“Usually when people say they have mixed feelings about something, it's a sort of euphemistic way of saying they hate it.” PeopleWayFeelingsHateMixed Feelings Author:Matthew Specktor
“My mom was a screenwriter. I saw a lot of people who didn't seem very fulfilled creatively or otherwise by their roles in the motion picture industry.” PeopleSeemsRolesSawsMomIndustryMy MomFulfilledScreenwritersMotion Pictures Author:Matthew Specktor
“When I moved to SF in my early 20s, I loved it, but I was absolutely astonished to discover that people there hated L.A. I was just like why? Really? I had no idea.” PeopleIdeasMovedNo IdeaHatedEarly 20s Author:Matthew Specktor
“You look at the absolute scorn that gets poured on a fallen celebrity, whether it's Tom Cruise or Lindsay Lohan or Marlon Brando, or Elvis when he got fat. They're not allowed the dignity of ordinary failure. And I think that plays into people's notions about Los Angeles, too. It's not allowed to be a regular city with problems.” PeopleThinkingLooksPlayProblemCitiesOrdinaryDignityAbsolutesNotionFatsFallenLos AngelesTomsScornCruiseBrando Author:Matthew Specktor
“People will continue to make movies. But I do think the economic model of the studio movie is closing in on a kind of systemic collapse.” PeopleThinkingKindEconomicModelsStudiosCollapseClosingEconomic Models Author:Matthew Specktor
“A lot of talent, a lot of the currency that movies used to have, has spilled over into TV. People talk about TV the way they used to talk about movies and, as much as I hate to say it, the way they used to talk about books.” PeopleWayBookUsedHateTalentTvsI HateCurrency Author:Matthew Specktor
“My own sense is that fiction is inching its way over to join poetry on the cultural margin. It's an area of passionate concern for me, as for many people, but it's nowhere near as central to the culture as it used to be.” PeopleWayUsedCultureMy OwnFictionAreasConcernPassionateUsed To BeMargins Author:Matthew Specktor
“I think being central to the culture is overrated. Who really gives a damn if something is popular? Jay-Z isn't actually any better than James Joyce even though more people understand him.” PeopleIfsThinkingGivingCultureDamnOverratedJoyce Author:Matthew Specktor
“Jay-Z isn't actually any better than James Joyce even though more people understand him. I'm more interested in what's meaningful within the lives of individuals. And fiction will always be central to the lives of certain people, which is all that matters.” PeopleMatterCertainIndividualFictionMeaningfulJoyce Author:Matthew Specktor
“There was a moment when the Berlin Wall came down and some people felt, "Oh capitalism won. That's the ideology we can believe in now."” PeopleBelieveMomentsFeltWallCapitalismDown AndIdeologyBerlinBerlin Wall Author:Matthew Specktor
“During the 90s, I watched a lot of people getting fat and prosperous, and I thought, culture itself is the casualty of this.” PeopleCultureFatsProsperousCasualties Author:Matthew Specktor
“These are the kind of movies that only a real apparatchik, someone who thinks that corporations are people, could love.” PeopleThinkingKindRealCorporations Author:Matthew Specktor
“Much to my surprise, there's a sense for people in the cable industry that fiction writers might actually be good at script writing. You can write dialogue!” PeopleWritingMightFictionIndustrySurpriseScriptsBe GoodDialogueCablesFiction Writers Author:Matthew Specktor
“I think having power ingrains people with a conservatism. There's a tendency to hedge one's bets. (Which explains a lot, actually, about why the movie business is the way it is, and why the publishing industry is too.)” PeopleThinkingWayIndustryTendenciesPublishingConservatismMovie BusinessPublishing Industry Author:Matthew Specktor
“We're a culture that's obsessed with people who make and who squander ridiculous amounts of wealth, which seemed an obsession well worth interrogating in a novel. That probably accounts for what some have called the book's "sweeping" feel, but I don't know that I set out to be cinematic. I wouldn't know how to do that in a novel, specifically.” PeopleCultureWealthNovelRidiculousObsessionObsessed Author:Matthew Specktor
“I grew up with such mixed feelings about LA, but I do love it. I grew up lectured by Woody Allen, for example, that LA was absurd, worthy of ridicule and contempt. Most people seem to describe Los Angeles as elementally despicable, or as someplace that requires an apology.” PeopleFeelingsWorthyAbsurdLos AngelesContemptApologyRidiculeWoodyMixed Feelings Author:Matthew Specktor
“People don't seem to have a problem with a romanticized New York, in fact that's almost all they ever do, in some sense, is romanticize that place. Los Angeles deserves the same courtesy.” PeopleProblemDeserveLos AngelesCourtesy Author:Matthew Specktor
“A Good Soldier is one of my favorite novels, for various reasons. But the class question is a good one, because it's not always easy to empathize with privileged people.” PeopleReasonEasyNovelSoldierMy FavoriteVarious Author:Matthew Specktor
