Bret Easton Ellis

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

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/