Charlie Kaufman in conversation with Jane Smiley at Live Talks Los Angeles

Charlie Kaufman in conversation with Jane Smiley
discussing the writing life and his novel, "Antkind"
to purchase a signed book, use this link:
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The bold and boundlessly original debut novel from the Oscar®-winning screenwriter of Being John Malkovich, Adaptation, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, and Synecdoche, New York.
Charlie Kaufman is the screenwriter of films including Anomalisa; Synechdoche, New York; Adaptation; Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind; and Being John Malkovich. He won an Academy Award for his work on Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and has been nominated three additional times. He is also a three-time BAFTA winner for screenwriting, and he has been nominated for three Golden Globe Awards, among many other film honors.
Jane Smiley is the author of numerous novels, including A Thousand Acres, which was awarded the Pulitzer Prize, and most recently, The Last Hundred Years Trilogy: Some Luck, Early Warning, and Golden Age. She is also the author of several works of nonfiction and books for young adults. A member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, she has also received the PEN Center USA Lifetime Achievement Award for Literature. Her next novel is Perestroika in Paris and publishes in December 2020.
“To paraphrase Charlie Kaufman, it’s like a brain factory in there! This is a whopper of a book, bursting with the driest of humor, the strangest of scenarios, and the most brilliant of observations. It is wholly original, maddening, and marvelous.”-Susan Orlean, author of The Library Book
“Each page is so stuffed with invention, audacity, and hilarity, it feels like an act of defiance. Antkind is a fever dream you don’t want to be shaken awake from, a thrill ride that veers down stranger and stranger alleys until you find yourself in a reality so kaleidoscopic you will question your own sanity-or: the novel only Charlie Kaufman could pull off.”-Maria Semple, author of Where’d You Go, Bernadette
B. Rosenberger Rosenberg, neurotic and underappreciated film critic (failed academic, filmmaker, paramour, shoe salesman who sleeps in a sock drawer), stumbles upon a hitherto unseen film made by an enigmatic outsider-a film he’s convinced will change his career trajectory and rock the world of cinema to its core. His hands on what is possibly the greatest movie ever made-a three-month-long stop-motion masterpiece that took its reclusive auteur ninety years to complete-B. knows that it is his mission to show it to the rest of humanity. The only problem: The film is destroyed, leaving him the sole witness to its inadvertently ephemeral genius.
All that’s left of this work of art is a single frame from which B. must somehow attempt to recall the film that just might be the last great hope of civilization. Thus begins a mind-boggling journey through the hilarious nightmarescape of a psyche as lushly Kafkaesque as it is atrophied by the relentless spew of Twitter. Desperate to impose order on an increasingly nonsensical existence, trapped in a self-imposed prison of aspirational victimhood and degeneratively inclusive language, B. scrambles to re-create the lost masterwork while attempting to keep pace with an ever-fracturing culture of “likes” and arbitrary denunciations that are simultaneously his bête noire and his raison d’être.
A searing indictment of the modern world, Antkind is a richly layered meditation on art, time, memory, identity, comedy, and the very nature of existence itself-the grain of truth at the heart of every joke.

[@nickzardiashvili624]

I think Antkind could potentially be a movie, but it would have to be at least 3 months long and would need to be watched forward, backward, upside down, et chetera.

[@ruly8153]

You just say etc I think I might buy this book

[@nickzardiashvili624]

@@ruly8153 Really? I thought it was et chetera... I think it might actually be some kind of a pum.

[@clanofclams2720]

@@ruly8153 nah, et chetera

[@nicolasdazefilms]

Love seeing Charlie again. New style as well, with the mustache!

[@rrluty]

It’s great to have a new book and movie from Kaufman. My copy of antkind is coming today, I can’t wait to read it.

[@14AspenDrive]

I just read the first chapter. It made me laugh out loud 4 times

[@nabil731]

How's the book? Do you love it?

[@14AspenDrive]

@@nabil731 yeah it's hilarious

[@nabil731]

@@14AspenDrive did the book confuse you? Because i've seen several people on internet said that the book is confusing

[@14AspenDrive]

@@nabil731 I'm only 100 pages into it. Cant say it's been very confusing so far.

[@lonelyone]

I have so many questions for Charlie and his process which I feel like no one is really getting into. He’s the type of person who I’d really like to get to know.

[@heeeyyy2947]

I may not be able to watch until I finish ANTKIND -- but until then: it's always incredible to hear from Charlie!!

[@ronanwalsh6394]

Did you finish it?

[@joelfutral]

What I really enjoyed about this book was that, although it was bizarre almost from the beginning, I began to realize that those early chapters were the comfortable parts and the new strangeness from the midway point until the end caused a severe sense of paranoia

[@attckonutube]

I like the Mark Twain look.

[@spooki6637]

i love charlie kaufman im a new fan

[@robonick3607]

That’s a legit ‘stache!

[@Patizm]

That moustache game is something else entirely 🙈

[@peterkohlmetzmoller]

[@cfishist]

I enjoyed this. I'd like to have asked him what aspect of making his latest film pushed him out of his comfort zone. 'Antkind' sounds like it could be as great as 'Infinite Jest'

[@nightrainbows1032]

Charlie, I wish you didn't have to endure these painfully mediocre interviews. Your work speaks for itself. I received my autographed hardback of ANTKIND. Thanks.

[@DevyanshBahri]

Where did you get that copy from?

[@cattothefuture]

The interviewer is actually a pretty interesting person. If you consider this more of a podcast, it might be a more enjoyable experience.

[@samcohen99]

Charlie K? That mustache bro 🤠😲

[@friendlypup5650]

Holy shit, that moustache threw me off

[@lilbigman777]

2:17 3:36 19:00

[@andreymakarov1744]

💆🏻‍♂️

[@rODIUMuk]

Charlie is hard to interview

[@spacewookie]

Especially if you ask questions like "are there any books that you really love".

[@alexandtherest]

🤣😂@@spacewookie