Category Archives: New Yorker

Festival: And They’re Off! (Their Rockers)

I’m actually at Festival HQ before it’s “officially” open. Out front throngs of people are clamoring for the tickets that the Festival has set aside. I noticed that all of the pricey Sunday morning events are now sold out, which is perhaps to be expected, as are the Pamuk/Rushdie event plus Sy Hersh, Simon Schama, Steve Martin and a few others. Plenty of good events, left though, even if they’re vanishing by the half-hour.
The chaos out front is only somewhat mirrored in the headquarters itself. I’m comfortably ensconced in the “Acura Lounge,” where it is posted that complimentary coffees will be made available. Not that I’m partaking—I’m wired enough as it is. According to the Festival Wire cellphone updates, Acura will actually be ferrying people from HQ to events, which I find rather remarkable (I think I’ll take them up on that!).
I’m currently seated amid a welter of controlled hubbub, as motivated young people scurry hither and thither, arranging the Cartoon Bank displays, wiring banks of lights, distributing attractive candles to all tables, and the like. I extend thanks to Josh at Scharf Weisberg and Melissa and Lisa at the New Yorker for helpfully ensuring me WiFi access even though HQ isn’t “officially” open yet. They can all add “liveblogger wrangler” to their resumes.
BoingBoing Gadgets was touting a T-shirt today that actually lights up when you are near a strong WiFi signal.


wifishirt.jpg

What I wouldn’t give for one of those for this weekend! (This assumes that Josh, Melissa, and Lisa won’t be catering to my every whim for the next three days, which admittedly seems like a longshot.)
—Martin Schneider

Joining the Coalition of the Willing: Greetings From Our Roving Correspondents

Martin and I will be reporting from the New Yorker Festival throughout the weekend, so look for our frequent reports! In the meantime, there are a few other people we’d like you to meet. —E.G.
Toby Gardner: With the New Yorker Festival upon us and so many events scattered across the city, the Emdashes Powers That Be (EPTB) saw the need for a new strategy: the Pepper Mill, whereby several correspondents are sprinkled throughout the proceedings like so many flavor-enhancing spices. And I am one of their new recruits. I hope I get called up for tonight’s chat between Miranda July and A.M. Homes on Deviants. There’s also a Town Hall meeting about the war in Iraq, but how relevant is that, really?
Although EPTB offered to pay off my student loans in exchange for my services, I said that really wouldn’t be necessary. [While we’re at it, we really should pay off ours, too. —Ed.] The honor to help cover this exciting festival is payment enough. So if you see a bald guy with a Mac G4 and a winning attitude, say hello. I’ll be working hard to make ensure that Operation Pepper Mill is a success.
Quin Browne will be covering a couple of events for Emdashes this weekend. She was born in New Orleans under one name, and writes in New York under this one. Blatherings about this and that can be found at www.fmdn.blogspot.com; actual shorts are located under her name at www.sixsentences.blogspot.com.
Tiffany De Vos‘s name and musical tastes owe much to the ’80s. She is a poet, pet chinchilla enthusiast, and teacher. Her stories and poems have appeared in Pedestal, The Saint Ann’s Review, Washington Square, Small Spiral Notebook, and the Global City Review. Her hair often falls over her right eye, but she is by no means a hipster.

Ira Glass and the Nonfictioners of Nonfiction

The youngsters of Chicago, city of kickass editors, could probably use a bit of sound instruction on whether the term is properly styled e-mail email e-mail, and we think that 826 Chicago is just the outfit to provide some solid guidance on that subject as well as “their creative and expository writing skills,” as they put it.
Think of it as the New Yorker Festival afterparty. On Monday, October 8, Ira Glass is hosting a benefit for 826Chi at Town Hall. The event is called “The New Kings of Nonfiction,” and showcases such New Yorker-affiliated lights as Malcolm Gladwell and Susan Orlean, not to mention Chuck Klosterman. Ira may be the finest “so wait” clarifier in the history of spoken utterance (listen for it on This American Life), and to see him do it live is surely the equivalent of watching Roger Federer hit a backhand or something.
Be diverted, help Chicago’s youth—not a bad combination. Our only complaint is that Maria Bamford, genius Comedian of Comedy, isn’t part of the lineup; she adds such goofy, nervy pizazz to every stage she’s on. —Martin Schneider

Close But No Cigar: Bethune Bethune Bethune Bethune Bethune…

In this engaging blog interview courtesy of the 92nd St. Y, Judith Thurman discusses good cabbies, bad cabbies, her many New York residences (one was on Bethune St.), Jane Jacobs, the upside of apocalypse, and beastly New York summers. (I disagree on this point—I love NYC when it gets all empty in August.) Thurman is obviously a New Yorker’s New Yorker, a locution that puts me in the mind of “Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo,” which I just found out about yesterday and which has been giving me headaches ever since (but the nice kind).
I’m not in town on October 28, but you might be. (I know, you didn’t ask.) Do hasten over to the Upper East Side and have brunch with her at the 92nd St. Y. I’m sure it’ll be a hoot. —Martin Schneider

Festival: Frantic VIPs Hanker After Tix (Which Are, in Fact, Available)

The New York Post today reports that tickets for this weekend’s Festival—make that for tomorrow’s Festival!—are in hot demand, and even well-known actors are being told to line up with everybody else. Shudder! Some individuals are trying the desperate measure of “sliding ticket requests under the door” of David Remnick’s apartment. Festival stalking! Now that’s a new one. (There’s also some scurrilous blind dishing about festival attractions participating in events under the influence. My attorneys have informed me that further comment on this subject is inadvisable.)
In a classic case of burying the lede, the Post lets four whole paragraphs go by before letting readers know that “Ten percent of all tickets have been held back for sale at 3 p.m. tomorrow [this means Friday], only at festival headquarters at 125 W. 18 St.” Indeed. There will also be a small number of tickets available before each event at the respective venue. If you’ve been shut out, we urge you to keep trying—you never know what opportunity will suddenly present itself!
Good luck to all ticket-seekers, and if you see or hear anything during the weekend that you think is worthy of comment here, we urge you to send it on to us. —Martin Schneider

Videos Trill the New Yorker Festival Stars

Newest news: Not only are there still tickets for some New Yorker Festival events, but for those of you who can’t get to them in person, videos of a bunch of the events will eventually be online. The lineup hasn’t been announced yet, but the videos will be rolled out on newyorker.com the way they were for the New Yorker Conference earlier this year. Oh, and you can subscribe on iTunes, too.
Which reminds me that I clicked around my own podcast subscription to the animated cartoons, just to see how things are going in that odd little realm. To my surprise, I found myself laughing at a bunch of them, and they don’t take any time to load in iTunes. Jeff Simmermon, still want to write that guest post about the animations? (He’s been writing about Boing Boing TV.)

New Yorker Festival Action on Craigslist, and Free Jeffrey Frank

There are still New Yorker Festival tickets available, so act fast! Not to mention a busy trade in festival events going on at Craigslist. As they say in The Scarlet Letter, “We must not always talk in the marketplace of what happens to us in the forest,” and vice versa. That said, give up now on getting into “Come Hungry”—you must remain hungry for another year, I’m afraid. Read some of Trillin’s books instead; they’ll fill you up!
Meanwhile, Lilit at Save the Assistants has a snappy account of her interview with New Yorker editor Jeffrey Frank. They’re even giving away a couple of copies of his new novel, Trudy Hopedale. Read on.

Ring My Bell


A 1994 Shouts & Murmurs by Andy Borowitz gets a barking new life as a Toronto Fringe Festival play. From the festival guide:

PAVLOV’S BROTHER

by Mark Ellis and Denis McGrath
directed by Liza Balkan

Before Pavlov went to the dogs, there was another: his brother. Pavlov has theories. But Nikolai’s the one with the saliva. Experiments ensue. This hilarious, true(ish) story plumbs one of the 20th century’s greatest scientific triumphs; the experiments that launched a thousand psych textbooks. ‘Pavlov’s Brother’ is a black comedy about bolshevism, anti-vivisectionists and gastric juices. From the Nobel Prize to the Russian Revolution, this is one story of sibling rivalry and obsession that will condition you to laugh on cue, and leave you drooling for more.

Based on a story [of the same name] in the New Yorker, from one of the writers of Top Gun! The Musical, Writer/Actor Mark Ellis, and Director Liza Balkan.

Cast: Mark Ellis and Paul Fauteux

The all-seeing Eye says:

Ivan Pavlov, so the story goes, briefly let the dogs out to conduct his mouth-watering experiments on his alcoholic little brother Nicolai. Steeped in historical colour, the show is modest in its plot progression, concentrating on Pavlov’s subtle cruelties towards his bro. Paul Fauteux succeeds in the meatier role of Nicolai, challenging with a pissed-off smile and rolling naturally in his drunkard scenes. Ellis plays Pavlov as a strictly business scientist and doesn’t hit the high notes in the more emotional scenes. A thoughtful drama that’s not quite as interesting as its premise suggests. RP [Ryan Porter]

From the comments:

“pavlov´s brother is the only show i´ve seen this fringe…that wasn´t either overpraised or overhyped. it´s hard to believe that anyone connected with top gun the musical did this show, cause it´s so very different. it’s serious and funny and heartbreaking and weird and i second the idea that i want to see where this show might go. one hour is probably not long enough to wrestle the themes in this show.” “a funny, thought-provoking piece. I think it channels much more than sibling rivalry into the story of these two brothers. Fauteux and Ellis are brilliantly matched as the achiever and slacker pair. Smart staging. The show manages to be touching and human while asking unsettling questions. I hope to see this one evolve into a full-length production.” “somewhat disturbing.” “i wouldn´t call it dark. touching in the end. some gross out stuff in the middle that was actually kind of funny. good acting and directing too. a great fringe show.”

And a mouthwatering morsel of Borowitz:

On the first two days of the experiment, Pavlov repeatedly presented croutons to Nikolai, rang a bell, and waited for his brother to drool on cue. Pavlov wrote in his journal, “My brother is an incredible pain in the ass, but his salivary reflexes are superb.” On the third day, however, the experiment took a sudden turn. When Pavlov rang the bell but refused to produce any croutons, Nikolai responded with a roundhouse punch to his brother’s nose, putting him in the hospital. His mother visited the injured scientist but showed little sympathy. “What were you thinking, ringing the bell but not feeding him anything?” she asked. “You know how cranky Nikolai gets when he’s hungry.” Go to the dogs.