Mailer's Minuet: 'Tough Guys' Two Left Feet
Karen Jaehne's interview in Film Comment (November–December 1987). Lennon judges that Mailer 'says more on filmmaking, and says it well, in this interview than in any other,' dissipating Jaehne's initial skepticism; he argues that forms 'should be explored, not obeyed.'
“Mailer’s Minuet: ‘Tough Guys’ Two Left Feet,” Karen Jaehne’s interview, ran in Film Comment 23 (November–December 1987), 11–17. By Lennon’s estimate Mailer “says more on filmmaking, and says it well, in this interview than in any other,” winning over Jaehne’s “initial skepticism about his abilities.” Mailer presses his lifelong argument against “categories” — “just critics’ attempt to bring order to a complex aesthetic universe” — and his credo that “forms … should be explored, not obeyed.” Tom Luddy, Wings Hauser, and Frances Fisher are also quoted. It is among the most substantial of the many Tough Guys Don’t Dance film interviews.