Eaxct Change 20th Anniversary

[David Morris]

James Wolcott relays third-hand a colorful incident involving an
"imperious" Sontag:
http://www.vanityfair.com/online/wolcott/2009/04/nate-silver-whom-i-met.html

In Phillip Lopate's Notes on Sontag (as juicily compact and smoothly
edible as Christopher Buckley's memoir about mum and pup), he tells a
story about Susan Sontag and an unnamed Italian director whose films
were paired on the same program at the New York Film Festival.

"The first night the program showed, it was my job to make
introductions of the filmmakers to the public, so I was in the Green
Room backstage a half-hour before curtain, when Susan swept in
requesting that I find twenty seats for her claque, who were waiting
outside. Though I had never heard of so many free passes being
demanded, particularly for a short, particularly at the last moment,
luckily I was able to accommodate her, with seats on the side boxes
where the filmmakers and their guests generally sat and, spotlit
afterward, received applause.

"Seeing the director of the charming Italian feature film a few feet
away, I thought to introduce Sontag to her. "Oh, we don't want to stay
for that crap!" Susan said in her emphatic voice, which I prayed the
Italian woman had not heard. Whether or not [Sontag] had ever seen the
Italian film before pronouncing it "crap," I was not going to argue
her out of her dismissal, lest her voice carry to the filmmaker. Even
if the poor woman, who it was very likely knew of and esteemed Sontag,
had not overheard this severe judgment on the crucial occasion of her
New York premiere, she could not fail to be wounded later by twenty
audience members in her vicinity leaving before the first image of her
film was projected.



On Mon, May 4, 2009 at 8:10 PM, rich <richard.romeo at gmail.com> wrote:
> is it me or is sontag the queen of hyperbole