Christian Lander: The Best Selling Author of "Stuff White People Like"

Christian Lander began a little blog on WordPress back in 2008 called “Stuff White People Like" It became an instant over night sensation. In less then a year he has been commissioned by Random House to write a book version and since then his book has sold millions around the world. He took a break from giving book talks and dreaming big to discuss his secrets of success. It was an honor and a privilege to meet such a humble writer like himself who has become one of the most famous writer/bloggers in the world!

When did you first begin these entries on WordPress?I began January 18, 2008…I remember it quite vividly, at the time I thought it would be a stupid blog that would just make my friends laugh but looking back, I see it as an important day.

How long did it take after that for agents to contact you?
I started getting approached by several agents in the first three weeks…

That was fast!
…and it took about three months after that before I chose my first agent.

What made you chose him/her?I asked a lot of people. All the agents were reputable but I really liked this agent that I chose.

What’s your advice to writers who want to become published?My advice is not to try…

That’s right…I did read that somewhere actually.…that’s the snarky way to say it…but realistically my main goal was for my three friends. It’s its own reward because I love what I do...there’s an honesty to it that I think people really see.

Are you open about discussing the advance you got for your book or is it a secret?It’s not something I discuss and I continue to follow that rule… Random House has been very good to me.

Has it been translated into other languages?
It’s doing really well in Australia... it’s also been translated into Dutch and Japanese.

I’m so glad it’s getting world-wide recognition. Oh, I also read somewhere that people initially thought you were black?Yes (laughing) and they were disappointed that I wasn’t. Many people thought I was an Ivy-League black guy…people would have thought it was more controversial and it would have been more instigated. It was fun for a while in the beginning. Some people also thought I was Asian.

How many hits did your site get before an agent approached you?It hit the one million mark.

Oh, I didn’t know that! I’m kind of jealous of you. There. I’m admitting it. Do you think that made a difference in getting so many agents?
It makes it easier for them to market…it has proven itself and it’s not as much of a risk.

Are you still adding new material?

It’s slowing down because I’m definitely feeling a bit burned out on it. The book itself has eighty or so entries something like that and on the web another forty…there was a lot of new material for the book that has been kept exclusive to the book.

Do you recall what your very first entry was about?“Coffee” was the first one I wrote and then so many followed after that…when I get a good idea I just need to get it out and I need to write it as fast and as furiously as possible.

Do you have a favorite?
“Knowing What’s Best for Poor People” is my favorite…

Why?
It was the one where I was most viciously attacking how pretentious I am…

In what sense?
When you read it you’ll get what I’m getting at.

I have to reread that one now. What were you working at, at the time you first embarked on this life changing journey?I was a copywriter at an ad agency…

Dreaming of becoming a writer I assume?Yeah, since I realized I wasn’t going to be a rock star or a major league baseball player…I was a failed writer, a journalist and academic…I dropped out of a PH.D program…

That’s so encouraging…you were struggling a bit and then BOOM, this great book gets written…I read this book in an hour by the way, I couldn’t put it down!
There’s a lot of ways to get it as a writer…I got ridiculously lucky…but it’s not like I hadn’t been trying to be a writer my whole life…my job was in writing and I had done some journalism…but this is better though.

Where have you given book talks?Google, Brown University… I’ve done three book tours since it came out so it’s a long list…

I also read somewhere that you don’t own a car, is that some political message?I prefer bicycles…I’ve never had a car in my life.

Is there another book in the works?
No, I’m moving into TV writing next….

Really? What kind of genre?
I’m hoping to write for a comedy TV show next.

That makes sense. Your writing is hysterical.

Thanks.

What was the reaction from your friends? Were they surprised by the instant fame you received?I think people were surprised about how big it was…people who know me weren’t surprised about what it was…they know this is the kind of stuff that I write.

Have you ever gotten any hate mail?
Yeah, people have accused (it) as being racist. It’s misinterpreting…some people really mean well and some people are idiots…there’s no getting around that at all.

I also read that there have been many knock-offs of your original idea…I think that is just wrong!
Yeah, there’s so much… “Stuff Unemployed People Like,” Stuff Midwesterners Like,” “Stuff Gay People Like…”

That must have been upsetting for you after you thought of it and now so many people are using it and making a lot money from it!
No, not at all. Almost all of them have linked back to me. I think they do really good work. I think it’s cool people are doing it….I don’t have any problem whatsoever with it…they’re writing about stereotypes in a non-hateful and funny way….some of them aren’t that funny but they’re trying. The only thing I dislike is when it’s negative, that’s something I wish I could get rid of but you can’t really stop the Internet. But the idea of people taking the idea and going with it is a positive thing…the world is not about bottling up ideas…it’s an art, I think it’s fantastic… they’re just building off my idea, it’s not taking away from my site…

That’s very liberal you. Have you ever been influenced to write a certain entry by a fan?Someone added one earlier on about hardwood floors and I really liked that and wrote about it but most of these ideas I already had…

Is there a certain length you use in your entries?
No. I just wrote as I saw fit….just where the humor flows and how it fits…..

What are your current projects?
I just got back from the Sydney Writers Festival in Australia and the Bumper Shoot Festival in Seattle and they’ll be some college readings coming up in September.

Do you have many “writer friends?”I still have “writer friends” but now I have “successful writer friends” (laughing)....

Now that you’re a celebrity, do you have to wear sunglasses to get ice cream and that sort of thing?
Well, not exactly…but I have been recognized…three times in Australia, twice in the US and once in Toronto…and once in LA but I was mistaken for an actor on “Entourage” before I had the beard.

Now that you can do whatever you want…what are some things you’ve gotten the opportunity to do because of this highly acclaimed book?I got to be on the Conan O’ Brian show and that was a life long dream of mine that I thought would never happen…

What are some qualities you like about him?
He’s been a hero of mine since I was in high school…he’s very funny and sharp and I thought it was just a dream come true that I just wasn’t expecting…

Is there a writer who you are greatly influenced by?
David Sedaris…probably the funniest writer I ever read and everyone who works for the Onion…oh, he just writes these really funny essays.

I will check him out. Oh, I love the Onion! What about music...that a "White" question?Indie rock… Reggaeton,,,um…let’s see, it’s always dated…Apollo Ghosts, Dirty Projectors, Saint Vincent…

I don’t know any of them…they don’t seem dated.Yeah, that’s how I win.

You’ve written about this in your book too, “Music White People Like,” which is…It’s the “white ipod;” the Arcade Fire, the Pixies, The Beatles, A Tribe Called Quest…

And then there’s the other one, “Black Music White People Like?”That would be Blues, Old School Hip Hop, that sort of stuff....

So, if a fan or just a friend said, “Hey Christian, I’m writing (fill in the blank) and I want to be a success!” your advice to them would be?
The happiest you’ll be is if you consider (it) your own reward and you’ll be surprised about what will come of it…

What about life in general…what makes you happy in life?
Um…I don’t know, no idea…

But Christian! I thought you knew everything! (laughing)
I DO know everything! It’s all subjective. Find something you really like to do…it’s all very Eckart Tolle…I’m hoping when I do something it’ll work…BUT if it stops just like that I’m okay with it…I’ll be totally fine….everything I’ve dreamed of is happening for me. I’ve been on Conan O’Brien and I have this best selling book….I dream big but I don’t believe anything is owed to me, that is an important way to look at things.

Is there a country where your book has been more successful then others?Australia was insane…I got recognized a lot…and the book readings were packed and…many people over there just really embraced it.

Well, Christian, I am so grateful for your time and words of wisdom…your book is very funny but also very well written, it has changed many lives, it has influenced others to write their own versions, and it’s got people talking which is always a positive thing. I wish your book continued success and I hope you write another book one day. Thank you.
You’re welcome.

Talking with Thomas C. Dunn: Writer and Director of The Perfect Witness starring Wes Bentley

Thomas C. Dunn is the director of the captivating movie A Perfect Witness (in Europe, it's titled The Ungodly) starring Wes Bentley (American Beauty). I was thrilled to speak with him about this amazing directorial debut film, his work as a screenwriter and his collaboration with Hollywood greats such as Beth Grant (Little Miss Sunshine) and Kenny Johnson (The Sheild). He also spoke to me about his sucess as a playwright and his ongoing collaboration with writer Mark Borkowski (Cost of a Soul). The two co-wrote the screenplay and continue to write even though Thomas resides in LA and Mark in NYC. I cannot wait to see what they will produce next. A Perfect Witness was one of the best psychology thrillers I have seen to date and I was quite amazed at how the two completed the film in such short time for the film festivals.

When did you decide you wanted to be a writer/director?
I’ve been writing since I was really young, mostly short stories--hopefully not my best work, then I started writing poems in high school…short plays, full length plays…now I’ll go back and forth from plays to screenplays. As far as directing, my friend Mark Borkowski showed me this play he was writing and he was stuck on the idea and I told him, “The reason you can’t move forward is because it’s not a play, it’s a screenplay.” We began to collaborate and finished it together…we just kept working back and forth until it made sense to both of us and we had in mind that he would play the lead role of the serial killer and I would direct. It was his first major role in a feature film and my first time as a director. That became ‘The Perfect Witness.’ For the international release, it’s called ‘The Ungodly.’
Wow!
We wouldn’t do the film any other way even when it was suggested…It’s sort of the norm, just from a financial point of view, if people see that Mark didn’t have a big name as an actor or I haven’t directed several other films, there’s always a risk. We had offers to move in a ‘bigger’ actor, a more experienced director…but for Mark’s role as the serial killer, we wanted someone you couldn’t recognize from ten other films. I thought it was perfect for him because you simply don’t know what to expect…Mark’s unpredictable as an artist and a person so he just really fits the role.

You filmed in Philly…that was his choice, right?
Well, we wrote mostly in LA and NY. The film was supposed to take place in Philly but it was cheaper to do it in LA…After we scouted Philly though, I said, “Let’s just find a way to do it in here…It’s got the sort of edgy, inner-city grit and realism we want.” And we found a way to make it happen.

Mark said it only took twenty four days to shoot...
He exaggerated. It took twenty-two or twenty-one, depending how you count—on one of our days, the camera had a problem and we only shot two hours. But I had a brilliant cinematographer, Paco Femenia. He kept the crew going, the actors were locked in, everything was storyboarded and we always made sure we made our days. Sometimes you’re forced to take short cuts, but there were a few scenes, like the elevator scene…when I was told by my first AD we weren’t going to have time to do it, and I just found a way to make sure we still got it in…you know that scene where the nurse is standing in the middle of Wes and Mark and she can sense this crazy energy between the two of them?

Yeah, and I’m so glad you made that decision to keep it, it was quite well done. The bloody scenes were also intense, what was that like behind the camera?
We had a special effects person, Steve Tolin, to help design all of that but in the end it’s interesting…if you look at the scene where the waitress was terrorized…someone once said to me that was a hard scene to watch because it was so bloody but we purposely didn’t show any blood in that scene! The audience pictures a lot more of what’s going on then you actually see. It’s the emotional toll on the victim that was important to us, not showing blood.

Aside from Wes Bentley, were there any other mainstream actors in The Perfect Witness?
Yes, Beth Grant, who plays Mark’s Mom, has been in everything. She’s just an amazing actress. She’s been in Little Miss Sunshine, No Country for Old Men, Rain Man, The Rookie, Matchstick Men…she’s had a career that’s spanned decades. There’s also a small scene where a cop stops Wes and Mark from fighting…

Yeah, I remember him and he actually trusts Mark’s story that Wes’ character is freaking out because he’s not on his meds…
…he’s one of my best friends, Kenny Johnson. He was on The Shield for years and he’s now on Saving Grace with Holly Hunter. And then Joanne Baron, who plays the sister, has done a ton of work and was really a pleasure to work with, so these actors may not all be household names but they’re really experienced, professional and enthusiastic. Even the waitress, Marina Gatell…she’s a well-established Spanish actress, just not as well known over here.

It did really well in Europe, right?
Yeah. You know, our original title for The Perfect Witness was The Ungodly, but it had to be changed in the US. We were told any title that can be viewed as potentially negative toward God, distributors won’t pick up, because there’s this nebulous fear of some religious backlash. It’s absurd. We’re catering film titles to the US bible belt which probably wouldn’t watch it anyway. But in Europe and everywhere else, it’s being released as it should be, as The Ungodly. The UK release, for example, is in September, 09.

Were there many challenges to making an independent film?
Yes, time, money, resources. But the lack of some of these also forces you to be even more creative and that can actually improve the end result. So there’s no excuses. I made the film I wanted to make. It can be a double standard when it’s finished though because we all complain about Hollywood releasing big budget films with tons of effects and very little story then when certain films are made independently, we complain because they don’t have those same effects. So I think it’s important that we balance going to see blockbusters with also seeing independent films. Even supporting local musicians at shows and buying their CD’s there, it really make a big difference to truly independent artists and helps shape the landscape of what films and music are made in the future.

How did you guys get the money to do the film?
A lot of the money came from Spanish funds and some of it was private equity, just individual investors.

How did you get the money from Spain?
A Spanish company had read one of my other scripts and approached me about funding it. Mark and I had just completed writing The Perfect Witness though and when I told the Spanish company about this other screenplay, they asked to read it too. They called afterwards and said, ‘we love it. Let’s do this first…’ We were really the first US/Spanish co-production and we needed to hire some Spanish actors and crew. It was a great asset to the film though because we got access to European talent that we might not have had. I went to Spain for some casting, parts of post-production…I also worked with the composer in a little village on a mountain outside of Barcelona. As a result, I think the film has a European feel blended with Americana and I really like that about it.

And you wrote a lot of plays?
A play I wrote, The Thread Men, was just published by Samuel French as one of the best short plays of 2008…

What’s The Thread Men about?
These two people get locked in an elevator together: one is a psychiatrist and the other one acts increasingly crazy. The elevator just becomes this pressure cooker. And the audience starts to realize that these two characters share some secrets from their past…It becomes increasingly tense and dangerous as the psychological chess match between the two of them plays out.

Hmmm, I like the sound of that…sounds like you were an English major?
Yes…I was around film all the time but didn’t take film courses. I graduated as an English major from UCLA.

Do you feel this (English) degree helps you?
Not particularly. I mean, it exposed me to new writers and novels and gave me an opportunity to write. At the same time, I think I was already on this path of discovery and was learning before university and am still learning long after…

When did you meet Mark (co-writer and actor of The Perfect Witness) anyway?
I met Mark when I was in college. We would be working on stuff together back then and it would get to 3 in the morning. I’d say, ‘I have to leave to finish a paper that’s due in the morning.’ And he would say, “what, a new play?” I would say, ‘Mark, a paper. I’m in college, remember?’ He always forgot I was still a student (laughing). We would be collaborating on this intense play and then I would go home and have to write a Chaucer paper.

Wow, LA seems so cool.
Mark and I have a crazy story of how we really first got together…we did a play, Everyman. It’s a 15th century play written in verse. It alternates between two character dialogues and monologues. Mark was playing the character ‘Knowledge’ and I had this small, five line part. The lead guy suddenly quit though and the director…he was crazy…said, “Anyone else want to do the lead?” And I said, “I will.” It was that simple. The director would just leave the theater and everything was up to the actors to do themselves.

Sounds awful…
The play opens with the main character, ‘Everyman,’ dying and having to make an accounting of how he lived his life to God. Even though it’s this Christian-morality play, Mark convinced me to mime overdosing from heroin in the opening scene. Mark was modernizing it. The director just shrugged. So one night, during a rehearsal, the theater fills up with 50 women from some Jewish women’s group that had pre-paid to see a different show. The director rushes backstage in a panic and tells us we have to put our play up, even though it’s a Christian play. Half the cast had already gone home for the night but Mark just wrote their names on my hand and told me to go on and do it. I had to improvise almost the whole thing, looking down at my hand and skipping around actors who weren’t there, ad-libbing in verse…I’m on stage, sweating and anxious as hell, doing my best, and I can hear Mark laughing hysterically behind the curtains…and that was our first time working together.

You’re writing screenplays now?
I just finished a new script I will work to direct, called The Assassin Club…and currently, I’m working on a screenplay that will be filmed by a Greek director, Vangelis Liberopoulos…I just got back from a month in Athens doing research and now I’m writing it…It deals with the Greek riots that lasted about a month last December after a 15 year-old boy was shot by a policeman.

Anything that stood out to you when you were there in Athens?
When you get behind some of the things that happened, it’s really amazing. Take for example, the cops who worked 20-22 hours a day during the riots. Many of them had second and third jobs because they only make about $15,000 US a year. Because of the hours they worked during the riots, they had to quit these extra jobs so they’re really struggling for money. The government steps in though and gives them a bonus of 500 euros for all their hard work. Three months after the riots end though, the government says, ‘yeah, you know that bonus? It was more like a loan that we’re now deducting back out of your pay checks.’

That’s not right!
I spent the whole month in Athens hearing some really interesting things. As a writer, it’s important to be a good listener. If you mean what you say and do what say, you gain people’s trust and they can really open up to you. I think if you stop any one person in the street and sit down and hear about their life, they will become fascinating…

What are the European films festivals like?

They’re all so different. For example, in Brussels, there were 500 people screaming at me in a French to sing when I got on stage to introduce my film. It’s their fun sort of way of heckling the director. I just started ad-libbing the Willy Wonka ‘Oompa Lompa song’ with my own lyrics. It ended with something like ‘Oompa Loompa doompity da, here-is-my-film-enjoy-Voila!’ They just went nuts!

Are there any celebrities you’d like to meet…I always ask this cheesy question.
I don’t have a strong desire to meet this or that specific person. I’ve met a lot of celebrities and I mean, I absolutely appreciate their talent but I don’t really know them as people…Maybe there’s ones I’d like to work with but not just to meet…When I see independent artists creating music, writing scripts, etc., not really knowing if anyone will ever hear or see the end result of their efforts, that’s actually inspiring to me. I can appreciate them just as much for their hard work, belief and talent…

What was Wes Bentley like? I want to meet him!
He’s a great guy. He worked extremely hard on this film. Usually actors get some breaks, to relax in their trailers every now and then but we really worked him non-stop. He did a great job…he was in every scene!

How did you support yourself when you were still just an up and coming writer/director?
I did all kinds of jobs but just continued to write as I worked. Anything, everything. I mean I was a stockbroker in New York for two years a long time ago...

What a contrast!
Yeah, and I convinced them that I couldn’t work on Fridays so I would work four days, wrote three. I saved money and after two years, took off and traveled for 10 months through Asia, just writing, learning, jumping trains, crossing borders…I think experiencing other cultures is a huge asset for a creative person.

How do your parents feel about you having such a creative lifestyle?
They’ve never said throughout my entire life, ‘do this or do that’. They’re always there for me, unconditionally. They’ve allowed me to make my own choices and supported those I made. Sometimes parents try to steer their children at the expense of ruining their relationship with them. Just love your kids, support them and let them follow their passion…

That’s very true, if everyone did what made them happy, people could get a lot more done. Thank you so much for meeting with me to discuss your work. It’s fascinating, I love it.
Thank you and you’re welcome.

Chillin with Chris Campion: Writer, Playwright, and Singer of Band

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WjkHZWQIfeo

WNEW: What's remarkable about this book is that it reads almost like a screenplay, with the author's monologue and the characters' dialogue so vividly intertwined it feels more like you're watching it happen around you, not reading it on the page. Campion has no doubt told and re-told these stories from many a barstool, perfecting the sequence of events but retaining that off-the-cuff delivery that makes them feel so real. Nowhere is this more genuine and hilarious than during the early scenes in the book that deal with his childhood in Huntington. From stories of sneaking out to watch his brothers play rock band in the garage, to the very humbling tale of moving home after dropping out of college, Chris's remembrances reveal the loving family that plays witness to his undoing. Phillster: Speaking with Chris Campion was a real roller coater ride. He is the author of the recent book, Escape from Bellevue and the lead member of the popular indie rock band, Knock Out Drops. We spoke about his humble beginnings, some of his adventures and his influences both musically and literary.
Tell me a bit about your temporary leave from your band.
We were an indie rock band putting out records for years and my life spiraled down a rabbit hole which is the major part of the book so coming back from that…you know I was a drug addict and an alcoholic, the title is when I was in Bellevue from 1998-2000 and our band had a bad history in the music business (during that time)…in the chapter, “Always a Bridesmaid” I illustrate this how we were always on the precipice of something big…we were always the opening for bands like the Violent Femms and Soul Asylum…but couldn’t go beyond that for whatever reason.

How did you go about getting reacquainted with them?
In 2000, I got sober and the band had been derailed by all of this so we got back together and put back together an album in 2003-2004. Around that time I was always in the habit of telling stories during the shows to make it part of the wider experience. We had this record that we were going to do when I came back from one of our tours and I had this idea to do like a rock-in-roll theater show…

That’s taking music in a different direction…
…and we ended up slapping it up, doing it in a hundred seat theater and it just took off beyond our expectations and we ended up extending it to three shows and along the way this thing happened on the radio, we picked up an agent, I wrote a book proposal, and the story (Escape from Bellevue) got picked up by Penguin.

That’s great publicity for your band…
Yeah, we graduated to a 300 seat theater, the Village Theater, when that show wrapped I wrote the book I was commissioned to do and the book came out March 19, 2009.

How inspiring, it’s all so adventurous.
Now it’s about doing performances around the passages; sometimes with the band, other times by myself…next Sunday I’ll be in Long Beach (the Cabana) and next Thursday we’ll be promoting in Riverdale doing a reading, then there’s a Boston Show at the Paradise Rock Club (one of the most famous venues up there, like Irving Plaza), after that at the Steven Talk House in the East Hampton area, I’ve been doing a ton of interviews with The New York Times, Newsday…

You’re keeping busy. Does your band get more groupies the bigger you guys get?

(laughing) The term is just like…it paints an image of giggling young women and I wouldn’t say the people that followed us around were groupies but you know with any band…our followers were primarily outside of New York and then when we moved here we built it up…we played with bigger bands, so the groupies were usually theirs (laughing). We have a lot of fans; you know I don’t know about too many groupies.

You escaped from Bellevue, right? So tell me about that…
Well, it is the climax of the story so I can’t tell you too much about that…there’s a lot of humor in the book, which is the Irish way…

Oh, you’re Irish?
Well, I’m Irish American…I don’t consider myself like Steve McQueen, I’m more like Benny Hill, you’re going to have to read the book to get that answer.

So if I’m not mistaken you got an advance to write this?
Oh, yea, it was really cool, we did that huge show that I mentioned and I wasn’t sure how we were going to do and then you know, the book…the idea of doing that was presented to me and then after I did the deal, there’s a kind of euphoria…at first you’re kind of jumping and then there’s this kind of terror…and then you start freaking.

That must have been serious pressure, you got paid well for a book you hadn’t even written yet…how did you manage it?
You know I had this 17 chapter outline. And I had this really great editor; it was great to have a good editor who can kind of say, “Okay, cut the fat off this…” I think it’s good to always stay within your outline. It definitely was kind of a terrifying thing, there’s this fear that nothing’s going to come out.

I bet…
I was playing gigs in New York at the time…I actually had to go away and get some work done. I decided to stay at my friend’s house in New Hampshire. It was winter time, very desolate, no internet and I just buckled down and then I came out to the city and I kicked out about 6 or 7 chapters…

That’s a huge accomplishment.
It’s obviously an amazing day when you get a book deal, just like it would be to get a record deal or art deal…with a book, it’s good to get someone to pay you and trust you but it’s also one of those ‘be careful what you wish for scenarios.’

Is your book completely autobiographical?

Yeah, although there is a note to the reader that because I was incredibly high at times…it’s not a social studies book, don’t hold me to any timeline, you know?

(Laughing) That was nice of you to give them a heads up…who are your literary influences?
My influences would be…Hunter Thompson would be one…Frederick Exley.

I’m not familiar with him.
He wrote A Fan’s Notes, a sort of memoir with a wink that he wrote in the 1960s and dialing it back…John Irving, John Steinbeck…

Those are great writers…
Obviously, I’m sort of doing monologues for people in the book, that’s the narrative tone and that was my objective and that’s what I feel like I’ve accomplished.

Are there any movie offers yet?
Well, that’s going on right now…we had an offer to convert it into an HBO series. The book only came out two months ago. In the fall, we might do a college theater show to promote the book. It comes out in paperback next year. It’s doing well in the Tri-State area where I’m from and we’ll be doing the West Coast swing soon.

Can you compare it to promoting albums?
It’s definitely different than promoting my music especially because I am a first time author.

I just love how you’re affiliated with my favorite radio station in the world, 90.7. I love how your already successful band got a big reception on that show.
I love all of what they play on that station. You know you can hear Modest Mouse or The Replacements…I just love that they don’t have to adhere to…I hate commercial cock rock. My taste is coming from an indie background…I feel like it’s the best radio station in town…

I do too….
….and discovering people and playing new stuff…it reminds me of when I was a kid growing up in Long Island…we had WLIR, and at the time they would play XPC and early U2, they played them two years before Bloody Sunday…they played them in 1980, it was an alternative to classic rock, you know elsewhere they played “Born to Be Wild” forty times a day. I mean I did grew up with this…you know Stones, Beatles but 90.7 keeps it current and they also do county, like The Jay Hawks and Steve Earl and to get on there for me at the time…I mean I didn’t even that Julian Welby was there…at my show!

It seems like she really played a big part.
She came down with her husband and they both loved it and then they asked us to come in and it was that fast. We got played during prime time, it was all lickedly-split…people were getting ready in the apartments to go to work and that’s when my soon-to-be agent heard it …

You were on this positive flow.

I did not plan for it and say, “You know if this succeeds, I’ll write a book…” it just ended up being…ever since we started doing that show in 2005, everything’s been new, everything is a dream, you know life gets more and more interesting it seems.

Do you feel curtailing your wild lifestyle had anything to do with it?
I don’t think anything could have been possible without it (sobriety), you know the “getting it” part is all in the book…circumstantially I would never have been able to write a book. But there are a lot of drunk-great writers like the two I mentioned earlier but I don’t think I have that kind of discipline. You know I was always able to write songs and play but I’m an alcoholic so eventually I couldn’t function. When I drink or drug that’s it for me.

What is the odyssey that is part of the book’s title?
You know the realization that I had this story of the band, it is kind of an odyssey in a sense, starting with me as a kid….the singer of Deep Purple lived next door to me so I always had my sights set on becoming a rock star but then there’s always been a quest for faith at the same time. I had a falling out with it (faith) when I was eighteen years old in college. But at the same time I never stopped trying to foster a relationship with god and I really missed the companionship of it and so you know that’s a big part of it too. As I descend further and further into alcoholism, it’s all very colorful, having all these crazy adventures. I’m really just trying to grapple with faith so the story is really how I try to get that…so there were many of these sort of moments…I would say quite a few along the way that were turning points; things like interventions. There was a time that I was ostracized by my family and I’m in a big Irish family…all my extended family was there.

What were some negative pressures holding you back?

I got to a point where I bought into the mythology of writers, look at those I’ve mentioned and then there was also people like Dean Martin or Jim Morrison and I bought into that stuff and didn’t want to get sober. I just thought it was…I was pigheaded about recovery at first…I was very much against that…I think for me when I was in rehab and this was like my second rehab…this guy who was a former drug lord…and we were in this detox together and as we’re both unpacking our gear I asked him where he was from. He took off his shirt and showed me gun shot wounds and said, “That’s where I’m from mother ******” and then he looked at me and I showed him my thirteen stitches from when I fell off my bike…

That’s hysterical.
…and he ended up being one of my best friends in there and I realized that this guy who came from a completely different background…at that moment all the armor came off. I would cite that as probably one of the biggest moments of my life and that was something that put me on a bright and shiny path, not to sound too corny.

You don’t…I wish you and your band and of course, your book continued success. I love the concept of your book and happy to see your positive choices in life have taken you to incredible places…it really affirms the importance of living life to its fullest.
Thank you.

Chatting with Colin Broderick, the writer of Orangutan

Released by Random House December

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o3H-HlIYhHk

It's been awhile since I've been excited about a book release. After hearing about Orangutan and pounding the pavement to find the writer, I finally got an interview with the Colin himself. He openly discussed his difficulty getting sober in an environment that condemns recovery, to the process of his book and finding an established agent...who holds the key to world wide publication/distribution so others in his predicament can be helped...before it is too late.

It's so nice to meet you...I'm so excited for the release of your book! I've heard so many great things about it. Tell me what it was like getting an agent for it?
I met a guy called Chris Campion...he wrote a book called Escape from Bellevue. I said, "If you get me an interview with your agent you'll never regret it!"

Just like that...that's the luck of the Irish for ya.

And she's the same agent for Barack Obama's book, "Dreams From My Father..." Three Rivers Press-Random House.

How many millions of copies do you think that book sold?
It hasn't left the best seller list for like two years now. Yeah, we hit it off immediately. She's huge now...we met just before he became the president. She just encouraged him to write a book after he graduated....

She obviously has an eye for talent. How many books have you actually written?
Three altogether, this is my first book that's been published.

Tell me about this soon to be released in book stores nation-wide book!
I'm actually working on the final edits as I'm speaking to you then the book will be in stores in December.

This is magic! I'm just in time...this interview is going to be gold soon. What will readers expect?

It's a memoir that chronicles the 20 years I spent working as a construction worker here in New York...and all the drinking...and trying to become a writer...

The title of your book is really significant...

Yeah, the book is called, Orangutan and the direct translation is man of the forest...the title of the book comes from when I was in a bar in California at the age of 23 and I was drinking with a black drag queen who was convinced that she was the true queen of England and she was crying on my shoulder about it...

Oh my god!
...And he/she said, "You don't know what's it like to be trapped inside a man's body" and I said, "But I do understand... I know what it's like to be trapped! I want to be an orangutan but I'm trapped in a man's body."

(laughing)

...so everytime I drank I became an orangutan and started acting inappropriately in public and ended up in jail...because that's what happens when you're an orangutan in an urban environment!

How many times did you go to jail?
Twice here in New York.

What were the offenses?
Drunk driving...I began to attempt recovery at the age of 23.

What happened?
I was knocked down by a car at the age of 24 and broke my back in two places and became a pill popper for about seven years...

As an Irish man, how long did it take you to return to work after breaking your back?
They told me I'd never be able to do construction again but I was back in less then a year.

Sounds like something my own father would do...What did you do for money when you weren't working at that time?
Workman's Comp.

Thank god!

I didn't drink again until I was 31 and was going through my second divorce and then the cycle began again...everything that didn't happen the first time around happened...the waking up in hospitals, the jails...

So when you returned to work after getting hit by a car and stopped drinking for those few years before your relapse at the age of 31, what else were you doing?
I went back to college and studied under Billy Collins and he became my mentor...I studied poetry with him.

Did you ever publish any of your poems?
I won the Alice B Croft Award while I was there.

Did you graduate?
No, I quit before I graduated...

Oh no!
...and opened up a book store/coffee shop in Riverdale.

Sounds awesome...was it successful?
No, but it stayed open for two years anyway....

What happened, why'd it close?
It's not as romantic as you'd think...when you're on the other side of the counter...I detail it in the book...how I just got sick of working 17 hours a day. But we had the best of the top poets world wide: Column McCann, Billy Collins, a long list of names...

Are you still in touch with Billy Collins?
I'm not sure, I haven't heard from him since I quit drinking. I'm beginning to think I might have insulted him in a late night drunken phone call. We've been friends for fifteen to sixteen years...

Who is your favorite writer?
Hemingway and Bukowski.

Who?
Charles Bukowski...he's a German...he just wrote all about his drinking and his debauchery...he's just a wild man, he's great...and Hemingway just for his clarity.

So, you never gradated college but you still wrote a book? I love it!
A few of my professors told me to just go write...I guess they were afraid I'd become a teacher and get lost in the system.

That happens way too often. Is there any censoring in Orangutan?
No, none whatsoever...whatever came out of my mouth went into the book...I wrote over 500 pages and it got edited down to 386 something like that...it's tough when you're writing a book...the people who know me are actually surprised of what I left out, you have to keep the thread of the story moving along so that the reader doesn't get bored with it.

What countries are mentioned?
I do a drunken trip to Paris, Russia...it goes from NY to San Francisco, Ireland, England....and in the end I wind up in Prague!

Why does the book end there?
I met this bartender called Renata and she gave me the will to finally sober up. We moved to Prague together to get away from it all for a while. At the moment I'm working on my new book and putting my documentary together and still working construction when I need the work.

Did you feel there was a lot of peer pressure to drink as an Irish Construction worker?
Sure, absolutely...it's in the book about the irony that the more I drank...the better I got paid and the more jobs I got...

That is ironic...so not good if you have a drinking problem!

(laughing) ...because all the Irish guys I know will claim they drink more than you do anyway so it's hard to say, "Hey guys...I have a problem."

True...where did you drink in Woodlawn (Irish section of the Bronx)?
I used to drink in the Catalpa and if a sane person walked in one night and seen what was going on they'd call people to come for straight jackets...I mean it's insanity...it's easy when you're drinking in the nuthouse to say,"They're the problem...it's not us, we're just drinking,..having fun."

Do you think the ugly stereotype for the Irish is true then?
Yes, it's very grounded in reality...what Mexican bars? What Italian? No...it's Irish...the stereotype is there because we drink. There are Asian, Italian, Chinese restaurants but 8 times out of 10 where there's a bar...it's Irish and that's because we drink.

You're right...come to think of it, I've never seen a Chinese bar, ever, maybe once.

When this book comes out the Irish are going to burn me at the stake but they'll buy the book anyway because they'll want to see if they're mentioned in it and what bars I talked about...

Wow!

There's actually been a book burning of Angela's Ashes....for this one they'll forgo the burning of the book and just burn me...

I hope not...I want you to keep writing, this stuff is really good.
Most Irish writers had to leave Ireland or stay in it and drink themselves to death...the Irish are famous for murdering their own talent...

That's very sad.
The Irish don't want to see anybody rise above the rest..that's why people like Shane McGowan and Brendan Behan were revered...it's only when Irish writers became honest and wrote about the truth that they came up against criticism......

In your book do you mention any dry out sessions?
Yeah, the book discusses how "Real Irish" don't need detox..the American dries out, goes to rehab and then to recovery....

Not common for many Irish!

No, the Irish guy dries out and goes back to the bar....

In conclusion...
In conclusion, it's much harder first of all culturally to admit defeat and then ask for help...we don't need no help...

I'm so excited to own a copy...I think your book will help others. It is so sad to see people suffer when they don't have to.

I always say in my book that in every room in recovery there needs to be an Irish guy to lend an air of authenticity.

That's interesting.
I think the Irish culturally have real problems with communication especially when it comes to talking about their problems and emotions....Americans are much more open...

Ah...thank you...
...when you sit down with an American they'll tell you everything whereas in Ireland they'll tell you about the weather and what they're wearing or they'll talk about the other great past time football...I guess you could say that I've been amazed that for a country that is revered for it's literary history...there are no contemporary writers...it's amazing...

Yeah, we need another Joyce and I hope that'll be you. So what happens in the end?
...I got married for the third time, to Renata.

THIRD TIME!
...we moved to Prague and I'm now back living in New York with my wife and daughter doing what I was meant to do, which is writing.

Doing what you love! That's perfect...your story is perfect for my book/blog because it stays true to its premise. I'm dying dying for a copy of your book....they're going to sell like crazy.
Thank you.


Below is a link to a recent piece by the author published in The New York Times:


www.nytimes.com/2008/03/29/opinion/29broderick.html?pagewanted=print

Talking with Tony Napoli

Speaking with Tony Nap was something I never imagined I would get the opportunity to do. He has had an incredible life. He is the son of Jimmy Napoli, the original Italiano...long before there was Gotti. In his new book, My Father, My Don, Tony recounts his combat training, how he took the law into his own hands, found sobriety and rediscovered the strong bond between him and his father. This book is currently being given to those in recovery at many rehabilitation centers around the country. Although he helps hundreds of people turn their lives around for the good, he is first and foremost a family man...

It’s wonderful to meet you Tony, thank you for sitting down to discuss your book with me, it’s a great honor.

You’re welcome.

I see you collaborated with Charles Messina?

I hired a team of writers that I paid because I’m not the writer, I’m the author…I’m just telling the story, Charles was the last writer I hired and he finalized the book… it is now the 9th best selling organized crime book!


Sounds like he did a good job.

He did. The book can be purchased at Amazon.com, just go to book search and type in the title and they’ll have it to you in a couple of days.

Has Hollywood approached you about the book?

Yes, I’ve went to Vegas twice and Hollywood twice to promote my book…we’re all in talks of a movie.

When?

Not anytime soon, there are some things they (Hollywood) would like to see changed but I won’t change.

Like what?

We do not live the Soprano lifestyle…we had to be at the diner table every night and Sunday by 3 PM and that was family time. We never brought the business inside the home. We never questioned my father. If we read about him in the papers…he was the king of the numbers racket of 5 boroughs of New York…we never asked questions.

Were there any similarities?

Sure, the night clubs, loan sharks, places like Va-Va-Voom, being the judge and jury, we didn’t call the cops. If there were any assaults, we handled it within the family…all domestic fights are handled in the family.

Are the roles they depict realistic in any way?

In some ways…usually the wife does stay home. She doesn’t go night clubbing with the husband and usually the man, especially if he has a title, travels with a group of people. And he might meet a broad but not on a steady basis…only if he was looking for a woman for the night. Wives were kept at home and it was a no-no for any man of the mob to fool around with a married woman, that’s a no-no.

When did you begin writing this beautifully articulated memoir?

When I was 26 years old but what happened was when I was writing (it) my father came in my room and ripped up my material…years later, I get older, everyone passes away. I get older, I get more material…

Oh wow…

In the year 2001, I hired some writers. The big boys…I’m from that blood line, like the FBI calls it. I started hiring writers six years ago in June 2001. I finished my story with a young writer from NYU; it took us two years to complete, from the year 2006-2008. He put the excerpts together...about a thousand pages of them…I still have over three hundred pages that I didn’t use.

That’s a lot of material!

My publisher and the young writer, who’s also a screen play writer suggested a second edition if it doesn’t go into a film first…I also have a screen play sequel and prequel to the book, My Father, My Don.
What is the moral of the story?

My story is about how a son journeyed from organized crime to sobriety. On the cover of the book, there are amazing quotes from Nick Pileggi "A must-read for anyone looking for an insider’s look at life in the mob"(wrote the screenplay for Wise Guy and Goodfellas, and Casino), Bill Gallo (Daily News correspondent) "A knockout! This powerful book examines, in great detail, Tony Nap's checkered past and his amazing comeback, including all the help he now provides former fighters through his work with the Ring 8 Veteran Boxers Association," Sonny Girard (writer of Snake Eyes and Blood of Our Fathers)"Unlike mob rats telling their stories with gratuitous and self serving lies, Tony tells his with honesty and a peacefulness of a man having come to grips with past conflicts in a peaceful way. Readers will see things as they really were, not as the writer wishes they might have been."…he learned to write while serving time in jail…and Sonny Grosso (producer of the academy-award winning picture, The French Connection).


Oh, I heard of Sonny Grosso, wasn’t he a cop?

Yes and at one point we didn’t get along but he changed his position with me because now we’re both on the same page. He said my story was “a true story told in the style of the French Connection.”

That’s fascinating. So where in your life do you start retelling (it)?

When you read chapter one of my book…how I took the law into my own hands when a punk in my daughter’s college sexually assaulted her…I said I’d ‘handle it’ and that meant I wasn’t gonna call the cops.

I would have killed him…I’m sorry, that’s such a tragedy.

I almost did. In chapter one, I detail the incident. After slicing the man's part of the body that he
doesn't want cut in the classroom, I was sentenced to three and a half years...

In the classroom? In front of the teacher and students?

I pushed the punk against the door that opened into a biology class dissecting a frog. That teacher went back to England after that and never came back!

You said you were sentenced to three and a half years?

The judge knew of my probable cause and believed I needed therapy more than a jail sentence and protected my daughter's honor and thought of it as a ‘sensitive case.’

That’s really honorable of you. Any father would have done the exact same thing. You were protecting your family…

The sobriety part of my life began July 11…15 years ago, that’s what helped me out of my life of crime, you can find you’re way into sobriety no mater what…

That’s amazing, getting sober is the hardest thing to do…how is your daughter now?

My daughter today is happily married and has two masters’ degrees, she’s doing fine now. Now she teaches teachers how to teach.

You’ve had many ups and downs...your story is such an inspiration. What was it like when you were sentenced to the VA hospital as a prisoner for therapy treatment?

I had classes six and a half hours a day, five days a week learning bout how alcohol harms the body. Before that I was considered 'The Prince of Vegas' hiring entertainers like Sammy Davis Jr., Dean Martin and Sinatra, etc, etc. to work at Caesar’s palace, I was their employer… and all that drinking I did takes a toll. I thought my best years were my drinking years…but it was hard for me to handle my responsibilities. Thanks to the judge who sentenced me to the VA hospital where I found sobriety.

Do you sponsor people in the program now?

My phone is available for anyone who needs my help and I am responsible for retired fighters. I help raise money for those who can’t afford it and I’m a volunteer for the VA hospital, I bring to them the knowledge I had when I was a union rep.

How would you describe yourself now?

I’m dull; people say no, you’re more exciting now because you’re doing good things.
When you do bad things everyone wants to know about it, it’s not when you do good.

That’s so true; the media is obsessed about it when anyone famous screws up! It’s not right. What other celebrities did you meet?

Laura Bacall, Joe Lewis…I walked the floor at Cesar’s Palace as a floor boss with heavy weight champion Rocky Marciano, Joe Louis, Former Heavy-Weight Champ of the World, Paddy DeMarco, Light Weight Champ of the World.

What was it like meeting Sinatra? I am a fan.

Sinatra is in chapter 21 of my book and it tells of how he went to the casino manager at the Sands Hotel (Vegas, Nevada) in 1967 and caused a disturbance. I was a floor boss and Frank was looking for a 10,000 dollar marker at the craps table. That's when Carl Cohen, the casino manager told Frankie we sold the casino to Howard Hughes' people and their representative Bob Mahu changed all procedures stating, 'No Markers!' And Frank got mad and pushed Carl Cohen. And Carl escorted Frank to his suite and knocked a few of his teeth out because Frank said he would not perform that night and refused to work for Howard Hughes' people. That was the last time Frankie worked at the Sands Hotel and he went up the road to work at Cesar's Palace.

Would you have given Sinatra the marker?

Yeah, if it was up to me…I mean if a celebrity's working for you and his pay is $250,000 a week and you're paying him and he wants a $10,000 marker, you give it to him.

What else do you discuss in your book?

After I got discharged from the United States Air Force, I was a Sergeant…when I got discharged I had disagreements with my father and had to leave. I had to leave because I worked over a crocked cop who tried to shake me down! My father settled the dispute and I had to leave town and I went on a lamb for three and a half years. And changed my name to Tony Reo and I did my boxing and fighting under this name out West to make a living. While doing that I read the New York papers and it was printed in Forbes magazine that my father was number four as one of the richest men in the United States who never paid income tax. And I was picking cotton for 75 cents an hour! I traveled in carnivals as a fighter fighting spectators under the name of Tony Reo to eat. During this time of my life, I lost my mother to cancer and I was not aware of it.

There must be a lot of publicity surrounding the publication of your book?

Hollywood wants me for five segments of a TV show, a reality pilot, “Home Made." It's about seven ex-mobsters who want to go straight and open up a chain of "Home-Made" restaurants and compete with the likes of McDonalds...and there's another video called "Cooking with the Family" about the wise-guys favorite recipe...and the book trailer video, My Father, My Don that I narrate explaining my autobiography.

So at the moment, no movie?

I keep turning them down because they want me to sell my life rights. I don’t want it just to be entertaining…I want people to see the discipline, the family life. The way it was back then...the way only the father discusses the 'occupation', (Jimmy Nap was also a boxing manager, promoter, helped entertainers get jobs, a gambler, he banked the number racket for over 40 years in the five boroughs in New York). There'll be no movie if I have to sell my life rights.

I like that, that’s honorable.

Meeting Malachy McCourt

It was an amazing experience to speak with Malachy McCourt, the writer of many great books and actor in wonderful films and plays (including many off-off). In my research I discovered that he, like my own father left school at the age of 13 to work in England! He spoke with me about the importance of finding true love, his concept of what makes a good film and the making of Beautiful Kid written by Mike Carty and produced by Patrick McCullough.

Hello Malachy, is it a good time to talk?

Yes, what would you like to talk about?

The making of this amazing film and other amazing things you’ve done.

Okay. I really loved working with Column McCann. He is fabulous. I’ve read all his books, I am in awe of him…his determination…

You’ve achieved so much as an actor (Molly McMaguires, She‘s the One, The Devil‘s Own, Green Card, Beautiful Kid, Happy Hour, Gods and Generals, Ash Wednesday, HBO‘s Oz), Soap Star (Ryan‘s Hope, Search for Tomorrow, One Life to Live and All My Children), stage actor (Mass Appeal, Da, The Hostage, Inherit the Wind, Carousel and A Couple of Blaggards) and as a writer (History of Ireland, Voices of Ireland, Harold Be Thy Name, Danny Boy, The Claddagh Ring, A Monk Swimming, Singing My Him Song), of all these achievements, what do you consider your greatest?

What I found to be my greatest is what I consider my true love, my wife Diana…that transcends anything that I have done…and becoming a parent and a grandparent. The other stuff is transient…people see you for a minute and then you disappear. There is something about falling in love and staying there. It’s like pealing the onion…more shall be revealed.

That’s wonderful. What is your advice to someone who is trying to accomplish their goals but is struggling?

You can accomplish anything if you stick around…now if you’re dead your accomplishments will come to an end, so stay above ground!


(laughing) Good advice. Let’s talk a bit about your books depicting the history of Ireland (Danny Boy, Voices of Ireland, The Claddagh Ring, History of Ireland). Would you consider these non-fiction?

It‘s historical but that doesn’t necessarily mean they’re factual, a lot of it is factual and opinion. Because in (recounting) history you can always get something wrong, and I do!

Can you give me an example?

For example there’s a continual thing about “Danny Boy.“ People say it’s an Irish Song. It has Irish music. But it’s not about a young man going off to fight for Ireland (as many believe). I have no idea. Who is Danny? And what is he doing? I put in my own version and people may not like this…

And you did a lot of research to get to the bottom of this mystery…you talked to historians, musicologists, academics, Irish icons…

Also my brother Frank, Liam Nissan, Seamus Heaney, Larry Kirwan (Black 47)…

And? What was the outcome? Who is the real Danny Boy?

They all had different opinions.

Aside from meeting and falling in love with your wife, what is another achievement you consider most important?

Another accomplishment is getting sober for the last quarter century…it’s a stroke of a divine providence… even though I’m not of the religious…I am spiritual.

That’s ironic because in the movie, your character tries to help the alcoholic family cope. Are there any Irish stereotypes that go with drinking?

As depicted clearly in the film…there is a similarity. However, there is this annoying thing that the Irish are automatically an alcoholic. However, the consumption isn’t anyway near as it is in other countries. Did you know that statistically the Irish spend as much money on books?

Wow, that really goes against those stereotypes.

The movie is fascinating…kind of a ghetto enclave (the Irish) who are besieged… they’ve always thought of themselves as being under siege. These characters as….at one time as Andrew Greely said, they (the Irish) climbed the ladder of success and pulled it up after them and became the seiged. The Irish had to attack and shatter their way into this country. They were the criminals, the prostitutes, they had to put up a fight….which in many ways has ruined their creativity. Now, they write insurance policies instead of books (laughing).

Is your writing approach of fact and opinion also evident in your book, Claddagh Ring?

It’s mythology and legend so nobody really knows. Again how it (the history of the ring) came about…nobody knows. There is a museum in Galway in a tiny shop dedicated to its history…

Does it get a lot of tourists?

No, you put three people in there and it’s packed (laughing). You know historical truth has always been written by the winners. There were no winners in Ireland when Ireland wasn’t ours so in the meantime we told all sorts of stories…

In your book, The History of Ireland you wrote and I’ll paraphrase: one characteristic of the Irish is having “an exhorted sense of resentment.."

Resentment is like taking poison and waiting for the other person to die. However, it makes for good writing. I don’t know what we would have done without the English. The French make great wine by crushing grapes. The Irish make good writers…to get great Irish literature you have to crush the Irish! (laughing) we are very shy…

I like your sense of humor…and I look forward to reading all of these books, especially your histories. You’ve done some mainstream films like, She’s the One. What was Ed Burns like?

I’m close to his mom and dad and I’ve known him since he was a kid. I really liked doing Oz. I mean it was pretty gritty and rough and violent and everything but it was an interesting exercise in the acting field even though it depicted the prison conditions……

You were also a Talk show host for many years.

For six years in the 70s. There was a lot of people pulling you up or abusing you with ‘Why don’t you go back to where you came from?’ Because of my attitude toward religion, ‘You’re disgusting …‘ So anyway, there isn’t anything I didn’t enjoy including being a barkeep. In everything I do, I can’t wait to hear what I have to say next…I am very egotistical…..

Which can be a very good thing.

Yeah, (laughing)you can get a lot done.

A Monk Swimming and its sequel Singing My Him Song seem to be autobiographical...

They are Memoir…not autobiographical. Memoir is impressionistic.

Wouldn’t want Oprah to tear you to shreds…

That’s right…if you’re going to call it an autobiography, it better be. With a memoir you don’t have to do that…

How many films did you do before Beautiful Kid?

35.

Really?

It was my first film with my brother Frank though. He’s not an actor.

That's very neat. Did you do anything else with him?

We wrote a play together but we hadn’t done much together in film…talks and things like that.

Beautiful Kid written by Mike Carty took place primarily in Woodlawn, was that your first time in Woodlawn?

I liked it. It’s not a place where I would go too often because I live in the city but I was fascinated by the Irish enclave again…

The movie paints a picture of an Irish American family, what are your thoughts and feelings about the stories‘ negative aspects such as the alcoholism, etc.

It wasn’t negative or positive, it was accurate. That’s what happened. We (Irish) can be pretty stupid like everyone else. I thought it was well written and well done in every way and I hope the very talented team of Mike Carty, Colum McCann and Patrick McCullough will do well with it.

And last but not least, this movie won Best Supporting Actor (John Carty) and Best Actor (Dan Brennan) Awards…do you have a favorite actor?

They were all great. But I think a movie is not an actors medium, it is a directors medium…there should just be best team work in a movie and there should be no awards for acting because it’s the directors efforts, the best way you know a movie is good is when you can’t pick out an actor. A good movie is when everything is working smoothly…to get out a well pulled story….with its big and small roles.

I really like that concept. Thank you very much for speaking with me, I appreciate your time.

You are welcome.

Visiting Victor Rodriguez

Victor Rodriquez is the author of two books: Eldorado in East Harlem (a partly autobiographical coming-of-age novel) and Ravenhall: Introducing Detective Sid Rodrigo, a murder mystery. Dr. Ulla Dydo, a former professor at Bronx Community College and Gertrude Stein scholar, has used Eldorado in her readings and class discussions. This book was also used as an historical fiction piece depicting Spanish Harlem in the 60s in a college classroom in Germany. It was inspiring for me to meet him and discuss his novels and current projects....

When did you begin writing?

Let's see...let me be brief. I was born in Puerto Rico and moved to East Harlem when I was two, and grew up there. I've lived most of my life in New York. When I was seventeen I suddenly fell in love with reading after being hooked by a murder mystery. This led to an appreciation of classic nineteenth century literature, particularly the works of Charles Dickens, Victor Hugo, Herman Melville and Mark Twain to name a few. But most of all it was the great Jules Verne who inspired me to become an author. I’m still mesmerized by his Extraordinary Voyages.

Do you like contemporary authors?

Yes, of course. But I’d have to say that the late Howard Fast, with whom I had the honor of meeting and corresponding, held as tight a grip on my psyche as did Verne. From Verne I learned to love adventure, and Fast’s historical novels, Citizen Tom Paine, The Last Frontier, Spartacus and April Morning gave me a deep appreciation of the struggle for human dignity and freedom. Fast was a gifted storyteller. I’ll never forget his words of encouragement.

What inspired you to write?

It began as desire to escape from the poverty of working class neighborhoods like East Harlem and the South Bronx. Not only did reading transport me to intriguing worlds, but it also made me aware of and appreciate art, classical music and other human endeavors.

Do you always write?

I try to write every single day. I’m sixty-five and have been writing since I was seventeen; when you love writing for that long, it must mean something. But getting published is even more difficult than writing. I got married at the age of nineteen and raised a family while working as a laboratory technician. After many years of struggling to get published, Arte Publico Press liked Eldorado in East Harlem and published it in 1992. Arte Publico Press is the foremost publisher of Hispanic authors.

What does the title mean?
Dorado is a Spanish word for gold. When the New World Indians saw how pernicious and greedy their Spanish invaders were they made up stories just to be rid them; virtual legends later woven into American folklore. One of these legends is the one about Ponce de León and the Fountain of Youth. The Aztecs told them of a city of gold to the north, which the Spanish later called Eldorado. I used the word as a metaphor for the image that some poor foreigners thinking of immigrating to America had of this country. But once here they found not an Eldorado but a place requiring lots of hard work to overcome poverty. Most of my characters are people struggling daily with life’s challenges. After Eldorado in East Harlem I worked on short stories and kept a journal for ten years. I then wrote Ravenhall a novel about an NYPD detective
named Sid Rodrigo, which was published last summer by PublishAmerica.

How much time do you dedicate to writing on a daily basis?
Five years ago I went into early retirement to devote myself to full-time writing. Now that I have the time I work four or five hours a day. Even If you write just a single page a day, in twelve months you’ll have a book length manuscript. But for me, it's not simple story telling. My love of history lets me enjoy doing research for my novels. For Eldorado I dug into the history of my old neighborhood and read several books about the politics of the early 1960s. And for Ravenhall, which is set in the Edgar Allan Poe Cottage in the Bronx, I re-read all of Poe’s works, though it’s not about him, a biography about Poe and numerous books on crime. I also delved into numismatics, jewelry making and the war on drugs. I interviewed detectives, watched TV shows like Forensic Files and, believe it or not, read about cockfighting. Though fiction, it is based on a real case. Poe Cottage is still there on East Kingsbridge Road just as Poe left it in 1849. It’s a museum now. The minute I toured the cottage I realized that its eerie atmosphere was a perfect setting for a murder mystery. Why not? Poe wrote some of his best ones there. Ravenhall is about a Bronx cop who goes on a furlough to relieve burn-out, but after finding a dead body in Poe Cottage he’s forced to go on a hunt for a murderer with ties to the Colombian drug cartel. I had lots of fun writing it.

I've taught Sandra Cicerones, The House on Mango Street and Esmeralda Santiago's When I was Puerto Rican, these writers focus a lot of their work on "The Puerto Rican experience," is this what you do?

I’ve read and enjoyed When I Was Puerto Rican and many other books like it. Although I write for a general audience, it must have a Hispanic angle to it because of my background and the fact that our heritage is a unique element of the American experience. Esmeralda Santiago is distinct in that her story is different from mine. It's a good contrast...my book involves a young man growing up in a rough New York neighborhood; his sole background. She has memories that harkens back to the island as well as experiences in New York because she moved here during her teens, I think. She was able to describe both experiences in wonderful detail because of this.

Why is there such a recent surge in the marketing of Hispanic work?

I believe that by the 1970s American and European readers, tired of reading traditional novels with familiar settings and situations, turned to the more imaginative and highly original Latin America writers such as the Colombian Nobel Prize winning author Gabriel Garcia Marquez. He perfected that literary movement know as magical realism, wherein he mixes reality with fantasy in such books as his dazzling One Hundred Years of Solitude, which gave new life to the modern novel. I strongly believe that Garcia Marquez and his contemporaries have also sparked the current trend among today’s youth for books like the Harry Potter series. It’s a wonderful thing seeing young people eager to read, learn and imagine enchanting worlds.

I agree. I remember reading Marquez in this great contemporary literature class I took at Manhattan College and it was difficult but I really liked it.
Even some major publishers, like Simon and Shuster, have an imprint which focuses on publishing Hispanic writers. However, I think general readers always keep an open mind and know a good book when they read it. I’ve read somewhere that countless bibliophiles, regardless of their ethnicity, have read, wept over and loved Angela's Ashes.What are you reading now?
There’s a wonderful Spanish author named Arturo Perez-Reverte, whose historical adventure novels are as exciting, enjoyable and informative as the classics of Alexandre Dumas and Rafael Sabatini. Perez-Reverte’s hero is a seventeenth century Spanish soldier named Captain Diego Alatriste who lives as a swordsman-for–hire in Madrid. Captain Alatriste is the first title in the series. And because I’m a New York history buff, I’m enjoying reading Victoria Thompson’s mysteries set in late nineteenth century Manhattan: Murder in Astor Place, Murder on Mulberry Bend, etc.

Are your novels intended for Young Adults?

Not in particular; I always aim towards the general reader. However, I was surprised that Eldorado in East Harlem did attract adolescent readers because its hero is a seventeen-year-old who gets into sticky situations with which they can relate. Several years ago I was invited to the public library at Newark, New Jersey. Many of the local high school kids, and their teachers, had read my book. After my speech and an answering session I signed so many copies of Eldorado that it numbed my right hand. But I was thrilled and surprised that so many young people had read it!

Why?

I think some scenes in the book are unintentionally racy and have some spicy street language.

That's probably why they loved it so much.

Well, I like to think of myself as being as much of a naturalist and realist as Jack London. His books depict life the way it really is, and not colored by the romantic sentimentalists that preceded him. Good blokes like Charles Dickens for instance. When London wrote about two animals in a life and death struggle you can almost see and hear them tearing each other apart. That’s the reality of life. I like to write about life the way it really is, warts and all. But one should always bear in mind readers’ sensitivities and not overdue it by sickening or offending them.

Is there a typical theme/message your characters portray?

I’m not a philosopher or moralist. One is a straightforward coming-of-age novel and the second one is a police procedural; a crime drama wherein a homicide is committed and solved in the end. I leave it up to readers to draw their own conclusions about what motivates my characters. What I'm working on now is a historical novel set in sixteenth century Puerto Rico and Spain. As you can see my interests vary.

What will that be about?

At this stage, I've finished two years of historical research and am working on the novel’s outline. It’s like constructing a house: you draw the plan, start with a foundation and work yourself up. I'm very very careful with the research and can back up all my sources. It may take several years to complete because the subject is a very broad one. Generally speaking it’s about the Post Colombian period and the devastating affects the Spanish conquest had on the Taíno Indians. Its main character is a mestizo.

What is that? I'm sorry...I should know this.

A mestizo is a Hispanic person with mixed ancestry, especially someone of both Native American and European ancestry.

What inspired you to write on this topic?

While a student at Bronx Community College I wrote a term paper about a Spanish Dominican monk named Bartolomé de Las Casas, who devoted his long life fighting for the rights of the New World Indians. He sought to have them recognized as rational human beings with souls and that their lives and property should be protected. He called for the abolition of slavery and condemned the cruelty, hunger, hard labor and diseases that were rapidly killing them by the tens of thousands.

That's very fascinating. What is your philosophy on life?

When the late great cellist Pablo Casals was in his nineties he was asked, because he was considered a musical genius, if he still leaned anything. His answer: “Yes. Every day. I never stop learning; I learn something new every day." I try to live by that same philosophy. Life is too wondrous to waste on trivial matters.

Describe one of your most memorable experiences you've had as a writer?

That visit I made to the Newark Public Library was in celebration of Hispanic Heritage Month. I was deeply moved by everyone’s interest in my life story and the impact it’s had on my writing. I think some of those young people may’ve identified with me and, hopefully, learned that the power to change their lives is deep within each of them.

That is very inspiring. I'm looking forward to reading your books. I think I'll start with Eldorado...I love books that takes place in the sixties. I love reading about how much New York has changed.

Thank you very much. Yes, New York has changed. But one thing will never change: it will always be the gateway to America.