Hot men don’t date less attractive women, do they? A few years ago, American writer Curtis Sittenfeld was watching an American comedy sketch show. Saturday night lifewhen she asked the same question.
“There is a real phenomenon where talented but average looking men date women who come on the show and are incredibly beautiful, talented, famous celebrities. But that doesn’t really happen when a talented but average writer meets a super famous, super handsome male celebrity,” Sittenfeld, 47, says of her late-Midwestern accent against a bustling, blank Zoom backdrop somewhere in her Minneapolis home. . (“This is my office. It’s nicely decorated, isn’t it?” she says dryly.
The show’s comedians certainly have a mysterious knack for attracting the attention of ultra-glamorous A-listers: Pete Davidson, by far Hollywood’s busiest boyfriend, dated Kim Kardashian and Ariana Grande after they appeared as guest celebrities, and Colin Jost now married to Scarlett Johansson. whom he met when he was the show’s writer.
“For a while I thought, ‘Oh, someone should write a movie about a writer for a show like Saturday night life, a writer who writes a parody that satirizes the phenomenon and ends up having chemistry with a male host,” Sittenfeld continued. “A few months went by and I thought, ‘Oh, maybe someone should write a novel instead of a movie.’ And maybe that someone should be me.
Zittenfeld fans know that this is the perfect combination of author and plot. In novels like 2020’s Hillary Clinton, the counterfactual story Rodham2008 American – about a woman who looks a lot like Laura Bush, and for my money one of the great American novels – en 2016 Pride and Prejudice retell SuitableThe author has repeatedly cut through contemporary gender politics and written books that are just plain fun.
romantic comedy It revolves around 36-year-old writer Sally Mills, who works for Saturday night life– like a show. When her “slim-skinned” co-host Danny starts dating a handsome, world-famous movie star, Sally writes a skit poking fun at the trend of dating men. She then discovers that she herself has a pretty crazy chemistry with a famous guest host – a stunningly beautiful pop megastar named Noah Brewster. But men like him don’t date women like her, do they? Or can social dominance work the other way around?
It’s a compelling premise that certainly resonates far beyond Hollywood. We all secretly wondered how our sweet but perfectly normal friend managed to trap his gorgeous soul mate. “The funny thing is, when I was writing this book, I thought, ‘If I were Kim Kardashian, I’d like to date Pete Davidson.’ I think the best quality in a partner is a sense of humor,” says Sittenfeld. “But in general, it doesn’t seem like most straight people think that way. I’m not in a relationship. But in general, finding a woman with a sense of humor does not seem to be the main task of a man.
Sittenfeld, who has two daughters with her husband, a journalism professor, grew up in Cincinnati, Ohio and attended Groton Boarding School in Massachusetts, from which she founded the school. Prepare, her 2005 debut about a scholarship student at a posh boarding school. When she was 17 she won Seventeen Journal Literature Award. “In a way, if someone knew me when I was a teenager, I don’t think they would be surprised by what I have become,” she says. “I have always been very interested in reading and writing. I’ve always had pretty much the same haircut.”
WITH PrepareShe has published two dense collections of short stories and six novels that are most compelling when they take us into a secret world. It has a lot of seductive fantasies romantic comedyBut one thing certainly is that the detailed details of the famous comedy writer’s life make it very easy for the reader to imagine that he leads such a hectic existence.
“Some people said to me: “Well, you worked in Saturday night life? And I’m like, “No, but I’m flattered you asked,” says Sittenfeld, a longtime fan of the show. From a hectic hair-raising schedule (Sally sleeps in the office at least one night a week) to 3am parties, Sittenfeld seems to be in his element, representing the creativity and ambition that remains behind the scenes in such time. show bubble. . . “I love researching fiction and I had to listen to comedians on podcasts,” she says, although she has also read memoirs of former actors and interviewed them.
American AND RodhamIn the meantime, you are lifting the curtain on a major player in American politics. RodhamThe portrayal of Hillary Clinton’s life if she had dated Bill but not married him divided critics, who scoffed at the more racist moments: “The first third contains a lot of hectic Black Lace-style sex scenes with lots of cans of testicles and… the image it conjures up is the phrase “his erection is inside of me,” journalist Emma Brokes wrote.
“Reaction to sex scenes in Rodham irritated me. I thought, “These are well-written sex scenes and I don’t apologize for them,” Sittenfeld says with a steely gleam in his eyes. “Anyway, you’re thinking, ‘Oh, please. I am quite capable of writing about sexual tension or sexual attraction. How, I’ll show you.
Sittenfeld is a supporter of the Democrats and in RodhamHillary runs for president in 2016 in what critics have called “an absolute liberal revenge fantasy.” However, she gets a little tense when the conversation turns to politics: “It’s strange to be a writer. I am embarrassed by statements about the state of America,” but politely gives the topic a chance. “I am concerned about American politics. It seems that there are no more claims to decency. It’s even more than blatant – it looks like trolling.” There is an unsettling undertone of trolling in many political conversations.”
We meet again about a week later, the day after Trump was accused of paying adult movie star Stormy Daniels a silence money, which, unfortunately for Sittenfeld, means I’m bringing up American political life again. “My children have a sore throat right now, so I have no idea how the country is feeling. I’m locked in my house!” she exclaims a little desperately.
Will she write about Trump? “Oh no. No, no, no,” she says, and her look of disgust deepens with each additional “no.” Rodham but I would never write a book where the protagonists are people from the Trump camp. I can choose the fictional world I live in and never choose that world. What about Stormy Daniels? “Oh…” she pauses – “no.” She looks thoughtful. “I mean, first of all, she’s very, very funny when you see her posts on social media,” she says, which likely means Daniels can tell her own story. “No, it’s still too close. Anyway, I wish her the best of luck.”
romantic comedyThe title refers to both the content and Sally’s ambitions as a screenwriter. “I’m not going to write condescending, wildly feminist rom-com scripts,” she tells Noah when they first meet. “I want to create characters that are not perfect, but also not funny or incompetent in life.” I’m trying to reach a new level in the category of romance novels or romantic comedies, ”the book deftly relies on the conventions of romance. comedy and undermines it at the same time. For example, there is as much about Covid as about first kisses; Sexual characteristics, but also scripted operations.
Grown up people love When Harry Met SallySittenfeld has a “very close relationship” with romantic comedies. “The scene I always love the most is when the couple kiss for the first time. This is the maximum expectation, the maximum nervousness, the maximum uncertainty.”
Recent rom-coms such as brothers AND You guys couldn’t keep up with their counterparts from the 90s and early 00s, leading some to declare the genre dead. But Sittenfeld laughs when I say this. “I don’t think the romantic comedy is in crisis. You can see that I voted against. I actually find it funny that people say that. I think there are other things in the crisis. Humanity?! But I don’t think it’s a romantic comedy.
After all, they are primarily a cause for frivolity. “I wanted to have fun,” she says. romantic comedy. “The challenges of the past few years have inspired me to write about happiness and connection, about people who are together and not apart,” she says in a mocking, dirty voice.
“It’s like sometimes you want four courses for lunch. And then you will also want to eat an apple or a piece of cheese. I do the same with books,” she adds. “Not everything has to be 500 pages long and politicized.”
Source: I News
I am Mario Pickle and I work in the news website industry as an author. I have been with 24 News Reporters for over 3 years, where I specialize in entertainment-related topics such as books, films, and other media. My background is in film studies and journalism, giving me the knowledge to write engaging pieces that appeal to a wide variety of readers.