Lemony Snicket, Emily Andras
I finally got around to reading my copy of "Who Could That Be at this Hour?" by "Lemony Snicket," the first book of the All the Wrong Questions series. The voice of Lemony Snicket--eccentric, self-deprecating, observational, wry, and offbeat in a way that's marked by a thread of melancholy and, I guess, repressed or very reserved frustration? that simmers beneath the surface of a man who has known disappointment--is so distinctive and I was instantly reminded why The Series of Unfortunate Events books have such a dark charm to them. Lemony Snicket, the persona of real life author Daniel Handler, has a delightful playful cynicism in his narrative style. Handler has such fun with the English language and words and is such a deft hand at turning a charming, insightful phrase. The dryness of his observations about observation gives everything this off-kilter humor that is coupled with a talking to, but not talking down to the target children audience. Like Unfortunate Events, Handler has Snicket stick to some narrative quirks, like using "big" words and defining them for his audience in slantedly hilarious fashion. (And I think that comes through to both younger and older audiences.)
I never got around to finishing the Series of Unfortunate Events series, but I loved the frame that Handler built for the story and the All the Wrong Questions series is a sort of prequel, a look back at the young days of Lemony Snicket. So if you like the Unfortunate Events books, you'll like this one. It's a super quick read.
Daniel Chandler himself is a really entertaining speaker and if you can ever get to one of his speaking author events , I'd heartily recommend attending.
Some snippets from "Who Could That Be at this Hour?" (Little, Brown: 2012):
"Theodora got the key into a fight with the keyhole, but after a few minutes the door was open, and we stepped into our new home." (69)
"Every new promise was like something heavy I had to carry, with no place to put anything down." (154)
"There was something I was always very good at, however, and that was teaching myself not to be frightened while frightening things are going on. It is difficult to do this, but I had learned. it is simply a matter of putting one's fear aside, like the vegetable on the plate you don't want to touch until all your rice and chicken are gone, and getting frightened later, when one is out of danger. Sometimes I imagined I will be frightened for the rest of my life because of all the fear I put aside during my time in Stain'd-by-the-Sea." (171-72)
"'Imperiously' is a word you may not know, but you've seen it on the faces of people who believe themselves to be much, much better than you are." (181)
"She looked frightened. She had not learned to save it for later, or perhaps she had, and very frightening things had happened before I'd gotten here. Perhaps they'd even happened before I arrived in town." (183)
"The rest of the place was ransacked, a word for something that is fun to do to someone else's room but no fun to have done to yours. Every scrap of Theodora's clothes had been flung out of the chest of drawers, and my suitcase had been dragged out from under the cot and emptied all over the floor. It is embarrassing to see someone's clothing tossed everyplace, although it is hard to say why." (216)
"I felt a complicated worry in my chest, like a tangle of wires or weeds, and when Ellington put her hand on my shoulder, I imagined that her long fingers would be good at untangling things." (231)
"'You may be right,' she said, a phrase which here meant 'I'm wrong, but I don't have the courage to say so.'" (241-42)
More "Lost Girl" things, but ones that double as interesting in the abstract. Emily Andras is the showrunner, read: head writer, of "Lost Girl" for Season 2 and the now-airing Season 3. I listened (and watched) two long interviews she did. In both, Andras talks about how she got into screen writing and what the process of writing (and showrunning) a show is like, so that may be interesting to some of you. She provides a very insider's look into the life of a screen writer, especially as someone who has climbed up the ladder and now is managing a successful show.
The first was with Writers Talking TV, available as a podcast. This is a more industry-focused talk, so there's a lot of interesting discussion about gender politics in terms of in the writing room, as well as in the types of stories that are told on television. How hard it is to advance in general, but also talking points about how less often she, as a woman, seems to be collaborating with another woman versus being in competition with another woman. The host and Andras have a really interesting conversation about women leads in genre series, writing to specific audiences (who is the audience--really interesting when she talks about kind of being between a rock and a hard place in the ardent devotion of two fan camps: genre fans and LGBT fans--the show loves and lives on such support, but those are two very different, very vocal groups), as well as writing process, how a group of writers collaborate together to produce one show and her own approach to writing and managing. Emily Andras has some interesting views and ideas that I may not fully agree with--I think the host brings up some good rebuttals--but that either hadn't occurred to me at all or I hadn't fully thought about. She draws distinctions between writing and managing and I find it humble of her the way she talks about being the one to take the blame when something goes wrong as a showrunner, but then, on the flipside, being gracious in sharing the credit for success. I think the discussion of Canadian shows and writers was also really interesting, especially considering that a show like "Lost Girl" was sold to Funimation and Syfy "as is" instead of being remade like 100 other shows.
The second was a more casual talk with Mind Reels. As someone watching "Lost Girl," I found this interview particularly interesting in Andras's breaking down of every actor's strength, what they bring to their role, and how the writers write to those strengths so that the creation of a character is collaborative--but also that sometimes the actors have to put their faith in the writing and the larger arc/story and be willing to make villains of themselves. There seems to be a generous amount of collaboration between the actors and the writers on "Lost Girl" that both camps note, so I was pleasantly surprised to hear Andras talk about Zoie Palmer (Lauren) and Anna Silk (Bo) approaching the writers to basically say that although the actresses love what's written, they are going to scrap it because, as Andras says, their chemistry on camera doesn't need as much dialogue to emote the feelings that the script is trying to evoke. I found the talk about Canadian values being more liberal and a show like "Lost Girl" bringing Canada's liberal social ideas to other countries interesting. Again, this interview had a lot of talk about writing process and preferences. Andras is married to a screen writer as well, so her frankness about what makes her marriage work when, as writers, she and her husband are prone to being caught up in their own heads, is interesting too.
I enjoyed these interviews as insights into "Lost Girl," but also for the general talking points. Just really, really interesting if you're curious about the behind-the-scenes machinery.
I never got around to finishing the Series of Unfortunate Events series, but I loved the frame that Handler built for the story and the All the Wrong Questions series is a sort of prequel, a look back at the young days of Lemony Snicket. So if you like the Unfortunate Events books, you'll like this one. It's a super quick read.
Daniel Chandler himself is a really entertaining speaker and if you can ever get to one of his speaking author events , I'd heartily recommend attending.
Some snippets from "Who Could That Be at this Hour?" (Little, Brown: 2012):
"Theodora got the key into a fight with the keyhole, but after a few minutes the door was open, and we stepped into our new home." (69)
"Every new promise was like something heavy I had to carry, with no place to put anything down." (154)
"There was something I was always very good at, however, and that was teaching myself not to be frightened while frightening things are going on. It is difficult to do this, but I had learned. it is simply a matter of putting one's fear aside, like the vegetable on the plate you don't want to touch until all your rice and chicken are gone, and getting frightened later, when one is out of danger. Sometimes I imagined I will be frightened for the rest of my life because of all the fear I put aside during my time in Stain'd-by-the-Sea." (171-72)
"'Imperiously' is a word you may not know, but you've seen it on the faces of people who believe themselves to be much, much better than you are." (181)
"She looked frightened. She had not learned to save it for later, or perhaps she had, and very frightening things had happened before I'd gotten here. Perhaps they'd even happened before I arrived in town." (183)
"The rest of the place was ransacked, a word for something that is fun to do to someone else's room but no fun to have done to yours. Every scrap of Theodora's clothes had been flung out of the chest of drawers, and my suitcase had been dragged out from under the cot and emptied all over the floor. It is embarrassing to see someone's clothing tossed everyplace, although it is hard to say why." (216)
"I felt a complicated worry in my chest, like a tangle of wires or weeds, and when Ellington put her hand on my shoulder, I imagined that her long fingers would be good at untangling things." (231)
"'You may be right,' she said, a phrase which here meant 'I'm wrong, but I don't have the courage to say so.'" (241-42)
More "Lost Girl" things, but ones that double as interesting in the abstract. Emily Andras is the showrunner, read: head writer, of "Lost Girl" for Season 2 and the now-airing Season 3. I listened (and watched) two long interviews she did. In both, Andras talks about how she got into screen writing and what the process of writing (and showrunning) a show is like, so that may be interesting to some of you. She provides a very insider's look into the life of a screen writer, especially as someone who has climbed up the ladder and now is managing a successful show.
The first was with Writers Talking TV, available as a podcast. This is a more industry-focused talk, so there's a lot of interesting discussion about gender politics in terms of in the writing room, as well as in the types of stories that are told on television. How hard it is to advance in general, but also talking points about how less often she, as a woman, seems to be collaborating with another woman versus being in competition with another woman. The host and Andras have a really interesting conversation about women leads in genre series, writing to specific audiences (who is the audience--really interesting when she talks about kind of being between a rock and a hard place in the ardent devotion of two fan camps: genre fans and LGBT fans--the show loves and lives on such support, but those are two very different, very vocal groups), as well as writing process, how a group of writers collaborate together to produce one show and her own approach to writing and managing. Emily Andras has some interesting views and ideas that I may not fully agree with--I think the host brings up some good rebuttals--but that either hadn't occurred to me at all or I hadn't fully thought about. She draws distinctions between writing and managing and I find it humble of her the way she talks about being the one to take the blame when something goes wrong as a showrunner, but then, on the flipside, being gracious in sharing the credit for success. I think the discussion of Canadian shows and writers was also really interesting, especially considering that a show like "Lost Girl" was sold to Funimation and Syfy "as is" instead of being remade like 100 other shows.
The second was a more casual talk with Mind Reels. As someone watching "Lost Girl," I found this interview particularly interesting in Andras's breaking down of every actor's strength, what they bring to their role, and how the writers write to those strengths so that the creation of a character is collaborative--but also that sometimes the actors have to put their faith in the writing and the larger arc/story and be willing to make villains of themselves. There seems to be a generous amount of collaboration between the actors and the writers on "Lost Girl" that both camps note, so I was pleasantly surprised to hear Andras talk about Zoie Palmer (Lauren) and Anna Silk (Bo) approaching the writers to basically say that although the actresses love what's written, they are going to scrap it because, as Andras says, their chemistry on camera doesn't need as much dialogue to emote the feelings that the script is trying to evoke. I found the talk about Canadian values being more liberal and a show like "Lost Girl" bringing Canada's liberal social ideas to other countries interesting. Again, this interview had a lot of talk about writing process and preferences. Andras is married to a screen writer as well, so her frankness about what makes her marriage work when, as writers, she and her husband are prone to being caught up in their own heads, is interesting too.
I enjoyed these interviews as insights into "Lost Girl," but also for the general talking points. Just really, really interesting if you're curious about the behind-the-scenes machinery.