This is a post about David Mamet.
David Mamet?
What did I just say? David Mamet.
I know who the guy is, I have full use of, y’know, my hearing, thank you, I’m just saying, what about him?
Maybe you should shut the f*** up and listen.
Maybe, maybe you–
The purpose of this post is to note that one of David Mamet’s former NYU theater students, Nancy Balbirer, has written a book.
So we’re talking about this now.
This is what we’re talking about.
She wrote a book.
Very good.
I don’t suppose she has a lot of nice things to say about him.
In her upcoming memoir, “Take Your Shirt Off and Cry,” actress-playwright Nancy Balbirer recalls how the acerbic author of “Glengarry Glen Ross” and “Speed-the-Plow” freaked when his students spoke too quietly.
“‘Get the [bleep] off my stage! Now,’ he’d bellow… ‘And,’ he’d continue, his short, burly body bouncing around like a school-yard bully in need of his daily Ritalin, ‘Don’t [bleep]ing come back until we can hear you. How dare you? You’re whispering. On the stage. It’s [bleep]ing passive-aggressive. You know, only people who are full of [bleep] whisper,’” Balbirer writes…
He also told his class he considered critics “the syphilis and gonorrhea of the theater,” and delivered a lecture, “the premise of which was that Bill Cosby was a whore… television was evil and for whores, Hollywood was a hotbed of whoredom, and we were to avoid all of these things like the plague, unless, of course, we, too, were whores and not the artists we said we were.”
Okay. Was there a point to all that?
[PAUSE]
Are you aware of your current location?
What?
Which is to say, do you know what this place is?
I don’t–
Do you know what the f*** this place is? You f***ing infant?
Jesus, Deceiver.com, it’s Deceiver.com.
[SILENCE]
Are you really going to…?
Oh, you just think you’re so–
Mamet said Hollywood is a hotbed of whoredom, correct?
What? Yes.
Mamet said television is evil and for whores, yes?
Okay, yes. Yes.
[SILENCE]
“Oh.” What he says is this: “Oh.”
F– You know what? F*** you.
Take your time.
F*** you!
[DOOR SLAMS]
[PAUSE]
C***.
No related posts.
What the F### is this about? Am I missing the revelance of this guy? Other than the fact that the picture of the guy looks like he has a turd hanging half way out of his butt. However, if one of my Prof’s ever spoke to me that way when I was in school, FIGHT CITY here we come!
Swede – I guess he wrote/created(?) several episodes for the TV show “The Unit” http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0460690/
and a whole bunch of other stuff
D—, thanks for the info and have a great New Years celebration!
Anyone that bills herself as “actress-playwright” deserves to be punched. Not just yelled at.
And if she shops her little memoir to oh lets just say, Oprah, someone better make sure it’s true first.
Simon, I really hope you aren’t thinking about giving up hypocrite-catching for play-writing. Who will keep us safe from the two-faced if you leave?!
Oh yea. The Unit. This guy was the douche bag unit that killed the other old douche bag unit. I am not looking forward to being a douche bag unit. I will become one, damn it.
Typical whore. Offended first and then interested right after he learned how much money he can do on the whoredom business.
Very clever, Simon.
Every time I look at this guy’s name, I think it’s “Marmoset.” David Marmoset.
See, Swede makes the entire conversation Simon posted that much funnier. Thank god Swede understands humor and did it on purpose, otherwise he’d look like an idiot. I bet he’s a comedian, he’s so funny.
Swede-
Ya might want to check good ol’ Google or Wikipedia or something before getting so angry about the fact you don’t recognize one of the most name-recognized playwrights in the country.
I’m not being snobby. This guy is huge in theatre. You can’t take a literature class without reading at least one of his pieces. I can understand not knowing about him, nobody knows everything, but damn it’s not like the guys obscure. You just come off as being angry that someone didn’t realize you were ignorant.
Wait a sec! What’s the problem here? We all like a whore or two now and then.
But is anything he said actually incorrect or inaccurate?
Here’s more from that piece:
“Balbirer – who appeared on ‘Seinfeld’ and wrote and performed the solo show, ‘I Slept With Jack Kerouac’ – says Mamet advised her, ‘There’s nothing worse than being a woman in show business . . . you’ll be asked to do only two things in every [bleep]ing role you ever play: take your shirt off and cry.’”
Can’t say he’s not on the money with that quote.
phoenix- see post #9 and take a pill to relax.
Oh, how brilliant this post was!
I actually acted in a stage play of “Oleana”–and I came away thinking Mamet was insane.
Now I see I was correct.
This guy always kind of gave me the creeps. But I did like “Sexual Perversity In Chicago”/”About Last Night”. It was a spot-on commentary about modern relationships.
Okay, while this is apparently going to make me look dumb, I just graduated with a BA in English and had to look this guy up… Sure, I recognized some of his works once I did (and his name sounded familiar before), but I never touched him in any of my classes and know English majors at other schools who didn’t either… and I’m glad. He sounds like a pompous ass who thinks he’s better than everyone else because he can be more crass and yell louder when he really has little talent. His life must be teeming with hypocrisy.
I always hated this guy’s film dialogue. It always just sounded like every character was speaking out of one guy’s head. Complete .
I like Mamet. He once called NPR “National Palestinian Radio.” Priceless.
What is significant about Mamet is that he recently and publicly dissed Liberals as insane and decided to walk into the light- er… Right. They are still reeling.
That has to be one of the worst blog posts I’ve ever read. Regardless of the subject matter, that was just unfunny and smug.
I loved his movie ‘Thr Edge’, starring the late great actor Bart the bear.
U can haz funny laytr? It’s Caturday!
Smug? How about that.