Dana Brown, DILETTANTE: True Tales of Excess, Triumph, and Disaster
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[0:54]Dana Brown is the author of Dilla Taunt, True Tales of Excess, Triumph and Disaster
[1:03]Dana is the former deputy editor of Vanity Fair where he was responsible for hundreds of future stories on topics
[1:09]reigning from geopolitics to business
[1:10]Pop culture to crime and high society scandal to the art world a number of which were recognized by the National Magazine
[1:16]Awards
[1:17]He has also written and developed films and television pilots for Miramax Hulu AMC imagine entertainment and CBS
[1:23]He lives in New York City
[1:25]Welcome Dana. Thank you so much for coming on mom's don't have time to read books to discuss
[1:28]Dilla Taunt, True Tales of Excess, Triumph and Disaster
[1:32]Thank you so much for having me my pleasure. So you may not know this but
[1:38]The summer of my freshman year of college. I interned at Vanity Fair
[1:42]Oh, wow
[1:44]Okay, I remember you being there and running around the office because I was like, who's that guy?
[1:51]That's so funny
[1:52]And I guess now it was like, you know, you had just started the year before so when I saw your book I met
[1:58]I was like, oh my gosh. Was that the guy who was like great and gorgeous assistant when I was at Vanity Fair with that summer
[2:03]What a small world. Oh my god. That's amazing. Yeah, I was part of like that, you know, every summer
[2:09]They had this like rotating. Yeah
[2:11]Yeah, I got to go away
[2:14]Let me ask you a question. Was it a good experience? Was it a valuable experience? Did you have fun?
[2:19]It was a good experience
[2:21]It's so funny though because you had a line in here that was like exactly how I felt about it
[2:25]Although I want to find it with there being kind of no path to being in author. Let me see if I
[2:32]Can find it. Yeah, you said there wasn't a lot of upward mobility at Vanity Fair
[2:36]You were either an assistant or an editor of some sort and there wasn't much daylight in between
[2:40]It was hard to make that leap to the next level easy to get caught in the middle
[2:44]And I hadn't had the experience of working directly with a text editor
[2:47]Like the other assistants or the foundation of an education and a degree in history or a literature
[2:52]The institutional knowledge I had accrued was useful
[2:54]And I was overflowing with it, but that wasn't enough to carry me on to carry me to the next level
[2:59]Yeah, it was like this that was like the story of my life for like and almost a decade
[3:05]And I have a memoir that comes out very soon called bookends and memoir of love last literature
[3:11]And I have like three pages all about my time Vanity Fair and how I put in I couldn't get
[3:17]I was like after the first day there. I was like, okay, there is no path
[3:23]Like I am filing author contracts. I am not going to be an author if I stay here
[3:28]Yeah, that's so funny. That's so funny. Yeah. I mean listen
[3:31]It was really true back. I mean, I don't know if it's true anymore. I think maybe they're there
[3:36]You know, I think that's been such a huge shift in the business is like is like the older people and I'm including myself among this
[3:42]Like we don't know what's going on with technology
[3:45]You know what I mean
[3:46]And so we need these kids to be to tell us be like no, no, no
[3:49]You have to be on TikTok and we're like whoa, what's TikTok? You know what I mean? Yeah
[3:53]It's so true
[3:54]I remember and I don't know maybe you were at this meeting too
[3:57]But there was a big panel discussion on
[4:00]The internet and how it would affect magazines at Conde Nast
[4:05]And everyone was like no it'll be fine
[4:08]Like we don't have to worry about it
[4:09]But like FY this is coming and blah, blah, blah
[4:12]And I was like sitting there in the boardroom being like oh, yeah, okay
[4:15]And now like there are basically no more magazines. It's like that thing ever
[4:20]It like decimated the magazine population in in two decades
[4:23]It's so funny because we did
[4:25]There was a guy who was at the effort a little while and named Toby Young
[4:29]Who wrote that book about fit? Yeah
[4:31]Did you have so good?
[4:32]No, it was so it was but his book was amazing
[4:35]Yeah, yeah, well his book well
[4:36]I mean it was this book came out like 20 years ago, I think
[4:39]So we're making sense of it
[4:40]It was how to alienate how to how to lose friends and alienate people
[4:45]He wrote like a charter goal in like 95 or 96 and Toby's a great guy
[4:50]It was really talented and ended up going back to the UK and and becoming
[4:54]I think a pretty pretty successful restaurant critic
[4:57]But he had done one of those little like humorous
[4:59]Charticles comparing the internet to the CB radio of the 70s
[5:04]And how it was basically the modern version of that
[5:06]And it was just like totally taking the piss out of the internet
[5:10]And I look back at that now and I'm like oh boy
[5:12]We pissed off the internet and it came after us
[5:18]You and Toby Young
[5:20]Making down the magazine world
[5:22]Absolutely
[5:23]Well, I read your book with with so much interest from this particular vantage point
[5:27]But I would have been interested in it regardless because you lived through as I mean
[5:32]I left magazines after that one summer
[5:34]But you stayed and like showed us what it was all like and all the twist and turns and even your
[5:40]Sort of in-depth description of how you even were plucked from security to do this job in the first place
[5:46]Why do you can you tell listeners a little bit about how you were just at this like you know industry hotspot and yeah
[5:52]Of course, it's sort of it's funny because it's it's a ran into somebody of my generation
[5:58]And I guess your generation who had been at Vanity Fair with me back then and and they read the book
[6:02]And they'd known some some of my backstory
[6:04]But but she said to me she was like boy
[6:06]She's like when you told me you're running a book
[6:08]I was like what's he gonna write about what's it gonna be like and she said
[6:11]But nobody could have really told this story in the way that you did because because I was like
[6:17]Literally the only person that came in this way. I'll try to be brief
[6:20]But I was I was like a total screw up as a kid
[6:25]You don't have to be brief. This is your up. This is your up. Okay
[6:29]By the way, thank God because I'm terrible at being brief
[6:32]Like you know being brief for me, but I was really sort of I was I was you know
[6:36]I was 21 years old in in the spring of
[6:39]1994 I was working behind the bar of a restaurant called 44
[6:44]I was mostly a bar back
[6:46]But occasionally I was I was bartending and 44 was was like the media
[6:52]Media fashion hotspot like lunch and dinner and and drink place and it was uh
[6:58]It was a restaurant in the lobby of the Royalton Hotel on 44th Street kind of right around the corner from Conde Nast's
[7:04]Building at 350 Madison and
[7:07]The owner of the restaurant was a guy named Brian McNally who who was very good friends with Anna winter and
[7:12]Great and Carter and Tina Brown and he was just part of that of that world as a restaurant tour
[7:17]He'd opened Odion in the early 80s with his brother Keith who also went on to to sort of fame and fortune in the restaurant business
[7:25]in New York and and the County Nast editors would hire Brian and his staff to come and cater their
[7:31]Their the parties and dinners that they would have at their houses and apartments
[7:37]And I was sort of added to this crew for just for graden's for some reason
[7:42]It wasn't I'd never it was never trusted to go to the Anna winter or Tina Brown
[7:47]events and for whatever reason gradient noticed me at these things and
[7:52]Called Brian one day and said I want to interview that kid. I'm looking for a new assistant
[7:57]Which I went Brian called me and I'd never barely spoken to Brian. I was like, you know
[8:02]I was like and nobody you know
[8:03]He left a message on my answer machine in a home and said you know
[8:06]Give me a call and I was like oh my god
[8:08]I'm fired what did I do like I had there was no other reason by Brian would have called me at home
[8:12]So he called me and told me that that gradient Carter wanted to interview me that he had seen me working at these events and thought
[8:19]I looked like a hard worker and humble and and so I got this interview and and it was kind of absurd and I
[8:27]You know, I again
[8:29]I went to college for like three weeks before realizing like oh this is just a waste of time and money
[8:35]You know, I was really sort of lost. I was playing music
[8:38]I was playing in bands. I didn't know what I was gonna do with my life the whole shape of my life
[8:42]I was like
[8:43]You know, I was 21
[8:44]So I went in on this interview. I didn't know how to tie a tie
[8:47]I had had my brother tie a tie for me and I borrowed a suit from him and I got this job
[8:52]I got this coveted job
[8:54]at
[8:55]Conde Nastin at Vanity Fair which at the time
[8:58]I mean
[8:58]I don't even know what to compare it to it was like everyone wanted to be in the magazine business like the magazine business was like
[9:07]Be like going to work for like
[9:09]Netflix or like even Goldman said like it was it was the place to be and and
[9:15]It was the place to go craft a career and it was exciting and it was fun and it was glamorous and it was upscale and
[9:22]And magazine editors were really like like the most important cultural figures in in New York if not the nation
[9:30]You know, they just held so much power and these these these little books that would arrive in the mail every month
[9:37]You know around the country and around the world were so important because it was the only link people had to culture in the outside world
[9:45]In this pre-internet age and so you would go to this thing for everything
[9:50]I love that you even have to explain this by the way
[9:53]I know it's sort of sad, but I kind of feel like I do. No, you're right. You do. I talk to young, you know
[10:00]talk to young friends and most of them are adjacent to the business and my nieces and nephews
[10:07]and stuff and they sort of get it, but not really. It's just become a different thing. But there
[10:12]was, if you wanted to be in touch, you had a stack of monthly magazines either arriving
[10:18]or you went to a new stand-up. As if it was a bookstore and you would look around and you would
[10:23]buy, maybe you would bring 30 bucks with you and if you could afford that like English magazine
[10:29]that cost $12 versus $399 and you would just walk out with your stack and it would sit next to
[10:35]your bed for a month until the next stack came. And then your apartment was littered with piles of
[10:41]magazines everywhere and it was it was a really sort of exciting time for magazines.
[10:46]Yeah. So anyway, so people's careers. I mean, when you guys, when Vanity Fair would pick the
[10:51]new establishment or Hollywood issue or whatever and these entrepreneurs would appear, you know,
[10:56]all anti-liberal and stuff, like that was like that was like. You know, Zippy, it's funny,
[11:02]I somebody reviewed my book in Canada and it was one of the first reviews that came out and so
[11:10]I was so excited to read it and he used the phrase, he said magazines made the weather and that's
[11:15]exactly right. It was like magazines were everything. They made the weather. They, like whatever
[11:23]was going to happen in the next, you know, weeks or month. It was like it was in these things
[11:28]and you could unlock it and it was sort of a journey to find yourself. Like what am I interested
[11:33]in? What are my likes? What are I in? That was sort of like a big part of it, you know what I mean?
[11:37]Totally. Totally. But go back for a second if you don't mind because you wrote about your
[11:42]childhood and sort of not really feeling like you fit in, hold on, I wanted to read this one
[11:49]passage. Well, you also talked about how not how you turn to books, but also turning to drinking,
[11:54]which I have to say is also in my book. The second thing, a sensitive introspective and lonely
[11:59]teenager discovers after books is drinking. Quickly followed by drugs, which were harder to get your
[12:04]hands on than booze or a book. They don't sell drugs at the library, although in the 1980s, they
[12:09]did sell drugs in Bryant Park right behind the New York Public Library. So you had to work your way
[12:13]up to that. Tell me a little bit about, you know, growing up is sort of a shy, quiet or kid,
[12:19]you're the youngest of four, and feeling like you just kind of got lost. Like I feel like this is
[12:24]totally not my place. Like you probably have some sort of learning disability because you're obviously
[12:28]super bright, right? You just like, you know, it's funny you say that because I did. And by the way,
[12:34]I like without going through like therapy for years, I would have never like stumbled on any of
[12:38]this stuff or been comfortable writing about it. Like trying to figure out my own head. But yeah,
[12:43]I think, you know, I think it's pretty common actually for kids to like, what I discovered in
[12:49]and yes, maybe I had ADHD, which, which wasn't really a defined thing back then. They didn't
[12:55]really know what it was. And I don't even know if my parents would have put me on on riddle and
[13:00]or whatever it is that everyone seems to be on now. But yeah, I mean, I just couldn't find my place
[13:07]in the world. I wasn't like good at anything. I wasn't a really good athlete. I was terrible in
[13:14]school. I couldn't draw like I could kind of play music passively, but not really. So I really
[13:22]struggled to like find my place in the world. And that does a lot of times lead to the sort of like,
[13:29]oh, I'm the shy guy at a party with my friends. And I'm sort of sitting in the corner and like,
[13:33]okay, I'll have a beer. And then it's like, oh, okay, like I can now talk to people and then,
[13:38]and then drugs make an appearance. And I think this is an incredibly common trajectory for a lot
[13:43]of people who, and unfortunately, a lot of times this leads to a lot of issues. Like if you don't
[13:48]deal, if you don't figure it out and deal with it, like later in life, it really comes back to sort
[13:53]of bite you and haunt you. But weirdly, it sort of gave me a foundation of like, like, I could
[13:59]drink when I was a kid. And it really helped me at Vanity Fair because it was like, that was
[14:04]a business that like, there was a lot of drinking. And if you could keep up with like, with the
[14:09]older folks, it was like, they were like, oh, wow, he's, you know, like crazy enough, I stumbled
[14:13]in the one business where it was going to help me, which is kind of absurd, it's kind of absurd.
[14:18]But, but it also, you know, Vanity Fair, again, it's like, 21 is really young. Like, 21 is really
[14:26]young when I walked into that place. And there's a lost and out of place as I felt in the world.
[14:30]And I felt that at Vanity Fair, two when I started, because I did not know how to do anything.
[14:33]I was really just like, like an empty vessel. But it became my place. Like, it became the place
[14:40]where I found myself. And it became the place where I sort of began to discover things that I was
[14:46]good at. And I had found a place where I fit in because it was full of like weirdos. It wasn't,
[14:53]it wasn't like going to work at a bank or a real estate agency. It was like full of weird,
[14:57]like, like fashion weirdos and like poetry weirdos and, and film nerds and pop culture
[15:04]geeks and music writers. And, you know, really was, it was like the island of misplaced toys.
[15:09]And I really sort of found myself fitting in there, which was kind of, kind of an amazing,
[15:13]and that's, and that's, that's a big part of the book is, you know, it's this coming of,
[15:17]coming of age story and tale of sort of finding yourself and finding yourself in mind.
[15:22]just happened to be at this, this magazine, this in, in, in the nineties. And of course,
[15:28]I ended up staying there for almost 25 years. What do you think you're good at now?
[15:34]What do I think I'm good at now? I, you know, nothing really. And this is something I will,
[15:39]again, discuss with my therapist on Wednesday at noon. I don't think I'm good at anything.
[15:44]No, I've cut, you know, what's funny is I, I have never, I'd never written, I'd written before,
[15:51]little things for the magazine over the years. I'd never written a book before. I'd never written
[15:57]about myself at length like this. And, and it was a similar process to that. Like, I really,
[16:05]really liked it. And I think I really quickly found a writing voice. I think I'm really comfortable
[16:13]writing like that. You discover like that's what a writer is. A writer is someone who expresses
[16:19]himself in words because they can't express himself in any other way. And so I, I'm going to
[16:24]pat myself in the back and say, you know, I think I am actually a pretty good writer. And it is,
[16:30]it is the medium where I'm most comfortable in and whether that's a book. And I write screenplays
[16:35]and, and, and television shows also. And I feel really, really comfortable. I mean, it's hard.
[16:42]And, and I'm not always motivated, but I feel really comfortable sitting there with just like an open,
[16:47]like word or final draft document just sitting there like writing a scene or a chapter.
[16:52]So I think I'm okay. I think I'm okay at that. And by the way, this is, this is progress in my life.
[16:57]So it is progress. It's great. It's, you know, having gone on this journey with you. I feel
[17:02]proud that you're able to even know that's very kind of you. Yes. I know I, I often say that
[17:08]you know, the thing that links writers the most I feel like is that everyone has this like underlying
[17:13]anxiety disorders, the thing. And like this, this deep observation and it comes out somehow through
[17:18]the keys, learn 100%. It's amazing to me. And this is really, I really just discovered this about
[17:24]myself in the last sort of three or four years. And it's, I mean, you know, it's never too late,
[17:29]you know, it's never too late to figure this stuff out. But I really like, I mean, I hate writing,
[17:34]but I love having written. And so I can sort of put in the time doing it now. And it's,
[17:39]it's sort of enjoyable. And how are you in terms of like keeping in touch with the vanity fair crew?
[17:44]Like what is that? How are they all, how are they all still in your life? If at all, like, what are
[17:49]the right? Well, you know, first of all, the, it's so strange to have, have two years of our life
[17:56]or two and a half years taken away from us and not being in touch with these people, although then
[18:01]I realized like I haven't been in touch with like family members and really close friends in two
[18:05]years, you know, we're a pretty tight group actually. I'm still in touch with a lot of people.
[18:12]You know, part of the reason is, is Gray and Carter went off and he started a digital magazine
[18:17]called Airmail, which, which feels, which feels like vanity fair. I mean, it's a very, it's basically
[18:24]digital version of his vanity fair in many ways, although I don't think he has the budgets that he
[18:29]once had. And, and there are a lot of vanity fair people that work there. And so I will occasionally
[18:34]write for them. And so I know, like I was, I did a restaurant review for them a couple weeks ago,
[18:41]and I got the copy edit back. And I recognized like a few of the like the things that the copy
[18:47]editor like suggested. And I was like, I know exactly who did this and tell him no. Like, you know,
[18:52]I mean, I mean, it's a dear old friend of mine, but it was like, and maybe you'll appreciate this,
[18:56]but it was, it was changing any, any uses of the word like to such as, which is like my one pet
[19:04]peeve in writing. I hate such as more than anything. And it's like, it's, well, it's just like
[19:08]super, it's just no one says it. No one says it. No one says it. It's so antique. It just feels so
[19:14]like, you know, like you would see it in an old New York or something. Anyway, but I, I knew exactly
[19:19]who copy edited it and sent them sort of funny nasty note. So we were very, very much in touch
[19:26]a lot of us, you know, people have gone on to do really interesting things.
[19:29]Wow. What restaurant did you review? So there was a pop up of the famous restaurant from,
[19:36]from Copenhagen called Noma. So there was a like super expensive pop up in Brooklyn for like a
[19:43]week, about three weeks ago or a month ago. So I went and I did that. And it was really, it was
[19:47]actually really fun, like reviewing restaurants. Something I've always wanted to do, but it just
[19:52]doesn't, it's not the sort of thing that just lands on your lap and this sort of landed on my lap.
[19:57]I was like, yep. I mean, I'll do it. What do you think?
[20:00]could have happened if Gray didn't have picked you.
[20:02]I, you know what?
[20:03]I, I think something would have come along.
[20:07]I really do.
[20:08]It's funny, I was kind of like,
[20:10]I'm not a believer in anything really,
[20:12]but I do believe like a little bit in fate
[20:17]and I think something would have come along
[20:20]and I don't know what that would have been,
[20:23]but I feel like in that era
[20:25]and maybe it's different now, maybe it's the same.
[20:29]I think people like to take chance,
[20:31]like you hear these stories of like,
[20:32]yeah, I got hired at the, whatever you know,
[20:34]I think people would take chances on people,
[20:37]you know, resume and education aside.
[20:39]They would be like, this kid's got, you know,
[20:41]even thinking like an old press kid's story,
[20:42]just move you through something like,
[20:44]this kid's got hustle, this kid's got Moxie,
[20:45]bring them on board, like, you know what I mean?
[20:48]I feel like there are versions of that story.
[20:50]I think something would have come along.
[20:52]I mean, God, I hope, I hope I'm sort of glad
[20:55]I don't have to live in that alternate universe
[20:58]because it could have gone really bad.
[21:01]Well, now that you're an author too,
[21:04]what advice would you have for aspiring authors?
[21:07]Right, now you've gone through the process
[21:09]and by the way, I know Pamela Cannon,
[21:10]well, who you have is a predator.
[21:12]I mean, God bless Pam Cannon, like she's a lifesaver.
[21:18]And I honestly, this book would not have been readable
[21:22]without her, she really sort of saved the day.
[21:25]Advice, advice.
[21:27]You know, first of all, find writers you love,
[21:31]like just find, and I think that's obvious.
[21:35]And I think people who really like to read find that
[21:38]and they find that writer that just connects with them
[21:44]in some way, whether it's the way they lay out a story,
[21:46]whether it's the turn of phrase,
[21:48]whether it's the use of language.
[21:50]Find writers you love and really get to know
[21:53]the rhythm of writing.
[21:55]And just get to know, I mean, that helped me a lot.
[22:00]It's just like, you know, obviously I worked
[22:02]with a lot of writers.
[22:03]I read, you know, I was reading everything
[22:05]because you sort of were always on the lookout
[22:06]for new young writers.
[22:08]Find what really connects with you
[22:09]because I think that helps find your own voice
[22:12]when you sit down to write.
[22:15]And I, you know, it's just gonna sound so cliche,
[22:19]but you're gonna fail a lot before you succeed.
[22:22]Like you just, you never know.
[22:25]You know, I know writers who have sort of found
[22:28]their voice out of frustration
[22:29]because they were trying to fit their writing
[22:32]into a box that they thought would work
[22:35]in the marketplace or that they were writing
[22:37]for this magazine.
[22:38]So they would sort of tone it down
[22:40]and do it in the style of that magazine.
[22:42]There's something really freeing
[22:45]about finding your own voice and writing in your own style
[22:48]and writing in your own way that you can't be afraid of.
[22:51]Like you have to embrace it
[22:53]because that's the thing that's you
[22:55]that you're putting on the page.
[22:57]And you need to sort of shut out the noise
[23:01]and just go for it, you know.
[23:03]But I do think I think it's really important
[23:05]to spend time getting to know writing, you know,
[23:08]reading everything, you know, going back to choice
[23:12]or whatever in a Hemingway, but also modern young writers
[23:16]and just like understand like,
[23:18]oh, I could be original
[23:20]and I can write my own style in my own way
[23:22]and I can break rules.
[23:24]And I think that's really important
[23:26]because I think a lot of writers feel like kind of stuck
[23:30]in little boxes that they're sort of forced
[23:32]on this one path.
[23:33]And I don't think there is one path.
[23:35]It's not a one size fits all kind of thing for writers.
[23:38]So true.
[23:39]And I experimented a lot with writing
[23:41]because like a lot of writers can write
[23:43]in lots of styles, right?
[23:45]Like I'm like, I can write like a first person
[23:48]present tense.
[23:49]Of course.
[23:50]I'm going to write a whole book like that.
[23:51]And I'm like, okay, but like that's not really me.
[23:55]Do you like that?
[23:56]I do.
[23:56]And I'm sure, and again, I don't know
[23:59]because I didn't go to school for writing,
[24:01]but I'm sure they teach you everything.
[24:02]I'm sure they teach you, you know,
[24:04]every single style of writing
[24:06]and like I do this from this character,
[24:08]this third person, do this whatever.
[24:10]And it doesn't necessarily make sense for you.
[24:13]Like when you sit down to write a story,
[24:15]you need to sort of write the way your mind
[24:19]is sort of pulling you in.
[24:21]And it's really important to let go
[24:23]and let it just pull you and let it take you.
[24:26]And you will know what that is
[24:28]and when it's working because you will just be like,
[24:31]oh my God, that's great, oh my God, that's great.
[24:33]And you won't sort of not be able to stop once,
[24:36]you know, it's just, it's like a race track
[24:37]that you accidentally get in the right car
[24:39]and it's faster.
[24:40]You're like, whoa, I can't believe I can go this fast.
[24:44]And it could be more fun.
[24:45]I mean, it's hard.
[24:46]It's hard, it's like, I don't know,
[24:48]wearing the wrong size shoes or something.
[24:50]Like you can do it,
[24:50]but it's not gonna feel good.
[24:52]No, no, exactly.
[24:53]And it's okay if you're going.
[24:55]You'll get where you're going,
[24:56]but you're gonna have blisters.
[24:57]Yeah, blisters.
[24:59]Okay, amazing.
[25:01]What is your next writing project?
[25:02]And also what are you reading right now?
[25:04]What am I reading?
[25:05]You know, I'm reading, I had so many amazing assistants
[25:11]over the years and they were all so much smarter than me.
[25:16]And like better writers than me.
[25:18]Like better everything.
[25:18]Like I used to hide behind their talent and pretend.
[25:22]I'd be like, oh, do you mind writing this paragraph
[25:24]on this thing for the, you know, for the thing?
[25:26]But so an old roommate, an old assistant of mine,
[25:31]a guy named Julian Sankton wrote a book
[25:34]and he's gonna kill me because I'm finally getting around
[25:37]to it about a year after it was published.
[25:38]It's called Mad House at the end of the earth.
[25:41]That's a year.
[25:42]And it was this sort of like disaster of like an Arctic journey
[25:47]that these three guys took.
[25:49]I think it was in the late 1800s.
[25:51]So late 19th century.
[25:53]And I think like one of them was a con artist.
[25:55]One of them was a real explorer.
[25:57]And it's sort of this wonderful.
[25:58]I love contained stories.
[26:01]I love stories.
[26:02]You know, it all takes place in this one boat
[26:04]for the most part.
[26:05]And that's a challenge as a writer.
[26:08]You know, whether you're writing for the screen or a book,
[26:10]like, okay, you're stuck in this one place.
[26:12]How do I pull the reader out of here at different points
[26:14]seamlessly?
[26:15]And he does such a great job at that.
[26:17]And I've been sort of super into that book the past few weeks.
[26:21]And again, he's gonna kill me
[26:22]because it's taking me to your get to it.
[26:24]And I think I've ignored his texts.
[26:25]Like, have you ready yet?
[26:26]Have you ready yet?
[26:27]Have you read it yet?
[26:28]So I can soon be able to text it back and be like, yes.
[26:31]And then I'm, you know, A, I'm hunting around
[26:34]for the next book idea,
[26:36]which is like a complete nightmare,
[26:39]because I don't know.
[26:40]It's like once you've written a memoir,
[26:43]you know, and if you're somewhat successful,
[26:46]at least in getting your story down,
[26:47]you will have publishers knocking on your door being like,
[26:49]so what do you wanna do next?
[26:50]And if you've done the memoir already,
[26:53]you're like, okay, I can't go back there.
[26:55]What can I do like non-fiction
[26:58]and like what are people interested in
[27:00]and what are people talking about?
[27:01]So I'm sort of on the hunt for that.
[27:04]And I'm not sure exactly what it is.
[27:06]I wrote a movie during COVID
[27:09]that I actually got to, I wrote and produced it.
[27:12]And it is like just about finished.
[27:16]So I'm very excited about that.
[27:18]I think we're probably gonna try to take it
[27:19]to one of the festivals at the end of the summer.
[27:22]And so I'm writing another screenplay right now.
[27:25]And there's another TV.
[27:26]Well, then the exciting news is that is, you know,
[27:30]I always, I partially wrote this book
[27:33]because I was like, you know what,
[27:34]I wanna make this into a TV show also
[27:35]because no one's gotten magazines right on television.
[27:40]And so I just closed a deal with a production company
[27:45]to write the pilot for Dylton.
[27:48]So my hope is, I mean, it's an uphill battle
[27:52]and getting a series going, but I'm really excited.
[27:54]So I'm gonna write that pilot soon also.
[27:57]So I'm going, I'm gonna,
[27:59]I'm gonna, my Microsoft Word is gonna get a break
[28:02]and my final draft pro is gonna be a little busy
[28:06]for the next few months.
[28:08]But I love screenwriting is so much fun.
[28:11]And again, that's one of those things
[28:13]where like until you find your voice and your style,
[28:17]it's maddening and it's frustrating.
[28:19]And then you find it and you can tell you found it
[28:22]because people respond.
[28:24]Like like someone's like, all right, yeah,
[28:25]I wanna make this and you're like really?
[28:27]So after my other 10 stocks, it's like this is finally,
[28:31]but it really is just about like,
[28:32]about like understanding how it works
[28:34]and doing your research and reading others
[28:36]and watching movies and, and, you know,
[28:39]once you find that style, it sort of becomes exciting
[28:42]and fun.
[28:43]Amazing.
[28:43]So that's it.
[28:44]Congratulations.
[28:45]Thank you.
[28:46]Great seeing you after all these years.
[28:48]I know.
[28:49]It's so much, it's such a small world.
[28:51]It's so nice hearing that.
[28:52]And you were there.
[28:53]That was like, that was like O.J.
[28:55]since, I mean, that was like that summer
[28:58]because that was when the 12 was going on.
[28:59]But before I left before O.J.
[29:02]because I was like in the fall.
[29:04]You're right.
[29:05]Yeah, it was, I was on,
[29:06]I don't know, I was white water rafting
[29:07]during the O.J. things.
[29:08]So sometimes that summer.
[29:09]So.
[29:10]Okay.
[29:11]Got it.
[29:12]Got it.
[29:13]I'm zippy, thank you so much.
[29:14]It's such a joy.
[29:15]I hope you have a lovely summer.
[29:17]Thank you, you too.
[29:17]Okay.
[29:18]Take care.
[29:19]Bye.
[29:20]Thanks for listening to this episode of Moms Don't Have Time
[29:23]to Read Books.
[29:24]Don't forget to follow me on Instagram at zippy Owens
[29:27]and at Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books.
[29:29]Also sign up for my newsletter at zippyowens.com
[29:32]and sign up for my virtual book club
[29:33]and meet lots of authors on Zoom every other week.
[29:36]Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan at Textures Sound
[29:39]for the Sound Editing.
[29:40]And thank you to Morning Moon Productions
[29:42]for providing this fantastic intro and outro music.