Wednesday, March 01, 2017 8:18:07 PM
Kurt Andersen and Alec Baldwin to Write Satirical Book About President Trump
By JOHN WILLIAMSMARCH 1, 2017
A little more than a month into Donald J. Trump’s presidency, it’s safe to say that the satire business in America is booming. Penguin Press announced today that Kurt Andersen and Alec Baldwin will team up to write “You Can’t Spell America Without Me:
The Really Tremendous Inside Story of My Fantastic First Year as President Donald J. Trump.” The book is scheduled for publication in November. Mr. Baldwin (as President Trump) will read the audiobook version.
Mr. Andersen is a novelist and the host of the public radio program “Studio 360,” but perhaps most relevant for this new project is his experience as a founding editor of the satirical Spy magazine in the 1980s. It was Spy that now famously referred to the future president as a “short-fingered vulgarian.”
The real estate mogul was often in the magazine’s cross hairs. “I didn’t think this former hobby of mine would return with this ferocity,” Mr. Andersen said in a phone interview.
Mr. Baldwin’s blustering portrayal of Mr. Trump on “Saturday Night Live,” [ https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/23/podcasts/alec-baldwin-in-his-own-words-on-playing-trump.html ] starting last fall, impresses Mr. Andersen, who said: “It is extreme, and with a guy like Donald Trump, to be effective it needs to be extreme.”
Mr. Andersen suggested the book would be an attempt to capture more of President Trump than just Mr. Baldwin’s version of him. “I think we’ll be channeling and amplifying the real Trump,” Mr. Andersen said. “Writing for a five- or 10-minute sketch is different than writing a book, which has to be a narrative.”
“I think it’s fair to say that Kurt will do most of the writing,” Mr. Baldwin said in an email interview. “We have that arrangement whereby he doesn’t put on the wig, I don’t open up a Word document.”
Asked how the book would balance broad lampooning with cutting political commentary, Mr. Andersen said: “It’ll be sharp. I’m going to start talking like Trump: It’ll be great! It’ll be fantastic! But it will be sharp. It won’t just be fun-loving.”
Two Booker Prize winners have also been influenced by the 45th president’s election. Howard Jacobson’s novella “Pussy,” to be published in Britain in April, is a fairy tale about an egoist from a golden city who falls into a leadership position.
In January, Mr. Jacobson told The Guardian that he wrote the book in a “fury of disbelief,” and that he hoped it would offer readers the “consolation of savage satire.”
And Salman Rushdie’s “The Golden House,” to be published in September, reportedly includes a character resembling Mr. Trump.
Parodists have been going at the president since the campaign trail. Andrew Shaffer’s “The Day of the Donald,” published last summer, envisioned the first two years under a Trump administration. (From that book’s flap copy: “While Trump’s detractors may call him a tyrant, the American people love bullies when the victim is Congress: Every time they impeach the president, his approval rating skyrockets.”)
In 2016, the comedian and author Michael Ian Black and the illustrator Marc Rosenthal published “A Child’s First Book of Trump,” a picture book with shades of Dr. Seuss that attempted to explain the then-candidate.
“There will be a moment when this will be over,” Mr. Baldwin said. “When Trump will fade into ignominy and take with him his ability to outstrip satire.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/01/arts/kurt-andersen-alec-baldwin-to-write-satirical-book-about-president-trump.html?_r=1
By JOHN WILLIAMSMARCH 1, 2017
A little more than a month into Donald J. Trump’s presidency, it’s safe to say that the satire business in America is booming. Penguin Press announced today that Kurt Andersen and Alec Baldwin will team up to write “You Can’t Spell America Without Me:
The Really Tremendous Inside Story of My Fantastic First Year as President Donald J. Trump.” The book is scheduled for publication in November. Mr. Baldwin (as President Trump) will read the audiobook version.
Mr. Andersen is a novelist and the host of the public radio program “Studio 360,” but perhaps most relevant for this new project is his experience as a founding editor of the satirical Spy magazine in the 1980s. It was Spy that now famously referred to the future president as a “short-fingered vulgarian.”
The real estate mogul was often in the magazine’s cross hairs. “I didn’t think this former hobby of mine would return with this ferocity,” Mr. Andersen said in a phone interview.
Mr. Baldwin’s blustering portrayal of Mr. Trump on “Saturday Night Live,” [ https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/23/podcasts/alec-baldwin-in-his-own-words-on-playing-trump.html ] starting last fall, impresses Mr. Andersen, who said: “It is extreme, and with a guy like Donald Trump, to be effective it needs to be extreme.”
Mr. Andersen suggested the book would be an attempt to capture more of President Trump than just Mr. Baldwin’s version of him. “I think we’ll be channeling and amplifying the real Trump,” Mr. Andersen said. “Writing for a five- or 10-minute sketch is different than writing a book, which has to be a narrative.”
“I think it’s fair to say that Kurt will do most of the writing,” Mr. Baldwin said in an email interview. “We have that arrangement whereby he doesn’t put on the wig, I don’t open up a Word document.”
Asked how the book would balance broad lampooning with cutting political commentary, Mr. Andersen said: “It’ll be sharp. I’m going to start talking like Trump: It’ll be great! It’ll be fantastic! But it will be sharp. It won’t just be fun-loving.”
Two Booker Prize winners have also been influenced by the 45th president’s election. Howard Jacobson’s novella “Pussy,” to be published in Britain in April, is a fairy tale about an egoist from a golden city who falls into a leadership position.
In January, Mr. Jacobson told The Guardian that he wrote the book in a “fury of disbelief,” and that he hoped it would offer readers the “consolation of savage satire.”
And Salman Rushdie’s “The Golden House,” to be published in September, reportedly includes a character resembling Mr. Trump.
Parodists have been going at the president since the campaign trail. Andrew Shaffer’s “The Day of the Donald,” published last summer, envisioned the first two years under a Trump administration. (From that book’s flap copy: “While Trump’s detractors may call him a tyrant, the American people love bullies when the victim is Congress: Every time they impeach the president, his approval rating skyrockets.”)
In 2016, the comedian and author Michael Ian Black and the illustrator Marc Rosenthal published “A Child’s First Book of Trump,” a picture book with shades of Dr. Seuss that attempted to explain the then-candidate.
“There will be a moment when this will be over,” Mr. Baldwin said. “When Trump will fade into ignominy and take with him his ability to outstrip satire.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/01/arts/kurt-andersen-alec-baldwin-to-write-satirical-book-about-president-trump.html?_r=1
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