#amo i legal thriller

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Started a new book today and I'm so into it

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I Care a Lot: Peter Dinklage is the Scariest Gangster We’ve Seen in Years

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This article contains I Care a Lot spoilers.

J Blakeson’s I Care a Lot is one of very few films where everyone in it is a villain. In the lead role, Rosamund Pike ushers in a new amoral high mark as conservator con artist Marla Grayson. Peter Dinklage meanwhile mines the standard Hollywood heavy role for an unexpected haul of gangster gravitas. And with his turn as Roman Lunyov, the former black sheep of the Lannister family in Game of Thrones joins the likes of Robert De Niro, Marlon Brando, Wesley Snipes, and Humphrey Bogart as memorable cinema crime bosses.

However, this isn’t Dinklage’s first turn in a mob movie. He got his button in Find Me Guilty (2006). The film was based on the true story of Lucchese crime family soldier Jackie DiNorscio, played by Vin Diesel, and the longest mafia trial in American history. The movie was co-written and directed by Sidney Lumet, who not only helmed such crime classics as Dog Day Afternoon and Q&A, but was one of the original Dead End kids when the proto-gangster social drama was still on Broadway. Dinklage didn’t play a mobster in Find Me Guilty. He played a lawyer.  

Dinklage’s Lunyov Family isn’t strictly going up against law enforcement in I Care a Lot. Rather Pike’s Marla Grayson and her partner in crime (and life), Fran (Eiza González), are court-appointed guardians from hell, and they represent a rival outfit. They are also operating a lucrative racket.

This guardianship gang war could be seen as similar to the scenarios which happened when Italian, Jewish, and Irish mobs moved in on the Harlem and Chicago numbers games in the 1920s and ’30s. Or how Michael Corleone’s first order of business as head of family in The Godfather was to take over the casinos in Las Vegas. Like Don Vito Corleone before her, Marla’s also got judges, such as the sympathetic Judge Lomax (Isiah Whitlock Jr.), in her pocket. Eldercare racketeering dominance is also comparable to the prohibition fights of The St. Valentine’s Day Massacre, and the body count is just as high. The take is just as sweet.

Edward G. Robinson set the standard for cinematic mob rule as “Rico” Bandello in Little Caesar (1931). Dinklage’s Roman Lunyov, by contrast, is more of a Czar. He heads a family in the Russian mafia and purports himself like a descendant of the Romanov dynasty. But he’s got Cossack in him. It’s in his DNA and cascading down his chin like the tail of a cavalry horse.

On Game of Thrones, Dinklage’s Tyrion Lannister was part of an insidious dynasty whose roots intertwined with every twig of the ruling class. The modern Russian mob, on screen and off, can boast even more branches.

Netflix’s World’s Most Wanted dedicated an episode to Semion Mogilevich, the reputed head of the Russian mob (aka Bratva). While Moglievich is allegedly tied to arms dealing, international trading scams, and countless murders, the cops in the documentary series compare him to the Keyser Söze character from The Usual Suspects. He’s a respected, low-key businessman who likes to smoke. He lives in a mansion next to the head of the Communist Party in Russia. His activities aren’t merely state-sanctioned, they are apparently encouraged.

Dinklage’s Roman is all these things, even as his identity is actually more elaborately guarded than Söze’s, and his tastes run toward elitist’s treats.

But then Russian mobsters are always ruthless on screen. These are the guys who killed Denzel Washington’s seemingly indestructible narco cop Alonzo Harris in Training Day (2001). You never prepare for that. When the “Three Wise Men” who always have your back tell you to skip town, you know you’re dealing with folks in a rough trade. On Netflix’s Orange Is the New Black, Galina “Red” Reznikova (Kate Mulgrew) would rather go to jail for keeping bodies on ice than say she was keeping them fresh for the Russian mafia in Queens.

Dinklage’s big bad leans into this mythic image of Russian mobsters, with Roman appearing cut from the same cloth as the New Jersey-based operators who could make even Tony Soprano take pause in The Sopranos. Albeit if Dinklage’s character ever actually visited the tough guys in the Garden State, he would probably need to rethink his man-bun. After all, Tony Soprano couldn’t even get away with shorts.

When James Cagney had fist fights in his early films, he was always matched with a bruiser twice his size because the studios thought no one in the audience would accept him being remotely challenged otherwise. Dinklage also doesn’t display a traditionally imposing physical presence. But he is no lightweight. His own thugs cower at the very thought of a cross word. In the Lunyov family, it’s best to bring a gun to a food fight.

Roman’s personal attorney almost wets his briefs when he screws up. That’s because Roman is as unpredictable as Cagney’s Cody Jarrett, the gang leader in White Heat, Cagney’s most psychopathic role. Dinklage’s introduction as Roman shows him asking how many mules died on the last drug run. He calculates them coldly, as part of business, with the sociopathology of a Chief Executive Officer. But his biggest similarity can be found in oedipal complexities. Like Cody Jarrett, Roman Lunyov loves his mother.

We don’t know much about Jennifer Peterson, the nice old lady played by Dianne Wiest. She’s got money, a nice house, no living relatives, and a doctor who will exaggerate dementia symptoms in court for a stock payoff.  On the surface Peterson seems to be a competent business woman who retired after a successful career. Now under the less than sensitive care at the Berkshire Oaks Senior Living facility, we realize her chosen field was career criminal. After all, any of these sweet old ladies could have had criminally scandalous youths.

When Marla finally asks her ward who she is, all Jennifer has to say is “I’m the worst mistake you’ll ever make.” We learn she has more than one son in the Russian mob. She could be a post-Glasnostic Ma Barker from the Prohibition era. Barker’s fictional approximation in White Heat, Ma Jarrett (Margaret De Wolfe Wycherly) tells her son she can take care of herself. And while Jennifer may have been declared legally unable to do just that in I Care a Lot, she is quite adept at a choke hold, eschewing the standard garrote assassination for her own elbow.

Marla doesn’t romanticize her mother, calling her a psychopath and offering her up as the collateral damage of closing costs. Her single-minded opportunism is more sociopathic than Pike’s Amy Dunne in David Fincher’s adaptation of Gone Girl. She employs a cutthroat logic that’s in the same territories as bad-mannered comedies, but with the ruthlessness of the shark in Jaws.

Roman’s black-on-black dress code ensembles, by contrast, broadcast a desire for stylish power games. Marla is not interested in gangster chic; she prefers classy monochromatic suits so brightly focused they attract moths like flames. Her crew is all business as usual. Dr. Amos (Alicia Witt) is the fixer. She picks the “cherries,” elderly cash cows who can be milked in the retirement home. Sam Rice (Damian Young) is the monster at the center of the center. Everyone’s got a soulless nature except Eiza González’s Fran, who is also the only one to see the wisdom of getting the fuck out of there.

Dinklage is fearsome in one of the scariest screen gangsters in recent years. This guy can dispatch troublesome community angels easier than a creamy éclair pastry–and he loves those treats. He even takes a last loving bite of a chocolate-covered, custard-filled house specialty before he tosses it onto the cold concrete of an underground parking garage.

When he ends negotiations with Marla, his only caveat is to make it look “organic.” Georgia Lyman, who is only credited as “the Assassin,” is I Care a Lot’s Luca Brasi, sharing duties with a few “heavies.” The film’s Fredo is Alexi Ignatyev, played by Nicholas Logan as if he’s always waiting for another shoe to drop. Even Ms. Peterson laughs and calls him an idiot. She laughs a lot, and it’s not just the steady drugs she’s being forcibly and legally dosed with, it’s the glee of power.

Roman’s power lies in his legal team, and the Lunyov family’s Tom Hagen is Dean Ericson (Chris Messina). One thing you have to admit with the Russian mob is they do appreciate innovation and sophistication. Ericson can’t help but be impressed by Marla’s scam. His lowball offer of $150,000 is an insult, but an understandable one. His veiled threats are as subtle as his suits are ostentatious.

Marla doesn’t seem to appreciate the power the Lunyov family wields, but she does appreciate the irony.

“If you can’t convince a woman to do what you want,” she says, appraising the fine print under the mouthpiece’s exploratory offer, “then you call her a bitch and threaten to kill her.” Marla pays it forward by calling the Lunyov matriarch far worse and threatening extreme discomfort, which she promises will last until the day she dies. As restrained as her venom may be, Marla is a proud femme fatale. Though also a stereotypical “ice queen” villainess, and heartless materialist. We’re almost sorry to feel bad for Marla when she is tied to a chair during last minute negotiations.

Director Blakeson, who made the science fiction action movie The 5th Wave and the noir thriller The Disappearance of Alice Creed, sets up I Care a Lot like a horror movie.

“There’s no such thing as good people,” Marla Grayson says at the start of the film. The opening is exquisitely unsettling as Jennifer is guided through a process of enforced institutionalization, followed by her house being emptied, painted, placed on the market, and sold. The plot thickens as keys are traced to a safety deposit box containing millions of dollars’ worth of diamonds, which officially don’t exist. Most gangster films aren’t driven by this kind of mystery, but Roman is a new kind of gangster. Though cheap, dead drug-mules are an unnecessary expense, the Lunyov family want to make a difference in the world.

Blakeson wanted to highlight all-too true stories of elder abuse and the perils of court-appointed conservators which could even bring The #FreeBritney movement calling. But he captures the allure of the anti-hero and the all-American dream of a corner on the market. Roman Lunyov has one final thing in common with Michael Corleone, and many of the traditional gangsters: He wants to earn money legitimately. This is not to be confused with wanting to go legit.

Those of us who root for the “bad guys” will find a wealth of insidious characters, and a very original caper, at the heart of I Care a Lot. Peter Dinklage’s Roman Lunyev may go against type, with his eastern bloc nobility stunted by the limits of black comedy. But as a movie mob boss, he is Street Regal.

I Care a Lot can be streamed on Netflix.

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The post I Care a Lot: Peter Dinklage is the Scariest Gangster We’ve Seen in Years appeared first on Den of Geek.

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he main reason to watch I Care a Lot The Main Reason to Watch I Care a Lot Is Rosamund Pike

The Main Reason to Watch I Care a Lot Is Rosamund Pike

The main reason to watch I Care a Lot, J Blakeson’s twisty thriller now on Netflix, is Rosamund Pike. The film around her character, Marla Grayson, is a bit of a monster — in the old sense of the word, in that it has the body of one beast and the tail of another. I Care a Lot wants to race along like a caper movie; it wants to sting like a satire. But it often winds up fighting itself, paralyzed by its own toxin.

Marla’s grift is (mostly) legal elder abuse. She bribes a physician to say an elderly patient is mentally unfit, then she persuades a judge to appoint her as the senior’s guardian. In one fell swoop, Marla gets the power to put her wards away in a nursing home, where she can control them totally, from limiting their visitors to liquidating their bank balances. She uses the proceeds to pay herself, and the money rolls in. You might think that Marla, who needs to pull the wool over people’s eyes, would come to court in sheep’s clothing, but no. When we see her twisting the system round her finger, Pike’s hair slices sharply enough across her cheekbones to draw blood. She looks like the dragon-lady boss in a ’90s corporate thriller, a stalking predator in a bloodred dress.

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She and her lover-slash-assistant, Fran (Eiza González), are waiting for a “cherry,” an older person with a fat bank account and no nosy family, someone they can park in a home and suck dry. One day, thanks to corrupt Dr. Amos (Alicia Witt), a sweet little old lady named Jennifer (Diane Wiest) drops into their laps. In a montage, we see how the scam works, how Marla blizzards Jennifer with documentation and official language, how swiftly the older woman’s phone and autonomy are taken away. But Jennifer is less alone — and less sweet — than she seems, and the folks that come to find her include an irritated gangster, played by Peter Dinklage.

This sets up a battle royal that also turns out to be, approximately, a battle of the sexes. Marla refuses to be intimidated by threats or even harm; she sneers at any man who tries it. She and Fran and Dr. Amos (and a few other obliging professional women) are competent in their monstrous efforts, while Dinklage’s gang is populated by nearly all male ding-dongs, bruisers accustomed to winning on the first swing. Unfortunately, Wiest is sidelined by the film, despite being its prize. During a lull in the action, there’s a tremendous scene in which Jennifer, dazed by overmedication, has a tense conversation with Marla, her “guardian-robber.” Jennifer’s gaze wanders, then sharpens. Deep in her eyes, a shark rises up from the dark. We wonder — could it be that it takes an old predator to bring down a young one? But the plot turns instead towards Dinklage and Pike and their increasingly Rube Goldbergian plans, and Wiest slips away again, back to the dramaturgical depths.

Blakeson, who also made The Disappearance of Alice Creed, is interested in the violent Absurd, so here he follows the Coen brothers in their Burn After Reading mode, stylizing for all he’s worth. His heavy hand does sometimes shake. Blakeson is British, and in sending up American evils, he dresses his characters as cartoonishly as panto villains: In order that we understand him to be a baddie, Chris Messina, a mobbed-up lawyer, wears a pinkie ring and a watch chain and a three-piece-suit made from upholstery fabric. Pike’s lipstick is so intensely red, her mouth becomes the focal point of any shot she appears in — not her eyes, which are often hidden behind mirrored sunglasses. And Dinklage and his team owe some of their stylings to other Coen Brothers films and their physical-comedy influences: They bobble weapons, hurl smoothies, and wear costumes so loud I apologized to my downstairs neighbor.

Some will find this cartoon toxicity entertaining, but I couldn’t reconcile the film’s very different registers. Essentially, there are two films here fighting it out. First, there’s a horror film about the way we exploit and ignore the elderly, particularly frightening because it’s true. Blakeson’s script does a good job of demonstrating how Pike’s corporate-speak pseudo-compassion makes the court system comfortable: Her cool professionalism reassures the judge, whereas other, messier interests — like her wards’ families — unnerve him with their emotions. There’s no way to argue once Marla’s got you in her coils, because arguing only makes you seem unstable. All it takes is one overburdened judge (Isiah Whitlock, Jr.), a slimy nursing-home director (Damian Young), and Marla to twist the care industry into a Kafkaesque labyrinth. In this, the movie is grave and real and nauseating. The film has tons of guns and near escapes, but no shot is as frightening as Jennifer’s soft face, crumpling when she realizes her nurse would rather sedate her than listen.

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The second film is a glossy, aerodynamic caper, full of disposable buffoons with pistols and pastries (both equally loved) and a grifter overreaching her con. Clearly, when everybody’s wicked, you can dole out the mayhem with an easy spirit! In early scenes, Blakeson asks Dinklage to play it broad, a direction Dinklage takes perhaps too well, and action scenes turn slapstick. I Care a Lot is concerned with surfaces and style, part of a long tradition of goofball gangster pictures. And Marla’s voice-over at the beginning of the film establishes that she sees herself as a scrappy, up-from-the-bottom antihero. “Playing fair is a joke invented by rich people to keep the rest of us poor,” she says, which would certainly excuse a bit of light drug dealing or an insurance swindle or three. But Marla is assaulting the elderly, isolating them, mass-neglecting them. Whoops! The first film does so well at evoking genuine horror, it fills the second film’s balloon with lead.

Pike is such a good performer that she can actually play in all the movies Blakeson is jamming together here. She’s got the ice she showed in Gone Girl, the battlefield tenderness of Hostiles, and the grit she manifested in A Private War. She and Messina go mano a mano in a nicely charged scene, when Marla keeps flash-freezing the lawyer’s oleaginous attempts at negotiation. He oozes; she zaps him. He oozes a little more, and the room starts to frost. Considering the strength of this scene and the showdown with Wiest, it’s strange that Blakeson so rarely lets his wonderful cast just … sit down and talk. In the end, he has made a film in which plot machinery overwhelms character and meaning — and for that specific kind of narrative engine to work, the audience does need to be invested in whether plans either succeed or fail. We don’t need to like what a movie’s characters do, but our hearts need to beat a little faster when they attempt it. My pulse stayed steady: I Care a Lot made it impossible to care at all.

I Care A Lot will make you worry about your grandparents (and Peter Dinklage) rankly,Frankly, the playbook for success in America sucks. You’ve heard it before: eat or be eaten, hustle hustle hustle, move like a shark, the competition is working while you’re sleeping. This is, to use the term loosely, sociopathic — which is why it’s such fertile territory for cinematic villains like American Psycho’s Patrick Bateman. In the new Netflix thriller I Care A Lot, writer-director J Blakeson introduces us to another: Marla Grayson.

Marla (Rosamund Pike) is a fully-formed monster of a well-mannered and respectable sort. She’s a con artist who specializes in separating the elderly from their wealth. She also has an efficient system: a doctor who will declare targets unfit to manage their own affairs, a practiced courtroom spiel that tells judges what they need to hear so they’ll appoint her as her latest target’s legal guardian, and a favorite retirement home that appreciates all the business she sends their way.

It’s a horrifyingly effective grift that foregrounds the terrible truth of elder abuse, which most Americans are vaguely aware of, but never confront until they have to deal with it themselves. Business is good for Marla, because like any good grifter, she isn’t making any waves of her own, she’s just inserting herself into a systemic injustice the wider culture has decided it’s fine with.

But one day she picks the wrong target. Jennifer Peterson (Dianne Wiest) should be an easy mark: She has a lot of possessions, and no close family. Unfortunately for Marla, Jennifer’s son is crime boss Roman Lunyov (Peter Dinklage, looking a whole lot like Jack Dorsey). Like any good crime lord, Roman loves his mom, and will stop at nothing to extricate her from Marla’s tangled web.

With its central conflict established, I Care A Lot prowls through its two-hour runtime. Mirroring its protagonist’s steady pulse and slick-yet-not-overstated style (consider her trenchcoat: a classic tan affair that hugs her upper torso perfectly, yet falls in loose, flowing folds), it confidently lays out the cat-and-mouse game between its two main characters, their moves and countermoves against each other. It never fully pounces, though — while the conflict between Marla and Roman does come to a head, the stakes remain relatively flat.

This is partly because I Care A Lot ironically doesn’t have much to care about. As Marla, Rosamund Pike is tremendous fun, playing the sort of openly conniving woman that her character in Gone Girl subversively hinted at. And while Dinklage’s Roman Lunyov is a compelling foe, he mostly acts by proxy, preferring to remain out of sight. So while they’re both bad people, only Marla has any sense of interiority. Pike works wonders to make a thin story feel full and satisfying to watch in the moment, but once it’s over, the thinness starts to become bothersome, especially given the arresting subject matter at its core.

There’s a meanness to I Care A Lot’s premise that is arresting and never far from the audience’s mind — in Marla’s spacious office, for example, she sits at a desk across from a wall where she hangs photos of her victims — or as the law now considers them, her wards. For brief moments, usually when Wiest’s character, Jennifer, is on screen, the film seems like it’s going to confront them head-on. But it always stops short. In these moments, however, I Care A Lot, is at its most compelling — when Jennifer looks directly at Marla and recognizes precisely the sort of creature she is.

Not a “fucking lioness,” as Marla calls herself in I Care A Lot’s opening monologue, spinning herself as a woman wise to the fact that people are either predator or prey, and that you can choose to be the former, or consign yourself to the latter. That’s just the great myth of American capitalism, a wonderfully adaptable fable that can gussied up with #girlboss buzzwords to create monsters like Marla in the first place. No, she’s something closer to the truth of how you make it in America, as Jennifer realizes midway through the film, from the nursing home Marla has trapped her in. She’s a goddamned vulture.

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Peggy Wheeler’s Literary Menagerie: Beautimus Potamus, The Raven’s Daughter, Chaco

What inspired 'Beautimus Potamus?' Any characters in that satire drawn at all from real life?

It's an odd thing how the character of Lady Beautimus came about.  I woke up one morning Summer of 2011 with that scene from Disney's Fantasia with the dancing hippos. My husband I drank our coffee in the morning, and I told him that morning I thought it would be fun to write a story  of one of the hippos as an adult, and then I started it as my first novel ever.  I'd been writing since I was six-years-old, poetry, little stories, and later technical writing, and non-fiction, but I didn't think I had the chops to write a novel.  Once I started work on The Splendid and Extraordinary Life of Beautimus Potamus, I became obsessed with the novel. 

I joined a critique group who were so brutal I didn't know if I ever wanted to return to it, but I stuck with the group, paid attention to their critiques, and in the two years I was with them, I learned so much about how to write a novel. After each weekly meeting, I went home, made changes to the manuscript and kept at it. Sometimes I'd wake up at two or three a.m. and get to my computer, and write sometimes for twelve or even fifteen hours straight without a break, except to use the loo or get a drink of water or coffee.  My husband loved the story and encouraged me to keep at it. And, yes, many of the characters, including my husband as the wolf, Steven D. Lobos, my mother, my daughter and grandchildren are represented in the story.  

Beautimus is the person I wish I were.  Beyond that, my mother with severe dementia,  blind, incontinent, delusional, and unable to walk or even feed herself, was in long-term care during the time I wrote this book, and I'd take pages in every day to read to her. I didn't think she'd understand most, but she did. She laughed at the appropriate places, and when one of my characters used foul language, she'd shake her had and say,"That's nasty."  

She loved the book, and off I showed up without a chapter or at least a few pages to read to her, she demanded to know, "Why didn't you bring the hippo story? I've been looking��forward to it all morning." When I read the last word of the final chapter to her, I thought she'd fallen asleep because her eyes were closed. As I tip-toed out of her room as to not disturb her, she bolted upright with tears in her eyes. "Peggy Ann, that was beautiful."  Shortly after, she passed away, and The Splendid and Extraordinary Life of Beautimus Potamus was the last thing I'd read to her before she died. I dedicated the book to her.   

How did you create and develop the hero in Chaco? How did you research his background?

CHACO.  I volunteered to work with immigrants in the 70s. I brought their paychecks, guitars, clothing to the deportation detention camp in El Centro California, assisted them to get legal help if they needed it, and brought messages to their families they were leaving behind. I also listened to their stories, and most of those stories broke my heart. Although I am not fluent, during those years, I learned to speak and read Spanish decently, and I learned much about the people and  culture of Latin America.  I wanted a highly unlikely hero for this story and couldn't think of any protagonist/hero that would be more unlikely than an undocumented worker hiding in California from a death sentence in El Salvador for being a freedom fighter on the wrong side of an American-backed coup. 

I also used several Hispanic sensitivity readers, native Spanish speakers, to make sure I treated the subject matter and language with respect. In the end, I believe I only got one thing wrong in saying Te Quiero instead of Te Amo in one scene, which I'm told is really no big deal. The highest compliment I received was from a Mexican-American friend in Texas who told me something like:  "Most white people, attempting to write Latino characters in their books, simply give white characters Hispanic names and employ a bunch of offensive stereotypes. You, however, demonstrate understanding of Latin American culture."  

How do you move so fluidly among genres? Do you work on different ideas, or different books, at once? 

I move fluidly through genres because I'm trying them all on for size.  I may always write cross-genre or mash-ups because it's fun, but seems as though I'm moving more toward being a mystery-thriller writer. I am also going to try my hand at literary fiction and Sci Fi.  

You asked if I work on several books at a time.  Yes.  I have four novels started, some far along.  The next book after The Desert Ravens is released, is the sequel to CHACO.  It's called "Moonforest Sanctuary, and I'm already to Chapter 6.  But I'm also working on The Woman in the Desert, The Ghost of Mrs. Stanislofsky, and two Sci-Fi novels.  The Raven's Daughter series (third set in Ireland is called The Ravens of Éire).  I already have several subject matter experts and recently visited both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland, and hope to get back again.  I'm also working with a woman who teaches Irish Gaelic so that any Gaelic terms I may use are accurate.  

I research heavily for all of my books, for example, I spent nearly two years talking to astrophysicists and people on Helioscience sites and groups to ensure that the science in the book is plausible before I even started work on the manuscript.  I got the idea for CHACO from a 2012 article in National Geographic about the 1859 Carrington Event, when two massive Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs) hit Earth full on and wiped out telegraph service throughout the Northern Hemisphere, and created chaos for years. 

The speculative story is about "What would happen if several Class X CME's were to directly hit Earth today?"  The scary thing is, this will happen and we are unprepared. When it does happen, we will be living as we did in the 19th Century, without more than a day or two warning, and the problems may not be completely resolved, and power may not be fully restored, for a decade!  Scary.

How did you research the Yurok culture to write Raven's Daughter? Did you find anything surprising?

We have a number of Native Americans in my family, Kiowa and Navajo mostly, but some from other nations as well.  When we lived in Weaverville, CA some years back, my husband and I attended annual bear dances at George Walking Bear's home, a Modoc healer, who lived with his Cherokee wife on sixteen acres on the banks of the Trinity river.  There I met and interacted with many northern tribes, mostly Yurok.  It was Yurok women who taught me how to process acorns by shelling and breaking them into pieces, putting them in pantyhose, and submerging them in a toilet tank so that with each flush, the acorns lose their acidity so they can be ground and used as flour or put into soups and bread.  

It is from the Yurok women that I also learned that the Yurok do not permit women to sweat with the men.  Mixed sweats are in some cultures.  Women only sweats and men only sweats in others.  I also got onto a number of indigenous sites and tribal websites to learn more of the history, and I used several indigenous folks as subject matter experts.  Learning the folklore and stories of the Yurok, including the legend of the Pukukwerek (also spelled Plukukwerek or Pukkekwerek, the monster killer who shapeshifts into a raven) fascinated me.  It's one reason, along with my repeated interactions with Yurok women, is the reason I decided to make Maggie Tall Bear Sloan into a half Yurok woman. 

Which of your books is your favorite?

My favorite book is, and will always be, The Splendid and Extraordinary Life of Beautimus Potamus, and its companion piece, The Anam Glyps, not just because I so loved writing the books, and Lady Bea is my first ever novel, but because of my mother.  I cannot read or listen to that book even now without thinking of her, and crying a little.  I'd love to see this story as a full-length animated or CGI film. 

Peggy Wheeler’s books are available here. 

[b0blegum]

t h y s í a - [#2]

Author: b0blegum

Pairing: Shin Ho Seok x Reader

Rating: NC-17 (violence, words)

Genre: Action / Crime / Thriller / Romance

Status: On Going

Part: #1 - #2 - #3 - #4 - …

Summary

θυσία

/thoo·see'·ah/

Origin: Ancient Greek

Meaning: An act of slaughtering an animal or person or surrendering a possession as an offering to God or to a divine or supernatural figure.

"Hey, wake up, babe." A soft voice gently touched you to wake up from your deep sleep. The voice was too familiar for you that made you open your eyes in just a second.

"Minhyuk?" You asked, quickly sat up from bed. "You're... Alive?" Your palms automatically feeling his cheeks, his warm pale skins, making sure it's really your boyfriend.

"I am alive, (y/n). It's really me." Lips curved on his face as he put down your hands and hold it gently. Tears started rolling down your cheeks, relieved that your dearest boyfriend was sitting on your bedside. "But, now, we have to go."

"Go?" You asked. His smile dissapeared, eyes looking serious.

"We need to go, now, (y/n)." He repeated. You looked blank. Not understanding what he meant.

"(Y/n), wake up! We need to go!"

Your eyes flew open. It was all white, the ceiling, that was right there when you opened your eyes. There wasn't a tall good-looking guy named Minhyuk in front of you, it was only a ceiling.

"(Y/n)!" Someone called you. His voice was rather too familiar, but it wasn't the voice of your boyfriend.

It took you almost five seconds to finally realised that yoy meeting your boyfriend was only a dream.

"Hey! Wake up! Come on, we need to get out of here quick." That voice snapped you. Head turning to the source of voice. You found that blonde muscular guy busy shoving things into his backpack. His face looked worried and scared.

"What is going on?" You stood up lazily. Your head was spinning as you forced yourself to get up.

"We don't have much time. We should go now. Come on!" He grabbed your hand and led you downstairs. Your eyes were wandering around the place you've been sleeping in.

It was dark and abandoned. It looked like an unfinished building's construction. You didn't have any idea on where it was, but one thing you were sure of, was that this located in the outskirt.

"Get in. Quick." He left you standing in front of the car door as he sprinted to his side, throwing his backpack in then himself.

You were still not sure of what was going on. You just woke up from a dream of meeting your late boyfriend and suddenly a guy that kidnapped you took you somewhere you didn't even know.

"You're not going to give me any pills anymore?" You asked as he started to drive his classic car.

"No." He answered shortly. His arm resting behind your headrest, head turning back to reverse the car.

"Why?" He pushed the gas pedal and drifted off through the tall grass that surrounded the area.

"You could die." He said. Turning the car to the legal road.

"Then why? I thought you wanted to kill m–" A stinging pain at the back of your head cut you mid sentence. He turned his face to you and you could feel something warm at the back of your head.

"Killing you wasn't on my list." He said shortly, as his hand caressing the back of your head while his eyes were still focused on the road, driving in full speed. "I'm sorry to make you went through all the pains."

"Who are you actually?" Your eyes shut tight, holding back the pain.

"I'm… Hoseok."

"I don't need your name." You snapped. "What are you to my late boyfriend? Why did you have to kill him? Why did you kidnap me? Why did yo–" This time, a heavy feeling of nausea stroke you that made you spontaneously covered your mouth with your palm and hold your stomach.

"Fuck." He cursed, messing his hair. "I'm really sorry to make you this way." He said, almost a whisper. "But i can't answer any of your questions. I'm sorry."

The pain was getting worse and worse. It felt like your stomach was being squeezed hardly and someone was beating the back of your head with something sharp.

"Please..." You tried to scream, but you're now too weak, so it sounded more like a moan.

"We can't pull over. Those jerks would catch us and we both would be killed." He looked at you again and brushed of the sweats that were already covering your face.

"I can...t." You cried out all the pain. This was something that was too much for you to handle. You've never felt something as torturing as this before.

"This... This is the effect if you stop taking the pills." His voice was almost shaking as he saw you squirming on your seat.

"Please, give me the pill. This is... This is torturing me..." You whispered.

"I can't. You can't take any more pills. I gave you ten and that is the biggest number a human could take."

"But... It hurts!" You cried, squeezing your head.

He ignored you then drove even faster. He didn't talk to you anymore and let you just screamed the pain off until you were to weak to do nothing but to seat there, head lulled to your shoulder, eyes closed tight and mouth murmuring things like 'it hurts' and 'please stop' every second.

Hoseok slowly decreased the speed as you both were getting closer to the neon sign at the side of the road. He pulled over quickly and parked the car.

"Wait a bit more. We're staying a night and i promise to make you feel better." He said before slamming the door closed.

You kept murmuring something that you didn't even understand until he was back and carried you out to somewhere you didn't know.

You heard the door being slammed rudely before your skin touched a soft and cold cloth.

"Min...hyuk..." You grabbed Hoseok’s arm just before he left you lying on the bed. His eyes widened by you calling him the name of your boyfriend. "It... Hurts."

Hoseok let go of your hand away and brushing your hair that was covering your face. "Please, bear with it just a bit more." He moved closer to your face, caressing your cheek and about to give you a kiss on your forehead before he pulled himself, holding back not to kiss you.

He shook his head, feeling disgusted by himself then he walked away.

"Please... Stay." You begged.

Warm water ran down his body. Touching every edge of it, missing not even one tiny spot dry. His arms resting on the tiled wall, supporting his weight as he looked down with closed eyes. He breathed heavy breaths as he gritted his teeth, regretting what he had done.

"Fuck!" He punched the tiled wall with his knuckle couple of times, enough to leave bruises on them.

He dried himself, shaking all the waters off of his hair and put on a loose white tee and a short.

The tiny room was quiet. There were only your heavy breath filling in the room and the sound of his regret.

He carefully dragging the wooden chair closer to your bed and sat on it. His eyes glued to you. He takes your hand gently and buried it inside his, kissing the back of your hand softly before putting it back down.

"(Y/n), I'm really... Sorry." He looked down. Slowly tears started ponding in his eyes and teardrops started to roll down his cheek.

The sun was rising. Its ray of light carefully touched your eyelids, saying hello to you and to woke you up from your peaceful sleep.

With a groan, you opened your eyes slowly and found a guy sleeping beside you with his back facing you. Without you even realised, your eyes felt watery. You were imagining that it was supposed to be your boyfriend's back that greeted you in the morning instead of someone's that killed your boyfriend and kidnapped you.

You gritted your teeth with anger. That'd be a lie if you didn't feel like killing him. You wanted to kill him so bad, but that just made you as disgusting as he is.

Your eyes were locked at his back, but slowly disturbed by a black-ink stroke that was almost all covered with his white tee. It looked like a tattoo for you and it seemed familiar. Curious, you pulled the hem of his tee slowly, to make a full look at that tattoo.

And it was indeed a tattoo.

Your eyes widened and you gasped in shock that that tattoo was exactly the same with the one your late boyfriend had.

It was a circular symbol depicting a snake, swallowing its tail and three Latin words filling the empty spot under it; Occidere, Amo, Vivere. The one you thought was weird and ugly.

"Why... Did he have this?" You mouthed as your finger tracing the tattoo.

Soon enough the boy shifted himself, facing the ceiling before slowly woke up.

"Morning." He smiled with his eyes still half closed. "Feeling better?"

You sat up right away, ignoring his question. "Explain to me why you have that tattoo!" You demanded.

"What are you talking about, (y/n)?" He rubbed his eyes as he helped himself to sit beside you.

"That ugly-ass looking tattoo, the one on your back. Why do you have it?"

"Ah... That," he paused. "I was... Young and stupid. I went to a tattoo parlor after i saw this symbol on a magazine."

"You're lying."

"What?"

"You're lying! I saw the symbol on the Internet but never saw the one with those three words underneath it." You snapped. "Tell me the truth. What was that mean? Does that have a thing to do with all of these?" You almost screamed in frustration.

"It's... True. I– i saw this on a magazine and i–"

"Stop lying, Hoseok! Do you think i'm stupid? Do you think i don't know what those three words mean?"

"Okay! Okay! Yes, i lied!" Hoseok rolled his eyes.

"What does that mean? Tell me to the tiniest bit about that!"

"Why would you know that?" He locked his eyes.

"My boyfriend. He had that, too. Everytime i asked him what that tattoo means, he said it was nothing and quickly changed the topic." The boy looked away for seconds before locking his eyes again with yours. His stare was deep and you could feel regret and sadness in it.

"He was like me." He started off. You looked confused. "He used to do killing and did other dangerous-life-risking things." Your eyes blinked rapidly, wanting to fire him with questions but letting him pour all the stories first. "All the scars he got, it was a lie if he told you he got that from fighting with his brother." And yes, he did tell you that he got that from fighting with his brother.

"What did he involve with?"

"We killed both bad and good guys. Pretty much anyone our boss told us to get rid of. We risked our lives everyday just to pleased him." He continued. "But one day, your boyfriend disappear. He left without a trace. Until one day i accidentally met him on the street. He avoided me at first, but finally we managed to had some talk and he said that he wanted to start his life again, from zero." He smiled vaguely.

"Then why did you come to our apartment and kill him?"

"Boss found out that he was alive. As simple as that." He tapped his fingers.

"Why didn't you kill me too? Why did you bring me here?"

"You are not to be killed. He wanted me to bring you to him and use you as his prostitute."

"Pardon?"

"I'm sorry, but that is the truth." He added. "And those pills…”He looked down, looking at your pale hands. “I’m sorry for giving them to you. It was boss, who told me to give them to you so you could laid unconscious until he came and took you.”

“Then why are we here?” You asked.

“We’re running away. We have to run away as far as we could, (y/n).”

to be continued…

[pangeanews]

“Sono stata fedele a una militanza funesta”: fino a strapparsi le ossa verbali, con Veronica Tomassini

I più, penso, resteranno lì, non vedranno altro oltre l’insolente insolazione della ‘denuncia’, al sole del ‘neorelismo’ di facciata, che sfacciati. Insomma, la scrittrice dei drogati, della periferia di Siracusa, che è poi anima di catrame, l’isolamento dell���uomo, catabasi, catarsi, etc. etc. Sarebbe come considerare Il processo di Kafka un legal thriller e Moby Dick un baldo romanzo d’avventure a bordo di baleniera e l’Ulisse di Joyce una guida turistica della città di Dublino, che idiozia. Con Mazzarrona (Miraggi Edizioni, 2019) Veronica Tomassini – già autrice di libri importanti, cito solo Sangue di cane e L’altro addio – va al di là del gergo linguistico di Altri libertini, è in esilio dalla ‘denuncia’ – propria dei burocrati della provvidenza, dei puri di cuore – redige l’implacabile epica dei rimpianti, dei persi senza pianto, dei tossici, degli indifesi, degli indegni, degli indimenticabili dannati senza aura, senza beneficio di pietà (senti qua: “I fiori degli aranci restituivano la leggerezza della stagione. Oggi mi sembra un fatto straordinario assistervi senza dover pagare un prezzo, sentirmi indegna. La primavera è per tutti. Anche per noi in quel tempo. Il nostro inverno perenne disconosceva la primavera”). Ci sono tante frasi da sottolineare e una bellezza così candida – del candore che si ottiene soltanto dopo il massacro – in questo romanzo, lo prendi ed è come se un pezzo d’ombra e un pezzo di sole fossero conficcati sotto i mignoli, a spalpebrare il senso del tatto. Ma non è questo. Veronica Tomassini scrive facendo scempio di sé, come i pittori d’icone che murano la propria vita nel carcere del Volto – per Veronica, ogni volta, scrivere è sudario, pazienza, perdizione – si scuoia per dare grammatica di fiamme al nostro caos. Ne parlo, è certo, con un giudizio sghembo, di Veronica, perché ho il privilegio di dialogare con lei, fino a sfinirci, fino all’ultimo lembo emblematico di fiato. Veronica significa colei che ‘porta la vittoria’, ma il nome, storpiato, ha a che fare con la vera immagine (icona) di Cristo. Il volto è vittoria; lei porta il tuo volto con una grazia indecente. Attraversi Veronica per trovare te stesso – e l’esperienza non è indolore. (d.b.)

Cosa bisogna avere per scrivere, per te: compassione o ferocia? Amore per sé o desideri per gli altri? Necessità di perdersi, definitivamente, o di risorgere, luminosamente?

La compassione è lo sguardo che finisce dove gli altri lo tolgono; la luce che si fa strada dove per tutti ripara l’ombra. L’ombra e non le tenebre. Il mio sguardo è compassionevole anche quando è feroce, serve alla scrittura, il dolore laconico, l’ho imparato dai nostri maestri russi, è la grande lezione russa, il dolore non si ribadisce, lo devi mortificare, ignorare, così lo esalterai nel suo potere di salvezza. È il riso con il suono del singhiozzo, persino, capace di seppellire il lettore nello sgomento e nella tristezza. Il dolore nella pozzanghera mirgorodiana di Gogol’. E alla fine l’uomo risorge, sì. E tuttavia non per questa ragione io sia nobilitata, migliore, dedicata all’altro, no, si può essere creature mostruose, fuori quello sguardo, fuori la scrittura.

Tu sei la santa dei sottosuoli, la regina virginea degli inferi della periferia: con un linguaggio visionario, da apocalisse gnostica, garantisci una consistenza narrativa a quella “loggia di sbandati” che è l’umanità di Mazzarrona. Mi pare, però, che la tua lucidità non preluda a una facile ricerca di ‘riscatto’. Dimmi. Dimmi perché quei luoghi sono la tua materia narrativa.

Racconto solo la mia vita. Tranche de vie. Non so fare altro. Sono finita nei luoghi sbagliati, tra gli imperdonabili, fino ad amarli. Io stessa lo sono, imperdonabile. Sono fuori dal mondo colpevolmente, una brutta copia della Bess di Von Trier de Le onde del destino. Ho letto Christiane F. Noi i ragazzi dello zoo di Berlino a nove anni. Mi ha cambiato la vita, forse me l’ha rovinata. Da allora quello sguardo di cui ti dicevo “deragliava”, illuminava i segreti e la laidezza della vita, mi sembrava di averla già conosciuta così marcia e finita a pochi anni. Ero preparatissima, a pochi anni conoscevo già l’abbecedario del tossico. Gropiusstadt, Haus der Mitt, il Sound, David Bowie, il trip, l’acido che devi calare con un succo di ciliegia, Sense of doubt. Era il mio paesaggio a nove anni. Allora ho capito che c’era una verità, dovevo trovarla, non l’ho ancora trovata. Devo capire ancora, non so cosa, quel tossico forse con l’ago infilato nel collo, Riboldi Gino chino sul cesso di un bagno pubblico (In exitu, Testori) o l’altro che muore steso su una panchina. Così è andata. E da adolescente e poi da adulta sono stata fedele a una militanza funesta, una vita in pezzi forse. E invece no, perché poi tutto mi è stato restituito, gloriosamente, tutto è diventato scrittura. Sono diventate parole, quelle parole che a Mazzarrona non si usavano, erano ridicole, troppo lunghe.

Ami dal culmine dell’abbandono, forse perfino in una compiaciuta estremità ed eresia. Il narcisismo dei perduti. È così? Contestami.

Sì, amo dal culmine dell’abbandono. L’amore è il grande assente. Il narcisismo dei perduti: mi piace. Mi sta bene. Ma devo essere perdonata e voglio solo perdonare in fondo, così sopravvivo.

C’è più denuncia sociale, rivolta civica o atto sacro, liturgia dell’amare e dell’accettare nel tuo romanzo, nelle tue intenzioni?

No, non c’è una denuncia sociale, mi annoia solo l’idea di un romanzo da denuncia sociale. Qualcosa da tessera di partito, inefficace, inutile come una posa. Soltanto racconto (non mi importa delle intenzioni, agiscono per i fatti loro, non le riconosco), poi io stessa divento simbolo di qualcosa magari. Quella che scrive di periferie o di ubriaconi, vagabondi, disadattati. Senza pietismo, però, per carità. Lo faccio e basta. Il resto mi annoia. La noia è un problema. Ho vissuto così.

“Era solo la morte degli altri, che avanzava implacabile e lenta, ad avermi contagiato”: che cosa significa?

Eroinomani, creature esangui. Erano la negazione della vita, una provocazione, un parto cieco. Frequentare eroinomani, sentir parlare solo di ‘roba’, di overdose, spade, rota, Aids, mi aveva fatto ammalare. Frequentare l’ignoranza che per me equivale a una volgarità morale, una volgarità tout court. Mi aveva fatto ammalare. Dimagrivo, avevo smesso di mangiare, non del tutto però. Non vedevo altro, solo questo orizzonte, pesto, greve. Solo la morte. Non c’era leggerezza. Era un castigo.

Da dove arriva questo tuo linguaggio che brucia i cliché di certa narrativa contemporanea, che affila il coltello con cui ti punisci? Che cosa leggi, intendo? Che cosa ti piace leggere, dell’oggi?

Oggi leggo solo testi sacri o classici dello spirito. Ho amato molto i russi, il neorealismo, alcuni autori americani, ma se vai a vedere scopri che sono poi russi o giù di lì, tipo Saul Bellow (origini lituane).

Ora cosa ti attendi? Lo Strega, un nuovo libro, uno che ti porti via da tutto bruciando i ponti, niente, tutto?

Uno che mi porti via da tutto, bruciando i ponti.

*In copertina, Veronica Tomassini è interpretata da Francesca Marzia Esposito

L'articolo “Sono stata fedele a una militanza funesta”: fino a strapparsi le ossa verbali, con Veronica Tomassini proviene da Pangea.

from pangea.news https://ift.tt/2u2JG6X

[newsprettypll-blog]

Shay Mitchell sobre seu novo App "Off The Menu" e sua nova série tv, "You"

Como você e Lawrence começaram o "Off the Menu"?

Conheço Lawrence há bastante tempo na verdade. Nós dois somos de Toronto. Eu não o conhecia quando morava lá, mas ele é uma das primeiras pessoas que conheci quando me mudei para L.A, através de amigos em comum. E nós gostamos de nos dar bem porque ele é uma pessoa legal, mas em segundo lugar por causa do nosso amor mútuo pela comida. Então, ao longo dos anos, sempre saíamos  para comer juntos e, depois, passando ... Não sei, quero dizer dois, três anos, começamos a gostar dessas conversas sobre lugares que ele conhecesse, pratos especiais que ficavam fora do menu, que eu não conhecia. Ele me levava para um lugar e ficava como "Você deve tentar este prato". E eu sempre ia procurar no menu, e ele dizia: "Não, não está no menu, está fora do menu". E eu ficava como, "Oh, você tem uma conexão especial. Você está tentando me mostrar alguma coisa". Então eu o levaria para um lugar e diria: "Oh, bem, este é um prato muito bom que eles costumavam ter em seu menu, mas eles não, eles ainda conseguem para mim porque eu sei sobre isso." Então nós continuaríamos um com o outro com isso. Eventualmente, ele chegou e falou, "Você sabe, eu quero começar um aplicativo onde eu posso dizer às pessoas os diferentes itens fora do menu dos restaurantes baseados nas cidades". Então nós começamos o "Off the Menu", apenas como um aplicativo básico como esse, e isso lhe daria lugares que têm um item diferente no menu. Então, há cerca de seis meses, um ano atrás, estávamos falando sobre um clube fora do menu. Ele ficou tipo, "Você sabe, os clubes que você se sente incluído, você está sabendo". Estou literalmente dando-lhe todos os detalhes, mas conversamos de um lado para outro para saber o que é o clube Off the Menu: 20 dólares por mês, você está convidado por e-mail. E todos os dias, sete dias por semana, existe um item diferente do menu de certos restaurantes. E você pode literalmente entrar no restaurante, mostrar seu telefone, e resgatar o prato que estão apresentando para essa semana. Então, é maravilhoso. E não só isso, mas sempre que você usa ou não, todos os dias, uma refeição está indo para No Kid Hungry (organização que quer acabar com a fome infantil), o que é super importante.

Como você desenvolveu a parte de entrega do aplicativo, e por que você decidiu ser no "No Kid Hungry"?

Foi realmente importante para nós ter um componente de renúncia também. A comida é uma parte tão importante da nossa cultura agora - a cultura do foodie, todas as contas do Instagram, todos os blogueiros que especificamente falam sobre comida. Mas a fome no mundo ainda é uma coisa. E nem mesmo a fome do mundo; fome na América, ainda há muitos filhos que vão à escola com fome, o que não deveria ser o caso. Quando estamos falando de comida, [não estamos] apenas [falando] apenas a necessidade disso, você sabe? [Estes são] lugares que você deve verificar apenas por causa.

Por que você decidiu um aplicativo ao contrário de um site ou qualquer outra plataforma?

Honestamente, não conheço muitas pessoas, mas não faço mais sites. Eu só estou no meu telefone, eu nem consigo trazendo meu laptop comigo. Então, para mim, era importante que isso fosse algo que eu usaria organicamente. Eu não quero ter que fazer login no meu computador. Sou um grande fã de aplicativos agora; Estou sempre procurando a coisa mais nova. Qual o aplicativo mais recente de que todos estão falando? Isso é o que é mais móvel. Eu quero pessoas na rua para poder atingi-lo onde quer que estejam e sejam como "Whoa! Isso é tão maravilhoso".

Como você encontra os restaurantes cujas refeições você deseja mostrar?

Na verdade, temos membros da equipe que vão em torno de L.A., e eles tentam achar muita comida excelente, mas é uma coisa divertida para não só os membros, mas também para os donos de restaurantes e os chefs porque eles experimentam algo novo. Você sabe, estamos caminhando lá e somos como, "Ei, você gostaria de estar no Off the Menu?" E eles são como "Oh, sim, nós realmente sempre quisemos testar como esse prato ficaria, e então vamos tentar por esta semana". Ou eles vão trazer de volta um prato popular e vê-lo como ele faz. Ou o chef mesmo criar�� algo completamente novo, o que é divertido para eles.

Houve uma refeição favorita que você teve no aplicativo que é seu favorito de todos os tempos?

Oh meu Deus. A pizza na "Prova" em L.A. é incrível; Eu meio que me dou o nome de conhecedora de pizza. E eu nunca tinha ido a "Prova" antes que este restaurante estivesse no aplicativo. Então eu entrei lá e eu tive sua Pizza Star... realmente foi a melhor pizza que eu comi em L.A.

Qualquer um que assista suas histórias no Instagram é obrigado a ver você falar sobre Off the Menu. Como suas próprias mídias sociais participam do crescimento do aplicativo?

Acho que agora, a mídia social é provavelmente o melhor tipo de marketing. E eu acho que eu realmente começei a falar lá mais rápido do que qualquer outra coisa. Sempre tenho tido muito cuidado com o que falo em termos de marcas com as quais eu tenho parceiria, ou qualquer coisa que seja que estou promovendo aos meus fãs porque eu nunca quero vendê-los. Eu não quero falar sobre algo em que não acredito. Não quero falar sobre algo que não uso. Isso nunca acontecerá. Biore ... Eu usei isso quando eu tinha 16 anos. Eu tenho fotos com minhas tiras de poros, você sabe? Cada marca ou endosso com o qual eu fiz parceria gostou. E nunca foi algo que fiz apenas para fazer uma verificação. Então, quando falo sobre coisas e, especificamente, "Off the Menu", é porque eu realmente acredito nele. Eu também sei quanto dinheiro as pessoas podem economizar. Meu irmão simplesmente se mudou para L.A. Ele não tem dinheiro para gastar em refeições três vezes por dia. Este aplicativo é realmente incrível. As pessoas estão gastando US $ 20 por mês, e você está recebendo um prato grátis todos os dias. Então, há uma poupança também. Então, se você pode tentar um novo prato, experimente um novo restaurante e dê uma refeição a uma criança, isso é bastante impressionante por US $ 20 por mês.

Você também acaba de anunciar sua própria empresa de produção e tem seu próprio espaço de estúdio do YouTube. Como foi navegar nas mídias sociais e no mundo tecnológico?

É algo que eu aprendi a seguir o caminho. Antes de Pretty Little Liars, não acho que tenha um Twitter ou uma conta do Instagram. Eu tinha o Facebook e isso foi muito legal para mim, mas meu primeiro tweet foi ao mesmo tempo que eu entrei no show, todas as outras meninas tinham o Twitter. E então eu lembro quando eu baixei o Instagram pela primeira vez, eu estava usando isso como outras pessoas que não tinham idéia de filtros. Pensei que era capaz de alterar minhas fotos. Então, eu não conhecia realmente as mídias sociais e o mundo on-line. E então, obviamente, desenvolveu-se com PLL sendo um grande sucesso no Twitter e nas mídias sociais; Eu me ensinei ao longo do caminho e aprendi com outras pessoas ou comigo mesma e com meus erros. Então, tem sido algo que se desenvolveu organicamente ao longo dos anos, e acabei de tornando genuína nisso.

Você tem algum conselho para jovens que têm uma idéia para seu próprio aplicativo, mas não sabem por onde começar?

Honestamente para mim, o desenvolvimento deste aplicativo e a execução exata dele foi mais o Lawrence, e o criativo fui eu. Mas você sabe que a grande coisa sobre isso é que você pode ir no Google pesquisar qualquer coisa. E há até aplicativos que mostram como fazer aplicativos. Se você tem idéias diferentes, há tantas pessoas no mundo tecnológico agora, que você pode alcançar que sempre estão procurando uma nova idéia, constantemente. Então, honestamente, penso que, se você passar um pouco de tempo online e fazer uma pequena pesquisa, você terá certeza de encontrar um monte de lugares diferentes que podem ajudá-lo e levá-lo ainda mais.

Como você faz para monitorar as refeições para o Off the Menu, mostrar para as pessoas e em seu canal do YouTube?

Bem, você tem que comer todos os dias, sabe o que quero dizer? [Risos] Por isso, é meio genial que Lawrence seja um bom amigo meu, e na verdade não consigo me lembrar da última vez que fui a algum lugar e ele não veio comigo. Se eu estou gravando em Nova York, ou o filme que estava fazendo em Boston... Logo depois de PLL ele veio e me visitou. E comemos em tantos lugares diferentes. Ele é realmente meu parceiro de comer. Ontem nós estávamos andando em Nova York, e eu fui encontrá-lo neste restaurante, The Sosta. Novo, italiano, causal, também é muito bom, FYI. A proprietária é incrível. Ela basicamente simplesmente teve a idéia de que a massa não precisa ser tão chique e tão cara. Você pode ter isso casual, o que é incrível, o restaurante também é fofo. Nós fomos lá, nós comemos toda a comida italiana... Foi muita comida. Três pratos diferentes de macarrão, duas saladas, bolotas de carne, tudo. Nós literalmente ficamos cheios. Saímos do restaurante, viramos na esquina e vimos uma loja de bolinhos. E Lawrence ficou como, "Oh meu Deus, bolinhos". Eu fiquei como, "Oh meu Deus, eu amo bolinhos". Nós fomos e pedimos dois pratos. Então lá vamos nós. Então estamos no Little Italy, então vimos esse lugar de gelato e nós temos gelato. Então, ficamos como, "OK, honestamente isso é excessivo". Estávamos caminhando de volta ao hotel, caminhamos pelo restaurante pop-up Cheetos. É o que eu quero dizer. Ninguém pode marcar como Lawrence e eu quando se trata de comida.

Existe alguma coisa que você possa nos falar sobre sua nova série de televisão, "You"?

É sempre um título engraçado para falar, porque imagina se i meu gerente me ligasse e falasse tipo "Ok, precisamos falar sobre "você", e eu ficaria como "O que?" E ele ficaria como, "Não, o projeto. "You". Então eu sempre pensei que era um título engraçado, mas é baseado em uma série de livros. Gregg Berlanti está produzindo esse também. Não sei como ele dorme. E é um thriller psicológico muito interessante sobre um cara que fica obcecado com uma garota, e apenas como isso se desenrola. Ele ocorre na cidade de Nova York, por isso pode ser muito divertido gravar no local. Eu mal posso esperar. E meu personagem se chama Peach. Ela é uma garota de Upper East Side. Muito bem.

Esse é um grande salto de Emily Fields. Como se sente em entrar em novos personagens depois que Pretty Little Liars terminou?

Emily foi perfeita para mim naquele momento [que eu comecei PLL], e ela era um personagem tão grande. Ela sempre terá um lugar no meu coração. Mas também é divertido poder fazer alguém próximo da minha idade. E Peach... embora não tenhamos uma personalidade similar, nosso estilo é muito parecido. Então, é super divertido poder trabalhar agora. Adquiri os sapatos incríveis e tenho roupas bonitas, bolsas e óculos de sol, e estou ansiosa para me vestir por uma vez.

Entrevista Original -

[flaminiamancinelli]

Ultimo appello di Steve Cavanagh

Ultimo appello di Steve Cavanagh

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