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Arts
Wednesday, January 27, 2016 — 5A
Lisicky to read in A2
By MARIA ROBINS-SOMER-
VILLE
Daily Arts Writer
“Find out what you love. Those
books are your greatest teachers,”
author Paul Lisicky said, offering
his advice to aspiring writers in a
phone interview with The Michi-
gan Daily. Lisicky is the author of
five books and currently teaches
in
the
MFA
Creative Writ-
ing Program at
Rutgers
Uni-
versity.
His
most
recent
publication
is
The
Narrow
Door,
from
which he’ll be
reading on Fri-
day at Literati.
The Narrow Door, accord-
ing to Lisicky, is a memoir that
explores the process of mourn-
ing in honor of his dear friend
and fellow writer Denise Guess
who passed away six years ago. It
also tracks the decline of his rela-
tionship with his husband, Mark
Doty.
“In part it’s an investigation of
our friendship but it also wants
to think about what the loss of
her unkenneled in me,” Lisicky
said. “It’s about our friendship;
it’s also about the breakup of my
long relationship. It’s about Joni
Mitchell. It’s about storms. It’s
about Vincent Van Gogh. There
are a lot of side pieces that I hope
activate the main story lines.”
Lisicky defined his arrival in
the writing world as an amalga-
mation of his early identities as a
musician and an introvert — two
factors that have allowed him to
explore the way an inner voice is
translated into art.
“I think I probably started
writing because I sensed that I
was smarter inside than I was
able to express to other people,”
Lisicky said. “I was so shy that
I rarely talked in the classroom,
never raised my hand, and would
fumble if someone called on me. I
think I had a low level fear that I
might have just seemed a little bit
dim and it was important for me
to develop my language at least
on the page.”
Although he identifies as an
introvert, the candor and enthu-
siasm with which he spoke sug-
gested otherwise. He expressed a
passion for his work as a creative
writing instructor and anticipa-
tion for the travels that will allow
him to share his works with a
larger audience.
That being said, he also clari-
fied the inherent introversion of
the creative process.
“I think every writer has to be
in large part an introvert because
so much of what we do is about
the investigation of the inner life
and we’re thinking about privacy
and hiddenness. It just goes with
the territory I think,” he said.
Lisicky said his experiences as
a musician have allowed him to
explore the way his inner voice
manifests itself in a public way.
He joked that his singing voice
is “not terribly distinguished”
in the way that his expression
through his prose is.
“There’s not that much subtle-
ty and nuance in my singing voice
but weirdly I feel like I know how
to go after shadows and nuances
and complicated sounds in my
written voice,” he said.
Having achieved a level of pres-
tige as writer, it was surprising to
hear that Lisicky’s early ambition
was to pursue music; writing was
something that came serendipi-
tously.
“I was a musician, and I was
very serious about it through my
mid-20s,” Lisicky said. “It was
really hard to turn my energy
away from that world initially. I
ended up taking a creative writing
workshop on a whim and it was
just out of a sense of play.”
His
musical
experience
is
inseparable from his writing —
although Lisicky writes mostly
prose, his grasp of sound gives his
work a poetic quality.
“I still think of music in rela-
tion to what I do,” he said. “I think
about music in relationship to
how I phrase a sentence, where I
pause and where I put commas so
I always start with a voice before
I start with image. I believe that
has to do with my origins as a
musician or a frustrated singer.”
Lisicky identified the work of
another Joy Williams as writing
that he’s always admired.
“That work still nourishes me,
still teaches me, still reveals facets
of itself every time I come back to
it,” he said.
He seeks to embody the reflec-
tive, that which amplifies itself in
a way that generates surprise and
evolution with each encounter.
These themes prove increasingly
relevant in The Narrow Door,
which presents an exploration
of loss and the nuances of emo-
tional vulnerability that grow and
change with age.
Paul Lisicky
Literati
Friday, Jan.
29 7 p.m.
Free
TV REVIEW
Clownin’ in ‘Baskets’
By MATT BARNAUSKAS
Daily TV/New Media Editor
TV
comedy
has
grown
increasingly diverse in an era of
unmatched choice in television,
a
time
that
FX President
John Landgraf
has
referred
to
as
“peak
TV”.
From
traditional
multi-camera
fare,
com-
monly
seen
on
networks
like
CBS
in
the
form
of
shows like “The Big Bang The-
ory” and “Two Broke Girls,”
to the insanely twisted buddy
dynamics explored by the likes
of “Broad City” and “Workahol-
ics,” television comedy is a vast
landscape with shows that blur
the lines between the comedic
and dramatic (“Jane the Virgin”
and “Shameless”) or completely
dip into the absurd (“Man Seek-
ing Woman” and “Review”).
“Baskets” is a beneficiary of this
broad comedic spectrum. With
its odd subject matter, off-putting
protagonist and occasionally delib-
erate slow pacing, “Baskets” is a
show that very well, might not
have existed in any other time of
television — presenting an alterna-
tive comedic choice for audiences.
Co-created
by
Louis
C.K.
(“Louie”), Zach Galifianakis (“The
Hangover”) and Jonathan Krisel
(“Portlandia”), “Baskets” follows
failed clown Chip Baskets (Gali-
fianakis) as he returns to Bakers-
field, California after dropping
out of a French clown academy,
due to the fact that he can’t speak
French. Best viewed with a raised
eyebrow, Chip isn’t the most
approachable figure. Portrayed
with simultaneous deadpan and
boiling volatility by Galifianakis,
the character is funny but also
incredibly pathetic. Failing in his
artistic ambition, the poor guy
clings to any hope of achieving his
dream as he becomes a completely
out-of-place rodeo clown, mar-
ries an unloving French woman
(Sabina Sciubba, “Stop Here”) and
struggles to pull together $40 so
his new wife can get HBO. It’s a
sad, pitiable existence, but Gali-
fianakis sells it, defiantly saying,
“I am a clown. I always will be a
clown!”
Chip is the definition of a sad
clown, yet no one (except the
audience) is laughing at him. If
you placed him in the famous
Pagliacci joke, the doctor would
still recommend Pagliacci. Chip
would bring up that he is a clown
as well and the doctor would say
that he’s never heard of him. That
is the existence of Chip, trapped
in unhappy anonymity.
Directed by Krisel, the first
episode, “Renoir,” effectively cap-
tures Chip’s washed out existence.
Trapped in Bakersfield, Chip
is cast against the flat browns
and tans of the desert area as he
reaches for any sort of relevancy,
or even dignity for that matter. As
insurance agent and possibly only
friend Martha (Martha Kelly,
“Ladies Night Out”) drives Chip
to his motel, the clown mutters,
“It’s only permanent.” With its
dead end town, “Baskets” touches
on the fear of failure and what
might happen if we don’t accom-
plish what we initially set out for.
Lightening up this somewhat
depressing reality is the usually
absurd humor, often provided
by the residents of Bakersfield.
Particular standouts are Chip’s
mom (Louie Anderson, “Life with
Louie”) who expresses her disap-
pointment with her son, all with a
smile on her face, and Chip’s twin
brother Dale (also played by Gali-
fianakis), “dean, student, and jani-
tor” of Baskets Career College.
With so many choices in TV
today, “Baskets” presents an
alternative experience for a niche
audience, with an almost depress-
ing premise that successfully
doesn’t fall into misery by the
graces of its mix of deadpan and
ridiculous sensibilities. In fact,
underneath the entire struggle is
a sense of hope at the end of the
episode. The appearance of a new
title card signals a new beginning
for Chip as he begins his journey.
This clown may just get the last
laugh yet.
FILM COLUMN
Spike Lee’s
cinematic activism
A
s I sat in my seat at
the State Theater this
weekend, I had the
unfortunate experience of seeing
the trailer for Michael Moore’s
new movie,
“Where
to Invade
Next.” When
the trailer
finally ended
after two-
and-a-half
minutes of
self-aggran-
dizement,
I shook my
head and softly muttered under
my breath, “God, I hate Michael
Moore.”
You can still subscribe to the
same ideology as Moore while
flatly loathing him, his films
or what he stands for. What-
ever purpose or original intent
Moore has when he concocts his
so-called documentaries, the
final cuts never seem to show
it — whatever points or opinions
he happens to raise, they play
second fiddle to his own ego
inflation.
The most blaring instance of
his agenda setting that comes to
my mind gets played out in his
2002 film “Bowling for Colum-
bine,” where he “explores” guns
and gun culture in America. He
asserts that we as a nation are
gun obsessed, that war monger-
ing is engrained in our public
consciousness.
“That’s an interesting opinion,
Mr. Moore. Please provide your
evidence.”
Moore goes to a bank in
Michigan where they have a spe-
cial offer: open a specific bank
account, get a gun. Moore opens
a bank account, and, minutes
later, he walks out with a gun. He
says this demonstrates the lax
standards by which we hand out
guns — no waiting period from
this bank/apparent arms dealer.
Clearly we live in a messed up
country.
Except that scene is complete-
ly fabricated. Yes, that bank with
that deal exists, but it mandato-
rily institutes background checks
and three day waiting periods,
per the law. Moore convinced
the bank to give him the gun
immediately because of “time
constraints” with filming, but
that caveat obviously didn’t make
it into his film. Michael Moore
lied, he fixed the rules to meet his
agenda so that he could walk out
of this bank with a gun held high
and declare, “I, Michael Moore,
am smarter than the system, and
for that I am wiser, even better,
than you.”
I don’t appreciate being lied
to. And I don’t appreciate Moore
flaunting his self-importance,
especially because he disguises it
under a mask of so-called “truth”
that would otherwise inspire
social change. And yes it’s pos-
sible to view his films as an impe-
tus for discussion, but because
it’s a documentary, a genre asso-
ciated (falsely) with neutrality,
people will likely accept it at face
value as truth. Spreading false
information is dangerous, no
matter how good your cause, and
empty practices in narcissism are
a waste of time.
Which is why viewing “Chi-
Raq” last week was so refresh-
ing. This was the first Spike Lee
film I had seen, not including the
various snippets of “Inside Man”
that get replayed on cable, and I
knew little about him beyond the
following: his film “Do the Right
Thing” is considered a mas-
terpiece, he is prone to making
provocative statements and he is
boycotting the Academy Awards
this year.
Here is a film that explores
the same grim topic as Moore,
guns in America, but explodes
with vibrancy, color and emo-
tion. It follows the same premise
as the play it’s based on, Aris-
tophanes’ Lysistrata, where a
group of women withhold sex
from bloodthirsty men until they
agree to put down their arms. It
is, above all else, a satire: in Lee’s
world, the withholding of sex
enacts global social change and
ends gang violence, police bru-
tality, war, etc.
Of course, sex strikes are not
the real, achievable solution the
film proposes but the mecha-
nism by which Lee delivers his
message. Instilled in this comic
narrative are incredibly power-
ful images that are sure to reso-
nate, most notably a wrenching
two minute scene during which
a grieving mother desperately
tries to clean the sidewalk of
her daughter’s blood, spilled in a
gang-related shooting the night
before.
Lee tackles this topic of gun
violence (gang-related, police-
related, military, etc.) with grace
and the occasional challenging
comment. His mission is not to
preach (though he does, more on
that momentarily) but to get the
dialogue rolling — he offers no
practical solution except to get
people talking.
The centerpiece of the film is
the rousing eulogy for the afore-
mentioned daughter, delivered
by John Cusack’s Father Cor-
ridan. In it, Cusack blasts the
gangs, the police, the public’s
indifference and lack of motiva-
tion, racism, all of these core
societal issues. It’s supposed to
raise questions, to get us think-
ing. But what struck me the
most was not the speech itself:
why does Lee have the only
substantial white character in a
film otherwise occupied by black
characters give the most direct
condemnation of the American
way of thinking? Is it because
Cusack is the most visible of the
cast? Is it because the real-life
priest he’s based on is also white
and Lee was staying factual? Or
is it because Lee believes white
people will only listen to a white
man?
I don’t know the answer to
this question, nor any question
the film proposes. But I read a
wealth of information on Lee and
the reception of “Chi-Raq,” the
criticisms it draws, and I thought
on its reflection of America as a
whole, which I imagine was Lee’s
goal.
The beauty of the film stems
from its absurdity. To quote
from my favorite graphic novel,
“Watchmen”: “He saw the cracks
in society … he saw the true face
of the twentieth century and
chose to become a reflection of it,
a parody of it.” And from the par-
ody of “Chi-Raq”— the hypersex-
ualized women, the hyperviolent
men, the frequent breaking of
the fourth wall, the music video
moments, the outrageous practi-
cality of a sex strike — we find the
truth of ourselves. The punchline
should be just that: a punch.
That is effective cinematic
activism; that grabs and holds the
attention. Instead of basing his
film on his own self-importance,
his self-sacrifice in the name of
“truth,” Spike Lee offers us a
fantastical but equally salient
portrait of America. I imagine
had “Chi-Raq” received a larger
distribution, and if more people
saw it instead of Michael Moore’s
latest (or any film of his), the
dialogue “Chi-Raq” wants us to
have, that the film very literally
ends with, might actually occur.
Bircoll is starting fights in movie
theatres. To provoke or diffuse,
e-mail jbircoll@umich.edu.
JAMIE
BIRCOLL
B
Baskets
Series Premiere
Thursdays
at 10 p.m.
FX
COMMUNITY CULTURE PREVIEW
Race in ‘Translation’
By VANESSA WONG
Daily Arts Writer
I first watched “Lost in Trans-
lation” in high school. I got 15
minutes in and stopped because
it made me feel so disgusted —
like I was disgusting. At the time,
I didn’t know why. That was
before I learned anything about
Asian American activism, before
I even realized that Asian Ameri-
cans were discriminated against.
But after seeing the title on the
State Theater’s board of features
while walking home last week
and remembering that there’s
a famous movie with actors I
love and by a director I love that
I hadn’t gotten through yet, I
watched it again and I finally
understood — it’s grossly offen-
sive.
There is a repeating motif of
Bob (Bill Murray, “St. Vincent”)
and Charlotte (Scarlett Johans-
son, “Under the Skin”) being the
only ones awake at night, mind-
lessly clicking through TV chan-
nels until the time difference loses
its hold on them. It’s framed as a
moment of cultural alienation, but
since the content of the shows —
over-the-top aggression in action
movies, ditzy looking reality TV
girls — is typical, the only thing
engineering the feeling of being
“lost in translation” is the Japa-
nese voice itself. It’s quiet, but the
incomprehensible, loud Japanese
are the cackling cacophony that
interrupts the silence, jarring
these poor white people out of
their element. Universal behavior
is reinterpreted with a Western-
er’s self-conceit, racialized and
portrayed as “bizarre” interac-
tions with a foreign culture.
Furthermore,
it
otherizes
Asians, exaggerating negative ste-
reotypes as its source of humor.
A simpering, high-pitched pros-
titute begs Bob to “Lip my stock-
ings! Preas! Preas!,” and when he
goes along with it out of amuse-
ment and derision, she rolls
around on the floor kicking her
feet up absurdly, “Don’t touch
me! Hep preas! No! No!” It’s the
peak of the hypersexualized,
submissive and morally strange
Asian woman stereotype. Mur-
ray constantly mocks the Japa-
nese for their accented English
by repeating them the “right”
way and questioning his Japanese
director’s vision as if it’s stupid just
because of the way he conveys it.
The Japanese are portrayed as
flat, hollow characters with no
thoughts of their own, as if they’re
just there for the white people to
laugh at. We don’t laugh because
we are confused, or because we
are embarrassed at our own sense
of
cultural
misunderstanding.
We laugh because all these Asian
people are just so weird. All these
stereotypes are true, but are pur-
posely exploited for cheap jokes,
like an elevator scene where Bob
towers at least a foot over a horde
of tiny Asian men while in other
scenes, there are clearly Asian
actors his height.
Even the aspects of Japanese
culture that are portrayed posi-
tively are done through a ste-
reotypical lens. The first time
Charlotte
genuinely
smiles,
it’s observing monks chanting
prayers in a Buddhist temple,
approaching women in kimonos
arranging flowers while tender,
serene background music drifts
quietly in the background. Japa-
nese culture is only used for the
white protagonist to find herself,
and even the speaker introducing
her to Buddhism is another white
woman, not a Japanese person
who carries that history.
“I know I’m not racist,” director
Sofia Coppola insisted in an inter-
view with the Independent, and I
believe it. People may say that I’m
being too sensitive, too politically
correct. After all, 60 years ago,
Katherine Hepburn was prancing
around in yellowface for “Dragon
Seed.” I get that the point of the
film is to show how alienating it is
to be alone in a different world, to
feel like no one understands you. I
get that all of these characters are
flawed. They project their own
insecurities onto their surround-
ings, so we shouldn’t take their
opinion as fact. The one-dimen-
sionality of the Japanese charac-
ters, portraying the mundane as
different — I understand the value,
even the necessity, of these artistic
decisions.
This is where things get a little
muddy. Having grown up in the
West, even I view some of the
same things the film mentioned
as something weird, or different
from what I’m used to. So these
feelings are perfectly valid, and
pointing out these differences is
how Coppola gets us to connect
with her characters. But empha-
sizing the difference taps into our
base instincts of xenophobia —
encouraging the intended Western
audience to draw on that point of
twisted personal empathy in order
to propel the film forward.
I really wish this film could
have succeeded in another uni-
verse. It might have felt a little less
exploitative if a white girl from a
privileged family hadn’t directed
it. Maybe it would have worked
well if an Asian had portrayed the
same feeling of isolation in Amer-
ica. But because there are so few
films featuring Asians, the rare
ones that do must work to undo
centuries of stereotyping. Unfor-
tunately, the thematic premise
of “Lost in Translation” makes it
inherently impossible to maintain
sensitivity.
FILM NOTEBOOK
COURTESY OF FOCUS FEATURES
“Lemme hear you say haaaaaay Ms. Carter.”