Amanda Stern is a Manhattan downtown hipster who is mad cool but youd never know that just from talking to her. In fact I think she denies it. Shes a born and bred New Yorker whose life has always revolved about New York City. She went to school, did sketch comedy and even wrote her first novel, The Long Haul on the island of Manhattan.
The Long Haul was released at the end of last year by Soft Skull press and its about a alcoholic and his codependent girlfriend who are driving through the State of New York to get to the city and encounter all kinds of insanity such as an ice storm, a kidnapping and of course each other. Its drawn comparisons to such films as Buffalo 66 and Jesus' Son.
You can buy The Long Haul directly from Soft Skull.
Daniel Robert Epstein: How autobiographical is The Long Haul?
Amanda Stern: Well Im not very good at math so Im not going to give you percentages but its based on an alcoholic relationship I had. So in terms of pathology its fairly autobiographical in that we were both stuck in these interdependent roles with him as an alcoholic and me in the relationship. But that said, nothing that happens in the book happened to me or happened to him. The trajectory of the relationship is autobiographical.
DRE: When you were in this relationship did you realize it was bad for you?
AS: I was young and I think I realized that this wasnt the person I should be with. But at the age of 21 there was something in being with someone who is wrong for you which is slightly appealing. Then it became an insidious thing. His drinking became more and more part of the relationship and it became harder to untangle myself. So I think even as it went on, somewhere in me there was a voice that got progressively louder that said, get out. But when youre in an addictive relationship it is inordinately hard to get out.
DRE: Is this the first time that this part of your life has come out in your work?
AS: I think that every aspect of my life is in my work in some way. I think I deal with a lot of issues about being a late bloomer because I am one.
DRE: Still?
AS: In some ways yeah. At 33 Im just learning how to drive. I think Im pretty progressed and advanced in some areas but yeah certain things that other people know how to do Im still learning. Even if its reading a map. In terms of my other work Im always accessing a part of me which has been through some struggle and theyre never good struggles.
DRE: Did you ever do a list like the character in The Long Haul does?
AS: I never did do that. I did have a puma box which was my runaway from home box. I had about a $1.75 in it. I always kept journals so I had one in there but basically there was no list or life plan. I never had that but in the journal I did have a list of all my requirements for my future husband. I made that list when I was 10 so the requirements were like; he has to play soccer as good as Pel, tall and curly hair. Every superficial thing you could ever think of.
DRE: Are you seeing anyone now?
AS: I am and I dont think hes a very good soccer player. But he is tall with curly hair.
DRE: I said to a friend of mine that you didnt name your main character in The Long Haul and they mentioned that Chuck Palahniuk did the same thing for Fight Club.
AS: Ive heard that only once before. I never read Fight Club, I saw the movie but I dont remember it.
DRE: Why did you make your main character nameless?
AS: I felt like these characters were really unformed as people. They werent really rooted nor do they have their feet planted on any solid ground. So their sense of identity was so shrunken, elusive and intangible. Its not that they didnt deserve names but they didnt know their own names in a way. I felt like the characters in the book that I dont name dont have a strong sense of self. The characters that are named do. In one story there is that little girl Megan who is 6 years old and she has a name. Even though she is so young I felt that she knew who she was. But the ones who had a real loss of identity and werent full evolved people didnt get labeled with names; they got labeled with their pathology.
DRE: Are names important in real life?
AS: I kind of go both ways so I could argue both points. I have a real obsession with names and have a connection to them. Its not that I find them important but just that I love them. In my life Ive named a few friends babies and even guessed names of babies Ive met for the first time.
DRE: Thats odd.
AS: Yeah its really strange. It doesnt happen with everyone but sometimes I get a very strong sense of a persons name. Not only that but also how to spell it, like if its Caryn I know instinctively that its not spelled Karen. At the same time I feel they are very limiting. I dont feel like I am Amanda. I dont feel that is the right name for me.
DRE: What works?
AS: I think something less flowery. I often think of Amanda as being the seductress or the girl thats a mistress. Shes always some sort of sex kitten or dressed in Laura Ashley. Im neither. I think Im more of a Fiona. I even asked my mom once if she felt like I was an Amanda and she said she thinks she misnamed me. So on the one hand names are incredibly important, people identify with their names so much that it can be positive thing to root them. But at the same time its kind of pointless because names dont mean anything. Theyre just labels.
DRE: The characters eventually end up in New York City where you are from.
AS: I was born and raised here so it lives in me like no other place in the world. Ive never made a conscious choice to live in New York City Ive just lived there. I was born into it. Im a third generation New Yorker. A lot of my friends are transplanted and I envy them sometimes because they made a conscious choice to come to New York. I never did that. So in some ways I cant escape it but when I leave I always come back. I think my work is very urban and very New Yorkcentric.
DRE: I think Soft Skull picks up on that too.
AS: Definitely. There is a lot about me that is very New Yorkcentric even down to the fact that Ive just learned how to drive. That is clichd New York.
DRE: Where did you go to school?
AS: I went to Friends Seminary in the East Village between 2nd and 3rd.
DRE: Whats that?
AS: Its a Quaker school.
DRE: Youre a Quaker?
AS: No [laughs]. There are barely any Quakers there at all. Its a very progressive school. Friend's Seminary is a Quaker organization that has schools all over the country. They are very arty schools.
DRE: What about college?
AS: I went to Bennington for one year then dropped out. Then I went to The New School for one semester then dropped out. After that I went to the University of Rochester. It took three colleges for me to get my BA but college is not for me.
DRE: What did you study?
AS: I studied film theory because I wanted to be a filmmaker for a really long time. I worked in film for a bunch of years. It was just an ego decision because at age 25 I realized I dont want to make films; I just wanted to hang out with filmmakers. So I would just do that and go do something else.
DRE: Some of these filmmakers were pretty big, like you worked with Good Machine.
AS: Yeah what happened with Good Machine, is that when I was 19 Good Machine opened. So the first day it opened I walked in and said Do you guys need anything?
DRE: Im sure they had no idea what to do with you at first.
AS: Actually they did. They were so much grateful. It was just Ted Hope, James Schamus and me. So I spent the summer interning for them and it was incredible. I got to be really good friends with Ted and James. Then I went to college and every holiday I went back and worked for them. Throughout college Ted Hope would call me about twice a year to convince me to drop out of college and be the office manager. He literally called me like clockwork every year.
DRE: Hes not a fan of education either.
AS: I guess not. During my senior year I called him and said I was graduating in two weeks. He said Thank fucken god. Do you want to be the office manager? I said that I didnt but I wanted to work for Hal Hartley. He said You got it. So I worked for Hal at his company called True Fiction Pictures and worked on Amateur. With Amateur, Hal needed someone to run rehearsals. So I ran rehearsals with him and then he ended up putting me in charge of the actors. So I ran first team which is with the lead actors. Then I did another movie then I worked with Hal on a Breeders videos. Then I worked on 12 Monkeys.
DRE: What did you do on 12 Monkeys?
AS: I did casting stuff. I never did the same thing on any film because I was still trying to figure out what I wanted to do. Ted Hope really wanted me to be a producer. I found out early I didnt want to be a producer but I didnt know what track I wanted to be on so I took a new job on each film. On 12 Monkeys I started out in casting. It was great. Im sure Terry Gilliam has no remembrance of me whatsoever. I adored him professionally thats a no-brainer but personally I adored him.
I did that for a really long time from film to film. Somewhere during this time Ted Hope came back to me and asked me again to be the office manager and I said no. I was offered a David O. Russell gig with a producing title but I turned that down to take a break and write my own film. So I wrote a film named Special and submitted it to the Sundance Filmmakers Lab where it became one of the finalists. Then Miramax got a hold of it.
DRE: I read about that. You became kind of hot for a bit.
AS: Yep I was a little hot in a circle of about 4 people. I went into this pile of scripts of other young writers who were ones that Miramax was keeping tabs on. These two young producers at Miramax had read the coverage and they called me and told me they wanted to do a celebrity reading of the script so it could get some exposure. We did that and it was during that time I realized I didnt want to be a filmmaker.
DRE: A lot of people are going to be pissed when they read this. You had all these amazing things happen to you but you didnt take advantage of it.
AS: I dont think that anyone was that invested in me being a filmmaker. Its happened twice in my life that these big career decisions happened. First with film then with comedy.
At this time I was tied to the idea of being a director. I wasnt wise enough or unstubborn enough to detach myself and let someone else to direct it. At that point I was so young and ambitious that I wanted to direct. People kept telling me they were interested in my script but I couldnt direct because I had never done anything before. I kept saying I wanted to be attached but I also dreaded directing and being the person in charge on set because I had no idea what I was doing. It was this internal battle where I wanted to be a filmmaker because of the title but I didnt want the job. It ended up going nowhere. I let it go and havent touched it since. But actually not too long ago the director of Secretary, Steven Shainberg, called me and said he wants to see Special. I rewrote and sent it to him. Now Im old enough and wise enough to know that I dont want to be a director. I just want to hang with them.
DRE: I read a bunch of your Long Haul rejection letters on your website www.amandastern.com. They were all positive.
AS: All the rejection letters I got were positive. Some were gushingly enthusiastic. I got one letter that wasnt exactly negative. They wrote they didnt think they could sell enough copies of the book which I thought was hilarious.
DRE: Whats it like just waiting for the other shoe to drop for someone to publish it?
AS: It was frustrating for just a few of the letters. Overall I was optimistic. I knew it was a good sign for the big houses to be this enthusiastic but also this afraid so I knew a smaller house would take it. I wasnt exactly discouraged but I was baffled. Letters were like I loved every word of The Long Haul. Its one of those rare books you read then you want to tell everyone. But I dont know how to sell it. I was thinking, isnt it your job to know how to sell it? Figure it out. It was discouraging but I think I definitely felt cognizant of the situation as a whole. This was just one pool and there were other pools out there to tap.
DRE: I was surprised about what happened with MacAdam/Cage.
AS: Yeah they made me an offer but they wouldnt publish it until 2004 and they wanted like 50 to 80 percent of the film shares. I think my agent felt really uncomfortable with that.
DRE: Thats weird.
AS: Yeah its a little weird too. My agent turned it down with my blessing. I was bummed about that because I really like that company.
DRE: Who should play your characters in The Long Haul movie?
AS: People ask me that all the time. I have the answer for the girl. There are two actresses one would be Chlo Sevigny or Sarah Polley who I really love. But I cant think of the guys.
DRE: Well then what celebrity couple?
AS: Are there any good ones?
DRE: Courtney Cox and David Arquette?
AS: No thanks [laughs]. Sofia Coppola and Spike Jonze but they just broke up or Tobey Maguire and his PR girlfriend definitely not Leonardo and Giselle.
DRE: He looks more like a girl than she does anyway.
So you were on Burly Bear TV for a while.
AS: Uch. Yes I was the host in 1998. I got fired. I actually had a job before then as comedian hosting a show at Catch a Rising Star with Marc Maron.
DRE: I hear hes a little tough to deal with it.
AS: No comment [laughs]. It was a celebrity comedy show and Lorne Michaels was the producer. When the show at Catch ended they hired me for Burly Bear. Apparently I was too downtown, too edgy for them.
DRE: Did you decide that?
AS: No thats what they told me. I did it for about a year and I made a boatload of money. They fired me by just not telling me when to show back up. It was fine because I was so miserable. I didnt like what Broadway Video was doing. It was simple, clichd and just stupid. They wanted me to be someone I was not. They ended up hiring Regis Philbins daughter so you can tell the kind of person they wanted.
DRE: Isnt his daughter like 55?
AS: I think shes 56 [laughs]. No I have no idea. I think shes younger than me but shes much more easily marketed than me.
DRE: So they called you edgy and downtown. Is being part of Soft Skull very comfortable?
AS: Yes it is. Im not a punk and not the edgiest person in the world. Im no Courtney Love but in the mainstream world they view me as edgy. But in the world where its real hardcore rock and punk they dont view me as edgy. So Im somehow caught in the middle but I definitely feel comfortable at Soft Skull. I dont feel theyre so punk either. What they put out is riskier fiction and somewhat fearless. I feel that is a somewhat more apropos title for me. Im a bit more fearless than Regis Philbins daughter for sure.
DRE: What you did with the contest on your website to find yourself a tour companion to accompany you on the 20-city driving book tour kind of reminds me of the way Amy Sedaris bakes cupcakes and waitresses once a week and the way Andy Kaufman would go bus tables. Do you do things like that because its fun or something to laugh at or are you just weird?
AS: I guess its weird. But to me its not weird its just fun. If I want something then I want to find a way to make it happen and make it work. I wanted to go on a book tour but the only way we could make it work is if I found a driver so the only way to find a driver would be to have a contest. I just view it as fun. Maybe its living a little more outside the box. If youre a strange and weird person do you know you are strange and weird?
DRE: Yeah you cant tell.
AS: People who think Im strange and weird I think theyre strange and weird. So I have no idea if I am weird. I know I have lots of very normal friends and a bunch of out there friends. I have a sense of fun and play that maybe is a little bit unfamiliar to people.
DRE: What do you do with your non-weird friends?
AS: What do I do with them?
DRE: Yeah do you play Monopoly?
AS: No Ive never played Monopoly.
DRE: Monopoly is fun.
AS: It may be. With my non-weird friends I talk a lot. Eat dinner, go to movies and drink a lot of wine. Im a basic fairly normal person but I like to have fun which in some ways is childlike in that not a lot of 33 year olds embody the same sense of fun that I do.
DRE: Who ruins the fun?
AS: Nobody really. I dont let anybody ruin the fun. If they try to I avoid them and cross them off the list. You can keep the fun going as much as you want.
But back to your question, the whole tour companion thing was not a planned stunt or gimmick. It really was a genuine innate response to a problem. Instead of panicking I turned it into a sort of game.
DRE: What were you like as a young person? Were you a troublemaker?
AS: I was a troublemaker. I was tiny for one and I think because I was tiny I felt I had to prove I was bigger than I was physically. So I used to beat up a lot of people. I was a real hardcore tomboy and skateboarder who skateboarded everywhere. I was very adventurous but never a girly-girl. I never dreamed of my wedding or put stockings on my head to pretend it was a veil. I didnt grow up with a TV so we had to invent a lot of our games. Everything became a project so my brothers and sisters were always writing plays and acting them out. We had to create our own games.
DRE: When did you did sketch comedy?
AS: I used to have a radio show at Pseudo.com for three years with a woman. We had a comedy team called Cindy Something and Mandy Maybe. Then I did the Marc Maron show so I worked with the Upright Citizens Brigade, Todd Barry and Slovin & Allen.
DRE: How has being Jewish been a part of your work?
AS: Im from a New York Jewish family so Judaism for me is just cultural. It means getting pickles from Gus and eating bagels and lox on Christmas. Being Jewish has never been a big part of my life. Its more of a cultural moniker. I look Jewish and I occasionally like to use it as a punchline but thats about it. It only affected me once when I was twelve. I had a friend who was very WASPy. I was going to her house one day and she told me a Jewish joke where the punchline was because he was a kike. I stopped because I knew that was wrong. I told her that wasnt funny because Im Jewish. She literally backed away from me and said Youre Jewish? You cant come to my house. My mom doesnt like the Jewish people. That didnt make any sense to me and then she said my mom has lots of books on Hitler. So I said we couldnt be friends anymore.
by Daniel Robert Epstein
SG Username: AndersWolleck
The Long Haul was released at the end of last year by Soft Skull press and its about a alcoholic and his codependent girlfriend who are driving through the State of New York to get to the city and encounter all kinds of insanity such as an ice storm, a kidnapping and of course each other. Its drawn comparisons to such films as Buffalo 66 and Jesus' Son.
You can buy The Long Haul directly from Soft Skull.
Daniel Robert Epstein: How autobiographical is The Long Haul?
Amanda Stern: Well Im not very good at math so Im not going to give you percentages but its based on an alcoholic relationship I had. So in terms of pathology its fairly autobiographical in that we were both stuck in these interdependent roles with him as an alcoholic and me in the relationship. But that said, nothing that happens in the book happened to me or happened to him. The trajectory of the relationship is autobiographical.
DRE: When you were in this relationship did you realize it was bad for you?
AS: I was young and I think I realized that this wasnt the person I should be with. But at the age of 21 there was something in being with someone who is wrong for you which is slightly appealing. Then it became an insidious thing. His drinking became more and more part of the relationship and it became harder to untangle myself. So I think even as it went on, somewhere in me there was a voice that got progressively louder that said, get out. But when youre in an addictive relationship it is inordinately hard to get out.
DRE: Is this the first time that this part of your life has come out in your work?
AS: I think that every aspect of my life is in my work in some way. I think I deal with a lot of issues about being a late bloomer because I am one.
DRE: Still?
AS: In some ways yeah. At 33 Im just learning how to drive. I think Im pretty progressed and advanced in some areas but yeah certain things that other people know how to do Im still learning. Even if its reading a map. In terms of my other work Im always accessing a part of me which has been through some struggle and theyre never good struggles.
DRE: Did you ever do a list like the character in The Long Haul does?
AS: I never did do that. I did have a puma box which was my runaway from home box. I had about a $1.75 in it. I always kept journals so I had one in there but basically there was no list or life plan. I never had that but in the journal I did have a list of all my requirements for my future husband. I made that list when I was 10 so the requirements were like; he has to play soccer as good as Pel, tall and curly hair. Every superficial thing you could ever think of.
DRE: Are you seeing anyone now?
AS: I am and I dont think hes a very good soccer player. But he is tall with curly hair.
DRE: I said to a friend of mine that you didnt name your main character in The Long Haul and they mentioned that Chuck Palahniuk did the same thing for Fight Club.
AS: Ive heard that only once before. I never read Fight Club, I saw the movie but I dont remember it.
DRE: Why did you make your main character nameless?
AS: I felt like these characters were really unformed as people. They werent really rooted nor do they have their feet planted on any solid ground. So their sense of identity was so shrunken, elusive and intangible. Its not that they didnt deserve names but they didnt know their own names in a way. I felt like the characters in the book that I dont name dont have a strong sense of self. The characters that are named do. In one story there is that little girl Megan who is 6 years old and she has a name. Even though she is so young I felt that she knew who she was. But the ones who had a real loss of identity and werent full evolved people didnt get labeled with names; they got labeled with their pathology.
DRE: Are names important in real life?
AS: I kind of go both ways so I could argue both points. I have a real obsession with names and have a connection to them. Its not that I find them important but just that I love them. In my life Ive named a few friends babies and even guessed names of babies Ive met for the first time.
DRE: Thats odd.
AS: Yeah its really strange. It doesnt happen with everyone but sometimes I get a very strong sense of a persons name. Not only that but also how to spell it, like if its Caryn I know instinctively that its not spelled Karen. At the same time I feel they are very limiting. I dont feel like I am Amanda. I dont feel that is the right name for me.
DRE: What works?
AS: I think something less flowery. I often think of Amanda as being the seductress or the girl thats a mistress. Shes always some sort of sex kitten or dressed in Laura Ashley. Im neither. I think Im more of a Fiona. I even asked my mom once if she felt like I was an Amanda and she said she thinks she misnamed me. So on the one hand names are incredibly important, people identify with their names so much that it can be positive thing to root them. But at the same time its kind of pointless because names dont mean anything. Theyre just labels.
DRE: The characters eventually end up in New York City where you are from.
AS: I was born and raised here so it lives in me like no other place in the world. Ive never made a conscious choice to live in New York City Ive just lived there. I was born into it. Im a third generation New Yorker. A lot of my friends are transplanted and I envy them sometimes because they made a conscious choice to come to New York. I never did that. So in some ways I cant escape it but when I leave I always come back. I think my work is very urban and very New Yorkcentric.
DRE: I think Soft Skull picks up on that too.
AS: Definitely. There is a lot about me that is very New Yorkcentric even down to the fact that Ive just learned how to drive. That is clichd New York.
DRE: Where did you go to school?
AS: I went to Friends Seminary in the East Village between 2nd and 3rd.
DRE: Whats that?
AS: Its a Quaker school.
DRE: Youre a Quaker?
AS: No [laughs]. There are barely any Quakers there at all. Its a very progressive school. Friend's Seminary is a Quaker organization that has schools all over the country. They are very arty schools.
DRE: What about college?
AS: I went to Bennington for one year then dropped out. Then I went to The New School for one semester then dropped out. After that I went to the University of Rochester. It took three colleges for me to get my BA but college is not for me.
DRE: What did you study?
AS: I studied film theory because I wanted to be a filmmaker for a really long time. I worked in film for a bunch of years. It was just an ego decision because at age 25 I realized I dont want to make films; I just wanted to hang out with filmmakers. So I would just do that and go do something else.
DRE: Some of these filmmakers were pretty big, like you worked with Good Machine.
AS: Yeah what happened with Good Machine, is that when I was 19 Good Machine opened. So the first day it opened I walked in and said Do you guys need anything?
DRE: Im sure they had no idea what to do with you at first.
AS: Actually they did. They were so much grateful. It was just Ted Hope, James Schamus and me. So I spent the summer interning for them and it was incredible. I got to be really good friends with Ted and James. Then I went to college and every holiday I went back and worked for them. Throughout college Ted Hope would call me about twice a year to convince me to drop out of college and be the office manager. He literally called me like clockwork every year.
DRE: Hes not a fan of education either.
AS: I guess not. During my senior year I called him and said I was graduating in two weeks. He said Thank fucken god. Do you want to be the office manager? I said that I didnt but I wanted to work for Hal Hartley. He said You got it. So I worked for Hal at his company called True Fiction Pictures and worked on Amateur. With Amateur, Hal needed someone to run rehearsals. So I ran rehearsals with him and then he ended up putting me in charge of the actors. So I ran first team which is with the lead actors. Then I did another movie then I worked with Hal on a Breeders videos. Then I worked on 12 Monkeys.
DRE: What did you do on 12 Monkeys?
AS: I did casting stuff. I never did the same thing on any film because I was still trying to figure out what I wanted to do. Ted Hope really wanted me to be a producer. I found out early I didnt want to be a producer but I didnt know what track I wanted to be on so I took a new job on each film. On 12 Monkeys I started out in casting. It was great. Im sure Terry Gilliam has no remembrance of me whatsoever. I adored him professionally thats a no-brainer but personally I adored him.
I did that for a really long time from film to film. Somewhere during this time Ted Hope came back to me and asked me again to be the office manager and I said no. I was offered a David O. Russell gig with a producing title but I turned that down to take a break and write my own film. So I wrote a film named Special and submitted it to the Sundance Filmmakers Lab where it became one of the finalists. Then Miramax got a hold of it.
DRE: I read about that. You became kind of hot for a bit.
AS: Yep I was a little hot in a circle of about 4 people. I went into this pile of scripts of other young writers who were ones that Miramax was keeping tabs on. These two young producers at Miramax had read the coverage and they called me and told me they wanted to do a celebrity reading of the script so it could get some exposure. We did that and it was during that time I realized I didnt want to be a filmmaker.
DRE: A lot of people are going to be pissed when they read this. You had all these amazing things happen to you but you didnt take advantage of it.
AS: I dont think that anyone was that invested in me being a filmmaker. Its happened twice in my life that these big career decisions happened. First with film then with comedy.
At this time I was tied to the idea of being a director. I wasnt wise enough or unstubborn enough to detach myself and let someone else to direct it. At that point I was so young and ambitious that I wanted to direct. People kept telling me they were interested in my script but I couldnt direct because I had never done anything before. I kept saying I wanted to be attached but I also dreaded directing and being the person in charge on set because I had no idea what I was doing. It was this internal battle where I wanted to be a filmmaker because of the title but I didnt want the job. It ended up going nowhere. I let it go and havent touched it since. But actually not too long ago the director of Secretary, Steven Shainberg, called me and said he wants to see Special. I rewrote and sent it to him. Now Im old enough and wise enough to know that I dont want to be a director. I just want to hang with them.
DRE: I read a bunch of your Long Haul rejection letters on your website www.amandastern.com. They were all positive.
AS: All the rejection letters I got were positive. Some were gushingly enthusiastic. I got one letter that wasnt exactly negative. They wrote they didnt think they could sell enough copies of the book which I thought was hilarious.
DRE: Whats it like just waiting for the other shoe to drop for someone to publish it?
AS: It was frustrating for just a few of the letters. Overall I was optimistic. I knew it was a good sign for the big houses to be this enthusiastic but also this afraid so I knew a smaller house would take it. I wasnt exactly discouraged but I was baffled. Letters were like I loved every word of The Long Haul. Its one of those rare books you read then you want to tell everyone. But I dont know how to sell it. I was thinking, isnt it your job to know how to sell it? Figure it out. It was discouraging but I think I definitely felt cognizant of the situation as a whole. This was just one pool and there were other pools out there to tap.
DRE: I was surprised about what happened with MacAdam/Cage.
AS: Yeah they made me an offer but they wouldnt publish it until 2004 and they wanted like 50 to 80 percent of the film shares. I think my agent felt really uncomfortable with that.
DRE: Thats weird.
AS: Yeah its a little weird too. My agent turned it down with my blessing. I was bummed about that because I really like that company.
DRE: Who should play your characters in The Long Haul movie?
AS: People ask me that all the time. I have the answer for the girl. There are two actresses one would be Chlo Sevigny or Sarah Polley who I really love. But I cant think of the guys.
DRE: Well then what celebrity couple?
AS: Are there any good ones?
DRE: Courtney Cox and David Arquette?
AS: No thanks [laughs]. Sofia Coppola and Spike Jonze but they just broke up or Tobey Maguire and his PR girlfriend definitely not Leonardo and Giselle.
DRE: He looks more like a girl than she does anyway.
So you were on Burly Bear TV for a while.
AS: Uch. Yes I was the host in 1998. I got fired. I actually had a job before then as comedian hosting a show at Catch a Rising Star with Marc Maron.
DRE: I hear hes a little tough to deal with it.
AS: No comment [laughs]. It was a celebrity comedy show and Lorne Michaels was the producer. When the show at Catch ended they hired me for Burly Bear. Apparently I was too downtown, too edgy for them.
DRE: Did you decide that?
AS: No thats what they told me. I did it for about a year and I made a boatload of money. They fired me by just not telling me when to show back up. It was fine because I was so miserable. I didnt like what Broadway Video was doing. It was simple, clichd and just stupid. They wanted me to be someone I was not. They ended up hiring Regis Philbins daughter so you can tell the kind of person they wanted.
DRE: Isnt his daughter like 55?
AS: I think shes 56 [laughs]. No I have no idea. I think shes younger than me but shes much more easily marketed than me.
DRE: So they called you edgy and downtown. Is being part of Soft Skull very comfortable?
AS: Yes it is. Im not a punk and not the edgiest person in the world. Im no Courtney Love but in the mainstream world they view me as edgy. But in the world where its real hardcore rock and punk they dont view me as edgy. So Im somehow caught in the middle but I definitely feel comfortable at Soft Skull. I dont feel theyre so punk either. What they put out is riskier fiction and somewhat fearless. I feel that is a somewhat more apropos title for me. Im a bit more fearless than Regis Philbins daughter for sure.
DRE: What you did with the contest on your website to find yourself a tour companion to accompany you on the 20-city driving book tour kind of reminds me of the way Amy Sedaris bakes cupcakes and waitresses once a week and the way Andy Kaufman would go bus tables. Do you do things like that because its fun or something to laugh at or are you just weird?
AS: I guess its weird. But to me its not weird its just fun. If I want something then I want to find a way to make it happen and make it work. I wanted to go on a book tour but the only way we could make it work is if I found a driver so the only way to find a driver would be to have a contest. I just view it as fun. Maybe its living a little more outside the box. If youre a strange and weird person do you know you are strange and weird?
DRE: Yeah you cant tell.
AS: People who think Im strange and weird I think theyre strange and weird. So I have no idea if I am weird. I know I have lots of very normal friends and a bunch of out there friends. I have a sense of fun and play that maybe is a little bit unfamiliar to people.
DRE: What do you do with your non-weird friends?
AS: What do I do with them?
DRE: Yeah do you play Monopoly?
AS: No Ive never played Monopoly.
DRE: Monopoly is fun.
AS: It may be. With my non-weird friends I talk a lot. Eat dinner, go to movies and drink a lot of wine. Im a basic fairly normal person but I like to have fun which in some ways is childlike in that not a lot of 33 year olds embody the same sense of fun that I do.
DRE: Who ruins the fun?
AS: Nobody really. I dont let anybody ruin the fun. If they try to I avoid them and cross them off the list. You can keep the fun going as much as you want.
But back to your question, the whole tour companion thing was not a planned stunt or gimmick. It really was a genuine innate response to a problem. Instead of panicking I turned it into a sort of game.
DRE: What were you like as a young person? Were you a troublemaker?
AS: I was a troublemaker. I was tiny for one and I think because I was tiny I felt I had to prove I was bigger than I was physically. So I used to beat up a lot of people. I was a real hardcore tomboy and skateboarder who skateboarded everywhere. I was very adventurous but never a girly-girl. I never dreamed of my wedding or put stockings on my head to pretend it was a veil. I didnt grow up with a TV so we had to invent a lot of our games. Everything became a project so my brothers and sisters were always writing plays and acting them out. We had to create our own games.
DRE: When did you did sketch comedy?
AS: I used to have a radio show at Pseudo.com for three years with a woman. We had a comedy team called Cindy Something and Mandy Maybe. Then I did the Marc Maron show so I worked with the Upright Citizens Brigade, Todd Barry and Slovin & Allen.
DRE: How has being Jewish been a part of your work?
AS: Im from a New York Jewish family so Judaism for me is just cultural. It means getting pickles from Gus and eating bagels and lox on Christmas. Being Jewish has never been a big part of my life. Its more of a cultural moniker. I look Jewish and I occasionally like to use it as a punchline but thats about it. It only affected me once when I was twelve. I had a friend who was very WASPy. I was going to her house one day and she told me a Jewish joke where the punchline was because he was a kike. I stopped because I knew that was wrong. I told her that wasnt funny because Im Jewish. She literally backed away from me and said Youre Jewish? You cant come to my house. My mom doesnt like the Jewish people. That didnt make any sense to me and then she said my mom has lots of books on Hitler. So I said we couldnt be friends anymore.
by Daniel Robert Epstein
SG Username: AndersWolleck
missy:
Amanda Stern is a Manhattan downtown hipster who is mad cool but youd never know that just from talking to her. In fact I think she denies it. Shes a born and bred New Yorker whose life has always revolved about New York City. She went to school, did sketch comedy and even wrote her first novel, T,...