Betsy Lerner

Box Office

Posted on January 6, 2010 by betsylerner

What I saw over the holiday break & what I thought:

Crushing

Up in the Air: I wish I were as thin as the script.

It’s Complicated: A complete abomination save Alec Baldwin’s twinkle. This could be the first movie Meryl Streep is in and not nominated for an Oscar. Steve Martin: Botoxaddictfreak, what happened to you, man? And tall guy from office, you should play Shaggy from Scooby Doo (and that advice is absolutely free).

Nine: Three words: Daniel Day Louis. I love everything about him including his strange hands, esp. his thumbs. Two Words: Penelope Cruz. Two Words: Marion Cottilard. One word: Fergie. Even Kate Hudson was winning — a first! If you love women as much as I do, please see this movie.

Secret Lives of Pippa Lee: If you like the “my mother was a pillhead therefore I am emotionally remote and all men are dickheads” genre, this is for you. One reason not to miss this movie is when Keanu Reeves puts his hand down Robin Wright’s jeans in the back seat of his truck. Wide-on! (That’s a female boner, credit to BR). Also, Winona, I’m sorry, but stick to shoplifting.

Sherlock Holmes: Robert Downey, Jr. you make life worth living, and you know I don’t say that lightly. And I thought Guy Ritchie was just Madonna’s butt boy — apologies are in order. He even made Jude Law sympathetic. Kudos!

Precious: My audience was laughing when Precious was being beaten by her mother or puking or falling down. WTF. If Halle Berry had been beaten I doubt anyone would have laughed. Obesity is still okay to laugh at. Pisses me off. I applaud the movie for tackling obesity, teen pregnancy, abuse, incest. I think the director Lee Daniels is amazing. And finally: revelation: Mariah Carey as social worker. Star turn. If her agent isn’t working on getting her an HBO series based on that character, he is OUT TO LUNCH. Mariah, call me.

Filed under: Uncategorized | 9 Comments »

We Are Family

Posted on January 4, 2010 by betsylerner

Much to say about the new year, but fuck that shit. I want to write about how family destroys the writer’s life. How, at the holidays, every part of my body screams: flee. I was telling one of my clients how much I dread the whole season, but then apologized for talking that way. After all, some people are homeless and don’t have any family. Doesn’t that sound great, she cooed.

Look, I’ve never given my whole self over to writing. I’m not built that way. I need stability, so I’m sort of talking out of my ass when I say I’m standing on the outside. Middle child. Black sheep. Voted most likely to become a… writer! But stability for me is writing. Getting away from everyone. What was I writing about anyway at eight, twelve, eighteen, etc. The same shit. Not getting enough. Variations on the theme: food, love, sex, attention. Much as I love to proclaim my hero’s dictum, “Loyalty to the family is tyranny to the self,” I doubt I’d have anything of value in my life without my family. I’m actually pretty sure of that. And yet, and yet. The drama of the fucked up child. Anybody with me? Anybody?

Filed under: The End of the World as We Know It | 32 Comments »

Is That You, Baby?

Posted on January 3, 2010 by betsylerner

Thanks to everyone who read and continued to comment over the holiday. Apparently, some people didn’t think I could stay away, especially our darling A. who wrote, “Yeah, who knew Betsy had such self control?” Not how I envisioned her.” It’s true, self control isn’t my strong suit. My parents always accused me of “not knowing when to stop.” And god knows, I’ve found myself waking up in bushes enough times to know that I had a wee problem putting on the brakes.

I’ve always wondered how temperament relates to writing. I used to edit a young woman, totally out of control, who basically plugged her pen into a socket. I worked with another woman, so quiet and cautious that she seemed to disappear. And she wrote a book about that: Disappearance. I know another writer who claims to have a huge cock, and this, he would say, accounted for his big sprawling novels and his staying power.

If you are a safe and cautious person, is that reflected in your writing? If you are bold and swaggering, then what? Does personal temperament inform your writing? Do writers resemble their work? Why do we love to look at author photos if not to glean something about the personality and how that relates to the writing. Is that you, baby, or just a brilliant disguise?

Filed under: Writers, Writing | 27 Comments »

Givin’ Yourself to Me Can Never Be Wrong

Posted on December 23, 2009 by betsylerner

This is it, my last post until Monday, January 4, 2010.

As a small child, I felt in my heart two contradictory feelings, the horror of life and the ecstasy of life.

Here’s my question, if I don’t believe in god, resolutions, or e-books, what do I have to look forward to in the new year? The answer, Nation, is writing. Writing. And writing. As far as I can tell it’s the only way out. I want to know on January 4, 2010, what you did, writing-wise, on your vacation (or few days off, I hope).

Did you finish your novel, start one? Did you get your query letters buffed and polished? Did you write a poem? Read a poem? Sublimate massive amounts of rage at those who rejected you this year and kept writing? Did you write a letter? On paper? Did you put a novel away? Did you write in your diary? Did you find the common thread in your story collection? Did you start therapy to deal with your writer’s block?

Did find a title for your new project, and that title galvanized the whole thing in your mind? Did you write twenty new pages? Ten? Or did you throw out every page you wrote, but wtf, you knew you were getting somewhere, big picture-wise. Or you threw every page away and fell into a deep despair which seemed to have no end in sight? Or did you just jerk off, and by that I mean were you really good to yourself?

My goal is block out my new script with my collaborator. And figure out how to install the new Final Draft software. If it would help to pledge your writing goal here, go for it.

Please take good care. I miss you already. Otherwise, happy and healthy new year. Let’s hope it doesn’t suck as much as this year. Love, Betsy

Filed under: The End of the World as We Know It, Writers, Writing | 40 Comments »

I LOVE ALL MY HATERS

Posted on December 21, 2009 by betsylerner

It’s that time of year. Everyone making top lists. I’m proud to say that Dave Cullen’s Columbine has made it on to 15 Best lists and still counting including NYT, Chicago, Salon, LA Times, Entertainment Weekly, etc.

For the record, here is my Top Ten List of Things I Hate (in 2009):

1) “Apps”

Where's the app for self-loathing?

2)Watching people use their iphone, especially men.

3) “Vacay” and “Staycation”

4) Robert Downey, Jr. and Mickey Rourke robbed at 2009 Oscars.

Sean Fuckin' Penn

5)”Man up.”

6) Jay Leno more than ever

Stinker

7) Did Michael Jackson die?

8) Mad Men withdrawal

I wd die 4 u

9) “Sexting”

10) Upping the Best Picture Category to Ten Oscar Nominations

Nominees or a minyan?

DID I MISS ANYTHING?

Filed under: The End of the World as We Know It | 43 Comments »

You Talk Too Much You Never Shut Up

Posted on December 21, 2009 by betsylerner

I always feel that it’s a big mistake to tell people what you’re working on. In part, if you talk too much about it there’s a greater chance that you won’t do it. There’s also the feeling that if you give too much away, you leech the project of its essential oils. I’m never paranoid that anyone is going to “steal” my ideas; I don’t think people really can steal your ideas, or execute them the way that you would. Still, blabbing too soon is like an artist showing his subject the portrait when it is half done. You leave yourself wide open.

Also, I always feel like an ass when I talk about a work in progress. Last week at a memorial services, someone asked me what I was working on and I described an intricate plot for a screenplay I haven’t written a word of. Call me superstitious, but I’m pretty sure I jinxed it and never will write a word of it. Whereas if I kept my big fat fucking mouth closed, the idea would continue to blossom in my head rather than be dispelled. Maybe I will, but I think it’s a point well taken. Don’t go on about the most important work in your life at a cocktail party, spinning class, at the dry cleaner or the mikvah. Protect it, keep it under wraps, let it marinate and percolate before it takes its first breath of air. Is yakking every beneficial to your project? Or best to keep it corked?

Filed under: Writers | 22 Comments »

You Would Cry Too If It Happened To You

Posted on December 18, 2009 by betsylerner

It’s 2:00 a.m. Home after the annual agency holiday party. I’m wired, agitated, and depressed all at once. I’m one of these people who dread all social gatherings. Then I have a really good time. Then I hate myself. It’s so fucking predictable.

Our party is just for our clients. No publishers, no editors. Just the talent. I have this fantasy that we’ll still have the party when we’re in our eighties and it will be a sort of Broadway Danny Rose affair. I like to think that I’ll still be at my desk, my hands knotted with arthritis, a ciggie dangling from my lips (I plan to take up smoking again after eighty), barking to some editor how I want a better royalty rate for a z-book, which will be a book that you download out of your ass.

I also have a fantasy that if I die young all my clients will come to my funeral and say extraordinary things. Not because I’m the end all and be all, but because they are brilliant writers and know how to string sentences together that dazzle. You have no idea how much I love the people who trust me with their work. And yes, I had a bit too much to drink. But they will come and they will read. And one will sing.

Filed under: Uncategorized | 19 Comments »

SOmeone LIke You Makes It Hard To Live WIthout SOmebody Else

Posted on December 16, 2009 by betsylerner

I wish I had something to say to inspire you tonight, but my tank is low if I’m going to be honest. I know I’m not an ER nurse, but sometimes this work is incredibly draining. Worse, I know that whatever anxiety I’m feeling whether it’s waiting for an editorial response, waiting for money, waiting for an offer, etc. it’s far worse for the writer. I have all these children living in my shoe. When something doesn’t happen for one, it’s bound to happen for another. One writer is getting tons of attention, a fat new offer on her next book, foreign sales galore. Another writer can’t get arrested. And three years from now their situations might be reversed; fickle are the gods of publishing.

This year has also brought even more uncertainty and fear about the fate of books. How many billions of conversations we’ve had about Kindle and Nook and Google, etc. and still don’t where the hell it’s going. We are obsessed with the question of the future and how to protect our writers’ interests. My question is: how as a writer do you get it up in the face of so much uncertainty? How the fuck do you do it?

Filed under: Authors, Books, E-books, The End of the World as We Know It | 42 Comments »

Maybe You Want To Give Me Kisses Sweet

Posted on December 16, 2009 by betsylerner

Two manuscripts came in last week on stretchers. One needed a heart transplant, the other a new leg. It took hours of surgery, but they are both doing well. People ask if I still edit. I can’t not edit. I think we all read with pencils in our hands. Isn’t that the job?

I’ve been editing writers for 25 years. A lot of the work is routine by now, easy to spot, easy to fix. Sometimes the diagnosis is more difficult. You can have a very well written book that doesn’t move you. You can have a beautiful mess. You can get a beautiful mess into shape. But how do you add feeling?

Editing is also about trust. It’s a dance. You have to feel that your partner won’t drop you. Will catch you. Sees the forest, sees the trees. Sees the birds. Sees the maggots. You know I love to hear stories about worst experiences, but I’d really love to hear about the best thing you learned from an editor or reader.

Filed under: Editor, Writing | 14 Comments »

All In Love is Fair

Posted on December 14, 2009 by betsylerner

This just in:

Is it OK for a writer to seek another agent for their second book, while the first book remains with the first agent, regardless of whether the first book sells or not? Of course, it’s taken for granted that the writer informs the agents about each other. In other words, is it OK for a writer to have different agents for different books? We’re talking fiction here.

In a word: NO.

Let me put it this way: NO.

You can’t have multiple agents. It doesn’t make sense unless you’re writing in different genres and your agent only specializes in one. For instance, I am working with a young adult novelist on his adult material. He has a YA agent for his fiction. But this is the exception.

One agent per customer, please. There is so much involved in representing a writer; you would be crazy to split up your properties and by extension how they were then handled in Hollywood, abroad, etc. It would be extremely confusing to the publishers as well. And, ideally, you hope to develop a relationship with your agent over time such that he or she fully understands you, your work, your needs, etc.

What happens more frequently is that a writer will become disenchanted (euphemism for disgusted) with his agent and want to make a change. He will talk to prospective agents before “breaking up” with his current agent. He wants to make sure there’s someone to catch him before he leaps. I totally get this. It’s a shame when a misunderstanding doesn’t get aired and leads to a break-up, but usually people do what they need to do for cause.

Maybe what you’re asking for is some new vision of the future where clients can have multiple agents like Tiger has multiple blonds. For the moment, I think monogamy in client-agent relationships is best. That said, some relationships stop working and it may be time to move on. For whatever reason, you no longer believe that your agent is the best advocate for your work. Trust has broken down. Sometimes, an agent feels she has done everything for a client and nothing is working. Just as authors need to change publishing houses to get a new start, clients and agents sometimes need to make a new start.

I’ve lost a handful of clients over the ten years I’ve been an agent. Some dumped me. I parted company with a few. It was always awful. Often painful. Even when it’s for the best, it sucks. When I was a young editor, a powerful agent told me that she never fired clients. She just stopped returning their calls. She waited for them to get so angry that they fired her; her reasoning that it would have been far worse for them to have been fired by her. Oh, merciful tyrant, you are too kind. WTF. Is there ever a good way to break up?

Filed under: Agent, Client | 12 Comments »

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