[APPLAUSE]
I think we're going to do a Q&A. If anyone has Qs I have As--
to really wave your hand in the air, because I'm blind.
I do a reading series in San Francisco
called "The Radar" reading series.
It happens once a month, up until now, at the library.
And half of it is readings, and then half of it is a Q&A.
And I'm always worried that it will be just like this.
Everyone will just stand there like this.
So I bake cookies, and then, if you ask a question,
I give you a cookie.
But I don't have any cookies, so yeah.
[INAUDIBLE]
So I'm really excited because I saw that [INAUDIBLE] there's
going to be shorts.
Can you tell me more--
Yeah, I've embarked on a really insane project
that I'm really overwhelmed by, and we just
got a grant to do it.
And if we didn't, I would just cancel it
because I feel like I've gotten in over my head.
But I had this idea.
It's a great idea I don't know if I can see it through.
But it's to invite 21 filmmakers,
to each make a short film out of one
chapter of my book, Valencia.
And so, then, all of the 21 movies
would be screened together as some sort
of sprawling, art-monster, queer film.
And so it would be probably live, mostly on the internet,
but maybe we would do a tour with it.
It could certainly screen in a movie theater.
But I've got 21 filmmakers signed up to do it.
And I've got some of really cool, big, 90s filmmakers,
like Rose Troche and Cheryl Dunye and Jamie Babbit.
And Margaret Cho's going to do one.
And then all my weirdo friends who
just make videos of themselves doing hand
puppets in their bathrooms.
So it's a really good mix of people
who are video installation artists and then
people who've done feature films and stuff like that.
And we're looking for a producer.
It's a lot of work.
I mean, I've never even made one movie, let alone 21.
So I'm really over my head.
But Cheryl Dunye has, actually, super risen to the occasion.
She's a great filmmaker.
You guys probably know about her.
If you don't, you should see her movie.
She just made a new movie called, The Owls.
It's this weird, lesbian, rustic, LA Canyon noire.
It's weird.
It's really good.
But she's really helping me get it together.
So I realized that I hadn't really talked about it
or promoted it at all, and we're going
to do a big fundraiser campaign for it
to raise the money to do it.
And so I just threw it on Facebook the other day,
and I got a huge response.
It was really exciting, actually.
It made me, definitely, feel like it's more possible that we
can actually do it to get a swell of support like that.
So thanks for asking about it.
[INAUDIBLE]
I'm not sure how to word my question.
[INAUDIBLE]
Yeah, totally.
Well I feel like I don't--
hmm, what do I want to say about that.
I come up with a lot of ideas.
I throw a lot of shit at the wall and just see what sticks.
And I come up with a lot of ideas
that don't actually go anywhere, and they're all a risk.
Anytime you embark on something new, it's a risk.
And some things are, I mean, in a way-- it's risky.
It's a very risky project to take on a film project,
but, also, projects that come through
can also be the projects that have a lot of support.
So, on the one hand, it's insane to try to make
a movie with 21 filmmakers.
And on the other hand, how much support
will 21 people get to generate?
I don't know.
I definitely think I feel very lucky in one way
in that, growing up in a really broke, chaotic household,
where nothing was expected of me, was a bonus.
I never had that experience of feeling like, oh, no.
I've turned my back on a path of success and stability,
and now I'm living this crazy, artist life.
It's like my path was always one of stability.
Really, I should be working at a Dunkin'
Donuts with three kids right now,
and no man or woman in sight.
That's what people grow up to-- that's
the lives people tend to have.
So it's a miracle that that's not my life.
And I think it's really made it so that it didn't--
everything just felt like a risk.
And so I feel really grateful that this has panned out.
And I've got a lot of energy, and I've
been very lucky in being able to make most things
that I want to happen happen.
And again, I think the reason for that I think
is that I've got a lot of energy to start things.
But the things I tend to get excited about doing end up
being community stuff.
And so I get a lot of support.
Like I started the "Sister Spit" tours in 1997.
And I started it really because I'd been
in a punk band that sucked.
We were really bad.
But we got to go on a little tour
even though we were terrible.
And I really liked going on the tour.
I really romanticized going on road trips,
but I don't have a driver's license.
So I was like, I need to be able to go on tours
or else I'll never get to go on these road trips.
But I never want to be in a band again
because music people are crazy.
But all these writers that I'm hanging out with are so great.
Maybe we can do a writers tour.
And it didn't, I mean, I guess I never
I didn't really see it like a risk.
What's interesting is that, now that all of this work I've done
for so long is under the auspices of a nonprofit--
like we are an official--
Radar Productions is a 501(c)(3).
We get funding from the NEA down to Rainbow Grocery in San
Francisco.
So we hit up every funding source,
and we are actually doing really cool work.
And so we get a lot of the funds that we ask for.
And suddenly, there are risk stakes a little bit
around that.
Because it's one thing to--
I feel I'm pretty resilient, and I
can like deal with a lot or deal with having a little, whatever.
So if I put myself in a risky situation, I can roll with it.
But now, a lot of times, if I'm going
to take on a risky project, it's possible
that it's putting Radar at risk.
And now this feels like it's bigger than just me.
I have a managing director, and we pay her salary.
And it's been a hard transition to do-- is this boring?
Am I boring you guys?
I'm like, la, la la.
I had an espresso, and I did it for you.
[LAUGHTER]
But I don't want it to turn against you.
[LAUGHTER]
I had this crazy idea, again, because I
wanted to go to Europe because I'd gone to went to Paris.
And I had this awesome time, and I met all these queers
in Paris.
And I wanted to go back to Europe again, basically,
just to have affairs, love affairs with Europeans.
And so I was like, well, how can I get over there?
And I was like, I'll bring Sister Spit.
And so I booked a Sister Spit tour of Europe,
and it was horrible.
I mean it was so bad.
It was so expensive.
We were performing in all these DIY spaces with anarchists
who think that even though they're
paying for their tobacco and beer, for some reason,
art should be free.
So everyone was pissed that we were charging for our show,
and it'd be like spitting a euro at us with attitude
and then going in to see the show.
So we'd have these huge turnouts like this size.
And all of the performers were-- it was really funny.
I booked this really big tour with different performers,
different ages.
But as the tour got closer, and it became evident
that we'd get no money for the tour
and that we would be sleeping at squats, everyone in their 30s
dropped out of the tour.
And only people in their 20s stayed on it.
And I'm almost 40. (LAUGHS)
I don't know what my problem is.
So we went on the tour, and the performers were really excited
because they're just showing up to perform,
and their needs are getting taken care
of because I make sure of that.
But I'm just seeing, oh, my God.
Radar is paying for this.
We didn't have funding for this.
Where is this money coming from?
I was just a wreck, and this crazy, bitchy monster.
And we did this one show at a squat in Cologne,
and they had given us a guarantee of 150 euros.
Thanks.
It's nothing.
It's like our gas.
And then, as it turned out, they could only give us 100.
And I was like, but a guarantee means
you just give us what you say you're going to give us.
So they're giving us 100, and then they
gave us the 100 euros wrapped in a fake 500-euro bill.
And I got it, and my heart just lept
and tears sprang to my eyes because we needed money
so badly.
And I was like, oh, my god, what?
Did they do something crazy?
They found some anarchist money fund in the yard,
or they dug up a chest and gave because they
want to support us?
And then I see that it's a fake 500-euro bill, and on the back,
there's this little like, (MOCKINGLY) capitalism
turns people into monsters.
I was just like, I fucking hate anarchists so much.
I just wanted to kill--
I wanted to break their necks.
I'm like, I'm glad you guys all liked our show.
Nothing is free.
I wish it were true that it was, but somebody's paying for it.
And right now, it's my little struggling,
non-profit organization.
So that was a bad risk to take.
And so, now, we're trying to find a way
to go to Europe that's more the way that Sister Spit toured
the United States, which is we go-- ideally, for us,
we like to go places where the show is free,
and the artists get paid.
And so we try to go through institutions, whether they're
art institutions to get funding through a grant, universities
that have a funding source for events on campus.
[INAUDIBLE]
Sure.
I think that--
I've worked in bookstores a lot.
I've worked in a lot of bookstores.
And I just think that the gay and lesbian shelves
in a bookstore are problematic.
And it's hard because I understand that there's ways
in which they're good as well.
But I think they're mostly, make sure
that nobody is going to read your book except a gay person,
maybe.
And then a lot of gay people who are going into bookstores
aren't going to the gay and lesbian shelves.
Because what ends up happening is
that the gay and lesbian shelves in a bookstore
are often these little, small-press writers you'd never
heard from.
And then you get someone like Dorothy Allison,
and she's in fiction, or whatever.
And so it's it ends up being this weird like, well,
if you cross over--
Jeanette Winterson's in fiction.
And it ends up being this weird thing where it's like,
so what does that mean.
And I just think that fiction's just fiction,
and it should just all be in the fiction places.
And there can be other ways to have resources about what
are great queer titles.
And I feel that way about everything.
Like African-American literature--
what are great African-American titles?
Not to take it out and then it just--
ideally, people are reading literature
because they want to have the experiences of other people
who are not them.
And they can pull a book off a shelf,
and it can be a queer person, and they'll read it.
But people just don't go out of their way
to go to those bookshelves because they feel subpar,
like there's just something second-classy about it.
And I really don't like it.
I mean, it makes sense to have a non-fiction queer studies
shelf, or something like that.
That's totally different.
But I think for creative nonfiction,
and for fiction, it just should all be together there.
That's what would happen in my bookstore that I don't have.
[INAUDIBLE]
Well, yeah, I mean, it's interesting.
I try not to pay attention, too much, how
I'm getting classified because it's so often wrong
and it can make you a little crazy and stuff like that.
But I do write about class a lot.
And I love writing about class, and what I just read from
is so much about that.
And I think that, probably, causes confusion
to a lot of people in our culture in a way
that, maybe, sexuality isn't necessarily quite as confusing.
I think that people come from mixed class backgrounds.
I think people are often in denial about their class
background.
I know people have had experiences
of just being raised, thinking they were middle class,
but they were really poor, but their parents
couldn't deal with it.
And then I know a lot of people who think that they're poor,
and I think they, actually, are not poor.
And so it's--
I don't know.
I think it's confusing.
Maybe it's-- I don't know why.
I mean, I did do a whole anthology
that's about the experience of people who are brought up
female and working class.
So it is something that's important to me,
but I don't know why.
Why?
I don't know.
[INAUDIBLE]
Well, thank you.
I'm also Polish.
[LAUGHTER]
Are we all done?
Because that espresso's still running through me.
OK, yes.
[INAUDIBLE]
What do you like to read on the airplane
other than what you're reading right now?
Oh, that's a great question.
I love to read magazines on an airplane.
There's this really great, new women's
fashion magazine that's super intellectual and weird.
It's called the Gentle Woman, and I think it's out of the UK.
And I missed the first issue-- it's really hard
to find-- but I got the second issue,
and I read that on the plane.
So yea, I love magazines so much.
And I write a fashion blog now, so I feel like, now,
I, somehow, have arranged my life so that reading Vogue is
work.
Because I always feel really bad about how much time I
spend sitting on my butt reading Elle magazine.
And I'm like, I'm researching for my blog.
It's going to be an income stream at some point.
I'm sure of it.
And right now, I'm reading The Ticking
is the Bomb by Nick Flynn.
But I just read, before that, I read Zeitoun by Dave Eggers,
and that book is amazing.
That book is a really good book, and I highly
recommend people read it.
In San Francisco, right now, it's the "One City,
One Book" read where the library picks a book,
and the whole city reads it.
And if you've never done that before, not for any reason but,
I really like Dave Eggers.
And I went to hear him speak about the book at the library,
and it made me really curious about it.
And I think it's really great, and I highly reco--
I think it's a really important book.
And all the proceeds from it are going
to these really great nonprofits that
are helping people who've been wrongly incarcerated
or helping rebuild New Orleans.
So buy it new, and enjoy it.
I'm blind, so I don't think there's another hand up.
But if there was, just yell, hey.
OK, guess we can stop.
Thank you, guys, very, very much for humoring me.
Thank you again, Gail, for bringing me here.
Thank you, Poetry Center.
[APPLAUSE]
You guys.
The library's open to the public, right?
The Poetry Library is open to the public.
This is the most beautiful homage to poetry
I've ever been in, like this whole Poetry Center here.
So let's clap for the beautiful Poetry Center.
The college is so amazing, and thank you, everybody,
who helped make this possible.
And you know something?
I really, really want to--
I do a writer's retreat with the writers that I work with.
I really want one to happen in Tucson.
So if anyone has a friend who's got a big house that they'll
let a bunch of writers hang out in it for a couple of weeks,
and it'll be a great tax write off, come talk to me.
I'm really serious.
I really make things happen.
It's risky, but I think it's a risk that
would pay off for everyone.
So all right, there.
[APPLAUSE]
OK.
Thanks, Michelle.
Thanks all of you for coming.
Come back to Tucson anytime.
OK.
All right.
I will.
And let's go continue the conversation next door.
OK, goodnight.