"... it’s hard to determine the line between truth-telling and hot air. Hollywood is 'flogging nonsense,' populated by 'criminal dolts' in a 'lickspittle racket' policed by 'Diversity Capos' Sometimes the complaint is delivered in the form of tortured metaphors... Sometimes it arrives in the twitterpated grievance patter of the anti-PC crowd: 'We knew [a movie villain] of old by his Black Mustache, or his Black Hat; and today by his white skin.' Often it is laced with very Mamet-ian profanity. Sometimes, alas, it comes in cartoon form.... A depiction of Disney’s 'early attempts at animation' shows a hand lowering a mouse into a film projector. One drawing likens an Oscar statuette to a vibrator. The less said about the ones featuring Cookie Monster, 'Shoah' and Harvey Weinstein, the better...."
Writes Mark Athitakis, in
"David Mamet is mad at Hollywood. His new book yells why. In an essay collection, ‘Everywhere an Oink Oink,’ the writer and director spews insults at Tinsel Town, especially at the filmmakers who rejected him" (WaPo).
And here's the book —
"Everywhere an Oink Oink/An Embittered, Dyspeptic, and Accurate Report of Forty Years in Hollywood" (commission earned).
I bought it.
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40 comments:
I always liked what Orson Welles had to say about Hollywood:
"It really was a brutal place, and when I take my own life out of it and see what it did to other people, I see that the story of that town is a dirty one, and its record is bad."
Hating PedoWood ought to be as American as apple pie...but for some reason people still give these clowns money. Seems to be a trend.
Good, I hope you can blog about it. As for Mamet, he did one great movie Glenn Garry Glenn Ross, and his other credits are C+ to B- material. He has 49 screenplays (most adaptations) to his credit, so Hollywood certainly gave him a lot of money and a lot of work.
Its humorous to look back at my ignorance in the 80s and 90s. I actually thought Mamet wrote Ronin, That winslow boy, and Postman rings twice, when they came out. I also thought "About last night" was really cool as a teenager, when its actually very cringe.
When coupled with the actors' strike and a long run of massive Disney film losses, so ends the Woke Hollywood era. Even the left must have ideological fatigue by now, and must feel the gnawing hypocrisy about the groupie/casting couch culture since 2017 (i.e., sudden rejections of Trump, Al Franken, Weinstein, Woody Allen, etc. after decades of literally sucking up to them). Then...they had the gall to immediately embrace transgenderism, child mutilation, enforced female second-class status, and antisemitism (in career suicide moves per the strong Jewish presence in Hollywood).
Another day of Hollywood with the attention span of a gnat and eager to sell its soul to the highest bidder. For fame. I'm sure that rah-rah patriotism will have another day in the sun, even if this time they promote Chinese nationalism. Flash back to John Wayne supporting the Vietnam war:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Green_Berets_(film)
I wonder if Amazon will limit comments to verified purchasers as with Liz Cheney's book.
Glengarry Glenn Ross is on my list of movies I want to watch that I never get around to.
…and he ain’t lying!
Mamet is a liberal turned conservative. And there are real pigs in the entertainment industry. Surprise, surprise!
"Just in time for Christmas, when you need a gift for that weird old uncle who is upset that everyone gets a trophy in youth soccer, comes a new David Mamet book.
“Everywhere an Oink Oink: An Embittered, Dyspeptic and Accurate Report of Forty Years in Hollywood” is a collection of observations, stories and aphorisms about Hollywood from one of America's foremost writers and, these days, provocateurs. It is virtually unreadable."
The Daily Sun, making me laugh
GGR isn't about salesmanship. It's about failure and vanity.
Athitakis writes like Grok.
From the blurb at the Amazon link: "...this memoir describes a world gone by, some of our most beloved film stars with their hair down, and how it all got washed away by digital media and the woke brigade. The book is illustrated throughout with three-dozen of Mamet’s pungent cartoons and caricatures."
The WaPo article is an expected woke brigade rebuke.
The left turned on Mamet years ago because his criticisms of leftism are pretty devastating.
Coffee is for closers.
"... it’s hard to determine the line between truth-telling and hot air. Hollywood is 'flogging nonsense,' populated by 'criminal dolts' in a 'lickspittle racket' policed by 'Diversity Capos".
Like WaPo, then? I think the WaPo is trying to get people to not buy the book.
I hate to say it, RealSpaceMountain, Orson Welles may have said that, but he stayed in Hollywood till the end of his life/career.
i think that Mamet may have a small case of sour grapes. Fading talent, fading relevance may have contributed to that. Hmmmm
Vicki from Pasadena
I ran into a friend at the Nashua, New Hampshire restaurant I went to for a late lunch/early dinner yesterday. He was using docusign on his iPhone to sign the papers for a place in Naples, Florida.
Glengarry Glen Ross is a great movie but I couldn’t help thinking when rewatching it recently that the people who bought into the Florida real estate development they were peddling 30 to 40 years ago likely did very, very well on their investment.
Did Mamet experience and report any "casting couch" requirements, a la female actresses and Weinstein? Does he comment on same, or is it all about him, and not getting his $$$$ for his work?
Writers have always been low on the heirarchy of respect, and respectability, from today's Hollywood to Shakespearean England, and probably to the scribes of clay tablets in Mesopotamia. So what, their words endure. If Mamet wrote an book about his disrespect by Hollywood, with the skill he brought to his other works, it would probably make a better movie than the atrocious "Babylon" of 2022.
Love Mamet.
Genius. He became a conservative based upon his study and reading.
I'm buying the book right now via the Althouse portal.
The Untouchables was a great movie.
I also like Mamet's heist movies.
"i think that Mamet may have a small case of sour grapes. Fading talent, fading relevance may have contributed to that. Hmmmm"
Hmmmm, just like you. Stay mad.
I haven't seen a movie in a theater for six or seven years now, except for the recent "Sound of Freedom" with Cavaziel, and even that was mostly to spite Hollywood rather than an actual desire to be entertained. When my wife and I watch movies on TV, which is also fairly rare for me, they are usually black and white classics from the Golden Age. I don't really need amusement, and for the most part I ignore everything except old nonfiction books and Jeopardy and an occasional sporting event.
Hollywood is a sewer, and the people in the entertainment industry are some of the most evil and despicable on the planet. When my beautiful little daughter was having her cheeks pinched by well meaning ladies, and being told she should get lessons in acting and modeling, I was quite outspoken that she would go into the show-business snake pit only over my dead body. My wife's friends thought I was a controlling right-wing asshole, and I was glad for the opportunity to prove them right.
“i think that Mamet may have a small case of sour grapes. Fading talent, fading relevance may have contributed to that. Hmmmm.”
LOL! Even in his later years, David Mamet’s talent puts the pretenders in their place. So sorry, little old lady from Pasadena!
lickspittle - there's that great word again.
I liked Glengarry Glenross as a movie. It had about as much to do with the reality of selling as Elmer Fudd has to do with the reality of rabbit hunting. GG was a well done, fun to watch cartoon.
I did not know much about David Mamet until you posted on his last book a year or two back. Based on your comments, I downloaded the sample, liked it and bought the book. I still don't know much more about him other than the book but based on that, he seems like an interesting fellow. Good recommendation, thank you.
I have downloaded the sample of this book and suspect I will eventually buy it.
Shooter Baldwin appeared for 7 minutes and won an oscar for his performance. Best thing in the whole movie and I did find the sales talk realistic and inspiring.
It is always well worth watching. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=czOpDN8Knr4
John Henry
Mitch and Murray couldn't be reached for comment.
The left turned on Mamet years ago because his criticisms of leftism are pretty devastating.
...all you need to know and if you don't think so I challenge you to go back and read what they wrote about him before he rejected their politics. Talk about tongue bath...
"Writes Mark Athitakis..."
Another WaPo scab!
"yells" "spews"
Anything harshing Hollyweird.
Glengarry Glen Ross is like the All-Star Game for actors. Jack Lemon killed. Ed Harris killed. Even that swine Spacey was a virtuoso. Baldwin, whom I detest, was effin' great.
Mamet's conversion to conservatism has mostly made him go from creative to cranky. No great work, toppling the chess board, happened. He just started saying angry white guy shit, like calling NPR "National Palestinian Radio," and that was where his muse got stuck. I know the feeling, so don't think I'm being too harsh. This world changes you. Sometimes against your will. Trying to find your way back, to doing your authentic work, is a lot for any artist to wrestle with.
He appears to be losing.
Dave and I went to the same liberal Chicago prep school. It was a liberal in the traditional sense of the word.
Students were taught HOW to think not WHAT to think. That is why Dave and I are no longer lefties.
Unfortunately, the school has now gone woke.
Bought the book.
Mamet is the writer closest to the late Tom Wolf.
I've enjoyed his movies....State/Main, Oleanna, the Spanish Prisoner etc. I've enjoyed even more his wife, Rebecca Pidgeon who played in most of his films. It made me wonder why she didn't appear in other films by others.... was she deemed not talented?
Mamet writes for the National Review which was surprising.
The 1994 film, Oleanna, is brilliant. It demonstrates how a lie/delusion can become bigger and bigger until it destroys everyone involved.
From 2008:
https://www.villagevoice.com/david-mamet-why-i-am-no-longer-a-brain-dead-liberal/
I have not seen nor read any of his work....
Given Mamet's age it no wonder that he's less creative. It's the rare artist who writes or paints or composes as well in the late stages of his life as in his energetic youth. The true measure of what he has done is the way his community in Hollywood has done a 180 in reaction to his altered political leanings. Had the reassessment of Mamet's talent preceded his political turnabout there might be something to it, but if there are any sour grapes here it is Hollywood drinking that brand of wine, not Mamet.
Given Mamet's age it no wonder that he's less creative. It's the rare artist who writes or paints or composes as well in the late stages of his life as in his energetic youth. The true measure of what he has done is the way his community in Hollywood has done a 180 in reaction to his altered political leanings. Had the reassessment of Mamet's talent preceded his political turnabout there might be something to it, but if there are any sour grapes here it is Hollywood drinking that brand of wine, not Mamet.
'He just started saying angry white guy shit,...'
What does 'white' have to do with anything?
Madison Mike: "Mamet writes for the National Review which was surprising."
This wont last forever as National Review is sliding inexorably to the left since that's where there major funding is coming from (Google in particular) under the astonishingly weak and insulting-to-the-memory-of-Buckley "leadership" of Rich Lowry.
Think of them as being in Early Stage Weekly Standard/The Bulwark/Lincoln Project Mode (with apologies to actual conservative Weekly Standard publisher Phil Anschutz who pulled the plug on those hacks Jonah Goldberg and Steve Hayes).
I suspect in time, like the others and including Drudge who sold to the left, National Review will be institutionally captured and come to no longer appreciate the contributions of actual conservatives and will become Dhimmis to the lefty billionaire bucks.
"So, that happened."
- Alec Baldwin
Joe Smith said...
'He just started saying angry white guy shit,...'
What does 'white' have to do with anything?
Says a man pretending he lives in Sweden or something. When Richard Pryor was alive, white Americans knew they're a stereotype, as much as they've made blacks one. Angry white guys will deny it now. The new white guys don't care. They're "in the club" with the rest of us, thank God.
It's been lonely out here.
Yeah. The guy who depicted a raped and murdered child as a "gynecological smell" in one of his novels because she was a gentile. Screw him. No matter what else he says, unless it's an apology to the family.
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