ARTS The Michigan Daily - Wednesday, February 5, 2003 - 7 Screenwriter Richard Price reads tonight at A2 Borders 'Marvin's Room' moves down to the Basement By Ricky Lax Daily Arts Writer Richard Price has written seven novels, including the national best-sellers "Clockers" and "Freedomland." He has also written the screenplays for "Ransom," starring Mel Gibson, and "The Color Of Money," for which he received an Oscar nomination. Price will read from "Samaritan," his new book, tonight at 7 p.m. in the Borders on E. Liberty. Recently, Price sat down with The Michigan Daily to discuss his experiences as an author and screenwriter. The Michigan Daily: Was growing up in the Bronx tough? Richard Price: No. The housing projects in the '50s and '60s were nothing like the projects today. Now it's shit. Housing projects are rough places right now. TMD: Why does "Samaritan" and so much of your work deal with race? RP: I feel compelled to write about it. It per- vades everything in American consciousness, American history, American culture. TMD: How are writers generally treated in the film industry? RP: Not very well, but you're paid an awful lot of money. Everybody has more power than you. The studio pays the bills. You can't write what you want; you have to write what they want. There's no independence. It's a product. You just can't decide to make triangular toilet paper for $60 million. TMD: Your character, Ray, from "Samari- tan," comes down pretty hard on television's high school, urban dramas. Are you not a fan? RP: The bigger the market the product needs to appeal to, the blander and safer the product has to be. They'll make these high schools on TV where it's supposed to be an inner-city, yet the student body is magically divided (equally) between black, white, Asian, Hispanic. I've never seen an inner city high school like that. TMD: Ray shows his daughter a Wee-Gee photo. Who is Wee-Gee? RP: Wee-Gee was a very well known tabloid photographer whose work transcended ... you don't know who Wee-Gee is? TMD: No. RP: He's probably the best-known black and white urban photographer of the '40s and the '50s. He was a crime scene photographer. TMD: What is "Samaritan" really about? RP: The title "Samaritan" is ironic. The whole thing is about how good impulses can be tainted by vanity. The point is that Ray is doing these favors for people with one eye in the mir- ror, admiring himself doing them, needing the praise, and that taints whatever good impulses he has. He does have good impulses. He's just a weak person with a little extra money in a poor, desperate area. By Marie Bernard Daily Arts Writer When "Marvin's Room" opened in New York and received its first critical affirmation from The New York Times, playwright Scott McPherson was unable to celebrate in the usual way because his body was receding into the final stages of AIDS. "Marvin's Room," ulti- mately, is the legacy he left behind, and the eloquence of the play, although not about AIDS, draws heavily from McPherson's experience with the dis- ease. It is the story of a family who rec- onciles after 17 years due to Bessie's (lead character) imminent death from cancer. Bessie echoes much of McPher- TMD: When can we expect "Samaritan" ti movie? RP: It's been sold and I'm supposed to wri the script, but I don't want to write it for while. I'd prefer somebody else do it. TMD: Why? RP: Because I did the book and it would I like doing "Samaritan"-lite. It's not a lot of fu It's a job, basically. TMD: Wouldn't it suck if someone el butchered it? RP: At this point I'd prefer that somebod else butcher it. he te a be in. son's own sentiments when she says, "I've had such love in my life. I look back on my life and I've had such love." This weekend, Base- ment Arts brings "Mar- vin's Room" to the Arena Theater. Director Danielle Stresiand first discovered the work when she was studying MARVIN' At the Aren Thursday, 7 and 11I Saturdaya Basemen abroad in immediate sickness and foreboding death into the lessons taught and learned by a family trying desperately to find its way back home." The play is often lauded for its delicate balance of humor and sadness. Ultimately, what garnered McPher- son his notoriety was writing so poignantly, not simply about dying or death, but also about humanity in gen- eral, and the important bonds of friends and family. Streisand says, "The play screams out: Live the best way you can. Live with hope and with love." "Marvin's Room" originally opened in Chicago in 1990,where it met critical acclaim before spreading across the country and to New York. The title will be familiar to many audi- ence members from its 1996 film version, which S RooM starred Meryl Streep, Diane Keaton, Leonardo a Theater DiCpario and Robert Friday at DeNiro. The film, which p.m. and garnered Keaton an at 7 p.m. academy+award nomina- at Arts tion, was also acclaimed for handling cancer with- out tearjerker sentimentality. McPherson put the finishing touches on this play knowing that every day could be his last. In the notes of the published version of his play, McPherson commented, "Now I am thirty-one, and my lover has AIDS. Our friends have AIDS. And we all take care of each other, the less sick caring for the more sick. At times, an unbelievably harsh fate is transcended by a simple act of love, by caring for one another. By most, we are thought of as 'dying,' but as 'dying' becomes a way of life, the meaning of the word blurs." FREE PASSES TO "How TO LOSE A GUY IN fO DAYS." Grt Yours t mE AHE ROOM, 420 MAYNARD S1. the michigan daily w APARTMENT SUBLEASE, IMMEDIATE Availability. Furnished, South Forest, One Block South of Hill. Nice Male Roommate, Price Negotiable. Call Aaron 517-881-4041. AVAIL FEB. 1 bdrm. in apartment. 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