#i always said twin peaks needed more gay sex but i take it back if it's gonna be like this

[catinfroghat]

Windom and Leo have some weird thing going on in that wood cabin sorry to say

[adultswim2021]

12 oz. Mouse #1: “Hired” | June 20, 2005 – 12:30AM | S01E01

Usually these write-ups include some long-winded story about my personal life and how it impacted my television viewing, using flowery language to describe my station in life (college aged and not having sex with anyone) or what the various comedy message boards I posted on thought of the each show when it premiered, etc. But I truly don’t remember much about the premiere of 12 oz. Mouse, and unfortunately all the message boards I used to post on turned out to be fronts for white nationalist extremists whose data was pulled from the internet by the FBI, so I can’t go back and look at old posts. Oh well! The truth is, I’m only MOSTLY certain that I watched this pilot on TV. But maybe I didn’t? I don’t even remember any hype around this show. Did it just show up one day? Surely it couldn’t have been a surprise? Was picked or panned in TV Guide? I simply don’t know! QUIT ASKING ME!

12 oz. Mouse is the absurdist misadventures of a crudely drawn mouse interacting with other crudely drawn characters (and the shark from “Kentucky Nightmare”, officially making this be a Space Ghost spin-off, you wikipedia wackjobs!). It was created by Matt Maiellaro, the co-creator of Aqua Teen Hunger Force. He’s the voice of the main character, Mouse. As for the rest of the cast it’s primarily voiced by people who were simply around the Adult Swim office; people whose voices you’ve heard pop up in other things playing minor roles here and there. Adam Reed is the Shark. Dave Willis is the bartender. Matt Harrigan is the liquor store guy, etc. The stories usually make just enough sense but the world of this show is so strangely dashed-off and certain things are left unexplained to affect a more surreal tone.

The show eventually veers into some heavy-duty serialization and world-building. I never really got totally into that aspect of the show. To be honest, this show has always been one that I appreciated more than actually liked. It has it’s moments, and good episodes, but as a whole I do consider it a bit of a chore to consume the whole thing. But, that might have to do with the fact that the only time I ever properly sat through the entire series was for the DVD “movie” edit, which stitches together the entire show as one long continuous story. This DVD was only available through the Adult Swim website and is way out of print. I had to sell it last year when my (and everyone’s) unemployment was about to run out.

At the time I watched said DVD version of the show, I was recovering from hernia surgery and on lots of pain killers so my brain was a little foggy, which sorta complemented the show’s own hazy reality. The only other thing I had to watch was Human Giant season one on DVD, which I also watched a fair amount of but had to stop because it was making me laugh too much and laughing was extremely painful. I literally stuck with 12 oz. Mouse because it DIDN’T make me laugh.

The show is sorta like Twin Peaks; It has a very specific, oddly pleasing setting with a small cast of characters where weird stuff happens. Also, like Twin Peaks, the show starts real strong and gets less interesting. But I can rewatch Twin Peaks and see it to it’s end because I love the world so much. I think you need to love the world of 12 oz. Mouse to hang with it. Also both of them had post-series revivals. Both of them use absurdism and reality-bending plots, etc. etc. You get it. This show takes inspiration from David Lynch! Okay! Fuck you!

The plot (there is one! please don’t let anyone tell you different): Mouse gets a job from a Shark to taxi a rectangular businessman to a meeting at Cheese industries. Mouse picks him up and takes him to a porn set, instead, and tries to coax him into making love with a doll. When he refuses, Mouse throws a bomb at him and blows him up. Mouse decides to rob a bank instead of work. He does that and celebrates by going to a bar and buying expensive beers. He’s gay-bashed by the bartender. Mouse hits on a woman, but comes on too strong and vomits on her. She transforms into a man and flies away. A giggly police officer questions Mouse, who denies being the bank robber. He gets the cop to leave him alone by telling him that the bartender called the cop a homo. So the cop goes over and shoots the bartender.

Mouse realizes that he and Skillet, (his chinchilla companion whom we first meet at the porn set) need to get jobs to cover up the fact that they rob banks. They go to a liquor store. Mouse drinks a $300 beer and leaves without paying. The liquor store clerk does nothing. Mouse then gets run over by several cars while a woman looks on, screaming “oh my god!” and other similar lines. Mouse inexplicably mouths the woman’s lines in one shot. Mouse deflects that he’s not hurt over and over, that he’s just drunk. He eventually goes back to the shark, who is disappointed with his performance but decides to give him another chance. Mouse meets his next client, an eyeball guy who over-pronounces any word that rhymes with “eye”. Mouse gets pissed off at this, show ends.

This might be my favorite episode of 12 oz. Mouse, though I can think of a couple more episodes after this one that I also like quite a bit. Hell, There might be some virtue in canonizing JUST the pilot of 12 oz Mouse and leaving the rest to the scrapheap. But maybe not. Honestly, I’m speaking in dramatic terms for no real reason other than to sound smart. Am I doing a good job of that? I guess we’ll see when the show actually starts up as a proper series in a few months, and I make it my business to not like it to artificially support this statement.

What’s good about the show is the low-key nature of it. It’s a good fit for late night TV. I used the phrase “dashed-off” earlier in this write-up and I don’t mean it as an insult. I believe that this whole show is built around the idea that it is in fact dashed-off. The voice-actors give almost nothing but low-energy/low-key line-readings. The giggly cop mentioned earlier sounds like the actor is stoned or at the very least has a case of the giggles. There’s all kinds of stuff like that in this show. The aforementioned editing mistake where Mouse inexplicably mouths another character’s line? So much of it is meant to resemble a mistake, but I have a feeling that most of these touches are carefully scripted or on-purpose.

According to the light research I did for this, Matt Maiellaro basically pitched this idea as something that would cost zero dollars and be easy to make. Instead of hiring character designers it sounded like he’d just whip up a crudely drawn character, go scan it, and send it to the computer animators as-is. There’s one scene where you can see the edge of a piece of paper where a background drawing was scanned (not sure if overscan was supposed to cover this up on a traditional 4:3 display, but it’s extremely there if you watch it on HBOMax). One character was drawn on the back of a script for Perfect Hair Forever and you can see the letters come through the other side of the page on the character himself. This was intentionally left in.

The opening theme is maybe the best ever to be on Adult Swim. In fact, it’s the one tangibly GREAT thing 12 oz. Mouse has going for it. It’s by Nine Pound Hammer, and it rocks, and it’s set to a cardboard mock-up of the town 12 oz. Mouse takes place in, getting exploded. The pilot originally aired with the 12 oz. Mouse title zoomed in too much so that only the words oz. Mo were on the screen. This apparently had to be changed as to not legally step on the toes of a British children’s program called Ozmo. This is fixed for the HBOMax edition. I’m pretty sure the “oz. Mo” version only aired once and was fixed way way back during season one.

Oh! There is one other scene I forgot about. When Mouse is on the ground after getting hit by multiple cars, a guy comes over and says, in a gregarious HOLLYWOOD way, that he’s “really something” and that he’d be “great in pictures”. I am noting this because I knew a guy who would quote this all the time. I’d come over to that guy’s house and try to make everyone watch Russ Meyer movies, and they’d usually be into them but they treated them hyper ironically and anytime a woman’s bare ass showed up they’d all act like it was gross and called it a “mom butt”. I never really understood what constituted a “mom butt”. These were all 23 year olds with 17 year old girlfriends and I guess if a woman’s butt didn’t look exactly like their girlfriend’s smoke show ass it deserved to be mocked. But I guess it was cool that they liked Adult Swim shows.

EPHEMERA CORNER:

MAIL BAG:

Another cool thing about the TGTTM episode Rats Off To Yah is that it features Stephanie Courtney (tv commercial's Flo from Progressive) at her peak ball draining hottest as the singer of the ROTY music video.

Thanks for writing but I need to tell you your disgusting sexist language is a serious turn off here. I have not watched the scene. I politely covered my eyes when she was on screen because I could tell it existed for the male gaze, and I will not partake in that sort of thing.

Also, Brandon, you keep referencing “ball-draining hot”, a thing I supposedly said once. I believe the line was actually “ball-achingly hot”, which I read in a torrent comment for the film “Under the Rainbow”, referring to peak Carrie Fisher. GET IT STRAIGHT, MATE

[mrs-mystica]

Prince Hunt | Chapter 2 [ Virgil ]

Ships : Prinxiety & Roceit

Alternative title : Two Yanderes for One Prince Roman is a popular guy, but he is even more popular than he thinks. Both Virgil and Damian (Deceit) fell for his charms, but they have a peculiar way of showing it. Competition is hard, both will do anything to get Roman’s attention. Who will win the heart of Prince Charming?

If you’re familiar with the term Yandere, you know how this is gonna go. For the others, please look it up before reading this, so you know to what you’ll be exposed to.

TW : Unsympathetic Virgil, Unsympathetic Deceit, swearings, mentions of sex, violence (physical and psychological), kidnapping, torture, lots of manipulation, abuse

More notes : Deceit’s name is Damian in this fic, if we get a name reveal, it will be change, like all my other fics mentionning Deceit.

It is recommended to read both POV, since both provid complimentary informations, but each chapter will be identified, so you can only read either Virgil or Damian (Deceit) POV if you really prefer to. Both versions of each chapter will be released at the same time.

To see Deceit’s POV, click here

Masterlink

Chapter 2  [ Virgil ]

Third Person POV

As usual, Virgil woke up before his alarm clock. But today is a special day. He wakes up to a mixed feeling of anxiety and excitement. Virgil got up quickly from his bed and headed immediately to the bathroom.

It's been 1 month since his encounter with Roman. And he hasn't stopped thinking about him since then. He had spent these last weeks spying on Roman and his friends. He wanted to gather all the information he could to be able to make a plan and foresee any outcomes. He found out that Roman was living with his family in a pretty expensive house. He found out that Roman had a twin, who only had a face in common with his brother. He has a horrible hygiene, he doesn't care about his appearance, he has a ridiculous mustache... All the complete opposite of the dreamy Roman. Virgil also found out that Roman is a big fan of musical comedies and Disney movies. Virgil had to do big researches on the last subject, since he didn't know anything about these movies. He now listens to Disney movies everyday and will listen to some every evening until he knows them all. He also found out that Roman is part of the theater club at their school. He usually is the lead role of their plays, which isn't surprising, who wouldn't want a good-looking guy on a poster?! Virgil also confirmed Roman's sexuality. He is gay, but it wouldn't have mattered if he wasn't. Virgil would make him his, no matter what. It's only easier this way, he thought.

After taking more care about his appearance than usual, Virgil exited the bathroom. He looked at the clock and exited his room. Before exiting, he took care to pick up dog food and a leash. Today, he had an objective in mind : Befriending Roman's friends. It was a good way to get close to Roman without being too sudden. It wasn't an easy task for Virgil, his social anxiety was on the rise, but for Roman, he could endure it.

To start his plan, he needed a dog. Virgil doesn't own a dog, but he had an alternative. There is that errant dog that hangs out near his neighborhood. During the last month, Virgil took care to tame it by giving it food everyday. He found the dog at his usual spot. It was a Beagle. As he saw Virgil, he wiggled his tail with excitement and approached the man. Virgil gave him the food and watched him eat.

Why did he need a dog? Because of Patton. Patton was his key to get closer to Roman. The entirety of Virgil's plan was created around him. He seems to be the most accessible of Roman's friends. Logan seemed cold and emotionless, it was hard for Virgil to determine if he would be receptive to his actions.

Patton loves dogs. That was the first thing Virgil learned about him. Virgil then learned his morning habits. Virgil took out the leash from his hoodie and slowly approached the dog. The dog is cagey, but Virgil managed to put on the leash. He then started to walk with it to Patton's neighborhood. Every morning, Patton and Logan walk to school together. They always go to school earlier, probably because of Logan wanting to study before it starts. Arriving at his destination, Virgil looks at his watch. They are always very precise in their morning habits. Virgil knows precisely when he'll see them. And there they are, on time, speaking while walking.

Virgil's anxiety is at its peak, almost suffocating him, but he can't back out now, it's now or never. He proceeds to walk with the dog. He wanted to be noticed without obviously walking directly toward them. And it worked. Patton sees the dog. He started to jump on place and pulled Logan's shirt, pointing toward the dog. Virgil takes a deep breath as he sees Patton and Logan approaching. He managed to force a smile on his face.

- Hey! What a cute dog you have!! I can't help myself but to ask you if I can pet it???

Patton was overly excited, it was hard for Virgil to keep his cool.

- Yeah, sure, go ahead. He's a good boy, just a little scared...

The dog was indeed scared when Patton approach his hand to pet him. Fortunately, he was gentle and the dog didn't bite him.

- He so cute!! What's the name of this good boy?

Virgil had to think fast. He said the first thing that came to his mind.

- His name is Prince.

- Oh! What a cute name for a dog!

Meanwhile, Logan stayed back, examining Virgil and the dog. He seemed suspicious and ready to strike if Virgil, or the dog, did anything to Patton. He only said one line.

- Your dog seems a little... dirty.

Virgil froze for a second. It was true, he didn't think about it. That was an errant dog, he was covered in dirt, that was a little weird for a domestic dog, as if he didn't properly take care of his dog. Virgil improvised.

- Yeahh... He has the tendency to roll in the grass every time I bring him to a walk... I'll have to wash him quickly before school... haha...

That wasn't bad, it seemed to satisfy Logan for now. Patton then stopped petting the dog and looked at Virgil.

- Oh, I think I've seen you before, you go to the same school as us, right?

Virgil didn't like the sudden attention to him, but it was inevitable if he wanted to befriend Patton.

- Yup...

Patton was staring at Virgil, pondering where he had seen him.

- I think we have a class together... History, right?

- Yup... You sure have a good memory, haha...

Virgil thought it was enough social interactions for now. He pretended to look at his watch.

- I should head home, otherwise I won't have enough time to take care of my dog and will be late for school. It was nice meeting you guys.

Patton smiled widely at Virgil.

- Yess, it was nice!

He petted the dog one last time.

- Goodbye Prince! And goodbye to you as well... hum...

-... Virgil, my name is Virgil.

- Right, right! See you soon at school, Virgil!

They then continued their walk toward the school. Virgil went back to where he had found the dog, silently cheering. The first step of his plan was a success. The first contact was established.

1087 words

[mshelenahandbag]

2017 - Year of the Laura Dern

Laura Dern is having the best year of her career, or anyone else’s for that matter. 

I could just end this article here, but you know I have to tell you WHY. Laura Dern has, for me, been constantly impressive with her acting prowess from a young age. My first memory is seeing her as Dr. Ellie Sattler in Jurassic Park, and even back then, little didn’t-know-I-was-gay-yet me loved the cool female paleontologist. (Looking back she also had THE best lines (“we can discuss sexism in survival situations when I get back!”), most famous of them all being during Goldblum’s “Man creates dinosaurs” soliloquy – “Dinosaurs EAT man….woman inherits the Earth.”) She’s always played interesting characters, but, for me, has never really had her breakthrough with mainstream television and film.

Until this year where Laura Dern has excelled in four projects and netted her first Emmy victory!

Sure, she’s had her accolades with David Lynch’s Blue Velvet and Wild At Heart and her notable appearance as the woman Ellen DeGeneres came out to on Ellen. But never anything truly concrete to make a large cross-section of people go “wow.” She’s always, at least to me, been good for niche groups.  Her last Golden Globe win was for the HBO series Enlightened where she played self-destructive executive Amy Jellicoe, and she got an Oscar nomination for 2015’s Wild as Reese Witherspoon’s mother.

Wild director Jean-Marc Vallee is one of the main reasons we’re buzzing about Laura Dern’s 2017 renaissance. He definitely saw something in Dern, and her chemistry with Witherspoon, because the two would reunite and butt heads in HBO’s Big Little Lies – exhibit A in her best year. While everyone was obsessed with the performances Witherspoon, Nicole Kidman and Shailene Woodley gave as the main trio of Madeline, Celeste and Jane (as they rightly should because the series is just that flawless), my focus was on Laura Dern embodying Renata Klein, queen of the helicopter moms in Monterey.

Dern’s Renata had me shouting EMMY long before others jumped on the bandwagon. There’s a scene in the second episode where the birthday party for Amabella, Renata’s daughter, is derailed by Madeline - out for blood when Renata didn’t invite Ziggy, Jane’s son. So Madeline comes back and gets plenty of comped tickets for Disney on Ice so everyone cancels on the birthday party. Renata hits the ceiling, calmly, telling her friend Harper (who bears the unfortunate duty of informing Renata) “Ok. Thank you.”

Harper tries to mediate with “Let us all get along-”

But Renata comes back with the AMAZING over the top…well…this.

“I SAID THANK YOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!”

Whether ad-libbed on the spot or script, this moment of hilarity, for me, from Renata made her one of the best characters this year on any show. Showing perfectly poised Renata lose it time and time again, especially when threatening her husband (“I will take my hands and put them around your throat!”) or Madeline (“I’ll even get Snow White to sit on your husband’s face. Maybe Dumbo can take a squat on yours”) was a highlight week after week. The entire series was worth of every Emmy it garnered and survived a potential shutout from FX’s Feud: Bette and Joan but if anything, Laura Dern was the only one out of those nominated that truly deserved to win.

From here, Laura Dern turned from psycho mom to plain old psycho in Netflix’s Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt as Wendy Hebert – who’s set to marry Kimmy’s old pastor. It’s a brief guest starring role, but Dern adds so much in those 20 minutes and delivers a fully-formed character. Wendy starts off so innocent, but the more we spend time with her and Kimmy (Ellie Kemper), the more we realize how unstable she is. Plus she helps Kimmy to confront some real traumas the reverend has inflicted on her, and she also delivers one of my favorite lines in the three seasons of the show as she confides in Titus (Tituss Burgess): “If we only see each other one hour a week, he’ll never realize what a useless piece of crap I am and he’ll love me forever, and that’s what I deserve!” In short, Dern’s portrayal of a woman with absolutely zero self-worth is hysterical.

And from here, Laura Dern’s year hits its zenith with Twin Peaks as she plays long-heard-about-but-never-seen Diane: Agent Dale Cooper’s secretary to whom he has dictated all of his many tapes. Laura Dern’s work with David Lynch has always been fantastic: whether in Blue Velvet, Wild at Heart, Industrial Symphony No. 1, or Inland Empire – it’s clear that Lynch knows how to get the best results out of her craft. And that’s the reason why her work as Diane is probably a role we will be talking about for years to come.

We meet Diane Evans as a chain-smoking foul-mouthed goddess who was my favorite part of the mindfuck of this 18-part opus. I seriously loved every time Dern, in her platinum bob wig would take a drag off her cigarette and generally her conversations would consist of “Fuck you [insert name here].” She played so well off her director Lynch as FBI agent Gordon Cole and the late Miguel Ferrer as FBI agent Albert Rosenfeld. But one of my favorite moments came when newbie Tammy Preston (Chrysta Bell) tries to thank Diane for helping them, only to be met with this-

Diane: “What did you say your name was again?”

Tammy: “Tammy.”

Diane: “Fuck you, Tammy.”

I laughed way too hard at this, for way too long. Diane’s modus was basically this for a few episodes but about halfway through the series, her mood changed. We saw her visibly uncomfortable speaking with Mr. C, Cooper’s evil doppelganger BOB created. She revealed that Cooper (Mr. C) had come to see he years ago, but refused to elaborate. We later her she and Mr. C were in cahoots, via text. Was THAT why Diane was so crazy? Diane seemed to be cool when Gordon Cole offered her a slot on the infamous Blue Rose team – investigating supposed paranormal encounters.

“Let’s rock.” Diane said, her index and middle fingers down.

Here is where I said “Something’s up.” You could easily explain her wayward associations with Mr. C, but those two words were uttered by The Man From Another Place in the original series. It’s not just a nudge-wink happenstance, it’s a deliberate clue from Lynch that something is off with Diane. And that comes to fruition twice as the series comes to a close. In part 14, we learn that Dougie Jones’s fingerprints match Cooper’s, and Diane reveals that Janey-E, Dougie’s wife is Diane’s half-sister. No simple coincidence, again.

In part 16 when the actual Cooper emerges from a coma (long story….), Diane receives another text from Mr. C. She goes to meet with Cole, Albert and Tammy and finally reveals what happened the night Mr. C came to see her. He raped her – and it affected her. Dern’s face telling this story is so genuinely pained and she just nails this. Then Diane begins to act odd….really odd, even for this show. She convulses and says “I’m in the sheriff’s station. I’m in the sheriff’s station. I sent him those coordinates, because…I’m not me.” Diane eyes the gun in her purse, Albert’s on edge and Diane pulls hers out only to be shot by Albert and Tammy before being whisked away by some unseen force. Tammy remarks she’s seen a real tulpa (a manifestation) and we cut to the Red Room in the Black Lodge. Yep, Diane was “manufactured.” But what about her cryptic statement “I’m in the sheriff’s station”? Well as luck would have it, we wouldn’t have to wait long to find that out.

In the finale of the series, we learn that the eyeless Naido who helped Cooper out of the Lodge and who Andy rescued, was actually our Diane. A quick fight took care of Mr. C and once the genuine article Dale Cooper lays eyes on Naido, she becomes our Laura Dern again and they kiss.

Then it gets weird.

Cooper pulls a Back to the Future Part II seeing the events of Fire Walk With Me play out – only this time he stops Laura Palmer from being murdered. We cut to the Black Lodge and Cooper and Diane are both there. Then they’re driving on a highway for 430 miles, cross over an electrical grid and check into a motel to have sex.

This is Diane’s final scene of the series and I love how Dern hearkens back to what she told Cole and the FBI earlier about her rape. You still see the pain and confusion on Dern’s face, especially because we’re unsure if this is OUR Cooper, Mr. C or a hybrid of the two. It’s such a fitting end for her work on one of the best shows of 2017, and her exit opens a whole new mystery.

The next morning, Diane’s gone and a note from “Linda” to “Richard” is left for Cooper and leaves us wondering if in a world where Laura Palmer has been saved – has absolutely everything changed? Is Dale Cooper now Richard and is Diane Evans now Linda? (Way more to say on this for a Twin Peaks fan theory thesis later, especially with the role of Carrie Page.)

I didn’t even need to see Laura Dern in Star Wars Episode VIII-The Last Jedi in her role as Vice Admiral Amilyn Holdo to know it will be amazing. I knew that from the casting, from her stills with the late Carrie Fisher (something I’m eagerly looking forward to) and the gorgeous Annie Leibowitz photos in Vanity Fair revealing that gorgeous lilac hair. But upon seeing Rian Johnson’s masterpiece that has become the crown jewel for me and many other (but not all) STAR WARS fans, I got to see Dern cap her banner year off in the most fabulous and wonderful style.

When General Leia Organa is unconscious from a First Order attack on the Resistance, command falls to Holdo. Dern and Oscar Isaac’s Poe Dameron immediately clash, and it’s breathtaking to watch. Holdo wants to load unarmed transports to try and escape to nearby Crait – home of an abandoned Resistance base – and Poe so strongly disagrees with her that he mutinies and relieves her of command (only for himself to be relieved by General Organa stunning him). Holdo remains on ship while the remaining Resistance flee to Crait, and as the First Order begins firing on transport ships. Holdo decides to make a stand and engage the ship to lightspeed, directly at the First Order’s ships. Hyperspace jumps only work when a ship is totally free and clear to maneuver. So if a ship’s in the way, it’s not gonna be pretty.

And it isn’t. Rian Johnson shows the devastation in a soundless scene that cements Holdo’s beautiful and poignant sacrifice. Dern’s time in the Star Wars universe may have been brief but Holdo is a character anyone should be proud to look up to: willing to step up when it matters and sacrifice everything for the needs of the many (…Wait that’s Star Trek…)

Laura Dern’s 2017 is something that won’t be duplicated any time soon, and it’s a career testament to one of Hollywood’s best actresses finally getting the recognition she has beyond deserved.

[booklust]

Futurelit Vol 5: Grace Byron

This time around, I had the absolute pleasure of chatting with Grace Byron, the Brooklyn-based columnist, writer and filmmaker and all-around brilliant, benevolent creative spirit whose recent book release party for NB Carrie Bradshaw (read it here via Epigraph Mag!) at Babycastles solidified my love for her and her work. 

This interview was the first time I had the opportunity to conduct a classic interview over the phone instead of over text chat, or as I like to call it for reasons I’d gladly explain to you over a glass of wine, “The Tony Hawk Method.”

This resulted in a truly gorgeous conversation that flows synaptically and always takes surprising directions (Twin Peaks, the afterlife, and a tender moment involving Coldplay that occurs towards the end---when you see it then you’ll understand!). It also brought me right back to the days at my editorial internship where I would transcribe hours of interviews, but in a good way this time. I took great pains to not only get the content and diction right, but to convey the undertones of our exchange that made it so vibrant. Which, interestingly enough, makes it take on the visual form of a text chat.

Check out our conversation at the jump, with gorgeous illustrations by Becky Ebben:

You do a column called “Trans Monogamist” for the Bushwick Daily (I binged that…it’s really dope) and your latest project is NB Carrie Bradshaw (which is out now!). So I’m curious, what sort of came first: your interest in the format of an advice columnist/relationship columnist,  or your love of Carrie Bradshaw?

Actually--I didn’t start watching Sex and the City until January 2017, which everyone is sort of super surprised by, and honestly? Me fucking too. Not that it’s a perfect show, but the aesthetic signals that it’s something that I should have seen a long time ago. It took me a long time to get to it. I had heard a lot of the negative stuff, which there is a lot of, and rightfully so. There’s this one terrible bisexual episode where Carrie’s just like, “I just don’t know….he’s bi .” And I’m just like… “Girl, so what.” The point is, the column writing came sort of naturally. I had a column a few years ago at my paper called Queer Art Vibes before I had even seen Sex and the City. And I was mostly writing about art, and capitalism, artists, and things I was finding interesting aesthetically. The last column that I wrote was after I had a break-up, and it was called “How To Date an Anarchist.”

Oh my God

And it got like, no comments. Because most of the columns that I was writing were about trans identity and stuff. I got all these comments like, “Why can’t people just make up their minds about gender?” And I’m just like, that’s completely irrelevant to what I’m talking about. So this column got no comments at all. There’s this huge anarchist population at Indiana University. It just closed down this month, but we had this huge anarchist bookstore that was this huge draw for the punk scene.

It was a column that didn’t make sense for where I was writing. But then as I was watching Sex and the City, and as I was doing a lot more dating my last year in college, I was thinking “yeah, this is really important to talk about.” And I started thinking of dating as a political and aesthetic and emotional practice. It’s more using this pop culture phenomenon to let people understand something about what it’s like to be trans and dating. It’s not like it’s me and my three friends that are all going through the same things. Or it’s not like me and my straight girlfriends talking about how our experiences are different. Or me and someone who is nonbinary even talking about how it’s different for both of us. But I do like that element of friendship in it, that element of comradery.  But I think it’s interesting now that shows act like there’s this group of 4 friends and they’re all the same. And that was never my experience? You know, there’s always a nonbinary person, a lesbian person, and...maybe a straight man.

LOL the token straight

Right. At least that’s my college experience, where I’ve never had a group of friends that were all the same. There were always at least one other gay or queer person. It’s a helpful lens to think about dating, and think about dating how much it’s changed since the early 2000s. A column is a dispatch from the front lines, like “this is what happened this month! How’s it going with you?” The book [NB Carrie Bradshaw] has a little bit of a more narrative arc to it. But in the columns, there’s no resolution. -----keep reading below------

Right, and that’s what I like about it. There’s endless thinkpieces about dating apps, queer dating, etc, and it’s so frustratingly depersonalized. It’s very strange how the discourse tries to force dystopia instead of actually having a comprehensive view of how people feel. There’s a lot more truth in the way that you present dating than how someone tries to dissect it in a thinkpiece.

Yeah, thinkpieces are weird. I love to read them, but I also don’t know how helpful they are a lot of the time. Especially when they try to draw a definitive statement. In some things, sure, that makes sense.

Like in a college thesis, where you’re forced to come to a resolution for your life, pretty much.

What was your experience working at a college newspaper?

Basically, I came to college, and I was on the media floor--and basically what I thought that meant was cross-genre. But in reality, what it meant was journalism. And then I thought, you know, okay, it’s fine. I thought it was interesting. And so I almost went to join the newspaper as a writer and interviewer, I did a few articles. But a rule was that if you were a writer for them, you couldn’t be interviewed. And that was my biggest problem with it--I knew I wanted to do art. I knew that I wanted to get press. I didn’t want to prevent that from happening.

Right after I came out my freshman year, this guy on my floor was like, “do you want to talk about being gay at IU?” And I was like uh….sure! It was weird because it was my first time being interviewed for something real, and I was talking about being gay. But I was also trying to sneak a pitch for my website while doing it, I was like...go watch it! They promptly cut that out of the interview, though.

Good effort, tho.

I didn’t love that environment. I wasn’t taken with it. I started volunteering at a local radio station where I did stories about lots of things. That was much more interesting and fulfilling than the college newspaper. And my friend was like, “do you want to be columnist--we need one.” Not because I was special or anything, because they really needed one. And I was like, “sure.” So I started writing these extremely leftist columns, like “capitalism is the devil, and here’s why : )”

And I wrote one that was like, “nudity in art isn’t porn,” which isn’t even an extreme opinion. But I started getting all of these comments like, “Counterpoint: nudity in art isn’t not porn.” I was just like wow, I can tell that you really read this column….

People just read titles a lot of times.

Yeah for sure. Our campus was filled with a lot of views of all extremes, and not just anarchists. We also had a militant white supremacist population on campus. There were a bunch of protests from that group over the course of years--it wasn’t just one year, or just this year, which was definitely the worse than the years before. I also got tons of hateful comments from white supremacist groups on my articles. So I was just one of the people on the receiving end of those comments.

But as far as my involvement in the newspaper group itself, I think I only attended one meeting. I didn’t really feel a sense of community at IU that a lot of people there felt. I think a lot of people looked down on what I did because it was so personal. It wasn’t like I was talking about music, or like I was talking about hard-hitting stories. So I wasn’t really a part of the “IU JOURNALISM COMMUNITY.” But it wasn’t like I really wanted to be. I would still sometimes get people who appreciated my work, that came up to me and said “I love this, I love what you’re doing,” but they were usually queer people.

Which is definitely the desired reaction, which is awesome. Talking about your webseries “Idle Cosmopolitan” -- what was your favorite audience, or your favorite venue that you showed it to? And what was that sort of reaction and vibe like?

I wasn’t at all of the screenings. It showed at Bloomington at Planet Nine--which is this small VHS rental/DVD rental video place that kind of reminds me of Ghost World or something. I wasn’t there, but a lot of my friends were there, since it was my home for so many years. I assume it went well. From the pictures, I saw that it went well, at least.

It showed at Sarah Lawrence, which I know very little about how that went. I wanted to be there, but I was scheduled at work. Which is a whole thing about how I’m not a full-time artist. I say that I’m a freelance artist, which means that I make MAYBE 50 bucks a month off of my art. If it’s a good month! So I can’t always go to everything that’s happening. It’s an interesting part about being an artist in this landscape. People expect you to be global, and there’s only so global you can be if you’re working class. Which I think is important to be transparent about. It’s not always fun to be transparent about that, but it’s important.

Exactly, you want to be honest about it, but you want to portray yourself as larger-than-life-to get attention, and at least the semblance of clout (whatever that fcking means). But being an artist, you’re a part of a community, and you want to treat that community well. You don’t want to stunt and act like you’re making a living off of your art when you’re not.

It’s not cool to lie one way or the other. It’s not cool to portray yourself as a poor person if you’re not, and I’m not super poor or anything, but I’m not living off of my artwork, and I make a decent living off of my work as a childcare worker. But yeah, you shouldn’t lie because you’re fooling yourself and making art seem elitist.

There’s the lie by omission, in a way. A lot of people are internet famous, or have a certain persona that makes people say “Oh, I want to be like this person, who so clearly lives off of their artwork.” When in reality, it’s probably a side hustle at best.

Or they live with their parents. Or they have rich parents.

It distorts people’s dreams and plans--it’s important to be responsible about that.

Totally. One show I was at physically was at Secret Project Robot, at this festival of poets, and my videos were showing between poets that were reading their work. So that was interesting---I was the only video artist at the show. And as many things as I have tried--I have written poems, but I’ve never called myself a “poet.” So I thought that was kind of cool to have that multimedia experience, to see my videos projected really large in front of a big crowd of 20 or 30 people. Which doesn’t seem like a lot, but it’s actually a lot. I remember thinking wow, the crowds are gonna be so big in New York. And they are! But 20 or 30 people is a lot for DIY art. Even if you’re successful, or internet famous--it’s hard to gather a crowd wherever you are.

And it was really cool because people who were actually in the video got to see it, which was cool! Chariot is in it, and he was there, so that’s cool.

There was one livestream and q&a in the UK, which was really cool. And that was my favorite, because the moderator was super smart and always asked good question about the fantasy genre, and its intersections with queerness. It was refreshing instead of questions like-- “Why are you gay? Why is this here?” It was a good convo to have beyond the surface level.

It’s awesome that I saw so many showings of your series was in Indianapolis, in Indiana. You may not see a big crowd--DIY art isn’t an Ariana Grande concert--but What you do see is how it sort of transforms the room, and creates a living space, a community. 20 people is a community. Especially in Indiana.

Right, there’s very established artists and documentarians where the only place they have more than 20 people show up is in their hometowns. Even world-renowned documentarians may struggle to get an audience. Which is awful. But I think that one thing that is happening in the real world is that there are plenty of people I look up to, who are famous, whose twitter gets pretty very few likes! And they may have a huge amount of followers! And I’m like--why am I getting more likes than world-renowned feminist scholars? I think that’s happening in real life too. These people are having talks and showings of their work and sometimes DIY work is a different experience and maybe draws more people than these professional pieces, and there’s a community of people who can see themselves in that as artists.

I agree, it definitely changes the dynamic for people are used to when it comes to art, you think there’s the artist and this huge invisible wall and then there’s the observer, and it breaks down that dynamic.

Right, it changes the power dynamic. The artist isn’t a preacher.  What we’ve seen in DIY venues is, everybody is sitting in chairs. The artist is in the front, but everyone is on the same level. There isn’t a stage to walk down from.

I think people are only starting to observe this change, and aren’t sure what to call it yet. Some people see changes like this as the death of something, like the death of some kind of empire of how art works. But especially with this project, I think I’ve not only been an optimist, but a realist in the sense that it’s for the better. So many people are screaming “death to media! Death to print!” and I’m just over here like, “You’re a Baby Boomer, please don’t talk to me.”

Ha! Right. These media aren’t dead, but they’re definitely dying. But I think they’re going to be dying for a while to come. People broadcasting the death of all of these things---like, they’re not dead yet. The Met is gonna be in trouble, but the Met is gonna be around for the next 100 years. The Met’s not just gonna crumble.

Going back to “Idle Cosmopolitan”--I love how it’s a series of very short films. And by short, I mean like, slightly longer than a Vine length. And some people may come across that and immediately compare the series to Vine culture, but my immediate thought was comparing it to poetry, with a lot of tightly-wound content being fit into a small space. So I was wondering how poetry influences your visual work, or how visual work influences your poetry, etc.

That’s interesting. I actually originally applied to go to college for poetry. I never called myself a poet, but I did think about it for a while. When I do write poetry, it’s usually about nature, and viewing nature through the lens of divinity and power dynamics. Which I think is definitely a big part of my video work. The “Queer World” in my piece is a forest. Somebody was talking to me recently, and said that “I think it’s interesting that the queer world is a forest. Do you think of urban spaces as, like, not-as-queer spaces?” I hadn’t really thought about that. But whenever I think of that sort of the afterlife, I don’t think of cities. And what’s our other option, really? Nature. An ocean would be a terrifying destination for the afterlife. I think that poetry is super important, I think when I’m writing anything, I tend towards a lyrical, poetic style. I love hard facts, but I was never super into Hemingway. I always loved the Great Gatsby. Not that I like showy, hyper-stylized stuff; I hated the Great Gatsby movie. But the suggestion of artifice, the suggestion of things like that, I think is really interesting.

There’s ton of talk about heaven and nature and sin in “Idle Cosmopolitan.” I’m sure it comes from a long line of being raised in Christianity, and having read all of the Christian classics. And as a kid, I was obsessed with the apocalypse. Once, I was between 6-9 I remember looking at clocks in restaurants and thinking, “Could this be the hour of the end?” I remember being super into Revelations, and the ghost stories that my friends and I would tell each other, and often confusing them as the same thing.

I think that’s a form of poetry true, a strange, mental form of poetry. I think the afterlife is poetic, because there’s no concrete that you can provide.

I think in terms of modality, I think I’m always writing in the form of the poetic, even if I’m not writing a poem. Even my column--it’s not a how-to column, it’s not a safari.

It’s not MTV Cribs!

Right! Definitely more reflections.

I always thought of videos sort of in musician terms, like “this is my new album---Idle Cosmopolitan.” This is the tracklist, and each has a poetic name, etc. And each year, there’s a self-image overhaul….well, there’s no image overhaul for me this year, but especially in college I was into that idea, where I wanted to amp myself up every year.

But this iteration, for me, was trying to marry these poetic ideals with my own lived experiences, to make it sort of autobiographical, but still have a flourish. I mean, I was watching Twin Peaks when I was working on it.

Yeah, I can definitely see that influence in there. Where there’s that magic-realism, but it’s so mundane. The suspension of disbelief is so well-dissolved into it.

Right as I was starting to write this, I just finished the season of Veronica Mars---I’m not sure if it directly influenced it…

But it was there

Yeah, and watching Twin Peaks: the Return. What I thought was interesting about it was its formal elements. There was this sort of suspension of disbelief present for both the characters and the audience. So then you’re just like, “Yeah, queer spirits! That makes sense!” So, it’s that magic realism that is super appealing. And also the fact that it’s episodic. One of the things about David Lynch that I’m really into is the episodic nature of his work. There’s this loose play with time and narrative, and it’s an experience.

I think what Lynch talks a lot about, especially in later seasons, is agency. But in Sex and the City, for example--Carrie isn’t a bad person, but she’s not necessarily a good person either. She has affairs, runs around doing whatever she wants, she tries to take a break from dating and has a guilt complex where she feels bad about her actions, and also places guilt on other people--it’s complex, which I think is interesting.

Like chaotic neutral, but a little more complex than that?

Yeah, definitely. I’m obsessed with people who are chaotic neutral. I don’t think I’m chaotic neutral, but I’m fascinated by that those people exists.

I’m a super-intense Virgo, Type A, Blair Waldorf type. I definitely pride myself on hard work--which could be problematic--but I have that crawl-my-way-to-the-top sort of vibe.

This character in the webseries, they’re sort of neutral. They’re a relationship writer, but it doesn’t seem like a main part of their personhood. The only thing that they seem mad about is when their boyfriend breaks up with them, which is fair. But they don’t seem to be making many choices, and there’s something very sidekick about that.

I was in this space in my life where I was having to make all these intense decisions--deciding to move to New York, having to make all of these choices about who I wanted to be as a person. The character is the exact opposite, where there’s no movement. There’s a movement in narrative, a movement in place, but it kind of happens to them.

They get a letter, a pep talk from Fate--and they’re just like, “Sure, whatever, I don’t care.” Then they enter the queer world, and they’re like “Alright.” And then the Blue Spirit is the one who was like, “No, this wasn’t actually a good choice.” And they’re like, “Okay, sure.” They never really doubt people’s motives.

There’s a sort of guilt about making choices that Type A people have. Inevitably, if you’re a type A perosn, you’re going to hurt people. Even if you’re not actually hurting them, you’re going to make choices, and choices affect people. There’s winners and losers. So what does it mean for the sort of stoner archetype, this chaotic neutral archetype, when they don’t make choices?

I’ve never been a chill person, so I gravitate towards writing characters that are like that. Because I’m always wondering….what does that feel like?

Right! I feel like it takes a lot of effort to be chill, which isn’t chill. It’s kind of a self-consuming concept. I’m not gonna say it’s the only real binary, but…

Haha, right! Ok back to influences. Actually, as far as the soundtrack goes, I’ve gotten a lot of feedback where people say it reminds them of Sex and the City, and that it’s derivative. Actually, one person said that the soundtrack reminds them of Rugrats….

Stop!!!

Right!? Well, it’s jazz, but it’s sort of this chaotic jazz.

It’s a typical theme song in a lot of ways, but it’s disarming. Which I like.

Some people said it makes them anxious.

It offsets the perceived chill in the series, which signals you to look harder.

Watching it back, I was like...something is wrong. Narratively, there’s something up. But I’m not sure if that thing ever gets hashed out or resolved, it just sort of hangs like a dark cloud.

Which is what’s so great about poetry. There’s always that lack of resolution. People always get angry at that, where they want to feel satisfied...where’s the sequel at??

Do they get the girl or not??

Yeah! It’s how we’re taught to view life. But especially with creative people, it’s paradoxical--they only thing that makes them (us) feel satisfied is poetry, that sort of form that leaves things unresolved.

Totally.

How has the internet shaped your writing?

The internet is definitely fucked up. It was created by the military, and is now owned by billionaires. That’s already strike one. But let’s assume that the internet is also provides a space that provides more access for more people. But it doesn’t provide equal access for everybody. It provides equal access for a relatively small amount of people. You have to afford a computer, internet access--and even if you go to the library, you have to afford to be there.

But let’s say it does level the playing field in that way---even still, people don’t have more of a chance of getting their art noticed because of it. It does mean more people can put their stuff out there, but it doesn’t guarantee more viewers, or more fans, or some utopia.

The internet has become this neoliberal promise of equality. This reveals itself in every aspect---who dominates media, who dominates internet celebrity, etc. This doesn’t discount the fact that there’s fantastic DIY spaces based on the internet, but there’s a lot being overlooked.

The internet as a structure is racist, sexist, homophobic, and transphobic. Even if we go back to technology like photography, for example, it was a technology developed to best depict white faces. It’s so great that the internet creates a platform for people, but that includes creating platforms for neo-nazis on 4chan, for alt-righters to doxx people. The web is pretty fucked up, and it amplifies our greatest strengths, like community. Especially the trans community, which is so important. But it also amplifies our problems, and reveals where we need to grow.

I don’t think the internet is the devil, but I think it makes it harder for people to feel like human beings. It mirrors capitalism, and degrades human beings in so many ways where we’re expected to become a brand, which is always tied to capitalism. We’re forced to reduce ourselves to something bite-sized, which is troubling me as a person and as an artist.

When did u start writing and being creative?

I was always drawing. I was super into Pokemon and all the Nintendo games. I was into anything cute and well-designed, like Zelda, and anything involving world-building. I was super into maps, and at a young age, I thought, “I wanted to do that.”

At a young age, I wanted to be a pop star. And I made the boys in the neighborhood be my band. Now I’m thinking that was sort of a strong signal of me being gay, haha. Boys---you’re gonna be in this band, and I’m gonna sing Breakout by Miley Cyrus.

I started getting really into bands. I was really into Coldplay, and I wanted to be Chris Martin.

STOP, ME TOO

I really liked “Clocks.”

ME TOO, when I first heard that, I was like, Now….that’s what I call music.

I also really liked “Lovesong” by Sara Bareilles, which is entirely different, but I was also like...that’s what I call music. Also Paramore and Deathcab, and I was like…..this is also Music. I still love all this stuff

I still listen to all this stuff pretty much on the regular, even though I laugh about it Yeah! And at the time, all of these things were coded as feminine. Even Coldplay, which was, not a boyband, but kind of more healing.

Right, like ~emotional boys~, ~soft boys~, this sort of soft masculinity before it was talked about and memed.

I went from wanting to be a popstar, to wanting to be in bands, to wanting to do comics, and then I was like...I want to be painter! I did a lot of paintings, and then I wanted to be an actor. I was fixated on stardom, on theater. I was in all the plays of my freshman year.

Then I moved schools, and this guy who didn’t even like me and stopped talking to me, but I liked him---I wrote this psycho-opera about him. It was all songs about him, and it was super awkward. I recorded an album about him. He started being nice to me, and then I was just like…...here’s an album…

I was like, that was fun, but then I started to getting into Wes Anderson. And Woody Allen, but #WORST. And then Godard, which was better. Then I started making movies. And I saw 30 Rock, and it confirmed what I wanted to do.

I love how you go from Godard to 30 Rock

I know!! I was very all over the map. Then I started watching more experimental films and wild stuff, so it’s been a journey to where I’m at now.

The wrapping up portion, something I ask at the end of every interview...this is actually the first interview I’ve done that’s over the phone, an actual physical conversation. And the form of how I’ve conducted each interview has really affected it.

How would you describe the future of literature in a tweet-length? Or a sort of verbal tweet length, also tweets are longer now so….yeah….

Smaller.

[mrmichaelchadler]

Figuring It Out: The Films of Laura Dern

Jennifer Fox (Laura Dern) speaks in voiceover in a half-dazed, half-searching tone, as if slowly bringing herself out of a dream. “The story you are about to see is true … as far as I know.” A documentary filmmaker, she’s used to finding ways to look beyond the surface of what people present about themselves; she’ll have to turn that ability on herself. She remembers herself being and looking older than she was, speaking about a man she calls a lover—despite the fact that he was an adult and she was only 13—with a defensive, forced attempt at nonchalance (raised arms, dismissive pitch) that turns pleading, then incensed when she’s called a “victim,” her voice breaking into a raised whisper, her expression into a furious grimace. “This was important to me, and I’m trying to figure out why … Let me just figure this out for myself.”

“The Tale,” debuting on HBO on May 26, is documentary filmmaker Jennifer Fox’s narrative retelling of her experience, and an emotionally searing look at how people process their abuse. The casting of Dern, one of the most adventurous actresses working today, feels apropos, given the performer’s willingness to walk a constant emotional high-wire act and her recent hot streak that includes, but is not limited to, “Enlightened,” “Wild,” “Big Little Lies,” the “Twin Peaks” revival, and “Star Wars: The Last Jedi.” It’s also an instructive text when looking at Dern’s body of work, a career filled with stories of women who have either experienced or witnessed unbearable trauma and who are trying to find the meaning behind it all.

The daughter of two of New Hollywood’s greatest character actors (Bruce Dern and Diane Ladd), Laura Dern began her career in uncredited roles alongside her mother (“White Lightning,” “Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore”) before emancipating herself at 13 when her mother objected to one of her early credited roles in the teenage punk girl drama “Ladies and Gentlemen, The Fabulous Stains.” Dern’s role as one of the members of the Stains is relatively small (it’s largely Diane Lane’s show), but she makes an impression as being kind and empathetic, expressing genuine sympathy when a band member of another touring group overdoses. Dern’s teenage roles draw on her natural warmth and luminous presence; her performance as the blind Diana in “Mask” in particular sees her displaying an unusual level of openness with Eric Stoltz’s Rocky (born with a rare skull deformity), a willingness to accept him for who he is and stray outside her comfort zone for someone who accepts her.

Straying outside one’s comfort zone is central to Joyce Chopra’s “Smooth Talk” (pictured above), which gave Dern her breakout role as Connie Wyatt, a teenage girl hitting her rebellious years and having a hard time of it with her demanding mother. The first half of the film is a remarkable study of a teenager’s tentative first steps toward sexual exploration, with Dern veering back and forth between being marvelously unaffected (tossed-off delivery and leaning posture around her parents) and exaggerated flirtation, like that of someone who’s both fascinated bt sex and stuck in a childish, mocking view of it. She adopts confidence only to shrink away, puts her full body into a kiss before breaking off, admitting that she’s not used to “feeling … this excited.” 

It’s in the second half, when a greaser (Treat Williams) appears outside when she’s home alone that “Smooth Talk” dives headfirst into that discomfort. Dern’s bashful body language gives way to a menacing, dancelike semi-seduction with Williams, shifting from apparent fun and games to something that’s outright predatory, with her demeanor collapsing collapse into hyperventilative terror. She’s in that uncertain place in between childhood and adulthood, when everyone is trying to define themselves, but there are plenty of men who have their own ideas of who she is and what they want from her. “Smooth Talk” would be an ideal (if grueling) double feature with “The Tale,” a young person’s immediate experience with sexual desire, confusion and abuse paired with an adult’s retrospective understanding of that trauma.

Dern received raves for her work, getting her first of two straight Independent Spirit Award nominations (back when they tried to be more than Oscar predictors); her next would come with a part that would bring her to greatest and most important collaborator. Few directors have brought as much out of Dern as David Lynch, but then, few performers have brought as much out of his characters as Dern, beginning with her role as Sandy in “Blue Velvet.” The archetypical girl next door, Sandy has a kind of unearthly wholesomeness that’s best showcased in her monologue about her dream about “robins of love.” The key to Lynch’s work is his belief that the truly good can coexist with the truly wicked. Dern represents the former, delivering the monologue with a whispered awe and reaching hand gestures that border on evangelical before bringing herself down and finding a way to clarify it to her rapt listener/love interest. Sandy and Jeffrey (Kyle MacLachlan) see some terrible things (including a painful moment of trauma that prompts a distorted look of sorrow that’s distinctly Dern), but she remains unwavering in her belief that her dream of light can conquer darkness and make sense of this strange world (would that Isabella Rossellini’s Dorothy were so lucky). 

Dern teamed with Lynch again for 1990’s “Wild at Heart” (pictured above), playing the far more confidently sensual Lula while retaining the same good-heartedness she brought to “Blue Velvet.” It’s a heightened, deliberately iconic role, with Dern leaping into exaggerated dancing, purring with sexual abandon and leaning just so to express her arousal or satisfaction when talking to or about Nicolas Cage’s Elvis-obsessed Sailor. But Lula is also someone who has experienced great pain—the death of her father, her molestation at the hands of his friend, the murderous rage of her mother (played, in a stroke of casting genius, by her real-life mother, Ladd)—and has come out the other end demonstrating a full-bodied, defiant belief in the all-conquering power of love. The film’s “Wizard of Oz” framing device sometimes comes across as a bit forced, but it’s also another example of how Dern’s characters often tell themselves stories to make sense of their lives and guide them from darkness to light. 

Dern’s early adult roles often deal with characters exploring their sexuality at a time or place where that might put them in jeopardy; that’s certainly the case with Martha Coolidge’s “Rambling Rose,” in which her “borderline nymphomaniac” Rose comes to live with the Hillyer family (father Robert Duvall, mother Ladd and teenage son Lukas Haas) after unspecified trouble with men. Dern brings a blithe, bouncy exuberance and confidence to the role, waltzing down the street knowing that her walk can turn heads and her smile win hearts. But Dern also embodies Rose’s goodness, her sexual escapades being the actions of someone who has an intense and open need to be loved, and to be treated with the kindness that she shows the world but that the world hasn’t been good enough to show her. A scene between her and Duvall after she’s caught in bed with a man sees her not going so far as begging, but rather earnestly presenting herself with all cards on the table, an eyes-wide-open, forward-leaning acknowledgement that “I’m only a human girl person, and I ain’t always perfect.” 

“Rambling Rose” earned Dern her first Oscar nomination and preceded two high-profile supporting roles in 1993. As criminologist Sally Gerber in Clint Eastwood’s beautiful “A Perfect World,” she illustrates the impossible situation that Butch (Kevin Costner) was put in as a troubled child with an abusive father, giving a full picture of his trauma and bringing us to empathize with how he became a criminal. As Ellie Sattler in Steven Spielberg’s “Jurassic Park,” Dern plays the warmer counterpart and partner to Sam Neill’s testier Alan Grant, exuding, intelligence, physical capability and a deeper concern for how easily the park can spiral out of control and the consequences that come with it (she also has the ability as an actress to practically unhinge her jaw in terror when things do go wrong). In a key character moment, she pleads empathetically for John Hammond (Richard Attenborough) to recognize how the people they love may get hurt. Both roles cast her as figures of empathy, finding ways to make sense of the reasons why people cause each other pain while trying to prevent it from happening again.

If “A Perfect World” sees Dern asking us to sympathize with a troubled person, Alexander Payne’s “Citizen Ruth” (pictured above) shows how far that should be extended. Make no mistake: Dern’s pregnant, inhalant-addicted Ruth Stoops is a first-class fuck-up. Dern dives headfirst into making her as gross and unlikable as possible, smearing her mouth with inhalant residue, manipulating the same people who are manipulating her (both sides of the abortion debate attempt to co-opt her case for their agenda), and shouting some truly filthy insults (“suck the shit outta my ass, you fucker!”) with gritted teeth and gusto. Yet the actress still finds something sympathetic in her, her downcast eyes and fidgeting fingers communicating her knowledge that she’s fucked up yet again and is about to be on the receiving end of some real hardship. Ruth may sputter with uncertainty when trying to voice the whys behind her right to choose, but Payne and Dern take her choice, and the pain behind what led her to it, seriously (besides, she said it loud and clear the first time).

Dern’s career slowed down in the late 1990s and early 2000s, something she attributed (more than plausibly) to her guest appearance on “Ellen” as a radiant, openly gay woman that causes Ellen DeGeneres’ character to come out herself. She got her first serious critical attention in years in John Curran’s “We Don’t Live Here Anymore” in 2004. The film, about a two couples (Dern and Mark Ruffalo, Naomi Watts and Peter Krause) whose lives are upended when Ruffalo and Watts begin an affair, is too drifting and one-note to draw much blood, but it comes to life whenever Dern’s enraged, emotionally rangy Terry takes focus. Dern adopts a hunched-over posture for her arguments with Ruffalo, her clenched chin jutting out slightly, to show a woman who’s well aware of how she’s being deceived and whose total dismissal to the role of child caretaker (something she does not take to naturally) looks like it’s almost literally weighing her down. Terry’s agonies in “We Don’t Live Here Anymore” are resolutely ordinary, compared with some of the other characters Dern has played, but they’re no less important to her.

Dern reteamed with David Lynch for the truly deranged “Inland Empire,” in which she plays the actress Nikki Grace, getting the comeback of a lifetime with the role of Susan Blue before her role starts bleeding over into her identity (or something … even more than usual with Lynch, describing what actually happens seems futile and beside-the-point). It’s a tour-de-force performance, alternatively put-upon, ferocious, frightened, and whatever one can call this terrifying face. She’s simultaneously the film’s emotional anchor and its constantly metamorphosing nucleus. “Inland Empire” is, at least partially, about the emotional wringer that performers can put themselves through for a role, and how easy it is to mix up one’s own emotions with their character’s. A monologue in which Nikki’s character (?) describes her trauma and her self-defense in a jaded tone that occasionally sparks into violence is later seen in a theater, the actress observing herself. She’s played a character who has lived through real terror, but we see that the actress herself is living in terror, both at home (her husband is deeply controlling and ambiguously threatening) and at work. Does the actress simply play the part, or is she drawn to roles that bring her to relive (and potentially make peace with) her nightmares?

“Inland Empire,” like most of Lynch’s works, does not put its or its characters’ purpose into words so bluntly; Dern’s next major role is a little more easily (and narrowly) defined, but not uninteresting. The 2008 TV movie “Recount” (pictured above) relives the national trauma of Bush v. Gore, the second-most nightmarish presidential election in recent memory. Largely focused on the tactics employed the official campaign teams of Vice President Al Gore (Kevin Spacey, Denis Leary, Ed Begley Jr.) and Governor George W. Bush (Tom Wilkinson, Bob Balaban), the film also takes time with Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris (Dern) and her poorly disguised efforts to throw the election to Bush. Dern walks a fine line between humanity and cartoon with Harris, whom she portrays as a zealous, wide-eyed ideologue with exaggerated hair and makeup. But she finds the heart of Harris in her true-believer story about Queen Esther sacrificing herself for “the lovely Jewish people,” evangelizing as if her staking her career on Bush winning the election is for the good of the people. Her self-martyring tone is farcical, but it’s also indicative of how political partisans view their work as de facto for the good of the people and a tool to bring a country together after a moment of bitter division, rather than the actions of further division. 

Many of Dern’s more recent film roles have been smaller, supporting parts, but a few have still been notable. In Paul Thomas Anderson’s “The Master,” she has that same true-believer tone as a rich woman who has taken to the new religion of Lancaster Dodd (Philip Seymour Hoffman). Her student’s passion for something that’s given her life meaning is palpable; so is her shocked pain at being rebuked for questioning how, exactly, it can switch teachings so cavalierly, her body practically crumpling at Dodd’s shout. She’s more unflagging in her optimism as Reese Witherspoon’s mother in “Wild” (her second Oscar-nominated performance). Dern comes across in only a handful of small scenes as a vivacious presence who nonetheless knows perfectly well that she’s lived through hell, smiling through memories of pain because it brought her the most important person in her life. She’s the witness to someone else’s pain in Kelly Reichardt’s masterful “Certain Women,” a lawyer to a man (Jared Harris) who got screwed over when accepting a piddling settlement after a workplace injury but who can no longer be helped because of it. One senses her lived-in frustration as he refuses to listen her (then listens to a male colleague who tells him the same thing), but her genuine empathy for a man who she’s effectively powerless to help is also clear. And as Admiral Holdo in “Star Wars: The Last Jedi,” she commands the screen with a steadfast, unwavering certainty that she’s doing the right thing—any assumption of her incompetence be damned—finally proving herself to be among the bravest and most self-sacrificing heroes in the series.

Still, most of Dern’s best recent work has been on television. The brilliant, unjustly canceled “Enlightened” sees Dern’s personality as embedded into the work as Mike White’s (indeed, the two are credited as co-creators). Amy Jellicoe is another of Dern’s troubled heroines trying to find meaning in their lives, following her nervous breakdown first with a genuine attempt to regain the respect of her colleagues, then by becoming a corporate whistleblower in a move that’s half genuine, half out of bitterness. Amy’s a mess, lashing out at people she (rightly or wrongly) believes have wronged her at one moment, then preaching with a sincere but totally oblivious sense of illumination in the next. What holds Dern’s performance together as Amy whips back and forth between manic highs and deadening lows is an ardent, indefatigable expression that it’s possible for her to do something important with her life and potentially make the world a better place, no matter how crazy that world thinks she is. 

Dern returned to HBO in “Big Little Lies,” with her Renata Klein initially set up as an ostensible villain; Dern tears into the overbearing, bullying aspect of Renata, whether she’s stabbing the air with her hands like a maniac or giving a silent but icy glare, shouting her threats at the top of her lungs or whispering them with quiet menace. But there’s still a beating heart in her, a genuine desire to protect her daughter from pain (whether it’s violence at school or the more everyday hurt of someone skipping her birthday party), and the heartbreak in Dern’s voice when she voices her feeling of utter powerlessness (a control freak’s worst nightmare for minor issues, let alone real pain) is unmistakable. Much of the strength in “Big Little Lies” is its belief that flawed women can ultimately come together, forgive each other and help each other along; Dern’s performance is key to that.

And still, “Big Little Lies” had only the second-best Dern performance on television last year. There’s a nostalgic, near-breathless thrill in Dern’s first appearance as Special Agent Dale Cooper’s long-unseen secretary Diane on “Twin Peaks” (or “Twin Peaks: The Return”), an unmistakable callback to their close connection in “Blue Velvet.” Still, one couldn’t have predicted Dern’s delightfully cynical performance, all long drags on cigarettes and venom-spitting “fuck yous,” a far cry from the mostly upbeat Sandy. But even putting aside the eventual revelation about Diane’s nature, it makes sense after decades of disillusionment following a rape by the man she most trusted. That pain comes through in her reunion with Bad Cooper, her voice breaking, her breath quickening; it’s even clearer in her late-series breakdown, her shield of cynicism giving way to trauma flooding back. Even Diane’s return to normalcy is a pyrrhic and only temporary victory, with a sex scene with MacLachlan’s Good Cooper playing less like a triumph and more like a final, deeply sad shared moment between the two (which Dern somehow conveys largely with her back), one of the show’s many acknowledgements that trauma cannot be erased. 

“The Tale,” then, is instead a look at how one lives with that trauma. Fox’s gradual shift to acknowledging something terrible happened is not an easy journey, nor is it a simple one. The film deals heavily with the tortured self-rationalizations and denials employed by both survivors and abusers, ones both sincerely believed and desperately clung to. The final scene is confrontational without being fully cathartic, Dern’s belated but volcanic outrage a moment of her taking her past back (a real triumph) without any illusion that she has expelled that very pain. If there’s something Dern’s best work shows, it’s there forever; one can only try to make sense of it.

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