the beheMOTH of podcasts

So definitely took all of two seconds to think of the title for this week's b-l-o-g, all about my new favorite podcast "The Moth." I was like, let me think of something vaguely clever, oh, well, the word "moth" is in the word "behemoth" which means "monstrous in size and power" and this podcast is monstrously good, so what the hell, let's rock and roll. And that is your intro for today, nothing fancy, but it's serviceable. Now let's talk podcasts.

You guys, I love this show. It's basically semi-famous intelligentsia figures going up to a microphone and telling embarrassing stories about themselves in front of a live audience! YES! I first heard about it when Ira Glass used one of these monologues on an segment of "This American Life." Ira Glass played Malcolm Gladwell (of "Tipping Point" and "Blink" fame) talking about his first job at the Washington Post and how he would just f*** around trying to get weird phrases into the newspaper as opposed to being a serious journalist, like he is now. And I was like, a.) I love you so much Malcolm Gladwell I want to be in your fanclub and wear a pin with your name on it and b.) what the hell is this Moth podcast and is it as funny/good as this TAL segment was?

It is, you guys it is. From Adam Gopnik (of New Yorker fame) talking about online miscommunications with his teenage son to Mormon (Latter Day Saint, whatever) comedienne Elna Baker talking about falling in love with an atheist, the Moth brings you smart, funny people who tell you fifteen-minute rockstar anecdotes about their lives.

So, the Moth is based in New York, and I'm like "Of course it is." Everything good is always in New York, all the boroughs are always mocking me, like "Oh Kit, would you like to come see all the cool off-Broadway shows that are going on right now? Oh that's right, I forgot, you can't you have to live in LA forever." "Oh Kit, everyone's meeting in Central Park to have a water-gun fight and eat ice cream and maybe after we'll go to the Met and discuss post-modern art, do you maybe---Oh, Oh my God, I'm so sorry, I forgot. Have fun spending all your money on gasoline in LA" And I'm like, whatever New York, you're spending all your money on rent, and besides, I drive a hybrid, so I'm only really spending most of my money on gas. But I do have big NYC envy. Big time. 

Which is why I was SO, SO, SO excited to find out they do Moth events the first Tuesday of every month at the Tangier restaurant in Silverlake! I'm totally going the first Tuesday I have free, and I'm also really excited because the LA events are hosted by Brian Finklestein, who has a really hilarious episode on the podcast called "How I Earned my Bitter Badge." Believe me, you guys, he really, really did. You can actually submit to go up and tell your story at the LA/NYC events. I would do this except my organs would disintegrate inside my body if I had to speak in public and also I don't really have an interesting enough life. Like it's all entertainment-industry-y stuff, and no one wants to hear that, boring snoring.

This is a picture of various "Moth" people telling there stories. I just felt like this post needed another picture.

The Moth. Fun 15 minute podcasts once a week for everyone, AND performances for people that are "lucky" enough to live in LA and NYC.  Website is themoth.org. Podcast are available on ITunes- yeah they are!

So, despite my lack of interesting anecdotes, know that I am full-on, hardcore--

Affectionately Yours,

Kit Steinkellner

Bend it like Bender

So, again, as always, have an awesome excuse for not updating in a week and a half-ish.

Last week I was in Washington D.C, having been awarded a week-long fellowship at the 2008 Kennedy Center's American College Theater Festival. A play I wrote/co-produced went up at the festival (one of four featured productions out of like a million). Won the National Student Playwriting Award. And a 2008 Sundance Theater Lab Fellowship. And a publishing contract for the play from Samuel French. What up? 

This week I had to make up for all the work I didn't do while I was in D.C. Busy days, kids, busy days.

But now I'm back, and am doing a post I've been meaning to do for a while. It's all about the wonderful, magical world of Aimee Bender, a short-story author/novelist who I kind of have a huge book crush on. Here she is, looking very back-inside-sleeve adorable.

Note. Why is it that I only feature attractive artists on my blog? Or is it that I'm just so blindly in love with their talent I think they're all total hottie hot hotsters? This would be a topic for discussion if I allowed people to comment on my blog, which I don't, because I'm completely sensitive and afraid of vicious comments from anonymous haters. So you can just debate it in your own head. Or with me, if we know each other. Anyways. Aimee Bender. Let's do it.

Okay, here's the score. I've read both of Bender's collections of short stories, but not her novel. If I love her so much, why not read the novel? Because I have this weird thing where if I love an author to pieces, I don't want to read all of her/his stuff, I always want at least one book out there waiting for me. This is why I haven't read all of Haruki Murakami or Marcel Proust.

So Aimee Bender has written two volumes of short stories (she's featured in others, you can take point-ten seconds to google that if you want). These collections are....



AND, and, and---

Let's start with "Girl in the Flammable Skirt." 

I'm forwarning you right now, this collection isn't perfect. Bender's all about these completely bizarre, modern, pseudo-fairytales. Apparently she writes her stories first thing when she gets up in the morning, when she's still half-asleep. For better or for worse, you can kind of tell, especially in this first collection. Her stories have that odd-dream logic to them, the kind that totally makes sense when you're asleep, but seems crazy town when something mid-day jogs your memory and your remember that dream about angels in your swimming pool drowning Satan in a circus tent. It's not for everyone. But I'm totally in. 

In "Girl in the Flammable Skirt" a mermaid and an imp go to high school and fall in love. A man returns home from war to his sweetheart without lips. A grieving librarian has sex with every man that comes through the library doors. A  boy who has lost his parents receives the magic ability of being able to find all lost things, his parents being the only exception. This girl has no censor in her head! Bender's stories in this collection are this unbeatable mix of being way kooky and very human, and emotional, and ultimately sad. But most of all, rad. Rad, rad, rad.

Then in "Willfull Creatures", Bender totally goes off her meds and it's even a little bit better than "Flammable Skirt." I hate to pick favorites, but I've got to give you guys the truth, or at least my very subjective perception of it. Okay, get this, in "Creatures" Bender writes of a man who buys a miniature person at a pet store and proceeds to torture him, a woman whose potatoes turn into children, a pumpkin-head family whose latest child ends up with a flat iron head, a boy with key shaped fingers, yay!

YOU GUYS, YOU GUYS, are you as excited as I am?  I got so hyper and happy when I read Bender's stories, because I was raised on classic tried and true shorts, Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Edith Wharton, Raymond Chandler. I mean, I though Isaac Babel was a little out there but Bender, you guys, Bender brings the crazy home and it's just fab. She's totally  insane and and tells really great stories and I give her an A with seven pluses. Bender totally expands your mind so you don't need drugs, because between you and me, I think she's taking enough for the both of us. And I totally support her probable substance abuse, because it makes her write like a fairy-angel-mermaid-princess with magical word-organizing abilities. Plus she's a Los Angelesian, and I always get really excited when artists are from/live in LA, I feel like it gives my place of origin/current residence more cred.

Okay. That's all. Go read you guys. As always and forever, I am---

Affectionately Yours,

Kit Steinkellner

favorite childhood pastime RUINED!

If you don't want every Disney animated movie ever ruined for you, then don't watch the Media Education Foundation documentary "Mickey Mouse Monopoly." 

Actually, I take it back. Watch it, and then get Svengali or Will Smith from Men in Black to erase your memory for you so you can go back and watch "Little Mermaid" and "The Jungle Book" and not see all the subversive racism, sexism, and classism.

I recently saw this kick-ass little firecracker of a documentary for a film criticism class I'm taking. And when it was introduced as being an expose on how sexist and racist and corruptive ad evil Disney is, I was like, okay, I get it, I know, all Disney Princesses have waists as thin as their wrists and eyes as big as car tires and give girls skewed body images. And every four or five animated films, Disney deigns to make a film with nary a white person to be found (Mulan, Aladdin, half of Pocahontas.... eh, that's all I can come up with.) I mean, I knew Disney wasn't a

posterchild for the ACLU, but after watching "Mickey Mouse Monopoly", all I can say is by accident or design Disney has churned out a whole bunch of potentially damaging films.

Like "Beauty and the Beast." A beautiful story about not judging a book by its cover? Or a story that tells little girls to accept aggressive men that can't control themselves, and by being nice these men will eventually become princes. A fairy tale that condones domestic abuse?

Uh-oh, the line is getting blurry, blurry...

Or that many of the animal characters in these animated cartoons are actually thinly veiled (or not really veiled at all) demeaning and dangerous racial stereotypes.

Or how Disney made the problem in "Pocahontas" about "Why can't Europeans and Native Americans just get along?" As opposed to "Why can't the Europeans stop invading places and inflicting mass genocide onto innocent indigenous people?

There's lots more stuff about how Mulan isn't really a feminist role model, "Aladdin" is an aggressively racist view of the Middle East, but I don't want to spoil everything for you so I'll bring the talking points to a close.

So you're interest is piqued and you want to take a look at this fascinating/disturbing film.But how, oh how?

Your friend the internet is going to make it super-easy on you. Look- it's on youtube in five easy parts! And look, I'm going to make it even easier by imbedding the parts in the blog!

Enjoy having your childhood memories ruined! This is, bizarrely, a lot more fun then it sounds.

Til next time, I am...

Affectionately Yours,

Kit Steinkellner

favorite childhood pastime redux!

I have not written in this blog for over a month. I'm surprised my blog hasn't shoved all my stuff in a cardboard box and left in out on the lawn for college students and other shady personalities to peruse. I've been a super-sucky significant other, and i could blame finals, and spring break, and then the first week back at school, and those are all excuses, but nothing really exonerates me from sucking. I suck so hard. I'm sorry, blog.

Anyways. back with a new post. The other day, one of my friends, Mr. Sheehan O'Hero(n) was asking me what other podcasts I like to listen to, besides This American Life, and Radiolab, and Sound of Young America, and The Treatment, and I'm like, oh shoot, you're listing off all my usual recommendations, almost all of which I've recommended on this very blog. And then I realized I haven't really recommended to anyone the short story podcasts I like to listen to.

Check it out. So remember when parents/teachers/babysitters/people who were responsible for your well-being would read stories to you and it was so great and life was wonderful and the sun shone brightly on your baby-curl-covered little head? And then remember when you hit the age of like, 9 or 10 and all of a sudden no one would read to you anymore and that empty void descended upon you and you felt like you would never be whole ever again?

Solution found to  said void! Presenting... "PRI's Selected Shorts" and "The New Yorker:Fiction" podcasts! Fanfare and rejoicing, hurray, hurray!

So, PRI: Selected Shorts first.


First, the good news about Selected Shorts. It comes out every Monday with an hour of short stories (usually about 3, sometimes as few as 2 or as many as 5), is hosted by the classiest guy in New York City, Isaiah Sheffer, who invites fabulous actors of mostly the stage but sometimes the film (Cynthia Nixon has been known to grace the program) with readings of super-good short stories by such diverse authors as Anton Chekhov, Mavis Gallant, Aimee Bender, Mark Twain, Arthur Miller, Ring Lardner, Alice Munro, Grace Paley, John Updike, Etgar Keret (recommended by this blog a while ago!), Eudora Welty, and a bunch of other great writers who are, right, great. I listen to this podcast at the gym, but I always feel a little silly sweating bullets while listening to Chekhov and Munro dissect the fragile human psyche. Would recommend listening to this show with tea and cookies. Or riding home on the bus at dusk. Or on top of a peaceful mountain or on a white sand beach or some other place peaceful and a little bit romantic.

So that was the good news. The bad news is--- I don't think there is any bad news about this podcast. You get to listen to authors you love and meet new authors you will love and you get to be read aloud to and your life gets to be enriched. Sold!

So I also like the New Yorker Fiction podcast.


The actual podcast does have a logo but I couldn't find it on google or copy it from Itunes, so am just using the regular New Yorker logo, get over it.

So the fiction podcast is, surprise, surprise, hosted by New Yorker Fiction Editor Deborah Treisman (who has one of the best jobs ever, and yes I am green with envy/very worshipful and yes if I ever met her I would be so nervous I wouldn't be able to get full sentences out. Fact.) Treisman picks an author that the New Yorker has featured in recent years (E.L Doctorow, Jhumpa Lahri, George Saunders, Junot Diaz) who in turn, go through the New Yorker archives and pick out a story they love by authors like Isaac Babel, Tobias Wolff, John Cheever, Donald Barthelme, and reads that story to us. Afterwards, Deborah Treisman and the author Treisman picked have a talk about the story the author picked. It's all very good fun. This blog is super good, but it only comes out once a month (usually the first week of the month) and they only do one story. So right now PRI has the edge, with equal quality, but far more quantity. But you know what? This country is all about underdogs and comebacks, so the New Yorker Fiction podcast may very well come out on top one of these days.

In either case you don't have to choose- you can listen to them both! Highly recommended for people who love radio, people who love stories, and people who miss being read to.

Sorry for not blogging for like a month. I'll do better. Til next time, know that I am still, always always, despite everything...

Affectionately Yours,
Kit Steinkellner

18th century silhouettes, American racism, and postmodern art, oh my!

I have not updated my blog in a little over two weeks. I could blame finals, but the truth is I'm just a very bad person. I'm so sorry.

What kills me is the subject of today's post is something I've been wanting to cover those past two weeks. Finally got a free hour to do it. So let's rock this.

So right now through June the Hammer Museum in Westwood is featuring an exhibit by artist Kara Walker entitled "My Complement, My Enemy, My Oppressor, My Love" which is maybe my favorite title for a work of art since Dadaist Hannah Hoch's "Cut With The Kitchen Knife Dada Through The Last Weimar Beer Belly Cultural Epoch in Germany."

 Eh, Hoch actually might win the title competition. But Walker wins everything else. Check it.

This is Kara Walker being like "I'm totally hot enough to be a couture model, but I decided to be a culturally subversive artist instead, suck it!"

Since 1994, Kara walker has been creating room-length murals encorporating the 18th-century method of paper cut-out silhouettes into her work. She uses this antebellum method of entertainment/art to explore the inconsistencies of history and the subversive attraction/repulsion/even sexuality of racism. Though Walker is most famous for her silhouettes, the Hammer exhibit also features some of her shadow puppetry films, sketches, paintings, and collages.

Enough talking, let's get to everyone's favorite, pictures! Following, some of the images from the exhibit.

Trust me, the exhibit is so, so freaking cool in person. You'll be in this big white room literally surrounded by this mural and you'll be looking around and at first you're like "Oooh, silhouettes are pretty." Then you take a closer look and you're like "Wait, is that an antebellum lady of the house snatching a baby right out of her slave's womb?" And then when you come to the Uncle Tom mural you're like "Wait, Eliza's about to commit cerebral seppuku with a giant axe and a little boy is being born out Uncle T's behind--- what the hell, Kara Walker?"

What the hell indeed. Walker creates these strange murals that combine seeming idyllic antebellum visuals with racial/sexual imagery of the most disturbing nature. I like this kind of postmodern art because while it's definitely more tangible than a cardboard box with a shoe hanging over it in the middle of an empty gallery, Walker never explicitly spells out the message for you. Through her images, occasional poems/ oblique letters addressed to the viewer printed on the walls, the viewer must piece through the exhibit and come to his/her own conclusions regarding the uncomfortably close connections between racism and sexuality, between the past and the present, and between their enemies, oppressors, loves, and themselves. Bad ass.

The Hammer is located at 10899 Wilshire Blvd, Los Angeles, CA, 90024. Open Tues, Wed, Fri, Sat, 11AM-7PM, Thursday 11AM-9PM, Friday 11AM-5PM. Free for students every day, free for everyone Thursday, hooray!

Even though I've been sucking at keeping up this blog, please believe me when I say that I am now and forever...

Affectionately Yours,

Kit Steinkellner

my blog's not-so-secret-anymore crush on David Foster Wallace

It's true. Secret's out.

My blog is majorly, totally, butt-crazy in love with David Foster Wallace.

(Note. Yes that was a reference to "Clueless." And no, neither my blog or I are ashamed to quote that work in the least.)

So back to DFW. Oh man, you guys, DFW.

This is a dreamy sketch they did of him in "Salon" magazine.



This is what he really looks like. Um. My blog and I just voted. Even with the "Lestat" jacket, still dreamy enough to crush.


So DFW (because my blog/me are totally on initial basis with him) is a writer. But guys, he writes EVERYTHING, fiction, nonfiction, short stories-- and he's really brilliant/snarky/impeccably grammared in all he does.

I've only read two of his books, both nonfiction, "A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again," and "Consider the Lobster." I was really afraid that if I read any more of his work in such a short period of time, I would, like, OD on happiness.

Let's sum up " A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again" first.

Published in 1997, the fabulously eclectic essay subjects in this book range from his childhood tennis days to the insidious inside scoop on the cruise industry to the wonders/horrors (mostly horrors) of the Illinois State Fair, to how television is now affecting the next generation of prose writers to David Lynch to my favorite subject there ever was, POSTMODERNISM. DFW knows me like the back of his hand.

I'll admit some of the essays I was initially more excited to read than others. Like... "Mmm, the State Fair, really? Well, okay, DFW you're such a baller and a god, I'm going to trust you." And my trust definitely paid off. DFW-slice explores each essay subject to the nth degree and fills his essays with razor-sharp observations and tons of steeze ( that's street talk for "style with ease." I learned that in a Linguistic Anthropology Class. I am the biggest nerd in history). But seriously "Supposedly Fun Thing..." makes non-fiction seem almost as fun as fiction, and that is the highest compliment I can pay it.

Rollling on to " Consider the Lobster."



A decade later, DFW completely brings his A-game, and matches, and I'm just going to go ahead and say tops "Supposedly Fun." I mean, both books are so great, but "Consider the Lobster", you guys. Sighs. Oh, "Consider the Lobster."

The books essays range in subject matter from the title essay, the lob-lob industry in Maine, to the US porn industry and their annual awards ceremony to being along for John McCain's 2000 campaign trail ride (reading this in retrospect is fascinating), to profiling John Updike, Fyodor Dosteovsky, and a late-night radio talk show host. The book is dazzling. Again and again, DFW manages to live up to his "MacArthur Genius Grant" but also be totally funny, relatable, and self-deprecating,

Also, DFW is addicted to using footnotes on every page. Some of the footnotes in his books are longer than the page of text they are footnoting. He's pretty bad in "Supposedly Fun" and only gets worse with "Lobster." I think this is awesome.

Also, also, DFW uses words like "Solipsism", "Stendahlian" and "Synecdochic" like they are totally words every mother and child knows, why are you going to look them up on dictionary.com, you are so stupid! He's a little bit pretentious without meaning to be. Like I know DFW is just trying to use the most precise word, because he's just that kind of guy.("Hmmm, I could just say "Exaggerate," but "Synecdochic is just the more accurate word in the particular context.... I'm going for it.") So he ends up riddling his books with these million dollar SAT words, and it is awesome-blossom-possum, that is my party line on the issue. My blog's too.

When I circle back around to DFW, I'm totally hitting up his fiction and giving you all the full ace-reporter scoop. But for now, all I can say is his non-fiction is thought-provoking, cooler than school, spectacular-ness. Read, read.

Even though, like my friend/blog's crush DFW, I can err on pretentious sometimes, and even though I'm also aware that calling myself on it doesn't cancel out said pretentiousness, know that through all that ridiculous intelligentsia silliness I continue to be...

Affectionately Yours,

Kit Steinkellner

Fun listening to other people talk about themselves

So I'm still getting over the shock of being able to write TWO blogs in ONE week! Saints be praised! As it goes, I have an hour to kill, and that's just the perfect amount of time to write a salient, topical, blog. So let's do this!

I'm actually really excited because over the last few weeks I've fallen in love with this KCRW radio program/podcast and have been dying to share it with blogreaders and anyone that will listen.

"The Treatment" hosted by Elvis Mitchell. Sweet graphic below.

"The Treatment" is essentially Elvis Mitchell interviewing current Hollywood creative luminaries about their recent work. But guys, it's also so, so much more.
But first a brief word on host Elvis Mitchell. According to Wikipedia, Mitchell is an "African American public intellectual and former film critic for the New York Times (1998-2004)." The article talks about his freewheeling, stream-of-consciousness style of critique, makes mention of "The Treatment" as well as a film project he is working on with about race, culture, and success, with the likes of Toni Morrison, Chris Rock, and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. However, nowhere in the article does the anonymous Wikipedia scribe talk about Mitchell's totally crazy hair. Nary a mention.

This makes me trust Wikipedia a lot less as a source for information.

But seriously, Mitchell's hair is totally wacky, but his interviewing style is completely thoughtful and chill. He has this weird talent of almost disappearing into the interview, like we don't notice him interviewing, just the subject being interviewed. Which is crazy in a really good way. Because his questions are all really thoughtful and interesting, it's just that he so seamlessly and organically blends them into the conversation. I've been going on about this for a while, but I just think it's a really cool thing.

So onto the subjects he interviews. Check it out people. In the last few months he's interviewed...

The Coen "Violence is the new black" Brothers on  writing/directing "No Country For Old Men."

Jason "I'm not Ivan, I'm Jason" Reitman on directing "Juno."

(Superfluous Note: Jason went to USC film school, and every time I look at a picture of him I'm like "Of course he did." And this isn't a USC diss, though as a UCLA film student I guess that would be par for the course. But it's not. JayReit just seems really freaking USC to me and I don't know why.)

Nancy "Nutsiest Conceit of the Year" Oliver on writing "Lars and the Real Girl"

Tamara "You though Slums of Beverly Hills was going to be my last film? Ha! Got you!" Jenkins on writing/directing "The Savages."

(Superfluous Note: Tamara Jenkins and me both like taking our pictures black and white, soft focus. I feel like I've found a kindred spirit. But seriously, it's just prettier)

And Tony "Violence is the new Smart" Gilroy for writing every Bourne movie ever and writing/directing Michael Clayton.

And many, many,many more. Hearing these interviews about the respective movies is like a really fun Sparknotes for said films. How did the Coen brothers adapt Javier Bardem's scarier-than- f*** character Chigurh from novel to film? What went on in Nancy Oliver's 7 year writing process of "Lars?" How did Jason Reitman direct the creepiest pedo-scene of the year between Jason Bateman and Ellen Page in "Juno"? How did Tony Gilroy's vaguest pitch in the history of pitching get "Michael Clayton" made?

You're going to have to listen to the podcast to find out. Bonus points for the juicy personal details that slip out every once in a while, like wunderkind Jason Reitman citing dating a 26-year-old woman when he was 16 as the reason for his early maturation/bursting onto the scene at Sundance at 19. It's really juicy. Just listen.

One half-hour podcast a week, guys,available on Itunes or KCRW.com. Recommended for film-y people, culture-y people, or just people that like listening to interesting people talk about themselves.

All right, 2 blogs in a week! This is the start of something good. Signing off for now, and though I don't have the crazy credits of aforementioned creative superstars, or the revolutionary hair of Elvis Mitchell, know that I continue and continue to be...

Affectionately Yours,

Kit Steinkellner

Purple Rose of A-maaazing

So when I said twice a week I definitely meant once a week.

My blog is totally looking at me with betrayed eyes.

Oh- it just went off to cry in the corner.

I would love to do twice a week. Oh my God, I would love to do every day. But there are big ass time constraints right now. And thus-- we're rolling one a week for the time being. I will happily update if conditions change.

So it makes me really happy when I hear that some of the movies I recommended have been going on friends Netflix queues. 

Here's another one for the queue. Woody Allen's favorite Woody Allen film and mine too. Not Annie Hall, not Manhattan, fools it's...

PURPLE ROSE OF CAIRO! (Note. I love how this poster is like 1/4 picture and 3/4 patting itself on the back with pull-quotes. But it's cool. This movie deserves to pat itself on the back. Because it is awesome. So. Much. So.)

So here's how it goes down. The 1985 film centers on Cecilia (played by the luminous Mia Farrow)who is a screw-up waitress in Depression-Era New Jersey.

Cecilia is horrible at her job, is trapped in an abusive relationship, and overall it just sucks to be Cecilia. The only joy in her life are the movies, which she attends compulsively. After watching the screwball romance "The Purple Rose of Cairo" a record number of times, the handsome young lead, archeologist Tom Baxter (Jeff Daniels) starts talking to Cecilia from the screen. Having fallen in love with her, he steps down from the screen into real life to be with Cecilia. When the studio finds out about this, and furthermore finds out that other Tom Baxters in other prints want to leave the screen as well,  they send the actor that plays Jeff Daniels, Gil Shepard (also Jeff Daniels) to go sort things out with his fictional persona. Gil Shepard ends up falling in love with Cecilia tooand Cecilia has to choose between fiction and reality. I won't spoil the ending, but the last scene practically revolutionizes the term "bittersweet." Yes I cry every time. That and "The Notebook" punch me right in the tearducts. So, so, so good.

This movie is just so brilliant. First off, because it's about movies and is just meta enough to be intriguing and hip and just emotional enough to be a real story and a real movie as opposed to like, some snotty screenwriting experiment. Also, it's romantic without being sentimental, smart without being cynical and awesome without being, you know, not awesome.

This is a great rent you guys. Start those Netflix Queues up!

I really want to try to post again this week, but might have to wait til next week. Til then, just know that whether you be real readers or fictional characters that have stepped out of your imaginary realm to read this blog, know that I am...

Affectionately Yours,

Kit

the world literally at your fingertips

So my blog is definitely feeling like my neglected child right now.

Blog: You used to update me like every other day!

Me: I know, Blog, I'm sorry I've been slacking.

Blog: Do you-- like-- (sniffles)-- not like me anymore?

Me: No, Blog, shut up,  I love you, you know that! I just have to work on my screenplay, and my pilot, and my webisode series, and all these plays I have going up...

Blog: What do they have that I don't?

Me: Well, they have due dates.

So, I have been sickeningly busy, but to make my blog (and myself) feel better, am going to try to update this sucker twice a week.

Blog: All right, guilt-tripping!

Yes, Blog, it's a compromise, but hopefully one that can be, if not agreeable, then at least acceptable to all parties involved.

(All the writers getting ready to go off strike are like "Gee, that sounds familiar.")

But back to the subject of the post. So I have been getting a little bit of time in for reading this quarter--

Blog- Wait- what? You had time for reading but you didn't have a measly hour to update--.

Me: Shh, Blog, shhh. It's for you.

Blog: Oh. Right. Oh.

So anyway, I think most people can agree that a book serves one of two purposes, if not both. It...

a.) Educates you.

b.) Helps you escape and lets you experience things you either temporarily or permanently can't attain in your own life.

Let's focus on B for the time being. I really like my life. I love my family, boyfriend, friends, where I live, my school work, my writing work, my work work. Life is awesome. I have so much.

But this is what I don't really have. I don't have far-flung world travels. I don't have adventure oozing out through every pore in my body. I don't have that.

That's why I read "The Adventures and Misadventures of Maqroll," by Alvaro Mutis.

This book, you guys, this book. So good. More like a collection of novellas then a traditional beginning-middle-end novel, "Maqroll" is the story of the same-named sailor  also called Gaviero, or "The Lookout", who travels around the world, constantly encountering misadventure and tragedy when he stays on land for too long. A sailor that is doomed to constantly wander the sea, a man that is incapable of forming roots. The novellas, if you will, jump back and forth in time, as we follow Maqroll through his misadventures that include tangles with brothels, drug cartel, military coups,  murder and mayhem, the list goes on and on. Pretty much almost everything I'm not getting in my life right now. Mutis' "Maqroll" novellas have been compared to the works of Miguel Cervantes and Joseph Conrad, though Mutis insists his influences are more along the lines of Charles Dickens and Marcel Proust.

Is this literarily appetizing to you? Because it is to me.

Yes, the book can sometimes be a little bit dense, as are all books that are not Goosebumps, Choose-Your-Own-Adventure, or written by Dan Brown. But it's worth the slight push sometimes, because once you get going in the world of Maqroll, the mix of vicariously living through Gaviero's adventures and schadenfreudenly being grateful for not living through is misadventures is unbeatable, people, for reals.

This is a picture of el Maestro Mutis. Ay, ay, ay!

A note on the origins of Mutis and "Maqroll." So, as John Updike puts it in his Times review of the book, "Bogota-born, Brussels-raised, Mexico City-dwelling poet and prose writer Alvaro Mutis" spent much of his youth on the sea, much like his main character Maqroll, going from port to port, reveling in the wonders of the world and reviling the respective horrors as he travelled along. Originally a poet, Mutis was writing about el Gaviero since he was 19 years old, only at the time, Maqroll was a character in his poems. It was only when Mutis was in his 60's that he began to write a poem about Maqroll that was so long he realized it was a novel. This "poem" became the first novel in "Adventures and Misadventures, "The Snow of the Admiral."

I note this because it's interesting, but also because I want to make a point. This character of Maqroll stayed with Mutis for over 40 years. This is the power of this character, and the stories that Gaviero inspires have a similar far-reaching magic and staying power. It's just good, smart reading people. 

And the intellectual elite will love you for it. Seriously, the password is "Mutis." Say it and you're in.

Also, Mutis is known to be life-long best friends with Gabriel Garcia-Marquez. He got the GGM seal of approval! Seriously guys, what are you waiting for!

So if you need a little more adventure in your life, or if you're like me, and just need adventure period, then "The Adventures and Misadventures of Maqroll" is for you, fools!

Happy travels, everyone! And for the record, whether your life is as action-packed as Maqroll's, as non-action-packed as mine, or somewhere in between, know that I am always..

Affectionately Yours,
Kit

music is so popular right now

So I haven't updated since Monday, and I just have to ask what is up with that?

It was a crazy week everyone. I had my play "A Small Pair of Feet in the Middle of the Sea" open at UCLA, began shooting the pilot for the internet series "Odyssey Years" with my writing/producing partner/bff Sarah "Rockstar" Masson and our awesome cast/crew, and had to do intense 40-hour surgery on the first act of my screenplay. I also went to classes. And sometimes slept. It's been busy.

But all this hectic scheduling gave me an super idea for a post. This post. Because what kept me more or less sane throughout this Wonderland-esque mindf*** of a week has been,of course, what soothes the savage beasts, the language of love, the purest form of art.....MUSIC!

So I thought it would be nice to profile a few artists I've been listening to/relistening to lately. 

A brief note on why I haven't talked about music on the blog as of yet. I'm not really that much of an expert. Like, I feel fairly confident giving you all the lowdown on books and radio, even movies. I feel pretty in touch with what's up and coming and/or off the beaten track in these mediums.

But in music I'm just a follower. I'll be like, "Oh wow, Feist is so cool!" And everyone else is like, "Um, yeah Kit, we've known that for, what? 15 months already?" And I'm like "This is why I shouldn't talk about music because it makes me look lame and behind the times as opposed to snarky and on the pulse." And everyone else is like, "Yeah."

Howevs,  I think the artists I'm repping today actually aren't on everyone-and-their-immediate-and-extended-family's-radar. For once, I might actually be kind of ahead of this music thing. Or at least on top of it. I disabled the comment section of this blog, so no one can asswipe-ishy contradict me. I'll keep my delusions intact. Today, I am a cutting edge, miles ahead of the crowd, Buddy-Holly-glasses wearing, band-you've-never-heard-of-t-shirt-clad, circulation-impairing-skinny-jeans-donned, dorkily-awesome music critic.

Enough introduction, let's roll.

1.) YAEL NAIM

This is Yael being like "Brunette actresses who play the quirky love interest in independent movies, I am the real life version of you so grab those forks and eat your hearts out."

So Yael is Israeli and by proxy, magic. Yael is just this second blowing up hardcore. Her song "New Soul" is the music they play in the new MacBook Air ads. And yes, the song is just as bad-ass as the platonic-ideals-of-computers that it helps advertise. "New Soul" is currently the number two song on ITunes. Sarah Bareilles, who is amazing and had that spot for like weeks with her "Love Song" is  so pissed about being knocked off her second-best pedestal, and is currently sticking pins in the vocal chords of a home-made Naim voodoo doll.

But I digress. "New Soul" is a great song, perfect for dancing around you apartment and pretending you don't have work to do. The rest of the album is not as dance-y, but just as fab. Beautiful melodies set to lyrics the flow from English to Hebrew to French back into English. You just feel a little more peaceful and cool listening to Naim. My friend Coco Kleppinger recommended me Naim and she recommended brilliantly. A great album to listen to while lying on your bed and looking up at the ceiling. Or driving in the rain. Or kissing your B'sheret, that's Hebrew for "soulmate." Naim's new album is currently my musical B'sheret.   Yael Naim's self-titled album, available on record industry-destroying behemoth, ITunes. Check it.

SPECIFIC SONGS THAT WILL MAKE YOU FEEL MAGICAL JUST LIKE NAIM-  "Too Long", "New Soul", "Shelcha" and "7 Baboker"

2.) CARLA BRUNI

There are two of you who are like, "Why is this name familiar? Wait, is that the model-slash-singer mademoiselle that just shotgun-weddinged the pants off of French President Nicholas Sarkozy?"

Yes, it totally is. And people are going to hold this against Bruni and think she's a gold-digger and not respect her work. And this is sad because while she may be a gold-digger (... I mean, maybeeeee she's really in love with Sarkozy and doesn't care about being First Lady of France and getting a major-career boost and maybeeeee Sarkozy is really love with her mind and not just her hot legs) she's not talentless. Girl is bursting with talent, it's stupid how good her music is. I first discovered Bruni almost two years ago when I was in NYC getting my play produced Off-Broadway at Playwright's Horizons. I was really lonely because I didn't have a lot of friends in NYC, so I spent a lot of time (and right, money) downloading music and listening to it while I walked through New York. I downloaded some really stupid albums like "Panic! At the Disco" and I am woman enough to admit it. 

But I also downloaded super-good stuff like Carla Bruni and her "Quelqu'un m'a dit." This album is like "I'm sweet, snarky, 21st century French Cafe music, love me, want me, need me." And I'm like "Quelqu'un, I do, I do." The songs in this are sometimes melancholy, but mostly Bruni composes in the genre of sweet-and-sour jaunty tunes, and I love it. This is the kind of music that makes you feel like a cool expatriate even if you're stuck in America with no escape in sight, at least none that the near future holds. Bruni is also good making-out-music if your significant other is cosmopolitan and low key but also fun. I tend to like make-out/driving music, or I tend to make the music I like fit into those categories. Personal quirk! So give Bruni a chance, she may be gorgeous and have France in the palm of her hand, but she's also really talented and I totally have a fun-music-with-lyrics-I-can't-understand crush on her work.

Carla Brunis' "Quelqu'un m'a dit," available at Harbringer of the Apocalypse ITunes.
SPECIFIC SONGS THAT WILL MAKE YOU FEEL LIKE A BADASS EXPATRIATE- "Raphael", "Tout le monde, " L'excessive" and "La derniere minute."

3.) MASON JENNINGS

So we just have to talk about how dumb it is that pop-folk singer-songwriter Mason Jennings hasn't (yet) achieved the same level of popularity of singer-songwriters like Ben Folds and Rufus Wainwright whom I also love a lot, but whom Jennings is absolutely equal to. Jennings is like that well-travelled, worldly-wise friend you live vicariously through and secretly want to be. He muses about life, love, death, and the matters that connect the three in the most intelligent, accessible, and original way. Jennings is also driving music, preferably driving alone on a highway in the middle of the night thinking about the MEANING of it ALL.

 That makes Jennings sound ponderous, he's not, he's much too wry and funny to be anything like that. One of his songs literally starts off like this "This is a bullet from a gun called what the f***?" I love this man. His songs are about embracing life and not fearing death and I personally don't think there's anything more noble to write/compose about. His music makes me want to put on my well-worn Converses and slip on my ten-pound traveler's backpack and just wander around the world and fricking live. 

Unfortunately, have too many obligations, projects, commitments, attachments, so that all will have to wait. But someday, if I'm free enough and listen to Jennings' albums on repeat enough times, I just might walk out that door and into the sunset and not come back for like a month and a half. For reals. Thanks to my boyfriend Brian, who recommended Mason Jennings to me. Thanks in turn to Willie Chase his friend first, but also now mine too, who first recommended Jennings to Brian. And thanks to Jennings for existing.

Mason Jenning's available on "Simultaneously convenient/insidious" ITunes.

SPECIFIC SONGS THAT WILL MAKE YOU FEEL LIKE WANDERING THE UNIVERSE-

"Bullet" and "Adrian" off of "Century Spring", "Crown" off of "Use Your Voice", "Confidant" off of "Birds Flying Away" "Darkness Between Fireflies" and "Butterfly" off of his self-titled album.

Back soon with more smarter-ing, better-ing things. I might be a little behind it all musically, but I am totally on top of being...

Affectionately,

Kit Steinkellner