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Kim Voynar

By Kim Voynar Voynar@moviecitynews.com

Tinsel

My old high school pal Hank Stuever, who’s written for the Washington Post‘s Style section for a long time, has written one excellent book, Off Ramp: Adventures and Heartache in the American Elsewhere, and has a new book, Tinsel: A Search for America’s Christmas Present, coming out November 12 (just in time for your Christmas shopping!).
Hank writes with humor, warmth and great insight about real people and places, and he has a remarkable talent for finding the extraordinary in what seems, on the surface, to be commonplace. He posted a heartfelt, frustrated and, at times, angry piece on his blog, Tonsil, about the issues authors face in getting their books seen and sold.
Even if you’re lucky enough to have a publisher and a book deal, he writes, an author still has to get out there and push and promote his baby in the cold, hard world if he hopes to not have it whither away into obscurity. Although Hank’s publisher has arranged his book tour, he’s still largely responsible himself for getting to the tour stops and promoting himself and his book to get people to come out for his readings. And this is a guy with a book being published by a reputable publisher, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
Honestly, I had no idea. But it sure reminds me of what indie filmmakers face in trying to get their babies seen and reviewed after pouring their heart, soul and limited bank accounts into making their films. So many talented people I know are creating amazing art — films, music, books — and just struggle and struggle to ever have it go anywhere. Society needs art and philosophy and films and books and music, but does so little to support those who have the creativity and talent to bring such things to life. It makes me sad.
As a regular reader of Hank’s excellent writing at the Post, and having read and absolutely loved Off Ramp, I can highly recommend Tinsel to anyone looking for a good book to give a friend or family member (or yourself, for that matter) for Christmas. (And for the record, Hank did not ask me to write about his book. I just believe in his writing and think he’s a marvelous author whose work very much deserves support and readership.) We who work in fields related to the arts need to support each other as much as we can … but just the same, I wouldn’t recommend Hank’s book if I wasn’t quite certain that it will be every bit as good as everything else he writes.
Best of luck with your new baby, Hank.

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It shows how out of it I was in trying to be in it, acknowledging that I was out of it to myself, and then thinking, “Okay, how do I stop being out of it? Well, I get some legitimate illogical narrative ideas” — some novel, you know?

So I decided on three writers that I might be able to option their material and get some producer, or myself as producer, and then get some writer to do a screenplay on it, and maybe make a movie.

And so the three projects were “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” “Naked Lunch” and a collection of Bukowski. Which, in 1975, forget it — I mean, that was nuts. Hollywood would not touch any of that, but I was looking for something commercial, and I thought that all of these things were coming.

There would be no Blade Runner if there was no Ray Bradbury. I couldn’t find Philip K. Dick. His agent didn’t even know where he was. And so I gave up.

I was walking down the street and I ran into Bradbury — he directed a play that I was going to do as an actor, so we know each other, but he yelled “hi” — and I’d forgot who he was.

So at my girlfriend Barbara Hershey’s urging — I was with her at that moment — she said, “Talk to him! That guy really wants to talk to you,” and I said “No, fuck him,” and keep walking.

But then I did, and then I realized who it was, and I thought, “Wait, he’s in that realm, maybe he knows Philip K. Dick.” I said, “You know a guy named—” “Yeah, sure — you want his phone number?”

My friend paid my rent for a year while I wrote, because it turned out we couldn’t get a writer. My friends kept on me about, well, if you can’t get a writer, then you write.”
~ Hampton Fancher

“That was the most disappointing thing to me in how this thing was played. Is that I’m on the phone with you now, after all that’s been said, and the fundamental distinction between what James is dealing with in these other cases is not actually brought to the fore. The fundamental difference is that James Franco didn’t seek to use his position to have sex with anyone. There’s not a case of that. He wasn’t using his position or status to try to solicit a sexual favor from anyone. If he had — if that were what the accusation involved — the show would not have gone on. We would have folded up shop and we would have not completed the show. Because then it would have been the same as Harvey Weinstein, or Les Moonves, or any of these cases that are fundamental to this new paradigm. Did you not notice that? Why did you not notice that? Is that not something notable to say, journalistically? Because nobody could find the voice to say it. I’m not just being rhetorical. Why is it that you and the other critics, none of you could find the voice to say, “You know, it’s not this, it’s that”? Because — let me go on and speak further to this. If you go back to the L.A. Times piece, that’s what it lacked. That’s what they were not able to deliver. The one example in the five that involved an issue of a sexual act was between James and a woman he was dating, who he was not working with. There was no professional dynamic in any capacity.

~ David Simon