Episode 597
with J. Wortham, Curtis Sittenfeld, and Margo Cilker
Journalist J. Wortham (The New York Times Magazine, Still Processing) recounts what happened when they visited a nude queer beach in Oaxaca; author Curtis Sittenfeld discusses her newest novel Romantic Comedy, which flips the script on the celebrity love story; and singer-songwriter Margo Cilker performs "With the Middle" from her sophomore album Valley of Heart's Delight. Plus, host Luke Burbank and announcer Elena Passarello highlight some favorite romantic moments in cinema.
J. Wortham
Journalist and podcast host
J. Wortham is a staff writer for The New York Times Magazine where they write about about culture and technology. They are the co-host of the podcast Still Processing. Aside from magazine writing, J., along with Kimberly Drew from One World, is a proud co-editor of the visual anthology Black Futures, a 2020 Editor's choice by The New York Times Book Review. J. is also a sound healer, reiki practitioner, herbalist, and community care worker oriented towards healing justice and liberation. They are currently working on a book about the body and dissociation for Penguin Press. Website • Twitter • Instagram
Curtis Sittenfeld
Author
Curtis Sittenfeld is the New York Times bestselling author of seven novels, including Rodham, Eligible, Prep, American Wife, and Sisterland, as well as the collection You Think It, I’ll Say It. Her most recent novel, Romantic Comedy, was a Reese's Book Club Pick. Her novels have been translated into thirty languages. In addition, her short stories have appeared in The New Yorker, The Washington Post Magazine, Esquire, and The Best American Short Stories, for which she has also been the guest editor. Her nonfiction has appeared in The New York Times, The Atlantic, Time, and Vanity Fair, and on public radio’s This American Life. Website • Twitter • Instagram
Margo Cilker
Singer- songwriter
Margo Cilker has spent the last seven years touring internationally as a critically acclaimed singer-songwriter. Her debut record, Pohorylle, was nominated for UK Americana Album of The Year alongside Brandi Carlile and Robert Plant which earned her a slew of festival performances and tours supporting American Aquarium, Hayes Carll, and Drive-By Truckers. Her sophomore album, Valley of Heart's Delight, refers to a place she can't return: California’s Santa Clara Valley, as it was known before the orchards were paved over and became more famous for Silicon than apricots. Margo is the fifth generation of Cilker’s born there, and in this 11-song collection, family and nature intertwine as guiding motifs, at once precious and endangered, beautiful and exhausting. Her music, which has been compared to that of Lucinda Williams, Townes Van Zandt, and Gillian Welch, deftly explores the complex, often-shifting terrain where love and loss meet. Website • Twitter • Instagram
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Luke Burbank: Hey there, Elena.
Elena Passarello: Hey, Luke. How's it going?
Luke Burbank: It's going pretty well this week. Mostly because it is time for a little Station Location Identification Examination. Are you feeling ready?
Elena Passarello: I am so ready.
Luke Burbank: This is where I give Elena a little quiz about somewhere in the country where Live Wire's on the radio. Gotta guess where I'm talking about. This place is home to an internationally known center for the arts, which was founded as a summer camp for young musicians. It's now actually a year round school for artistically talented youth from around the world. I see you already nodding like you know this.
Elena Passarello: What's the next clue? Just, just to confirm.
Luke Burbank: The state park that's associated with this place is home to one of the last stands of old growth pine in this state, the state being.
Elena Passarello: Interlochen, Michigan.
Luke Burbank: Interlochen, Michigan. My goodness, that was impressive. Where were on WICA.FM
Elena Passarello: Do you know the most one of the most famous graduates of Interlochen is? [Luke: You?] No, Jewel.
Luke Burbank: Seriously? The Pieces of You Jule?
Elena Passarello: Yes, she she was. It's an amazing school. That I would—I was so jealous of people who got to go to that school, so I it's been on my radar for about 40 years now. Probably.
Luke Burbank: Well, you're at least a person who knows about it. So thanks to everybody tuning in from Interlochen, Michigan. Shall we get to the show?
Elena Passarello: Let's do it.
Luke Burbank: All right, take it away from it.
Elena Passarello: This week writer J. Wortham.
J. Wortham: I can't trust my notes. I literally read them on the corner, and I was just like, what is the meaning of glitter? Like all caps. And I felt it. I felt it in my spirit.
Elena Passarello: And author Curtis Sittenfeld.
Curtis Sittenfeld: I think the romantic comedy has been subverted. It's very racially diverse. It's very queer. There's lots of elements of like fantasy or time travel. It's like a big world out there in romance.
Elena Passarello: With music from Margo Cilker and our fabulous house band, I'm your announcer, Eleno Passarello, and now the host of Live Wire, Luke Burbank.
Luke Burbank: Thank you so much, Elena Passarello. Thanks to everyone tuning in from all over the country. We have a really fun, informative show this week. Of course, we asked the Live Wire listeners a question. We asked, what is the most romantic movie moment of all time? And we're going to be hearing those responses coming up in just a few minutes. First, though, we got to kick things off with the best news we heard all week this week. This is our little reminder at the top of the show that there's some good news happening out there in the world. Elena, what is the best news you've heard all week?
Elena Passarello: Okay, here's some cool stuff coming out of Takoma Park, Maryland, which is, up by Silver Spring near D.C., at the corner of Flower and Erie. At that cross section, there is an old school pay phone kiosk, so not a phone booth, but one of those things that kind of looks like a wash tub that you could kind of lean in if it was raining and put your shades out. Remember, you can't put change in it anymore, but it's got this bright yellow receiver, and when you put it to your ear, you can hit a button and make it play you a bird call.
Luke Burbank: Okay.
Elena Passarello: You can hear a night heron, you could hear a pileated woodpecker, you could hear a red tailed hawk, or you could hear seven other native species. The dial tone is a mourning dove, which I think is kind of great because it's kind of like [Elena making dove sounds].
Luke Burbank: Hey, that's a pretty good mourning dove.
Elena Passarello: Thank you. So this amazing bird call phone booth is the brainchild of a local musician and artist named David Schulman, who noticed the kiosk back in 2016, and he wrote a grant to city officials asking for money to do this public interactive art project. They gave him $5,000, and the whole community really contributed into making this a reality. He bought, a refurbished payphone off of eBay, put it in that spot. He got the bird files from the famous Cornell Bird Lab. So all the sounds are coming from basically kind of the gold standard. He had a local radio personality provide the operator voice along with other local members. So now you could get these sort of like identifications of what bird is making, what noise in English, Spanish and Amharic, which of the three most spoken languages in the community. And there's this gentleman who owns the West African restaurant directly across the street from the phone booth, and he has, pardon the pun, a bird's eye view of what the past six years have been like for this phone booth. And do you know who the number one demographic of people who patronize this phone booth is? Kids. Can you guess why?
Luke Burbank: They're trying to call their mom to get a ride home from soccer practice.
Elena Passarello: No, it's because they've never seen a phone kiosk before. [Luke: Right!] They have no idea and this is a particularly cool place for this to be happening, because Takoma Park, Maryland is kind of bird town, USA. Not far from this kiosk is another piece of public art that's dedicated to Roscoe the Rooster, who was this rogue rooster that roamed downtown, avoiding capture and winning over both the townspeople and the shopkeepers hards for most of the 1990s. They just had a fugitive rooster that they prayed no one would catch. So there's a bird payphone, and there's a rooster statue for this, like, total vagabond rooster. And so I am moving to Takoma Park, Maryland.
Luke Burbank: This sounds like the place for you. Speaking of Maryland, by the way, that's also where the best news I saw this week comes from. It's a big Terrapin State segment this week. A couple of years ago, the Girl Scouts of Maryland announced that they were going to be selling some land that they owned. This is in Prince George's County. It's an area called the Marlton Forest. It's like 20 minutes outside of D.C., and they were going to sell this land. And it turns out they were going to sell it to a real estate developer who was very excited because this is some beautiful property. And the real estate developer said they were going to put like over a thousand residences on this piece of land that was being sold. Well, there happened to be a Girl Scout of the local chapter named Netra Pura Sheth, a man. And what she said later to the paper was, Girl Scouts has a tree pledge and all these nature environmentally friendly things. And by selling this forest to developers, they're kind of going back on all those policies. If they're teaching us all of these skills our whole lives, we feel like they should be following them too. So neither was 15 at the time of this. Gets her couple of friends together. Her friend Sienna and her friend Mireya, and they start up a petition online to stop the the Girl Scouts, organization that was going to be selling the land to the developer from doing that. But something about these three young people who are Girl Scouts themselves. They got like 3500 signatures on their petition. And this was a couple of years ago, but it was just announced recently that, in fact, this forest will be sold to the Maryland National Capital Park and Planning Commission to be preserved as forest. And they sold it for like $12.5 million. So a lot of, Girl Scout cookies.
Elena Passarello: Yeah. That's a lot of Thin Mints.
Luke Burbank: Yeah, seriously. Thick mints. More like it. They're going to use some of that money, though, to actually purchase adaptive outdoor equipment like tents for, Girl Scouts that use wheelchairs. They're going to provide training to help neurodiverse campers and also offer mental health resources and more scholarships for campers. So not only is this section of Forest and Maryland being preserved as forest, but some of the money from selling it is now going to be used to help more people, particularly more Girl Scouts use the forest.
Elena Passarello: Amazing. If you want something done, you need to call a Girl Scout.
Luke Burbank: Get Sienna, Mithra and Mariah together and you'll get some real results. So there you go. That is the best news that I heard this week. You. All right. Let's welcome our first guest over to the program there, a staff writer for the New York Times Magazine and co-host of the podcast Still Processing, as well as coeditor of the anthology Black Futures. The Village Voice describes their writing as skirting the edges of tech, culture and identity, carving out their own corner of the internet wherein they are a rightful star. They're currently working on a book about the body and dissociation. This is for Penguin Press. J. Wortham joined us on stage at the Alberta Rose Theater in Portland, Oregon. Take a listen. Hello. Welcome to the show.
J. Wortham: I am so excited to be here. It's like, this is incredible. Thank you for having me.
Luke Burbank: Thank you. Well, yeah. We have been. We have been big fans of your work for a long time. And so this is, this is great to have you here. I want to start, though, sort of at the beginning of maybe your young adult life. Did I read correctly? You studied medical anthropology in college?
J. Wortham: Wow. You went back there.
Luke Burbank: I just I don't think I've heard of that of that area of study. What drew you to that? And what exactly does that encompass?
J. Wortham: Absolutely. I'm so glad you brought this up, because not a lot of people know it's what happens when you don't know what the f you're doing in college, and you get them to make up a major for you. They're like, you've got some credits here, you've got some credits here. We'll make a, you know, degree sandwich. So I, went to college. I was the first in my family to go away to a four year school. And my parents were just like, have fun, come out with the job. I had been really good at science and high school. I was such a nerd. And so when I got to college, I went to UVA, which is a school where that has an incredible medical program. So everyone was like, you should specialize in pre-med. And after about a year or so, I was like, wow, I'm really miserable. I don't I don't love this. And I got really interested in anthropology, the study of culture. And I think what really fascinated me was thinking about how we talk about culture. Right? Like how we talk about people, how we talk about how they lived, what gets included, what gets excluded? It really did primed me for so much of my life, because in my professional career later on, because I had this rigor of curiosity and I had this way of thinking about how we live and why it's important, and being someone who wasn't used to seeing their story being told or their history being told, I had that skepticism also when I was taking these classes. And so when I ended up writing about technology and writing about culture, I brought some of that same rigor with me. So it all worked out in the end is my point.
Luke Burbank: I mean, that's why I was internet researching what your major was, because I find your career so fascinating. The variety of things that you write about and talk about on the podcast, how do you, when you're writing for the New York Times Magazine, do you think of yourself as having any sort of beat? How do you kind of go towards the stories you go towards?
J. Wortham: Thank you for saying such kind of things about my career. I mean it when you were talking, I want to jump in and be like, it was called panic. But I, you know, I spent a lot of time in college and after college and in high school to actually, waitressing. So I'm a big service industry person, which is also kind of how I learned to interview because so much of that work is reading. People like you walk up to a table and you're like, what's going on here? You know what I mean? Are we on a date? Is it a bad date? Is it a good day? If it's a bad day, you know you're going to be more attentive, right? Because they need distractions. If it's a good day, you're like, I'm like hard, you know? Right. But you know, that really did primed me in a lot of ways. So it's funny because I when I was waitressing, I lived in San Francisco and I started interning at a bunch of different places, and I landed at wired magazine, you know, started out as an intern and then a researcher, and I started writing about technology because that was just what I was living. So I was like, there are these cool things happening. So this is what I'm writing about. So some of my writing got the attention of The New York Times, and I started having all these lunches. I started having all these meetings with them, and they were like, do you want to come write for us? And I was like, like, I'm 24, like, you know what I mean? And I was just like, that's bananas. Know what? That's bananas. Who am I? I'm like, at the elbow room every night. Like, I don't know. I'm just like, I'm not. That's not that's not who I am. That's not what I'm capable of.
Luke Burbank: You turned them down?
J. Wortham: I did turn them down. And actually they called me and my incredible editor, Damon Dahlen, whose name I always say because he was so supportive and so encouraging and and that's not many people's experience in that industry in particular. And he called me and he was like, I got your email. I want you to delete it. Send me another one that just says, like, when can I start?
Luke Burbank: Wow. Already editing you.
J. Wortham: Yeah. Already editing me. Genius of a human.
Luke Burbank: We're talking to J. Wortham, a writer for the New York Times Magazine, among other things. And when we get back, I do want to talk about one of the pieces that they wrote where they went to a nude beach in Oaxaca, and something happened to them that feels exactly like it would happen to me, involving nudity, comfort levels. Anyway, that's in a moment. This is Live wire. That's a hell of a forward promotion, by the way.
Unidentified: This is a Live Wire from PRX, back at the moment.
Luke Burbank: Hey, welcome back to Live Wire from PRX.
Luke Burbank: I'm Luke Burbank here with Elena Passarello. We are at the Alberta Rose Theater in Portland, Oregon this week, and we are talking to writer J. Wortham from The New York Times Magazine, as well as the podcast, Still Processing. You wrote a piece in the Times Magazine a while ago about going to what you describe as being a sort of queer, nude beach in a fairly remote part of Mexico, in Oaxaca. What were you expecting when you went down there?
J. Wortham: Oh. Listen, I was expecting to, like, have a do-over of my 20s. I had a late coming out as a queer person in my mid-30s, and so I just felt like I missed a lot. And I was just sort of like, this is my time to shine. It's going to be like, gay spring break. I don't know what's going to happen. I bought a thong. I was just like, this is going to be incredible. And it wasn't quite that. Something else happened when I was there.
Luke Burbank: Well, actually, could you read a little bit from this piece?
J. Wortham: Yeah. Okay. You set it up beautifully. Thank you. So this is kind of a truncated version of me arriving at this beach. And some of the things I experienced. I should also say that I've been researching queer beaches and waterways for the last couple of years, because I just think they're really incredible spaces where community and history and, amazing oral histories happen. So this is kind of some of the context. Okay. Oh, here we go. I haven't read this out loud, so we'll see how this goes. Okay.
J. Wortham: After throwing my bags in my room, I ran down to the beach. I hadn't looked at any photos of Tay before arriving and didn't know what to expect. Pushing my way through the trees and brambles, I came around the bend and caught the breathtaking vista of a wide, flat beach dotted with mountainous outcroppings that perforated the blues of the sky and the blues of the water. I spread out my blanket and flopped down, taking it in. It was Sunday and the vibe felt languid luxury fed by the surplus of hours left in the day. All around me. People were strolling hand in hand, reading books, playing volleyball and eating completely naked and planning my trip. I thought more about the queer aspect of the beach than the nude element, and I hesitated before joining in. The only times I've gotten naked in public, I've been busted or harassed on a rugged lake in Austin, Texas, where I felt so cleared out by older men that I robed as quickly as ID robed. And in the dunes of Provincetown, mass. Where girlfriend and I tried to covertly have sex several times, only to have a park ranger chase us away several times with the increasing exasperation of someone trying to clear a road of errant livestock. It's true this was different, but I'd also arrived in Mexico with my winter body, which mere weeks before I had described to a friend as loose mashed potatoes tied up in a burlap sack. Also true. I decided to start slowly. After a few minutes, I stood up and pulled my sports bra over my head and tossed it to the sand. The flicker of heads turning towards me gave me a boost. I started jogging towards the water. Gold chains bouncing in my bare chest, enjoying the attention along this particular stretch of coastline. The tide takes its time undulating onto the sand. Walking into the water cannot be rushed. It is the perfect stage for cruising. I made my way out there and dunked under the waves a few times. And Earth Song, a body song as Langston Hughes wrote. Satisfied, I sprawled on my beach towel to big serotonin coursed through me, sparked by the delight at arriving in a new place, drunk on sand and sand and beauty as my skin began to heat back up. I leaned on my elbows and surveyed the scene. The longer I sat there in my swimwear, surrounded by so many unencumbered people, the more I became aware of my own clad body. My entire life, clothes felt like a necessary protective layer between me and the world. And on this beach, they felt like the linen bibs you wear to get dental x rays. Emboldened, I decided to take the next step. Full nudity. I lifted my hips up and began sliding my nylon shorts off nylon. Almost immediately, I felt the woosh of displaced air created by a mouth and motion near my ears. I got to cocoa. I froze, I felt as if my entire body yelped the gentleman who materialized on my left holding a machete in a coconut simply trying to sell me refreshing beverage, looked as alarmed as I did. He dropped to a knee to introduce himself. He offered me his hand to shake it, and I accepted it gratefully with the hand that wasn't gripping my shorts. He told me he has a lot of respect for my people. Who are my people? Nudist gays, black people, I'll never know. Heart still racing. I rested my shorts back up and settled back onto my blanket and gay watery enclaves. Water also functions as a protective force, spits of land cocooned or barricaded by water that take hours to reach by car or ferry, are made for distance from gossip and prying eyes, and sheltered from convention, chemically speaking waters and near universal solvent. Its arrangement of oxygen and hydrogen atoms allow the molecule to dissolve more substances than any other liquid found in nature. The sheer strength of water itself can disrupt another molecule's electrostatic charge entirely. Water, then, has the absolute power to transform, to take one material and turn it into something else. What's clearer than that? Being made and unmade by force greater than yourself. If queerness can be understood as a longing, a technology that allows us to glimpse something new that we can sense before we see it. A dowsing rod, a black light, then water might be the catalyst that dissolves our attachment to whatever's keeping us from it ourselves.
Luke Burbank: J. Wortham here on Live Wire, reading from their piece in the New York Times Magazine. I thought that was such a fascinating piece. You had something much more recently that I was also fascinated with for different reasons, which was writing about Beyoncé's Renaissance tour. And, I guess the first question is, what did you wear? Because there is— [J. Wortham: Yeah!] there was like a lot of mandatory outfits or at least strongly suggested outfits, like, what were you what were you wearing to to go as a fan because you went as a journalist and then a different time as a fan? If I have it correct.
J. Wortham: Yes, yes, I know it's hearing this, I'm like, I have a good job, I am, I'm like, life is good. Yes, I went on Renaissance World Tour with friends and I wore like a silver sheer like cover up because I was just like, I'm going to be dancing. I'm moving it to be hot. And then I had such a good time. I had a call with my editor, like a day or two later, and I just could not stop talking about Beyonce. And she was like, you should write about it. And I was like, look, if y'all want me to write about this, I got to go again. That was my time. I was on my time. I was also on some light about a psychedelic, so I was like, I can't trust my notes, right? I can't trust my notes. I literally read them on the call to her and it was just like, what is the meaning of glitter? Like all caps. Like all caps. And I felt it. I felt it in my spirit. You know, just like it was so amazing.
Luke Burbank: So the first time you went, you were enjoying it as a fan. And then the second time, less drugs and more note taking, like, was it not as much—it just must have been much more like you're observing everything because you're writing this now for your job. Yeah. Was it still fun the second time or was it just work?
J. Wortham: It was so fun. No, it was so fun because, I mean, I'm someone who—look, I'm rewatching all of Gray's Anatomy right now because it's the one show that I can watch that I know I never have to write about. Like, I'm someone who's in the world. It's over. It's done. We all know what happens. You know, they.
Luke Burbank: I would read your think piece on Gray's Anatomy.
J. Wortham: It might happen and I will say at this point I have some thoughts. But, you know, as a cultural critic, I wanted to see the production. I was just like, Where is Beyoncé at? Like, what is she thinking about? Like I was going to go either way. It was so fun to go with that receptor tuned. And I was so excited just to like, pay attention in that way.
Luke Burbank: So, if I understand the timeline, right. You had written a piece about Beyoncé previously that had gotten her attention that involved, some sort of a thank you note or, a nice note, from Beyoncé. Does that arrive on a Pegasus? How do you get how is that news? How does one get that kind of feedback?
J. Wortham: Yeah, it was really interesting. I had been asked to contribute into this roundtable for the newspaper, so I mostly work for the magazine. I guess she had released formation, and maybe it was new music in a very long time. And we had a really rousing conversation about Beyoncé, stepping into a new era of herself when pop stars politicize themselves, you know, the role of entertainment, and how entertainers use their platform and sort of how that plays out and people's resistance to that. Right. I guess you like what I said because, you know, I came into work and there was a delivery. And, you know, I'll be honest, it was really embarrassing, kind of because as a journalist, you know, you're supposed to have this objectivity, you're supposed to be distanced from these things. And people were literally coming by my desk to like, touch the flowers. And I was this was like, it was it was a delivery of flowers. And I was like, I can't take them home because people keep asking me like, are the Beyoncé flowers here? You know? And it was it was really shocking. But, I kept the note. I don't think she wrote it. I don't know, I it doesn't look like her handwriting on her Tumblr.
Luke Burbank: And the other thing, we're getting towards the end of our time here, but I want to talk to you about Still Processing, which is this great podcast that you and Wesley Morris do. I'm curious, did it come about because the two of you were just, like, in the lunch room at the New York Times talking, and you were like, we should be recording this. How did how did it start?
J. Wortham: He had the insight. He had the foresight. We would always get together and chit chat and talk about things. And he had made a podcast when he was a writer at the Grantland or Grantland. And so, but so he had been pushing at the New York Times to get them to do a podcast, and he wanted to do with me. And I was like, I feel like he came to ask me, and I was like, researching something in like a library and like, looked up and was like, dusty. And I was just like, get out of here. No, like I'm busy. But it was such an incredible opportunity and in a way, to learn to collaborate. Because when you're writing, you're just so siloed. You know, it's like you're you're writing something and then an editor sees it. But this was a chance to learn how to think out loud in public, which is really a trust fund and act of vulnerability.
Luke Burbank: It's a very intimate, show between you and Wesley in the way that you're really there for each other. Will there be more hopefully?
J. Wortham: We hope so. We always want to be making it. We're both finishing our books right now, so it's just like one of those things where we're both like X number of years is it and just need to do it. You know, those memes that are like how to finish a book and you like turn the slide and it's like, write the damn book, you know? And like, it's just that thing. You just want to do it. Yeah.
Luke Burbank: This one knows. Writer of multiple books.
Elena Passarello: Yeah. How to finish a book? Don't do a radio show. Yeah.
Luke Burbank: All right, well, sounds like we all have places to be and other projects to do. So we're going to say goodbye to J. Wortham from the New York Times Magazine and Still Processing.
J. Wortham: Thank you so much. Thank you.
Luke Burbank: That was J. Wortham right here on Live Wire. Be sure to follow and check out their work in the New York Times Magazine. This is Live Wire. Of course, each week we like to ask our listeners a question because we're going to be talking to Curtis Sittenfeld about the book Romantic Comedy. We asked the listeners, what's the most romantic movie moment of all time? Folks responded, and Elena has been collecting up those responses. What do you see?
Elena Passarello: Okay, so one movie got multiple mentions. Can you guess which one?
Luke Burbank: Well, I'm a basic sort of person. So I'm wondering, was it Casablanca?
Elena Passarello: No. What a great choice. No, it was Pride and Prejudice. [Luke:Oh, okay.] Which is even more classic, honestly. But the 2005 Pride and Prejudice with Keira Knightley and Matthew McFadden. One person, Aurora, loves it when Mr. Darcy says, you have bewitched me, body and soul. And I love, love, love you. That, that's Aurora's that really grills Aurora's cheese, so to speak.
Luke Burbank: You know, I've got four younger sisters and Liz, Sarah, Hannah and Rachel, and they were Pride and Prejudice fans to the point where they would just call it Pratt and Pratt. And like it was being discussed so much in the household I grew up in that and we couldn't waste the time to say Pride and Prejudice. They would just say, Pret and Pret.
Elena Passarello: And it was that one. It was the 2005.
Luke Burbank: I think. No, I think it was the before that it might have been like a BBC TV series, the Colin Firth. I think it was the Colin Firth version that loomed very large in the Burbank household. All right. What's, another romantic movie moment that a listener loved?
Elena Passarello: Mike says that Shrek is romantic as it gets, specifically Shrek two, where the intro to the movie is a montage of their honeymoon. Spoiler alert they're frolicking and giggling, and they're farting together in a hot tub. Hahahahahahahaha.
Luke Burbank: So this person is worried that we're going to spoil the end of Shrek one by mentioning that there's a honeymoon in Shrek two. Yeah, for anybody who was taping it, they get married at the end of Shrek.
Elena Passarello: Yeah, and they fart in the bathtub at the beginning of Shrek two is the most important part of the story.
Luke Burbank: Okay, one more quick romantic moment from one of our listeners.
Elena Passarello: Oh, this one from Erica. Erica says the last scene in Rocky where he's gone 15 rounds and he's all beat up, and there's a bunch of press everywhere asking him questions. Everything's chaotic, and the only thing he does is call out for Adrian. You know, he's like looking all over the place. He's being swarmed with people and Burgess Meredith there, and he's just like, where's Adrian? Where's Adrian?
Elena Passarello: Well that's my Sylvester Stallone [Luke: That's a pretty good.] It gets me every time. It's like he has one directive and it's just to find little Talia Shire.
Luke Burbank: Oh, I think that, you know, when you really love someone and anything happens in your life, you just want to tell them about it, right? Like that's the first thing you want to do for all of the kind of, you know, the violence of that movie and raw egg eating.
Elena Passarello: And eating lightning and craping thunder.
Luke Burbank: All of it, it's at the end of it, really. He just wants to tell Adrian that he wants like, she didn't know. Like she wasn't just standing over there watching the whole thing. Thank you to everyone who sent in a response, to our listener question this week. Really appreciate it. All right. Our next guest is a New York Times bestselling author of seven novels. The New York Times Book Review says that her work exists in the dissection and comprehension of female desire. What we want, what we absolutely don't, and maybe paramount what we're even allowed to have. Her latest novel, Romantic Comedy, is a love letter to the whole concept of rom coms. Here's Curtis Sittenfeld, who joined us on stage at the Alberta Rose Theater in Portland, Oregon. Curtis, welcome to Live Wire.
Curtis Sittenfeld: Thank you.
Luke Burbank: Now, this book is about a writer on a, live television sketch program that airs on Saturday nights. I believe, this show in your book is called The Night Owls. TNO. And I don't want to brag, but I think I may have cracked the case. I am thinking this might be about Saturday Night Live. Am I getting warm?
Curtis Sittenfeld: Maybe it might be.
Luke Burbank: Yeah. What were the circumstances around which the idea for this book, I understand, was in the pandemic and you were watching a lot of SNL?
Curtis Sittenfeld: Yeah, a very, very subtle connection. Yes. So my family was watching a lot of SNL, and I would think to myself as we watched, someone should write a screenplay about the phenomenon of talented but sort of ordinary men on the show, like cast members or writers who end up dating and in some cases, marrying these incredibly famous, gorgeous, world famous, like, women who are either musical guests or guest hosts on the show.
Luke Burbank: This is a direct assault on Pete Davidson and Colin Jost.
Curtis Sittenfeld: It's actually it's not a direct assault on. It's a celebration of this.
Luke Burbank: Like, let's have more of this, but let's have it run in both directions.
Curtis Sittenfeld: I mean, it's funny because I find Pete Davidson delightful and endearing. Anyway, I would think, like, oh, there should be a screenplay about a woman who's a writer for this show, and and she writes a sketch about it would never happen with, like, an ordinary female writer and a smoking hot male celebrity. And then that week, there's a smoking hot male celebrity and they have chemistry. And then I was working on a different book that I, and I sort of wrote myself into a corner with it. And eventually I thought like, oh, that that other idea, maybe instead of a screenplay it should be a novel. And maybe the the person who writes it should be me.
Elena Passarello: Okay.
Luke Burbank: That's a big epiphany to have.
Curtis Sittenfeld: I know it, actually. Sometimes you're the last to know.
Luke Burbank: Can we talk about Sally Mills, the main character? What's kind of her? What's her deal? What's her motivation?
Curtis Sittenfeld: Well, so she's she's in her late 30s, which I'm. I'm now in my late 40s, and I think people are like, it's so refreshing to have, such, like, an old protagonist in a romance, but, anyway. But she's she's in, she's in her late 30s and she's, she's been at the show for nine years and she's professionally confident, but she's sort of personally insecure. She had a sort of what she thinks of as a starter marriage in her early 20s. Got divorced, didn't have kids. She doesn't feel like she needs, you know, to get married. But she also has sort of low expectations. She doesn't think that either what she wants is available to her or what's available to her is that appealing.
Luke Burbank: I wonder what it's like to write something that's a sort of romantic novel in, you know, this era where certainly you don't want that character to be defined as someone who is incomplete unless they find their other half, which is the premise of most rom coms from ten years ago. How do you how do you how do you work within the genre without getting too stuck in some of the tropes of the genre?
Curtis Sittenfeld: I mean, I think that the genre is actually a lot more complex and and sort of varied than people who don't read that widely in it realize, this is some people will say to me like, oh, were you trying to subvert the romantic comedy or the rom com? You know, the book form, which actually I like, that's now, as you might or might not know, what was once called chick lit 20 years ago is now called rom coms in books. Wow. Why.
Luke Burbank: Did they get rid of chick lit? I can't see any.
Curtis Sittenfeld: Any problems with that.
Luke Burbank: You know.
Curtis Sittenfeld: The one of the what I really objected to is there's a term like a in people, you know, sort of say this with a straight face. There's women's fiction is like a category, which it sounds, I guess there's fiction and then there's women and sex, and I write women's fiction, it turns out.
Luke Burbank: So you're always the last one. And I know.
Curtis Sittenfeld: I know, it's true. It's true. So, I think the romantic comedy has been subverted. I think that there's a sort of stereotype that, again, people who don't necessarily read it might think of that's like 20 or 30 years out of date. It's very racially diverse. It's very queer. There's lots of elements of like, you know, fantasy or time travel or sci fi. There's it's like a big world out there in in romance.
Luke Burbank: Can we talk a little bit about Noah Brewster? What? It's his. What's his story?
Curtis Sittenfeld: So Noah is the the pop star who's the guest host and the musical guest at the Night Owls? And the week that takes up, like, the first half of the book is the kind of countdown of preparing for the live show on Saturday night. And he's someone who he sort of hit it big, like 20 years ago. And he is he's actually like a genuinely nice person, although Sally is a little bit suspicious of him, and he's also very handsome. And I think she, she sort of feels like, oh, how could someone who's very rich and famous and and handsome like one, how could they also be this nice and then to like, why would they be interested in, like, a successful but unremarkable writer at a TV show?
Luke Burbank: Obviously you've written a lot of books and you've think about character a lot, and you're, I'm presuming as a writer you want the reader to have certain feelings about characters. But was it a different challenge to write this Noah guy and to be like, we really need the readers to, like, be rooting for this dude?
Curtis Sittenfeld: That's a good question, actually. So I think that having a book published can be this incredible, like illustration in what you can't control and, and how people have incredibly varied reactions. So I think my job was to read someone that create in Noah, someone that I thought was appealing and then like, hope that enough people would agree with me that the book would find readers, or so I. I think that Noah is very endearing. Although it's funny because I also got enough of a sort of like, heterosexual female enthusiasm for this book that I was like, I feel like some, maybe some straight men who are having troubles should, like, just read it could take it.
Luke Burbank: Could that.
Curtis Sittenfeld: Yeah. Well, I'm sorry, I won't presume.
Luke Burbank: I know I got a lot of tips. I actually I'm going to I'm going to start acting very differently now after observing Noah Brewster's character.
Curtis Sittenfeld: But I mean, you seem like, you know, obviously you're a professional listener, right? I think that the main things that are most appealing about him are not that he's very handsome, very rich, you know, very successful. It's that he actually, like, listens to Sally and like remembers the things that she told him. And and he's like very affectionate and complimentary, like all these things that are actually you don't need to be, successful pop singer to, to like, employ those techniques. I'm actually not talking to you. Yeah. No, no.
Luke Burbank: I don't, I don't I not. I mean, I it's an honor just to even be mentioned in the same company as no matter who we're talking to. Right. We're talking to Curtis Sittenfeld here on Live Wire. Her latest book is romantic Comedy. What I also really enjoyed about the book was the the kind of, you know, the night owls or the Saturday Night Live backdrop. You know, because they're, Sally is a writer. And what what it does seem to involve was you, Curtis Sittenfeld, writing a lot of Saturday Night Live esque content. Did you know how to do that? Had you had sent a packet into SNL at some point? Was that ever a dream of yours?
Curtis Sittenfeld: No. You know, so again, I'm I'm 48 now. I did have the thought while writing this. Like, if I had understood how it all worked, maybe in my 20s I would have applied. Although I also, I will say right now, like I'm like 60% asleep right now. Like I was like, I get I late, I'm, I live in Minneapolis. I'm like two hours behind and I like to get in bed literally at like 8:45 p.m.. So it's like I almost think, like setting aside the.
Luke Burbank: Lifestyle of an SNL writer?
Curtis Sittenfeld: I mean, they literally pull, like one or 2 or 3 all nighters a week, like I couldn't in my prime. I couldn't have done that.
Luke Burbank: I mean, you're writing sketches, you're writing premises for sketches, which you're you know, your work in the book is going up against what we see if we watch, you know, Saturday Night Live and, and that's something that, you know, professional sketch writers and it's, there's this process of getting to the supposedly best idea, like, did you run any of this by people that, you know, that work in that world or.
Curtis Sittenfeld: Okay, not not only did I not, but the there's there's one there's really there's kind of like scenes that are set during rehearsals and there's like references to sketches, but there's almost only one scene where you're getting like verbatim punchlines, one after the other. My children, help me write it. Oh.
Luke Burbank: Well, bring them to SNL. Oh, yeah.
Curtis Sittenfeld: I know, and actually, like, I've been really complimented on that scene specifically. And and they'll be like, I love that. And I'll be like, yeah, my older daughter, I think she was like 12 when she wrote like it was we were. So it's the premise of that is, Google searches that dogs would would do. And we were like one of many families who had gotten a pandemic dog. So we were like sitting in, we got we actually got stuck in gridlock in a school parking lot in Minneapolis. And so I was like, I give up. I just pulled back in and I was like, oh, you know, we've been meaning to do that dog sketch thing. So why don't we make use of this time? And and so sometimes it helps to almost like maybe not take your own work too seriously.
Luke Burbank: Yeah. The the dog sketch. You know, dogs googling things is really funny. Also, I just like the passing reference to a TV show, a singing TV show called American Lungs. Yeah, that, that was very good. Real chef's kiss.
Curtis Sittenfeld: I will say, actually. So my brother was the first reader of this book, and it's he that's the dog scene who's like, it's not that funny. Most people are like, that's my favorite part of the book. And American Lungs, he's like, it just really rubs me the wrong way. And I was like, okay. And then I like tried.
Luke Burbank: But he didn't like American Lungs.
Curtis Sittenfeld: He didn't like.
Luke Burbank: He pick a lane.
Curtis Sittenfeld: I know, I know, but it's it's also subjective. It's good. It's good to get harsh feedback from your family members early on because it prepares you for the eventual bad reviews.
Luke Burbank: Is this the first interview where American Lungs has been referenced?
Curtis Sittenfeld: It is the first.
Luke Burbank: Point Live Wire. The book is Romantic Comedy. Curtis Sittenfeld, thank you so much. That was Curtis Sittenfeld right here on Live Wire. Her latest book, Romantic Comedy, is out and available right now. I'm Luke Burbank here with Elena Passarello. We have to take a very quick break, but don't go anywhere. When we come back, we are going to hear some music from the very wonderful Margo Cilker. Stay with us. Welcome back to Live Wire from PRX. I'm Luke Burbank here with Elena Passarello. Before we get to our musical guest this week, a little preview of next week's show. We are going to be celebrating Black History Month with a special episode. We're going to be talking to the poet and author Tracy K. Smith about her new memoir, To Free the Captives: A plea for the American Soul. She is going to tell us about how, in the book, she looks to uncover black strength and community through the lens of her own family, which starts with her father growing up in Sunflower, Alabama. Then we are going to talk to the writer and poet Saeed Jones. He's got a collection of poems out called alive at the end of the world. He talks about grief and life and what it means to be a black, queer person in a world that feels kind of like it's ending. Plus, we're going to hear music from musician and performer Meklit, who artfully blends music and sound and has been all over the world. Not just music stages, but also Ted talks and a meeting with the United Nations. So that's coming up next week on the show. Do not miss it. All right. Our musical guest this week spent the last seven years touring internationally as a critically acclaimed singer songwriter. Her debut album, which we all loved around here, Pohorylle, was nominated for a UK Americana Album of the year and now we're critically acclaimed. Sophomore album Valley of Heart's Delight is out and you can get it, so please do. First though, listen to Margo Cilker right here on Live Wire.
Margo Cilker: Hello. Thanks for having me back.
Luke Burbank: Thanks for coming back. I know you've been touring and running all around the country and New York City and Tennessee and everywhere in between. I'm curious about the name of this album. Valley of Heart's Delight. Is. That's a reference to where you grew up?
Margo Cilker: It is. That's a, an old agricultural slogan that they use to entice people to come to the valley of Heart's Delight to to behold the apricot and prune blossoms every spring.
Luke Burbank: And this is in California?
Margo Cilker: This is in. Yeah, the Santa Clara Valley.
Luke Burbank: Which is now where Google is.
Margo Cilker: That's. Yeah. So instead of yeah, no, they just have apples.
Luke Burbank: Yes. It's totally different. Were you into country music or Americana music when you were growing up, and was that typical for folks in the area?
Margo Cilker: I didn't know, I didn't really know about country music I was listening to. Well, I sang in the church choir, and I sing in school, and I got into Simon and Garfunkel. That was like the gateway for me, for sure. And, you know, I had like a, I had my very own Garfunkel, my sister.
Luke Burbank: And like the real Garfunkel. Do you no longer speak to her?
Margo Cilker: No, I do, I do speak good, I speak to her/
Luke Burbank: I'm glad that's where the similarity ended.
Margo Cilker: Exactly like the folk revival. Like the 60s folk revival stuff. Kind of, like Joan Baez was also like a local legend because she was in the Bay area, and she was a huge influence and.
Luke Burbank: I something else I didn't know until recently was that you were in, living in Spain and you had a Lucinda Williams cover band called Drunken Angels.
Margo Cilker: That's right.
Luke Burbank: What's it like playing country music in Spain? Like, are they down for it?
Margo Cilker: Well, Luke, I have to tell you, I was in the Basque Country. And if they heard me call that Spain, you know, they were.
Luke Burbank: Oh, sure.
Margo Cilker: Oh, right. Have something to say about it?
Luke Burbank: They sure would. I don't need any sheep ranchers coming after me from the Basque Country. But I mean that. So that is a part of Spain where there's obviously a very rich tradition of rural life and and agriculture and farming and things. So were they into your Lucinda Williams cover band?
Margo Cilker: You know, I was, I was when I lived there, I was living in Bilbao, which is referred to as the Portland of Europe. So I, you know, and I think part of the reason I loved living there is that it's like they've got a great art scene, they've got the the Guggenheim Museum and there's the coast. So it's there's this like surf culture that's like very mind blowing for someone who grew up, like going to Santa Cruz. And it's like, oh, but here you're all like, the young kids are like drinking wine and surfing.
Luke Burbank: So, what is, the song we're going to hear?
Margo Cilker: I'm going to sing the song With the Middle for you.
[Margo Cilker plays With the Middle]
Luke BurbTnk: That is Margo Cilker right here on Live Wire. Her album Valley of Heart's Delight is available right now. All right. That's going to do it for this week's episode of the show. A very big thanks to our guests J. Wortham, Curtis Sittenfeld, and Margo Cilker.
Elena Passarello: Laura Hadden is our executive producer, and Heather De Michele is our executive director. And our producer and editor is Melanie Sevcenko. Eban Hoffer and Molly Pettit are our technical directors at our house sound is by D. Neil Blake. Tre Hester is our assistant editor. Our marketing and production manager is Karen Pan. Rosa Garcia is our operations associate, Jackie Ibarra is our production fellow, and Becky Phillips is our intern. Our house band is Ethan Fox Tucker, Sam Tucker, Ayal Alves, and A Walker Spring who also composes our music. This episode was mixed by Molly Pettit and Tre Hester.
Luke Burbank: Additional funding provided by the Marie Lampe from charitable foundation Live Wire, was created by Robyn Tenenbaum and Kate Sokoloff. This week, we'd like to thank members Turrell Mill Broth, Portland, Oregon, and Victoria Gross of Bremerton, Washington. For more information about our show or how you can listen to our podcast, head on over to Livewire radio.org. I'm Luke Burbank for Elena Passarello and the whole Live Wire team. Thank you for listening and we will see you next week.
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