his audience

684.

new book White out April 2019.

Combining personal reflection and social observation, Bret Easton Ellis's first work of nonfiction is an incendiary polemic about this young century's failings, e-driven and otherwise, and at once an example, definition, and defense of what "freedom of speech" truly means.

Bret Easton Ellis has wrestled with the double-edged sword of fame and notoriety for more than thirty years now, since Less Than Zero catapulted him into the limelight in 1985, earning him devoted fans and, perhaps, even fiercer enemies. An enigmatic figure who has always gone against the grain and refused categorization, he captured the depravity of the eighties with one of contemporary literature's most polarizing characters, American Psycho's iconic, terrifying Patrick Bateman, and received plentiful death threats in the bargain. In recent years, his candor and gallows humor on both Twitter and his podcast have continued his legacy as someone determined to speak the truth, however painful it might be, and whom people accordingly either love or love to hate. He encounters various positions and voices controversial opinions, more often than not fighting the status quo.
Now, in White, with the same originality displayed in his fiction, Ellis pours himself out onto the page and, in doing so, eviscerates the perceived good that the social-media age has wrought, starting with the dangerous cult of likeability. White is both a denunciation of censorship, particularly the self-inflicted sort committed in hopes of being "accepted," and a bracing view of a life devoted to authenticity.
Provocative, incisive, funny, and surprisingly poignant, White reveals not only what is visible on the glittering, pristine surface but also the riotous truths that are hidden underneath.

What a pseud

glamarosa or gtfo

Review of White, and boy is it a doozy: https://www.bookforum.com/inprint/026_01/20825

The prose in White is shapeless, roving, and aggressively unedited. One waits in vain for an arresting image. Several passages recycle or embellish material from the past few years, including a baffling 2011 essay for Newsweek on the difference between “Empire” and “post-Empire” celebrity that reads like Marshall McLuhan without the rigor. For a man who prides himself on roguish individuality, Ellis uses a laughably derivative vocabulary, a mélange of Breitbart talking points and weirdly apolitical antiestablishment ideas, as if he has just discovered Nietzsche on his older brother’s bookshelf. He bemoans “the democratization of culture,” he calls social media “Orwellian,” and he regularly tosses off words like “groupthink,” “corporate,” and the dreaded “status quo.” The Man, man. “Social-justice warriors never think like artists,” Ellis declares, as if this is a sentence. Like his hero Joan Didion, Ellis believes that style is everything; what a shame he has written a book with so little of it.

Mostly, Ellis hates social media and wishes millennials would stop whining and “pull on their big boy pants”—an actual quote from this deeply needless book, whose existence one assumes we could have all been spared if Ellis’s millennial boyfriend had simply shown the famous man how to use the mute feature on Twitter.

From the writer: https://scontent-sjc3-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/55458151_324343171769101_6588478681012764672_n.jpg?_nc_cat=105&_nc_ht=scontent-sjc3-1.xx&oh=cd58fe617a2cc410518bac28c2a403ca&oe=5D454E40

that was a pretty excellent takedown

well-written negative reviews of books are such a joy to read

the author was also responsible for this recent classic

https://www.affidavit.art/articles/no-one-wants-it

“I’ve been rated and reviewed since I became a published author at the age of twenty-one, and I’ve grown entirely comfortable in being both liked and disliked, adored and despised.”

Social-justice warriors never think like artists,” Ellis declares, as if this is a sentence.

say what you will about the sentence, but it is definitely a sentence.

literalist

well, when you're writing about bad prose...

god i wish there were more interviews like this, ellis is such a fucking self satisfied dope and out of his depth

https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/bret-easton-ellis-thinks-youre-overreacting-to-donald-trump

Agreed. Agreed.

Well, you said it—of course you agree. So what you are saying is that everyone can agree assault is wrong, but maybe we are going too far?

so good, man

Ouch. I almost couldn’t finish that, I was so embarrassed for him.

I have... thoughts.

I read the whole thing, which was excruciating. Here's what I posted on a friend's FB thread:

"I’m a fan of his, with reservations post-2013. (He isn’t making it easy.) As I said on someone else’s share of this interview, I’m actually HAPPY this interview happened - because it might help inspire Ellis to shut the fuck up about politics, which he’s admittedly misinformed about (not just here, but on his podcast and social media) and stick to what actually makes him INTERESTING and of value for many of us who follow him - which gets drowned out by the political/cultural stuff, which grabs headlines and has transformed him into an all-around punching bag - his aesthetic perspectives on film and literature."

In the next week or two I'll have a review of White out in the world, which I'll link here when it's up.

my impression is that his fiction, and its portrayal of people who are often decadent and at best morally ambivalent, reflects his actual view of human nature. the validation of his work being successful has made him think that everyone's like one of his characters and doesn't get why claiming real life figures and their behavior falls within acceptable boundaries brings outrage

he's not exactly a writer of stories where characters come to epiphanies about their own behavior although he's due a few of his own

ray is otm, so much of BEE's podcast is old man yelling at cloud / millennial boyfriend. but i enjoy his film commentary, even if i disagree with him most of the time.

We could totally do without him by now, couldn't we?

We could totally do without him by now, couldn't we?

Pretty much, yeah, and I'm someone who loved Less Than Zero, American Psycho and Glamorama (the latter in particular; I've read it four or five times).

Lunar Park is the one... his most sincere & moving prose

I tried Lunar Park but couldn't make it to the end.

he's doing this to get his name in the cycle imo. if this interview goes well, who reads it? almost no-one. instead...

does he express the same dipshitted thought-free views on his podcast for hours every week and in other interviews and in his writing as part of the same long game?

yes

his whole career has been exactly like this

any decade now, he's going to write something that isn't surface-level vapid in its understanding of humans and money, and we'll all be wowed because of his careful cultivation of alternate expectations over the rest of his output

Having heard many of his podcasts I'm always amused that his opening salvo about whatever he saw at ArcLight that week or some snowflake grievance is done with his guest waiting quietly there with him. He'll go in for 10 minutes before introducing them and they have to jump in wherever he is.

10? more like 45

it is a good bit

any decade now, he's going to write something that isn't surface-level vapid in its understanding of humans and money, and we'll all be wowed because of his careful cultivation of alternate expectations over the rest of his output

ok I just read the interview... wow 🥵

You came to the defense of Roseanne Barr, saying that she denied, after tweeting racist stuff about Valerie Jarrett, knowing Valerie Jarrett was black.

Did she say that? That she didn’t know she was black?

You say it in the book.

Yeah, right, I quoted her.

Thanks so much for talking.

It’s interesting to have that back-and-forth pull in an interview. The only problem, however, is that I am not that political, and so, when we have this conversation, and you confront me with certain things like this, I really am, I have to say, at a loss.

what a choad

he’s SO imperious like some regent giving audience to a scribe which is hilarious bc almost no-one gives a shit about him anymore

Seems like the people posting here give a shit about him

I kind of hate that they used that dewy, youthful glamourshot of him in that interview (note: I've never given a fuck about him besides that checkmark on gay men who are terrible misogynists.).

the shtick of saying wrong or irritating things in conversation to get attention, only to reveal you don't remember any particular conversation because you had no real emotional investment in one thing

doing so in print and then shrugging it off as "oh, I guess I wrote that, whatever" to further irritate an interviewer and the audience makes me think he's subconsciously going for next-level jackanapes status

The entire comes off as him having had many decades of therapy but ultimately he just doesn't care because it doesn't affect him personally (except for not being able to fuck his millennial boyfriend in peace). Please buy his book.

otm, that disaffected stance of "I don't give a shit about any of this but it's the only thing anyone around me will talk about. I'll just be contrary so they pay attention to me."

As I posted upthread he was reflective when talking about this when I saw him a decade ago, but since then he’s obviously gone full culture war and decided that he was the wronged party and that he’s never, ever getting over it.

I think I am an absurdist. I think politics are ridiculous.

Maybe don’t write a book about it. Would that be the solution?

[I think the problem is that I don’t necessarily see this as interesting as fiction.

Yeah, I could tell.

lmao

i love isaac chotiner's interviews, he's remarkably good at letting people hang themselves

I haven't been able to track down who they're talking about, but some people on twitter have mentioned that Bret's partner is a boring-ass centrist democrat.

He seems to be a Biden fan, so yes.

Does Biden have a lot of millennial support? Wouldn’t have thought so.

Does Biden have a lot of millennial support? Wouldn’t have thought so.

he's def the choice of boring-ass centrist democrats

he watches Maddow and his name is Todd

otm, that disaffected stance of "I don't give a shit about any of this but it's the only thing anyone around me will talk about. I'll just be contrary so they pay attention to me."

This. He tweaks the left because they are the only ones who know who he is and might give a shit. Trump voters likely don’t give a shit about him; can’t rebel if no one knows who you are.

remember back when ivanka trump was explaining that she wanted a man like patrick bateman

sometimes ponder whether she thinks she got that

https://www.interviewmagazine.com/music/discovery-todd-michael-schultz

ok, if that's Todd's actual twitter account I found...

...well, I don't really use twitter to be an intellectual, but jesus christ

Him tweeting “come over at do bring coke now” at like 5 in the morning that one time was pretty good tbh

Gloriously scathing review from Anna Leszkiewicz at the graun.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/apr/24/white-by-bret-easton-ellis-review-sound-fury-and-insignificance

Best review yet in nailing how Ellis acts like the detached observer when he's the irrational, outraged one. Funny how David Mamet has done something similar, going from being the guy who was all about the mechanics and math of playwriting to becoming the didactic, moralizing writer he always bemoaned in essays and interviews

https://s.put.re/xaEDHCno.jpeg

My two cents.

https://bookandfilmglobe.com/nonfiction/book-review-bret-easton-ellis-white/