For some reason, about twice a year, a spate of articles come out by writers questioning the validity of MFA programs. And twice a year I read them and think, Well, I'd rather watch an actual circle jerk than read this shit...again. Because, really, no one gives a fuck about this stuff except for the person writing the article and, presumably, that guy Seth Abramson who writes every other story about MFA programs. Now here's the thing. I have an MFA. I direct an MFA program. Before I had an MFA, I'd published five books, sold stuff to Hollywood, sold something like 50 short stories and maybe a thousand feature stories/book reviews/interviews with Aubrey O'Day. (Incidentally: Aubrey O'Day? A perfectly nice and interesting interview subject. Couldn't have been a sweeter person.) Since earning my MFA, I've published three more books, sold more projects to Hollywood, a bunch more short stories and features et al (though no more interviews with Aubrey O'Day) and am, by all accounts, pretty much the same asshole I've always been. A mitzvah, for sure. (And if you want a full accounting of my own MFA experience, you can read this.) So I am the poster boy for not getting an MFA and the poster boy for getting an MFA, apparently, thus I feel uniquely qualified to present to you what I believe is the definitive word on Writing Articles About MFA Programs.
And really, just to clarify, here's all you need to know about whether or not you should get an MFA: If you want one, you should go get one. If you don't want one, don't get one. There. I've saved you a lot of precious reading time, so, please, go write something.
It's the holiday season, a time when I try to see the best in people in hopes that they'll see the best in me and give me a gift, so for the last few weeks I've tried not to read Parade Magazine in hope that by avoiding fucktards my belief in the indomitable spirit of the human race would return and, in exchange, someone would get me an iPad just for being part of said group of humans with an indomitable spirit. So I spent a lot of time reading Real Simple and Sunset and learned some great recipes and found out how to fold my clothes when packing for optimal space and found out that quail is the must have fowl this autumn season for chefs everywhere. A mitzvah, really.
But then today, while watching my favorite football team implode, I felt the need to escape from my life, to find a release from the existential suffering man can only find while rooting for the Oakland Raiders for the whole of their life...in short, I went looking for something more painful to ease the weight from my soul caused by watching Bruce Gradkowski "throw" the football and, thus, landed on Parade Magazine. How bad could it be? I pondered. I mean, it's not like I was going to open the magazine up and find someone wondering if an actor liked to fuck little children or something...
Oh, wait, yeah, that's in there.
You see, one fucktard named Mike Dwyer of Seattle, Washington wrote to Walter Scott's Personality Parade with a question so fucking stupid, so inane, so utterly moronic that it's actually strikingly similar to a question Hugh Grant asks when he's stuck in a media junket in Notting Hill...it's right here, at 58 seconds in:
It's actually rather funny in Notting Hill because, you know, it's not real life. It pokes fun at how moronic people can be. That's the part Mike Dwyer apparently didn't quite understand if he happened to see Notting Hill (and really, who hasn't seen Notting Hill? They play it on TBS as often as they play You've Got Mail), since Mike asks:
Is Jackie Earle Haley anything like his characters?
Shall we take a look at Jackie Earle Haley's most prominent recent roles? I mean, in order to understand Mike's question, don't we need to really understand his motivation? In 2006, Haley was nominated for an Academy Award for his portrayal of pedophile Ronnie McGorvey who later castrates himself in Little Children. This year, Haley starred as Freddy Krueger in the reboot of A Nightmare on Elm Street. In case anyone is unclear on who Freddy Krueger is, well, he's not a nice person. He kills people in their dreams. He has really bad skin. He prefers hats. In general not someone you'd want to be in real life. Also this year, he appeared as an insane man in Shutter Island. Prior to 2006, Haley was pretty much out of Hollywood, so I'm going to guess that Dwyer isn't all that familiar with Haley's work in Dollman, where Haley played the evil antagonist to, uh, the guy who gets shrunken to the size of a doll when he comes to Earth. Let's assume that Dwyer is familiar with Haley's best known pre-Little Children role, that of Kelly Leak in Bad News Bears. Now, granted, at the time of its release, I thought Kelly Leak was pretty bad ass. He had a motorcycle. He was awesome at air hockey. He drank beer, smoked, was a loan shark, wore cool sunglasses and wanted to bag Tatum O'Neal. Pretty cool. Except, when I think about it now, he was supposed to be 12 in that movie. Where were his parents? He could have been molested, for all we know, by...well, himself, as the character in Little Children.
So, which character is Haley most like? The pedophile? The undead killing machine? The 12 year old thug? And which character does Dwyre presume Haley is most like? Because one doesn't get their ass off the sofa to write a letter to Parade unless they are pretty sure that what they've always assumed is sorta true, right? Let's see what Haley says:
I love to fuck children's corpses and then take a long ride on my motorcycle, so I guess I'm like all of them! Man. I love killing.
Okay, that's not his answer. Because of course his answer is that he's not like any of his fucking characters because, you know, he's not an undead killing machine, or a pedophile, and he's really no good at air hockey, either.
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