Watching Fran Lebowitz talk about life in America for 83 minutes will make you want to change life in America. But, very soon after she puts this notion in your head, you’ll realize why Lebowitz herself is so cynical. Changing America is quite impossible. It’s better just to laugh about the who and what of it all over a good cigarette and a good cup of coffee.
She talks about how every generation of New Yorkers recall how much better New York used to be. Lebowitz is just as guilty as the rest (as much she knows), but few make their point better and with more sting and compassion.
Directed by Martin Scorsese, Public Speaking is an interview with the writer, complimented by a whole lot of New York B-roll and Lebowitz archive footage. It’s a lean piece of filmmaking. All it seems to want is to expose another group of people to the writer/speaker/woman of opinions who never finished that first novel Exterior Signs of Wealth.
When asked if she believes people can be lucky, Lebowitz responds: “Gender. Here’s how lucky that is: any white, gentile male who didn’t become president, failed. Okay?” The majority of what she says is capped with ‘okay?,’ one of many quirks the artist offers without so much as an afterthought.
“I think it’s mostly important that we have a black president because we got it over with…it shouldn’t be our present, it should be our past,” she also says, during a conversation with fellow writer Toni Morrison.
Lebowitz says things that, once heard, feel kind of obvious in some way. Perhaps it’s the way she says it. Or perhaps it’s because most of what she says makes sense. She’s not a zealot, she’s not a politician, she’s just mostly right, as Morrison so astutely points out. She’s also never fair. Lebowitz claims that’s why she’s always right, because she’s never fair. Consider he lament of the slew of dead homosexuals in the late 80s/early 90s thanks to AIDS. All of the artists who died were the best around, she says, creating a black hole for the less-talented bunch to get famous: “If I could talk to those people, I’d say ‘You’ll never guess who’s famous now!’”
One thing’s for sure, she’s funny as hell. Laugh and get educated. Maybe even read a book after or something. And move to New York City while it’s still something like the way it used to be when art was art and celebrity was something else. Yes, this isn’t true, but it feels true listening to Lebowitz speak her mind.
