Wednesday, January 11, 2006

A million little shrugs

Play it: Everybody is a F*cking Liar

James Frey's best selling memoir, A Million Little Pieces, may be a fabrication. I've restrained myself from commenting on this yesterday, but now that it's blown up today (it was on our local Sports Radio last night??) I'll say this: Whatever.[shrug] Nobody would care so much if it wasn't an Oprah book club pick.

Remember what happened the last time she picked a live author for her book club... that was the Jonathan Franzen (The Corrections) debacle, where he exhibited some mixed feelings (when pressed on the issue by the press) about having Oprah's logo on his book. Oprah was hurt, disinvited Franzen to her book club episode, and put her book club on hiatus. After she brought back her book club, she chose only dead authors for a good while. Then, the story goes, she read Frey's gritty tale of addiction and recovery... his (allegedly fabricated) story lured her back into the dangerous, dangerous world of live authors... and bam! She's been hurt again! Frey even made her cry on her show, by saying it was all true. [shrug]

Frey's (alleged) memoir is also in the process of being made into a movie. They're only in the casting stage at the moment, though, and this might drive away 'A' list actors who don't want to be associated with controversey. [shrug]

My favorite comments on the subject so far have been from Lindsayisms:
* Two things about Freygate:

1. This is how I felt when I found out Vanilla Ice was really Robert Von Winkle and that Miami wasn't really his town that created all the bass sound, enough to punch and kick holes in the ground!
2. I'm so taking my copy of Middlemarch back for a refund. Who knew George Eliot was a WOMAN?

Frey will appear tonight on Larry King Live (9PM EST, CNN) [Blogged live on Syntax of Things]
TRANSCRIPT HERE

Here's a CNN video piece on the subject (WMP,) if you need to get caught up to speed.
The Smoking Gun article
Frey's website

I admit, all this coming on the heels of the exposing of JT Leroy, makes it more of a story.

Previously:
The Vandals, James Frey & Lindsay Lohan (Frey's My Friend Leonard

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3 comments:

Anonymous said...

i tried calling the larry king show, but to no avail. it seems to me that it's not the number of pages that is at issue, but the fact that these events affect everything in the book and the way we perceive it. oprah saved his ass, as well as her own, and that pisses me off! i hope there's a ban on his book.

Shawn Anderson said...

Here's a transcript of the show.

Shawn Anderson said...

The Stranger this week has a hilarious parody of the Smoking Gun piece (and, really, the whole ridiculously overblown coverage of the thing.)