A Flimsy Script for a Flashy Film.

Show: FRESH AIR
Date: FEBRUARY 11, 2000
Time: 12:00
Tran: 021101np.217
Type: FEATURE
Head: Interview With Andre Dubus III
Sect: Entertainment
Time: 12:06

This is a rush transcript. This copy may not
be in its final form and may be updated.

TERRY GROSS, HOST: From WHYY in Philadelphia, I'm Terry Gross with FRESH AIR.

The publication of Andre Dubus III's novel "House of Sand and Fog" coincided with the death of his father, the award-winning writer Andre Dubus. On today's archive edition of FRESH AIR, we talk with Andre Dubus III about writing and his relationship with his father. Andre Dubus III and his brother built their father's coffin and buried him on his land.

Also, film critic John Powers reviews "The Beach," starring Leonardo di Caprio, and David Bianculli reviews "Homicide," the telemovie that wraps up the loose ends of the NBC series, which was abruptly canceled last spring.

That's all coming up on FRESH AIR.

First, the news.

(NEWS BREAK)

GROSS: This is FRESH AIR. I'm Terry Gross.

On this archive edition, we have an interview with writer Andre Dubus III. He's been described as a remarkable and distinctive writer who is the son of a remarkable and distinctive writer.

Andre Dubus III had a novel published last year which has just come out in paperback called "House of Sand and Fog." The original hardcover publication coincided with the sudden death of his father, Andre Dubus, of a heart attack at the age of 62.

As you may know, Dubus Senior was an award-winning writer who had lost one leg and lost all use of the other in a freak car accident in 1986. Last May we invited Andre Dubus III to talk with us about his novel and to share some memories of his father.

The novel, "House of Sand and Fog," is about two people from two cultures who have claim to the same house, a house which is about all they possess. Kathy is a housecleaner and recovering drug addict who inherited her father's house. It's taken away from her by the county for not paying back taxes that she was mistakenly charged.

By the time the error is corrected, Kathy has been evicted, and her home has been sold to an Iranian, a former colonel in the Shah's army. For him, the home represents his chance for regaining the dignity he feels he and his family have lost as struggling immigrants. The colonel is ashamed to be working on a highway cleanup crew and at a convenience store.

This passage will give you a sense of how he sees America. He's sitting on a bench watching people pass by.

(BEGIN AUDIO TAPE)

ANDRE DUBUS III, "HOUSE OF SAND AND FOG": "I hear the speech of Orientals, Greeks, Germans, and French. But the majority are the more large, more fed, pink-in-the-face Americans who carry their shopping bags, eating ice cream cones or drinking sweet sodas from cups as they walk past, their small, loud children leading them.

"I sit and I regard these cows, these radishes, and I again think to myself, These people do not deserve what they have. When I first came to these United States, I expected to see more of the caliber of men I met in my business dealings in Teheran, the disciplined gentlemen of the American military, the usually fit and well-dressed executives of the defense industry, their wives who are perfect hostesses in our most lavish homes.

"And, of course, the films and television programs imported from here show to us only successful people. They were all attractive to the eye, they dressed in the latest fashion. They drove new automobiles and were forever behaving like ladies and gentlemen, even when sinning against their God.

"But I was quite mistaken, and this became to me clear in only one week of driving my family up and down this West Coast. Yes, there is more wealth here than anywhere in the world. Every market has all items well stocked at all times. And there is Beverly Hills and more places like it. But so many of the people live in homes not much more colorful than air base housing.

"Furthermore, those late nights I have driven back to the Pooldar (ph) apartment in Berkeley after working, I have seen in the windows of the pale blue glow of at least one television in every home, and I am told that many family meals are eaten in front of that screen as well. And perhaps this explains the face of Americans, the eyes that never appear satisfied, at peace with their work, or the day God has given them.

"These people have the eyes of very small children who are forever looking for the next source of distraction, entertainment, or a sweet taste in the mouth. And it's no longer to me a surprise that it is the recent immigrants who excel in this land, the Orientals, the Greeks, and, yes, the Persians. We know a rich opportunity when we see it."

GROSS: I'm wondering how you came up with the way that the colonel sees Americans.

DUBUS: Well, Terry, I guess I can answer that most honestly by talking a little bit about my writing process. For me, it's really -- I think the whole reason I do it is because I don't know what I'm doing, and I feel -- my imagination is pulled to a situation or to a sliver of an image or to a character, and I really write it to find out.

And so I based the colonel situation on a man I knew. He was the father of a friend of mine in -- from college. And he was a colonel in the Shah's air force, and his life did fall apart after leaving that corrupt regime.

And I had an image in my head, I was visiting him, and I saw him working two jobs and disguising what he was doing -- hiding that, really, from people in the building where he lived. And I was -- you know, I was struck by it. And it never left. For 15 years, that image of his sort of sour-faced body in the elevator with groceries at the end of a 16-hour day stuck with me, and I've never been able to let go of it.

GROSS: Well, when you said that you watched him disguise what he was doing, the character in your book does a lot of manual labor, but he dresses in a very expensive fine suit to leave the house so people will think he's got a fine job. And then he changes in a hotel or in a rest room along the way to work and puts on his working clothes.

DUBUS: Yes, I lifted that right from life. But it should be said that the man whom I based this on is not remotely like that, and I discovered a whole new character. But, yes, and the writer Alice Munro calls those sorts of moments "starter dough."

GROSS: (laughs)

DUBUS: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) (laughs) there are all these other ingredients in there and see what comes out.

GROSS: What inspired the idea of two people who have claim to the same place, the same house, who both desperately need it?

DUBUS: Well, you know, I know a lot of writers share this little technique I have. I get a lot of good story ideas from newspapers, especially the -- you know, your local or national news briefs, where they just have a really scant little paragraph that presents the situation, but gives you no detail. So your imagination really gets hungry for the detail.

And my first writing class I ever taught was in 1990 at Emerson College. And I had never taken a writing class, and I didn't know how to teach one. (laughs) So I said, Well, I'll get them started the way I start. So I brought in a newspaper and pointed to some news sections.

And one of them was about a woman in Oakland who had her house evicted for failure to pay back taxes she did not owe. And when they admitted their mistake, the county who had evicted her, they already sold it, and now the man who bought it legally didn't have to give it back.

That was actually in the newspaper clipping. And I told my students, "One of you guys should write about this. This is pretty interesting." And nobody did. But it never left my imagination either, so -- but after finishing my second book three years later, I -- that's what -- I started to write myself into that.

But it didn't come together, Terry, until -- I had been trying to write about the colonel's situation for years too, and I felt, well, maybe it'll just be a poem about a guy in an elevator. I mean, maybe it'll be a short essay. I don't know what it'll be. It doesn't seem to want to be fiction.

But then I actually noticed in the newspaper clipping that I had kept that the man who bought the house had a Middle Eastern name. And while I think it was probably Arabic and not Iranian, it did get me -- it (UNINTELLIGIBLE) little -- you know, the writer light bulb went off. And I thought, Well, what if my colonel bought that house?

And then it just -- it took off. And, you know, four years later, it was done. (laughs)

GROSS: (laughs) The point of view in your novel keeps shifting between the colonel and Kathy, and so you're writing in each of their first-person voices. And this requires you writing in the character of two people who are very different from you, and you're doing this at a time when some people get very angry if they think a writer is presuming that he or she is capable of understanding someone who is of a different race or ethnic group or gender.

And I'm wondering if...

DUBUS: I'm so glad you're bringing this up.

GROSS: ... I'm wondering if you feel that this is a loaded time to be writing in the voices of an Iranian colonel and a woman.

DUBUS: Especially when I'm a white guy?

GROSS: Yes, yes, yes, right, I know, I...

DUBUS: I think -- yes, I -- it is a loaded time.

GROSS: That's the way it usually goes, right, that white guys aren't allowed to do this, yes.

DUBUS: Yes, yes. I know, and I completely -- I think I understand the intent behind the anger behind all of this. And while I completely am with that anger -- and we're looking at, you know, thousands of years of patriarchy and imperialism and genocide, right, that's what's actually caused this anger, and I'm no small audience. I mean, I listen to that and share in that rage, actually.

But the fact is, I think culturally we are deeply misled when we begin to go after writers who are doing this. The fact of the matter is, it is our job. It's not just an interesting thing to do, it's the very job description of the writer is to imagine the lives of others.

And I think the writer Rose Ellen Brown (ph) really put this all to rest for me. She articulated it really well, I think. She said that, you know, when the writer puts him- or herself in the shoes of the other -- you know, for instance, a white male writing from the point of view of a dark-skinned man or woman, et cetera -- that far from -- it's -- this is not an act of colonialism. Actually, because it's an act of empathy, it's inherently an act of friendship.

Now, the danger, of course, is that the writer can fall flat on his or her face and get it completely wrong. And I think that's where the risk should lie. I mean, I mean, we should be able to take that risk, and we should -- you know, oftentimes we fail.

But nothing risked, nothing gained. I truly believe that the imagination is huge, and I -- if I get on my little high horse for a second, I do think that we live in a time that's suspicious of the imagination. I mean, I think that's why TV talk shows are so big, and I think that's why memoir is so big, and I think that's why true life crime shows are so big.

I don't know what's going on, but somehow we don't trust the imaginative work as much as we did even 20 years ago when I was in college.

GROSS: My guest is writer Andre Dubus III. We'll talk more after a break.

(END AUDIO TAPE)

This is FRESH AIR.

(BREAK)

GROSS: On this archive edition, we're featuring an interview recorded last May with writer Andre Dubus III after the publication of his novel "House of Sand and Fog," which has just come out in paperback. Its publication last year coincided with the death of his father, celebrated writer Andre Dubus.

(BEGIN AUDIO TAPE)

GROSS: I was very sorry to hear about the death of your father recently. Had he been sick, or was this just an out-of-the-blue thing?

DUBUS: No, no, it was just one of those terrible sudden deaths. He -- you know, as you know, because you've interviewed him over the years, he was in a wheelchair the last 12 1/2 years of his life, and that's not easy on anybody.

But, you know, that notwithstanding, he was in pretty good physical shape, you know. My brother and his partner had built a really long, straight ramp from his house just in the last few months, and my father did sprints on it in his wheelchair. In the summer he swam laps in his pool, he shadowboxed and lifted weights. I mean, he took relatively good care of himself.

So, you know, he was 62, and we didn't -- no, it was a shock, he got in the shower and had a heart attack and died.

GROSS: Now, I understand that in his papers, he'd asked that you build his coffin, and you're -- one of the many things you do is, you're a carpenter. What was your reaction when you found that out?

DUBUS: Well, it was not in his will at all. It actually came as a -- my brother and I were busting his chops over, frankly, the last story he'd ever written, called "Sisters," which is coming out in -- I think in "Book" magazine.

It's a Western, and in a Western, the hero (laughs) built a coffin for a man and digs the grave and does it all in about three and a half hours. And my father was a master writer, but he'd never worked with his hands, and my brother and I have always done this kind of work.

And we really gave him grief for that, because there ain't no way you can build a box that can hold a 200-pound man in three hours, let alone with hand tools, and then dig a hole around trees with roots. So we really gave him, you know, a lot of heat for that, and we were having fun doing it out on his deck this past summer.

And he said, "Well, when you build my coffin, you can take all the time you want, and I want it to be straight pine." Then we got into the discussion here. And he said, "And I want to be buried on my land."

And so that was just, you know, this past summer, and we -- from busting his chops. And so I was on this book tour for this novel, when I heard in San Francisco, and all I wanted to do was get back and hug my children and then go find my brother and build the coffin. And we did. We gathered at the lumber store, my brother, Jeb, and me, and we designed it, you know, through tears. And (UNINTELLIGIBLE) just such a stark experience.

And then bought the wood, spent about an hour picking it out out in the lumber yard, where we'd been for years on jobs. Went to his shop, and from about 5 at night to 9 in the morning, we built my dad's coffin out of pine. And -- ohh. And it was a beautiful night, though. I have to say, you know, we'd be -- it'd be like on a job, you know, we'd say, Come on, what kind of a router is that? What kind of a, you know, dadel (ph) is that? Give me your router, let me show you how to do it.

And then the, you know, this -- you know, masculine sparring. And then we'd be hugging each other and crying. And then we'd be ripping a piece of wood on the table saw and laughing and crying, and then there'd be these long moments of stillness and quiet.

Over the course of the night, his friends would come by, you know, his long-time agent and friend, Phillip Spitzer (ph), and his brother, Michel (ph), came with their -- with family. And they just came and were there and took some pieces of wood with them when they left. And one of my father's priests came by about 3 in the morning, helped us sand. And some friends came at dawn with beer and sandwiches. We took a break.

And when it was finally done, I lay in the coffin and had them shut it so I could feel what it was like. And I was also honestly testing to see if the lid was the right height and there was enough curve to it.

And then we dug the grave, because we ended up buying a plot of land a half-mile from my dad's house, and the farmer who we bought it from said that she hired her hands to dig it by shovel. She didn't have a backhoe. And when we heard that, we said, well, no, we'll be happy to dig it. If anybody's going to be digging this grave by hand, it'll be his sons.

And so my brother, Jeb, and I and our good friend Bill Cantwell, who was like a third son to my father, we dug the grave.

And the funny thing is, it took eight hours. So digging -- building the coffin with power tools took two men about 12 hours, and digging the grave with three men took eight hours. So (laughs) the veracity of that detail was off on that story.

GROSS: So you were right to criticize your father.

DUBUS: Yes. He needed to redo that one.

GROSS: Did he, by the way, redo it? Did he change that?

DUBUS: No, he didn't. He said, "No, well, then there was sand near those roots, and he happened to have the tools."

GROSS: (laughs)

DUBUS: You know, he exercised -- you know, he was so far along in the craft, he was such a master. He said, "Hey, screw, this is called poetic license." I don't know if he said that, but that's essentially what he did, he just put down a big staff and said "Poetic license, move on." (laughs)

GROSS: As many of our listeners know, your father lost his legs in a road accident back in 1986. He was helping people who had been hit by a car when he was hit by another oncoming car. I'm wondering how the accident affected your relationship with him.

DUBUS: Well, I think, you know, I'm the second oldest of his six children. I have an older sister, Suzanne (ph), and then me, and then my brother, Jeb, my sister, Nicole (ph), and then my two sisters Cadence and Madeleine (ph), from my father's third marriage. And I think I can speak for all of them, because we've all talked about this, when I say that we all got closer.

It's very hard to see anyone in your family suffer, and so that was hard, but not any hard -- it was a lot harder for him. So I think the short answer, and I think hopefully the most honest answer, is, we got closer in those 13 years, mainly because he was very focused on family in those -- in that last decade, family and writing, I think, for a number of reasons.

One, his writing had gotten to the point where he was making a living from it and didn't have to have another job, and he was raising his two young daughters, who were still just 16 and 12. And -- no, that's not completely true. The -- what happened, though, I think, and my father's written about this and talked about it, is something spiritual. You shift into a higher spiritual gear, which I don't think just anybody would do, suffering a crippling.

And consequently, he was a very present, focused father. And I got -- I'm just so grateful for all the times we've had in these last almost 13 years. I mean, he really should have been killed in 1986. He was run over at 58 miles an hour. He was standing on the road, got hit at 58 miles an hour. There's a quarter bent in half in his front pocket.

So I personally just feel so grateful he was around another 12 1/2 years. I want him around another 20. I am not ready for him to be gone, and I miss him terribly. But we had some really, really wonderful talks and family times in the last 12 1/2 years.

GROSS: When he lost the ability to walk, did you have to figure out how much responsibility you were going to try to take for helping him get through -- especially get through those transitional periods when he was learning how to be a different person?

DUBUS: Yes, I think the whole family -- I guess every family has to go through that sort of balancing act of who's going to take over here, who's going to take over there, and, you know, all families slip into their little pathologies.

GROSS: Yes, really.

DUBUS: The one who always does it does it, the one who never does -- I'm not saying that happened in my family, but all that came to fruition.

I'm grateful, too, that this happened at a time in my life where I wasn't nearly as busy. I mean, my wife and I are blessed with three young children now, and I work all sorts of jobs and write daily. And it would be a lot harder now to attend -- to tend to him now. But when he was hurt, I was in my mid-20s, I was single, and, you know, we all took turns kind of helping out.

My dad and I used to lift weights together for years and run together. Actually, on his birthday every year, we'd run this 11-mile course near his house. He was a real athletic guy. And, you know, after a year of being sedentary and 11 operations and losing his leg, his body had atrophied terribly. So he was really weak. And for the first few years, I went over three times a week and set him up on the weight bench and set him up with some weights and put him through a program.

And it was really a wonderful experience. And it sounds self-absorbed to say that. But it was -- you know, frankly, it just feels good when you can do something for somebody who you might at first judge as helpless. He wasn't helpless. He was severely compromised. Course, he would hate that euphemism. He would say, "Hey, bull, man, I was crippled."

GROSS: Right, right.

DUBUS: (laughs) You know, matter of fact-...

GROSS: I remember him saying that.

DUBUS: Well, I'm the one. (laughs) He was always very polite about protecting my identity. But I heard him say on some interview, it might have been with you, Terry, or might have been in print, that one of his family members was trying to talk him into, you know, a positive state of mind (laughs) about being crippled, you know, and had told him, "You know, Dad, maybe -- you know, that thing they're calling them now, physically challenged, that... " That was me. And boy, he let me have it. He said, "No, man, you're physically challenged. You just ran up the stairs, you're breathing hard. Me, I'm crippled."

GROSS: I remember him saying that.

DUBUS: Oh, I crept out of that room. Oh, he's right, he's right, oh, shoot! I should have known. I'm a writer, I should hate you for missing (ph) this just as much.

(LAUGHTER)

GROSS: After your father's accident, he went through a long and famous bout of writer's block, and I figure you were at that time an aspiring writer or an already published writer. And I'm wondering, as a writer, what it was like for you to watch him struggle with wanting to write and not being able to write for such a long period of time.

DUBUS: Well, I'm glad you asked, because I think there's been a public misperception. But he really did not stop writing. He was writing, and it just -- the fiction was not coming. He was writing nonfiction all along, and he actually, I think, was writing well.

What stopped, though, was fiction. And it was my sister, Nicole, who's a therapist and a teacher and writer out in California, who told him, you know, Maybe you should, you know, I mean, put that on (ph) your imagination and just start writing about what's in front of you, which is being crippled, and write about that.

The fiction took a hiatus. And I was there the day in his house when he finished a story called "The Curse," which was later published in "Playboy" magazine. It's a really strong story. And I was there the day he finished writing it longhand. And he was weeping in his room. And my little sister, Cadence, who was about 5 at the time, ran in, and he held her, and she was worried because he was crying and thought his leg might hurt, because he spent all day with the leg propped up. He was in a lot of physical pain.

And he cried, and just said, "No, I've got it back, I've got it back. Go tell Peggy," his wife, "I've got it back." And, you know, honestly, what it was, was his days were full and nights were full of trying to get through the physical pain and learn to get his mobility back. And everything fell to the wayside, including writing. So I think I thought about it very little as well.

(END AUDIO TAPE)

GROSS: Andre Dubus III will be back in the second half of the show.

I'm Terry Gross, and this is FRESH AIR.

GROSS: Coming up, we continue our conversation with writer Andre Dubus III. John Powers reviews "The Beach." And David Bianculli previews "Homicide," the telemovie that ties up the loose ends from the TV series, which was abruptly canceled last spring.

(BREAK)

GROSS: This is FRESH AIR. I'm Terry Gross.

Let's get back to our 1999 interview with writer Andre Dubus III. His novel "House of Sand and Fog" has just come out in paperback. Its hardcover publication last year coincided with the death of his father, the celebrated writer Andre Dubus.

(BEGIN AUDIO TAPE)

Your father had been a Marine, and from what I recall of one of our interviews, that was really important to him and seemed to be an inspiration to him during his period of recovery.

DUBUS: That's true.

GROSS: Especially early on. And I don't think that's an experience you had, and I'm wondering if you think that that was a fundamental difference as well, if there's anything you wished you'd had of that Marine experience.

DUBUS: Yes, I mean, I remember being 19 at the University of Texas and seeing the boys in dress blues and wanting to jump in and do it, because I was a real athletic kid, and wanting to be tested in that way. At the same time, I was getting a political consciousness and knew that Marines were being used, frankly, for corporate gain. You know, nothing against the Marines, it wasn't their fault.

So I was politicized and couldn't just leap in like that. But the fact is -- well, I have -- this is not an issue for me with me and -- the difference between my father and I in our experience. He used to always say that my Marines were -- was my bar-fighting. And I have to put that in context, because boy, I can sound like a real blowhard talking about bar-fighting, and reactionary.

But I do think that men in this culture, especially in working-class neighborhoods, have to fight like dogs, often. And I grew up in that area, and at 15 or 16 began to fight back after not fighting back for years, and fought for a long time. And it became a real problem, I mean, to the point where -- I mean, I was never a bully, and I never started fights with anyone who didn't deserve to have a fight started. Usually I'd kind of walk into someone who was beating up his girlfriend and punch him.

And it was a weird self-destructive eight or nine years. But I had my own demons with masculinity. I know that my father has written about this and talked about this at length, that he joined the Marines because he didn't feel masculine enough, and he felt he had to prove something to his father, who I never had the pleasure of knowing.

And, you know, I think it was very soon after his own father's death that my father quit the Marines. But see, one thing the old man did for me is never left me feeling that I wasn't a man already. I judge myself as being -- needing some strengthening, and I need to be more of a man. But I guess the long answer is, I do think every -- I -- what you seem to be asking, Terry, is, was there a rite of passage for me? Is that right?

GROSS: Sure, yes. And I guess I'm also wondering what the transition was between not fighting back and fighting back.

DUBUS: A terrible event. I -- you know, just like a lot of kids, I was a new kid in town for years. I think I went to about 14 schools before I got out of high school. And, you know, as did my brother and sisters. And that's a hard life for a kid. And a lot of the neighborhoods were tough neighborhoods.

And so for years, I just hibernated and hid inside my house. And my brother was beaten up very badly by a military policeman in the street, with a whole bunch of people watching one day. And I didn't do anything about it. And something just -- I was 15 years old, and my self-hatred got to such a level I couldn't endure it any longer. I would really rather be stabbed or shot than not fight again. And something really snapped.

And I went on a rampage for about 10 years. By rampage, it -- that's not the right word. I began to lift weights and take care of myself and stop eating Twinkies and drinking Coke. And I didn't -- I stopped doing drugs, which I was in a lot of in the early '70s as a young teen. And cleaned up my act, and really started to work on my body, and then worked on self-defense and was surprised that I actually had boxing ability.

And then I sort of set out to exercise that part of my life. And I put myself in situations, usually barrooms, where there was always an opportunity to prove whether or not I had what i Washington hoping I had, which is the ability to fight when I was afraid. And -- which is, I think, at the core of us all the time. I think we're always afraid. I was always afraid.

And so, you know, I would wait until some guy hit his wife, or pushed a little guy down, or was just being inappropriate. Then I would step in and say something, like, you know, Hi, can I have a glass of milk? Something to get him to insult me. And then I would go at it. (laughs) It's terrible. I mean -- but this is 15 years ago, and I haven't -- it's something I had to do early in my life.

And in direct answer to your question about the Marines, I think it was my -- I had to build a little rite of passage -- not little, it was very significant for me and very frightening. And I had to design one on my own. And the problem is, once you learn to break that membrane, that sort of psychic membrane between your fist and somebody's face, it's sort of something you have in the tool box, which is a dangerous thing to have.

GROSS: Right.

DUBUS: And it's important to learn -- you know, to love actively without using that.

GROSS: When your father was alive, did you show each other your writing before it was published?

DUBUS: Yes, we did, absolutely.

GROSS: I think one of the real dilemmas writers have, even fiction writers, is that if they're basing a character on someone who they know and who they're close to, and that person recognizes themself in the story, that even if that person is transformed a lot in the fiction, the person could still be offended if they feel that they've been mischaracterized or described in a negative way.

And I figure, since your father was a writer, you might have been very sensitive to that, because there might have been characters and stores who were loosely modeled on you, and you might have been sensitive about that yourself, I don't know.

DUBUS: Yes, well, it's a good question. I was, and I do think it's the obstacle and challenge of so many writers that we -- and you know, back to this point about imagination being somehow under siege right now in late 20th century America, is -- in my opinion, is, I think -- I see that with writers with whom I work, who will stop cold in their tracks a perfectly wonderful story because they're afraid of how their dead mother will read it over their shoulder. And that's a completely understandable fear.

But I do think that the art has to be -- has to go past that, and that the truth has to be illuminated in whatever way. And also the fact -- as you said, they are transformed. This is no longer your mother. This is no longer your father. You know, you based all those physical features on your living daughter, but because now it is in a work of literature and not life, it is no longer her. There's -- this alchemy occurs.

My father did a very generous thing when I first began writing and publishing, when I was 22. I sold my first story, and he called me. I was in Colorado at the time. And it was just so generous and so loving. And said, "Listen, you know, you're going to be a writer whether you think you are or not, and frankly, for two more years, I wasn't calling myself that, and I didn't think that's where I was going.

And he said, "Just don't do what I did. Don't wait till -- don't wait until we're dead before you write about us." He said, "Feel free to do it now."

And I thought that was a really brave and generous, kind thing to say. And I took him up on it, (laughs) and about a year later I wrote a story about -- based on the day when my father left my family in divorce. And there was a scene there with the girl based on my little sister. And in this scene, she cries a little bit. I think I had phrased, "She cried a little bit too."

My father, after reading the manuscript said, "Well, she cried a lot, actually, and when I said to feel free to write about us, I didn't mean you to take me up on it right now.

(LAUGHTER)

DUBUS: But, you know, yes, that happens.

GROSS: So what -- was he truly sorry that you'd done it?

DUBUS: No, he was -- it just brought up -- it was painful for him and painful for me. And -- but no, he just put it in its place, and gave me a hug, and said it was a good story and send it out.

He was very generous and very supportive. And I have to say, I -- you know, I'm not alone in this, I'm not saying this just because I'm his son. I do think he's one of the greatest writers in the English language of the short story, and his work's going to last a long, long time. And I never once heard him, ever, say an arrogant word about his own work. All the private moments, 39 years of private moments with him, never once, ever, heard him say anything arrogant or cocky about his own abilities or his own work.

GROSS: I want to thank you so much for talking with us. I really appreciate it.

DUBUS: Thank you, I appreciate you having me on.

(END AUDIO TAPE)

GROSS: Andre Dubus III, recorded last May after the publication of his novel "House of Sand and Fog." It's just been published in paperback.

Coming up, "Homicide: The Movie."

This is FRESH AIR.

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Dateline: Terry Gross, Philadelphia, PA
Guest:
High: Andre Dubus III is the son of the celebrated writer Andre Dubus, who died last year. His novel, "House of Sand And Fog," has just been published in paperback. Dubus is the author of two previous books, and he teaches writing at Tufts University and Emerson College.
Spec: Andre Dubus III; "House of Sand and Fog"; Entertainment

Please note, this is not the final feed of record
Copy: Content and programming copyright 2000 WHYY, Inc. All rights reserved. Transcribed by FDCH, Inc. under license from WHYY, Inc. Formatting copyright 2000 FDCH, Inc. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to WHYY, Inc. This transcript may not be reproduced in whole or in part without prior written permission.
End-Story: Interview With Andre Dubus III

Show: FRESH AIR
Date: FEBRUARY 11, 2000
Time: 12:00
Tran: 021102NP.217
Type: FEATURE
Head: David Bianculli Reviews 'Homicide: Life on the Street
Sect: Entertainment
Time: 12:49

This is a rush transcript. This copy may not
be in its final form and may be updated.

TERRY GROSS, HOST: Last season, NBC pulled the plug rather suddenly on "Homicide: Life on the Street," giving executive producer Tom Fontana and his colleagues little time to put together an actual final episode. The network is making up for it Sunday night with a two-hour movie which brings back every major cast member who's ever appeared on the show.

Before we hear TV critic David Bianculli's review, let's hear from one of "Homicide"'s stars, Andre Braugher, who plays Detective Frank Pembleton. Braugher's early training was as a Shakespearean actor. I spoke to Braugher in January of 1995.

(BEGIN AUDIO TAPE)

The way that a Shakespearean character uses English is different than the way, the way a contemporary detective speaks. What can you learn from Shakespeare that you can apply to contemporary film and television, in terms of speech? I don't mean making speeches, but intonation...

ANDRE BRAUGHER, "HOMICIDE: LIFE ON THE STREET": Oh, all of that, all of that work came to me from the Juilliard School, breaking up -- communicating, breaking up the sentences into understandable parts and putting them back together again, the pure technique of speaking in order to be understood through complex thoughts, was taught to me at the Juilliard School.

Shakespeare, of course, his thoughts are quite long and quite expressive and quite complex, and the actor is forced to think through the line from beginning to end, and -- as opposed to modern speech, you know, modern, I guess you can call it that. It's not broken down into short fragments, but rather longer and more subtle thoughts.

So consequently when I go over to "Homicide," when I get a long sentence, I break it down into its component parts, and I use the entire sentence, you know.

GROSS: Is there any way I could get you to take a line from Shakespeare, or to take a long sentence from "Homicide" and show us how you break it down, and how you actually analyze that line before delivering it?

BRAUGHER: Wow, I don't have a script in front of me. Let me think. "So we're looking for a van that... " I can't remember the line. "We're looking for a van that does not exist, which carried kidnappers who never lived, which did not abscond with a U.S. congressman and then didn't drop them off here?"

So the line, I think I got the line. "So, we're looking for a van which does not exist, which carried kidnappers who never lived, which did not abscond with a U.S. congressman, and then didn't drop him off here?" "I guess," is what the other character responds.

Now, that's a long and complicated thought, which you typically don't get. Typically it's, like, "Where is this guy?" or, "These kidnappers don't exist," or some smaller thought. And I relish the idea of taking a long thought and breaking it down to its component parts, putting it back together again, and being able to deliver it in one breath from beginning to end, and have it end up sounding like a question that I actually asked and have made my own, rather than sounding like a newspaper clipping or something to that effect.

GROSS: You say before you left Shakespeare, even when you were young, what did you find when you were young in Shakespeare? A lot of young people don't -- just don't like Shakespeare because it's such a different period, and because the language can be very difficult to understand, compared to contemporary writing.

BRAUGHER: This is my impression, that if your vocabulary is limited, then your thoughts are limited. And I'm not a man who wants to be limited, and I found something really, really beautiful in Shakespeare, something very spiritual and lovely in Shakespeare. And I'm not willing to give it up. I'd like to be -- I'd like to feel the kinds of feelings that Laertes feels upon hearing about the death of his sister, you know. Or when he sees his sister mad, with a -- with flowers in her hair, and talking outrageous gibberish, and acting -- her behavior -- acting with an incredible kind of sexual license that he's never seen her act with. He says simply, "Oh, God, do you see this?"

Now, a lot of people would say, What's wrong with her? Let's get her to a doctor. They'd try to solve the problem, they'd do a lot of different things. But Laertes is a very spiritual man, and he looks up and he says, "Oh, God, do you see this?" It's a crime against nature in a certain way, you know. And his strange love for his sister is expressed in this way.

And it can't be beat, it can't be beat by cop shows, and it can't be beat by the most interesting kind of television drama. Shakespeare lives, and his characters express the deepest parts of themselves.

Pembleton doesn't express the deepest part of himself, you know. There's so many chameleon-like layers and aspects to Pembleton's behavior and his speech and his relationships with everyone else. But in Shakespeare, I find the opportunity to really glimpse the most elemental and human part of a person.

(END AUDIO TAPE)

GROSS: Andre Braugher, recorded in 1995. You can see him Sunday night on "Homicide: The Movie."

Let's hear TV critic David Bianculli's review.

DAVID BIANCULLI, TV CRITIC: All those years "Homicide" was on the air, from 1993 until last May, it never really got the credit it deserved. For most of its run, it was the very best drama series on television. Its plots were unpredictable, its conflicts were intense, and even its heroes were flawed and complex.

Anything could happen on "Homicide," even to the good guys. Over the course of the series, a few characters moved on to other jobs or private lives. Several were shot. One was brutally murdered. One committed murder. And another committed suicide.

So how do you provide a fitting end to a series this good, incredibly reunite all these characters, living and dead?

Whenever there was a major case on "Homicide," the squad members referred to it as a red ball, a case that demanded everyone's effort at the same time, because the media scrutiny and political fallout were so intense.

"Homicide: The Movie," which picks up nine months after the series left off, starts off with the biggest red ball imaginable, the near-fatal shooting of Baltimore's new leading mayoral candidate, former homicide lieutenant Al Giardello.

Giardello, played by Yaphet Kotto, fights for his life in intensive care, while all his former colleagues return to the squad room to help find the shooter.

Even Andre Braugher as Frank Pembleton and Kyle Secor as Tim Bayliss reunite temporarily as partners, which is quite a big deal. Pembleton guiltily retired from the force after Bayliss took a bullet for him. And Bayliss is just back from a long leave of absence after secretly killing a freed murderer in cold blood. That victim's name is up on the homicide board in red as an unsolved case, and it isn't too long before Pembleton, still the sharpest of detectives, begins to detect a connection.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP, "HOMICIDE: LIFE ON THE STREET")

BRAUGHER: Very blue. You never told me the squad room was this blue.

KYLE SECOR, ACTOR: Sure I did.

BRAUGHER: Yes, but not this shade.

SECOR: No, huh?

BRAUGHER: This is excessively blue. Azure, cobalt, cerulean.

Except the board. All these open cases. Too much red. Hurts my eyes, I'm seeing spots.

What?

SECOR: Nothing.

BRAUGHER: No, something.

SECOR: No.

BRAUGHER: So what's this, Ryland (ph), is this one of your open...

ACTOR: No, no, no, no, no. That (UNINTELLIGIBLE) is mine, Frank. Luke Ryland snuck two women live on the Internet.

(UNINTELLIGIBLE) got off on a technicality.

Next day they found him, curbside, laying there, .44 slug in the back of his head.

BRAUGHER: You know something (ph)?

ACTOR: Not a one. Uh-uh. Whoever did the deed knew how to execute an execution.

BRAUGHER: And this sordid little tale you makes you jumpy because...

SECOR: No, no. Frank. Doesn't make me jumpy.

BRAUGHER: You're jumpy. I know you.

SECOR: No. You know something? You don't know me. Things change, Frank. People, they change.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

BIANCULLI: "Homicide: The Movie" is very tightly written and strongly performed. It's a wonderful end to a wonderful series. It's got even more delicious twists and turns than you might expect. And it would be the greatest and most deserving of ironies if "Homicide," which never got an Emmy as best drama series, winds up winning one as best telemovie.

So far this season, that's exactly what it is, the best telemovie of the year.

Oh, and while I'm looking ahead and wishing, I have one more wish, this one for Fontana. If Bayliss ever is brought to justice for the murder he committed, could you please find some way to have him transferred into "Oz"?

GROSS: David Bianculli is TV critic for "The New York Daily News."

Coming up, John Powers reviews Leonardo DiCaprio's new movie, "The Beach."

This is FRESH AIR.

(BREAK)

TO PURCHASE AN AUDIOTAPE OF THIS PIECE, PLEASE CALL 877-21FRESH
Dateline: Terry Gross, Philadelphia, PA
Guest:
High: TV critic David Bianculli previews this Sunday's "Homicide" made-for-TV movie on NBC.
Spec: Entertainment; Television and Radio; "Homicide: Life on the Street"

Please note, this is not the final feed of record
Copy: Content and programming copyright 2000 WHYY, Inc. All rights reserved. Transcribed by FDCH, Inc. under license from WHYY, Inc. Formatting copyright 2000 FDCH, Inc. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to WHYY, Inc. This transcript may not be reproduced in whole or in part without prior written permission.
End-Story: David Bianculli Reviews 'Homicide: Life on the Street

Show: FRESH AIR
Date: FEBRUARY 12, 2000
Time: 12:00
Tran: 021103NP.217
Type: FEATURE
Head: John Powers Reviews "The Beach"
Sect: Entertainment
Time: 12:45

This is a rush transcript. This copy may not
be in its final form and may be updated.

TERRY GROSS, HOST: Leonardo DiCaprio's first starring role since "Titanic." "The Beach" was made by the British team that collaborated on "Shallow Grave," "Trainspotting," and "A Life Less Ordinary," director Danny Boyle, producer Andrew MacDonald, and screenwriter John Hodge.

Our film critic, John Powers, has a review.

JOHN POWERS, FILM CRITIC: Four years ago, the 26-year-old English writer Alex Garland wrote "The Beach," a gripping first novel that could be happily read by those actually on a beach. The book was about backpack culture, those swarms of young Westerners who wander around Asia and Africa, carrying Lonely Planet guides, bedding down in cheap hotels, and seeking out peak experiences.

"The Beach" became a cult hit, and it was inevitable that it would soon be turned into a movie. But what kind of movie? One faithful to Garland's casually bleak portrait of backpacker seeking paradise? Or a Hollywood spectacle that would try to make it all seem glamorous?

Leonardo DiCaprio stars as Richard, an American traveler who comes to Thailand in search of adventure. At a hotel on Kowsan (ph) Road, he meets the suicidal drug-addled Daffy -- that's Robert Carlyle -- who gives him a map to a secret island untouched by other tourists with a perfect beach and endless supplies of dope.

Richard sets off for this Eden along with a French couple, the responsible Etienne and the sexy Francoise, who Richard fancies. She's played by the terrific French actress Verginie Ledoyen. The three eventually make it to the island and discover a small community of travelers led by Sal, the film's most interesting character. Played by Tilda Swinton, she's a tough woman who makes sure that the island runs smoothly.

Needless to say, this mini-Utopia is not all that it seems. The only way paradise can remain paradise is if you keep other people out. So when Sal sees some party-minded invaders on a nearby island carrying a map Richard left them but claimed he hadn't, she tears into him.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP, "THE BEACH")

TILDA SWINTON, ACTRESS: Is that or is that not a map she's holding? And did you or did you not make that copy?

You know, the lying doesn't bother me. But that map is trouble. The farmers -- right, you remember, those men with guns -- they said to us, they told us, No more people. And now it looks like we're handing out tour guides.

LEONARDO DICAPRIO, ACTOR: Sal, I mean, we can explain, right? I mean, we could tell them it was Daffy.

SWINTON: We could explain. I want you up here every day until those people come.

DICAPRIO: Here?

SWINTON: Yes, here. And when they come, I want you to get the map back, OK? Whatever happens, you get the map back.

DICAPRIO: Wait, Sal, wait. Sal, take a look at this. I mean, they could be there for weeks.

SWINTON: That's right, and you'll be here, waiting for them.

DICAPRIO: Well, what am I supposed to do when they actually get here?

SWINTON: Get the map! You (UNINTELLIGIBLE) it, you handed it out. Now you get it back, and turn them away.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

POWERS: Garland's original novel was a triumph of unobtrusiveness. It managed to be smart without telegraphing its ideas -- for example, how young Westerners treat less-developed countries as a kind of theme park. In the book, Richard's a Brit, and he tells his story in a low-key voice so seductively readable that it takes a while to grasp that he's not altogether a reliable narrator, or a particularly nice guy.

His mind is filled with pop culture fantasies, from Nintendo to Oliver Stone movies, and each time he's asked to guard the community's enclave, he treats this duty as if it were a war game.

Garland puts all this across very matter-of-factly, and to keep the backpacker spirit, the movie should have been made dirty and cheap, by skillful indie filmmakers, like the guys who did "Pie," or "The Blair Witch Project."

Instead, "The Beach" has been made by the British team that did "Train Spotting," and they inflate everything to Hollywood size. They pump up Richard's narration so he's constantly announcing the movie's big themes about tourism and paradise. They pump up the design, so that the island community looks like one of those eco-conscious resorts for the rich. They pump up the visual style so that the camera's always whooshing down waterfalls or rising into the heavens.

And they pump up Richard's fondness for pop culture, using digital effects to literally turn Richard's fantasies into a real-life version of a Gameboy. They're so busy pumping up the spectacle, all the air goes out of the story. They don't make us care about Richard or any of the characters, never convince us that the island is any kind of paradise, and can't be bothered to show us the most interesting thing, how the whole place runs.

They can't even pull off the love plot that they've added to Garland's story. After pushing Richard and Francoise into each other's arms, they drop her once she's taken off her top. Of course, for most viewers, "The Beach" is primarily a vehicle for DiCaprio, whose boyish prettiness has begun to thicken.

It's tempting to blame him, or at least his post-"Titanic" stardom, for the movie's overblown dullness. After all, you can't have an edgy little film with the world's most famous actor at the center.

But the truth is, DiCaprio's not killing the movie, the movie's killing him. You can see him struggling to bring conviction to the role of Richard but being defeated by the script's flimsiness. To his credit, he does succeed in showing that Richard's not a nice guy. But you have to wonder how the Fox executives felt when they realized they were paying Leo $20 million to play not a dreamboat but an ugly American.

GROSS: John Powers is film critic for "Vogue."

FRESH AIR's executive producer is Danny Miller. Our engineer is Audrey Bentham. Dorothy Ferebee is our administrative assistant. Roberta Shorrock directs the show. Our theme music was composed and performed by the Microscopic Septette.

I'm Terry Gross.

TO PURCHASE AN AUDIOTAPE OF THIS PIECE, PLEASE CALL 877-21FRESH
Dateline: Terry Gross, Philadelphia, PA
Guest: John Powers
High: Film critic John Powers reviews "The Beach," the new film starring Leonardo DiCaprio.
Spec: Entertainment; Movie Industry; "The Beach"; Leonardo DiCaprio

Please note, this is not the final feed of record
Copy: Content and programming copyright 2000 WHYY, Inc. All rights reserved. Transcribed by FDCH, Inc. under license from WHYY, Inc. Formatting copyright 2000 FDCH, Inc. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to WHYY, Inc. This transcript may not be reproduced in whole or in part without prior written permission.
End-Story: John Powers Reviews "The Beach"
Transcripts are created on a rush deadline, and accuracy and availability may vary. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Please be aware that the authoritative record of Fresh Air interviews and reviews are the audio recordings of each segment.