John Blumenthal has done it all––at least as a writer. Starting as a low-level editor for Esquire, he went on to write for Playboy, where he once interviewed the entire cast of Saturday Night Live. As a freelancer, he wrote humorous essays that appeared in Punch, The National Lampoon, Oui, and many others, and he published seven books––before and after his stint writing for film and TV. His recent novels, What’s Wrong with Dorfman? and Millard Fillmore, Mon Amour, were published by St. Martin’s Press in 2003 and 2004 respectively, to critical acclaim.
In What’s Wrong with Dorfman? a screenwriter whose career has taken a nosedive seeks a diagnosis for a mysterious multi-symptom illness. Although the psychological underpinnings of his disease become obvious to his therapist and, consequently, the reader, Dorfman remains maddeningly oblivious.
In Millard Fillmore, Mon Amour, Plato Fussell struggles with an obsessive-compulsive personality, social anxiety, and the plague of his moniker (all the school kids called him “Play-Doh”), while researching a several volume biography of Millard Fillmore, America’s thirteenth and perhaps least memorable president.
It came as no surprise that Blumenthal’s prose is hilarious. He did write the screenplay for the 1999 comedy hit, Blue Streak. What did come as a surprise was how he used that humor to develop memorable characters, intricate relationships, and universal themes.
Now working on his eighth book, Blumenthal took time out recently to talk with The Rose and Thorn.
R&T: What’s Wrong with Dorfman? and Millard Fillmore, Mon Amour were actually a return to novel writing for you, am I correct? You also published several books before you started your TV and film writing.
Blumenthal: Dorfman was really my first novel, but I actually published five books in the 1980s. One was a spoof of Hollywood (The Official Hollywood Handbook), two were satires of mystery novels (The Case of the Hardboiled Dicks, and The Tinseltown Murders). One was a lampoon of Romance novels (Love's Reckless Rash), which I co-wrote under the pen name "Rosemary Cartwheel." The last book was nonfiction (The History of Hollywood High).
To publicize the romance spoof, my editor at St. Martin’s Press actually talked me into wearing a 19th century white gown for the publicity shots. It worked pretty well since I have a mustache, which I refused to shave off. There are some things I just won't do for great literature, but aside from the mustache thing, I can't think of anything.
R&T: What's Wrong with Dorfman? and Millard Fillmore, Mon Amour are, in some ways, very different books, but an obsession with germs and disease plays a major role in both. In Dorfman the physician father exhorts his family to always wash their hands and “create a nice lather.” In Millard Fillmore the main character, Plato Fussell, and his girlfriend exchange medical records before having sex.
Blumenthal: My father actually was an MD as well as a hypochondriac, which can be a deadly combination, especially if you're a ten-year-old kid with an upset stomach. The father in Dorfman is patterned after my father.
When my sister and I were kids, my father had a terminal diagnosis for everything. Every chest cold was lung cancer, ever headache, a brain tumor.
In Dorfman, the repetition of the line about hand washing and creating a nice lather is something my father said ad infinitum. He drove us nuts with it. My sister and I have both become hypochondriacs as a result. As for Plato's obsessive-compulsive nature, I just made that up because I thought it might be funny. I'm only slightly obsessive myself, although I make sure to lick five trees every day.
R&T: What made you choose Millard Fillmore as the president Plato Fussell wants to immortalize in biography?
Blumenthal: Because Millard Fillmore is generally regarded to be the most insignificant president in American History. It was between him and Calvin Coolidge, but Coolidge was just dull, which is why he was nicknamed Silent Cal. I gave serious thought to James K. Polk, but somehow Millard Fillmore sounded funnier and most people don't have a clue who James K. Polk was. As I later discovered, nobody knew who Millard Fillmore was either so the joke was on me. In retrospect I probably should have given it a title that would have attracted female book buyers, a title such as "The Romantic Mr. Ditto," or something along those lines.
R&T: You appear to have lived a writer's dream, working for magazines like Esquire and Playboy, publishing humorous essays in publications like Punch and the National Lampoon, then writing for TV and movies as well as novels. Does it feel that way to you?
Blumenthal: Of course it's nice to have all those credits, but it would be a lot better to be really famous. Paris Hilton is famous for absolutely no reason and I really aspire to be like her, but don't tell anybody because I don't really look that great in sexy girl clothing.
In any case, the odd thing is that in spite of all my credits, it seems that every time I write something new, I have to start from scratch which, frankly, is a pain in the neck. At this point in my career I was hoping to be able to coast a little. No such luck. That's why fame helps––you can phone it in. They'll publish almost anything you write, like your grocery list and so on.
R&T: Do you ever experience any type of writer’s block?
Blumenthal: Actually, I do have a set of blocks with writing on them and I often play with them. But seriously. No. I've never had writer's block in my life. I think that might stem from my experience working for magazines and newspapers, which have stringent deadlines. You don't have time to be blocked. In fact, at Playboy, I was the guy they usually got when something was due last week. I could knock out 500 publishable words in about twenty minutes, no editing necessary. I guess I'm lucky that way.
R&T: Is there one type of writing you prefer over the others?
Blumenthal: Comedy. I've always done comedy. At least I think it's comedy, although some people might not. My work at Esquire and Playboy was mostly humor. My novels, TV work, and movies were comedies as well. Somehow, I just can't tell if it's good if it's not funny. Problem is, publishers aren't really looking for comedy unless you're David Sedaris, but he has a radio show which helps a lot. What I need is a radio show on NPR. Is there anyone from NPR out there reading this? I'd love a job and you wouldn't even have to pay me.
Anyway, comic novels are considered "mid-list books," which means they don't fall into the major categories such as Romance, Thrillers, Mystery or Chick-lit, the genres that usually sell the best. Christain books do well too, but I'm Jewish so that's not a realistic option.
But getting back to the question, when you consider that 200,000 books are published every year in the US and readership is steadily falling, publishers don't like to take chances. It was a lot different when I first wrote books back in the 1980's. In those days, if you sold 50,000 copies, your editor yawned. Today if you sell 10,000 you're a star. Go figure.
R&T: In your acknowledgements for Dorfman you say that it was originally self-published. Can you tell us a little about how it was picked up by St. Martin's Press? How do you feel now about the self-publishing route?
Blumenthal: I self-published it because every major publisher in NY turned it down. So did the small presses. Big publishers said it wasn't commercial enough and small "literary" publishers said it was too commercial. As a comic novel, nobody wanted to take the chance.
But the rejection letters gushed with praise, [so]… I started my own publishing house called Farmer Street Press, and made up a fictitious guy named Jerry Blake as the Editor-in-Chief, so I could have somebody to rave about the book…. I got lucky. Dorfman was well received by critics and made it to the BookSense76 List as well as January Magazine's 50 Best Books of 2000, which incidentally included Michael Chabon's The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay. Good company. Plus I sold 4000 books. But it's a lot of work and I doubt I'll ever do it again. Selling sheetrock is easier.
R&T: What made you start writing novels after your TV and movie career?
Blumenthal: Actually, I started writing novels for two reasons:
One, I had turned 50 and, in spite of the success of my last movie "Blue Streak," I was considered too old to write screenplays anymore…. Most people don’t know this but there is real age discrimination in the entertainment field…. Studio execs and agents are all in their 20's and they want movies aimed at 14 year olds. And if you're in a pitch session with one of these guys and you mention somebody like W.C Fields, you get a blank look, because they haven't got a clue who W.C. Fields was. It's pathetic actually.
Two, I got tired of other writers rewriting my scripts. This is standard procedure in Hollywood. "Blue Streak" was first written by me in 1989, then went into turnaround about 4 times––which means the original studio sold to another studio––and was rewritten by about 14 different writers, until the studio finally decided to go back to the original script. Nobody rewrites your novels unless your grammar really stinks.
R&T: What’s Wrong with Dorfman? and Millard Fillmore, Mon Amour are very humorous novels. In fact, I often found myself laughing out-loud. However, the underlying themes are meaningful. In Dorfman, I felt you were trying to show that we are all crazy to a greater or lesser extent, but if we learn to accept our own and other people's eccentricities, we can move forward, maybe even excel in our lives. In Millard Fillmore it was that we can never truly know anyone, yet we still need to take that leap of faith and allow ourselves to love. I hope I'm not sounding overly analytical, but do you think it is easier to express poignant themes when you serve it up with a dose of humor?
Blumenthal: I think poignant themes can be expressed in practically every genre. I just find it more fun to do it through comedy.
R&T: You do a wonderful job of depicting family interaction and how much our parents affect how we turn out. For example, your main character may employ a certain expression––like “no pun intended”––or demonstrate an obsession. Then when we finally 'meet" the parents, they use the same expression or show signs of the same obsession. You accomplish this so subtly that the reader may not pick it up until the second or third time. Was this something you worked at or did it just happen naturally?
Blumenthal: It happened pretty naturally, and thanks for the compliment. I've always been pretty good at dialogue and I think characters come to life most effectively through dialogue, which is one reason my books have a lot of conversational stuff in them. I don't like to be overly descriptive because I find long descriptive passages in books to be useless and boring in most cases. I skim through it all. I've seen some writers spend four pages describing a tomato. I know what a tomato looks like, enough already!
R&T: Do you think that your screenwriting has anything to do with this?
Blumenthal: Yes. Screenwriting taught me a lot about writing dialogue and how it can describe a character. You have to shorthand things in scripts because they have to be a certain length and nobody in Hollywood will even read a script that's over 120 pages. They're lazy, but that's how it is.
R&T: There is a part in Dorfman where the main character is waiting by the phone for a bidding war to begin on his screenplay. The tension is so high that I read it before bed and had a hard time falling asleep. Is that autobiographical?
Blumenthal: Definitely autobiographical, although I didn't go quite as batty as Dorfman. It is indeed a pins and needles kind of situation, partly because there's so much money at stake, and partly because your ego is on the line. I once had a script that got both Michael J. Fox and a powerful producer attached, but for some reason none of the studios were interested. It killed an entire weekend just waiting to hear…but it only took me six years to get over it. I’m pretty resilient.
R&T: What are you working on now?
Blumenthal: I've just finished a darkly comic novel about a 1920's Berlin cabaret comedian who ends up in a concentration camp when the Nazis come to power. After a year, he escapes and ends up in the US where the last thing anybody wants is a comedian with a German accent. There are a lot of subplots, but it would take a whole 500-word synopsis to explain them all. Berlin of the 1920's was a pretty debauched place, a tourist Mecca for Europe's sexual deviants…. It's much more interesting than a four page description of a tomato. The book is currently circulating with agents.
R&T: Many of our readers are also writers just getting started. What advice would you give them?
Blumenthal: Keep writing. If you have real talent, one day it will be noticed. And don't be discouraged by rejections––tastes change frequently in the writing business and what's not cool today might be cool next week or next year. You never know.
Also, don't try to write in a genre that you don't really like. Your disdain will show. Write about what you know or about what you find interesting. And don't take agents too seriously. Nobody really knows what will sell. Try to find a tenacious agent who loves your stuff and believes in it. Many give up after two or three rejections. It took Stephen King quite a while to get his first novel published, and now he's rich and for some idiotic reason, still lives in Maine…. Of course, luck and timing play a big part as well.
R&T: I can’t let you go without asking what it was like interviewing the entire original cast of Saturday Night Live?
Blumenthal: Actually, the SNL interview was almost a catastrophe. After much haggling, I managed to get cast and writers all in one big room. I started asking questions but nobody answered. Nobody said a word. I'm not sure why––fear of being one-upped? Temporary deafness? Catatonia? Too much grass? Who knows?
So what I ended up doing is interviewing each of them separately, asking each person–– Al Franken, Gilda Radner, Chevy Chase etc––the same questions and then, when I was all done and got the transcript, I edited it so that it seemed like they were all in the same room. Needless to say, it was an editing nightmare. I had a clothesline strung up in my Playboy office just so I could keep track of who said what. For all I know, I invented the group interview.
For more on John Blumenthal and his work visit his website .
Nannette Croce is Senior Prose Editor for The Rose & Thorn. Her short fiction has appeared in various online and print publications and her essays and book reviews have appeared in The Philadelphia Inquirer and Montana, the Magazine of Western History. Her articles on Native American Culture and History have also appeared on various sites online. Visit her website .
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