5 Questions
1. Leave me a comment saying "Interview me". (If you want to, of course! No pressure at all.)
2. I'll respond by asking you five questions of a very intimate and creepily personal nature (or not so creepy/personal).
3. Update your LJ with the answers to the questions.
4. Include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the post.
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, ask them five questions.
Answers to Genn's Questions (which kicked ass, by the way)
1. What are the three best things about your profession?
Absolutely number one would be meeting new people. Taken a little further, meeting new and interesting people, who have really wonderful and amazing stories to tell. I've had the pleasure of interviewing celebrities like Dr. Ruth and Peter Frampton, and people who just have or had cool professions.
I met a barber named Rocky Vitetta who had run a barber concession in an old, now defunct Fort Lee nightclub called The Riviera. Now, this nightclub was THE hotspot on the East Coast, second only to the Copacabana. Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis Jr., and the rest of the Rat Pack all performed there quite often. And celebrities like Jayne Mansfield and Joe Dimaggio dined there frequently. Rocky told me a lot of stories about Sinatra and the cocktail waitresses that were pretty much unprintable, but you can use your imagination. Once, Sinatra was caught practically red handed by his then girlfriend, actress Ava Gardner, and they had a huge fight in the lobby.
Second, I really love getting to write at least once a day and get paid for it. It isn't glamorous, it's often frustrating and depressing and makes you want to jump out a window when you can't get a sentence quite the way you want it--but it's magic when you do.
Lastly, I guess I love the lifestyle. Being a reporter gets you invited to a lot of cool events and dinners and gala openings. It also can make you the least liked person in the room, if the room is filled with politicians who hated your last article, or feel like they have to be on their best behavior in front of you.
It's also a job/lifestyle that gives you freedom of movement. The job requires that you leave the office, and actually pound the pavement, sit in diners and coffeeshops listening to people, picking up scoops and story ideas.
2. If money were no object, what piece of art would you own? Use you own definition of art, but explain, please.
I've always been attracted to El Greco, so I would like to own any original painting of his. It's something in the way he chooses his subjects, and the way he executes his interpretation of those subjects, that puts me in a very contemplative, almost Zen-like mood. I guess I appreciate the spirituality that comes through in his works.
3. If you could live in any Hemingway novel, would you? Which novel? Why?
This is a hard question, because while the locations of his novels are often romantic and exotic and full of local flavor, his themes are usually depressing and the situations his character get into are way too stressful and painful.
If I was going to just base my answer on location, I would probably say "The Old Man and the Sea," because pre-Castro Cuba was a great place to be in the 1950's. And I have always been attracted to the tropics and the sea. That is also my answer to "Would you?" I would live in a Hemingway novel because of the opportunity to live in a world that doesn't exist anymore.
4. What vise do you have that you're happy to have and don't want to get rid of anytime soon?
I guess porn would be the only vice that I'm not ashamed of and don't want to get rid of anytime soon. I don't smoke anymore, and that was a vice that I hated having and really wanted to get rid of. So, I would say porn.
5. Who/what is your muse? Subquestion: How do you get over "writer's block"?
This is a tough question, because there is no one muse that is the be all and end all. But the things I tend to find inspiration in is music, conversation, and honestly, daily mundane activities like driving and showering and brushing my teeth; even going to the bathroom. My best ideas pop up when I'm alone, involved in a bland activity, or when I'm driving and I see something in the landscape that sparks an idea, be it architecture or a tree or just the layout of a town's road network. Some towns have really interesting road systems--especially in their shopping districts--that really blend with the character of the town, and sort give it a personality.
As for writer's block, if I'm at work, I try to drown out the world around me with my iPod and find a song that matches the rythym of the story and/or my thinking process. If I'm writing for myself, I try to read as much as possible, be it a newspaper, magazine, short story, the back of DVD box, whatever. I try to watch movies that I know will be intellectually stimulating in some way or other--and not in a snobby way. I can be as stimulated watching "The Good, the Bad and th Ugly," as I am when watching "Citizen Kane," or "The Saragossa Manuscript." Basically, if I feel the need to create, I go to what's been created before.
I've actually come around to welcoming dry spells, because I know that at the end there will always be a deluge of ideas.
Coming tomorrow, answers to Jordana's questions.
2. I'll respond by asking you five questions of a very intimate and creepily personal nature (or not so creepy/personal).
3. Update your LJ with the answers to the questions.
4. Include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the post.
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, ask them five questions.
Answers to Genn's Questions (which kicked ass, by the way)
1. What are the three best things about your profession?
Absolutely number one would be meeting new people. Taken a little further, meeting new and interesting people, who have really wonderful and amazing stories to tell. I've had the pleasure of interviewing celebrities like Dr. Ruth and Peter Frampton, and people who just have or had cool professions.
I met a barber named Rocky Vitetta who had run a barber concession in an old, now defunct Fort Lee nightclub called The Riviera. Now, this nightclub was THE hotspot on the East Coast, second only to the Copacabana. Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis Jr., and the rest of the Rat Pack all performed there quite often. And celebrities like Jayne Mansfield and Joe Dimaggio dined there frequently. Rocky told me a lot of stories about Sinatra and the cocktail waitresses that were pretty much unprintable, but you can use your imagination. Once, Sinatra was caught practically red handed by his then girlfriend, actress Ava Gardner, and they had a huge fight in the lobby.
Second, I really love getting to write at least once a day and get paid for it. It isn't glamorous, it's often frustrating and depressing and makes you want to jump out a window when you can't get a sentence quite the way you want it--but it's magic when you do.
Lastly, I guess I love the lifestyle. Being a reporter gets you invited to a lot of cool events and dinners and gala openings. It also can make you the least liked person in the room, if the room is filled with politicians who hated your last article, or feel like they have to be on their best behavior in front of you.
It's also a job/lifestyle that gives you freedom of movement. The job requires that you leave the office, and actually pound the pavement, sit in diners and coffeeshops listening to people, picking up scoops and story ideas.
2. If money were no object, what piece of art would you own? Use you own definition of art, but explain, please.
I've always been attracted to El Greco, so I would like to own any original painting of his. It's something in the way he chooses his subjects, and the way he executes his interpretation of those subjects, that puts me in a very contemplative, almost Zen-like mood. I guess I appreciate the spirituality that comes through in his works.
3. If you could live in any Hemingway novel, would you? Which novel? Why?
This is a hard question, because while the locations of his novels are often romantic and exotic and full of local flavor, his themes are usually depressing and the situations his character get into are way too stressful and painful.
If I was going to just base my answer on location, I would probably say "The Old Man and the Sea," because pre-Castro Cuba was a great place to be in the 1950's. And I have always been attracted to the tropics and the sea. That is also my answer to "Would you?" I would live in a Hemingway novel because of the opportunity to live in a world that doesn't exist anymore.
4. What vise do you have that you're happy to have and don't want to get rid of anytime soon?
I guess porn would be the only vice that I'm not ashamed of and don't want to get rid of anytime soon. I don't smoke anymore, and that was a vice that I hated having and really wanted to get rid of. So, I would say porn.
5. Who/what is your muse? Subquestion: How do you get over "writer's block"?
This is a tough question, because there is no one muse that is the be all and end all. But the things I tend to find inspiration in is music, conversation, and honestly, daily mundane activities like driving and showering and brushing my teeth; even going to the bathroom. My best ideas pop up when I'm alone, involved in a bland activity, or when I'm driving and I see something in the landscape that sparks an idea, be it architecture or a tree or just the layout of a town's road network. Some towns have really interesting road systems--especially in their shopping districts--that really blend with the character of the town, and sort give it a personality.
As for writer's block, if I'm at work, I try to drown out the world around me with my iPod and find a song that matches the rythym of the story and/or my thinking process. If I'm writing for myself, I try to read as much as possible, be it a newspaper, magazine, short story, the back of DVD box, whatever. I try to watch movies that I know will be intellectually stimulating in some way or other--and not in a snobby way. I can be as stimulated watching "The Good, the Bad and th Ugly," as I am when watching "Citizen Kane," or "The Saragossa Manuscript." Basically, if I feel the need to create, I go to what's been created before.
I've actually come around to welcoming dry spells, because I know that at the end there will always be a deluge of ideas.
Coming tomorrow, answers to Jordana's questions.