Tag: Fleabag

Of ‘Fleabag,’ ROKon Magazine & Daydreaming About Jennifer Lawrence In The Movie Version Of This First Novel


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I really need to shut up about any potential movie adaptation of a novel that’s not even finish yet. But, lulz, I’m a nobody and the only people who read this blog are stalkers or people who stumble across it for this or that reason.

Phoebe Waller-Bridge

It’s the murder of a Fleabag-type character that ultimately serves as the catalyst for the dramatic transformation of small Southern town I’ve come up with. I’ve mentioned that Bella Thorne would be ideal to play the character in any movie potential movie adaptation, but I have a huge ego and, as such, I realize what I really what is Jennifer Lawrence to play a person that Bella Thorne could play just by being herself.

LONDON, ENGLAND – DECEMBER 01: Jennifer Lawrence attends a photocall for “Passengers” at Claridge’s Hotel on December 1, 2016 in London, England. (Photo by Anthony Harvey/Getty Images)

The character is inspired — even based on — the late Annie Shapiro who was, in her own way, at least somewhat like Fleabag. (This is really stretching it, but Fleabag is a character everyone understands when you invoke it and as such, that’s why I’m using it.)

The late Annie Shapiro. RIP.

Annie Shapiro was a very, very unique person. And I’ve been trying to tell our story in the context of ROKon Magazine in Seoul for the better part of 20 years now. But I’ve finally accepted that it’s just not going to happen. So, instead, I’m using things I know to be true and pouring them into a five novel series set around something else I know to be true — what it’s like to live in a small Southern town.

So, I guess what I’m saying is, in my mind, the character whose murder changes everything is a mixture of Annie Shapiro fused with Fleabag as played by Jennifer Lawrence if she was channeling Bella Thorne.

Bella Thorne

Anyway.

Of Bella Thorne & The Influence Of ‘Fleabag’ On These 5 Novels I’m Developing & Writing


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I really love Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s “Fleabag.” So, in the back of my mind as I work on these five novels, I think about that character in the context of the character who is really the source of all the chaos that attacks the little Southern town I’ve come up with.

So, let me lay out what’s going on. The first book starts about 25 years ago. And it’s about the events leading up to, and the immediate consequences of, the murder of a Fleabag-like young woman. Or, put another way, imagine the damage Fleabag might cause if you plopped her in a small Southern town 25 years ago.

A lot, is what I believe.

(If I was going to cast this particular character in a movie adaptation of this book, it would be Bella Thorne. She’s perfect.)

But the point is — the character did not deserve what happened to her, even if she was really causing a lot of problems for people in the town. And, as such, the five novels are about how one person’s has value. The over-all, macro arc of the story is about how each one of us has value as a human being, pretty much no matter how bad our behavior. (Within reason, of course.)

So, I like I toying with the implications of Fleabag-like character “coloring outside the lines” leading to her murder in a small town and how everyone has to deal with with the consequences over the course of a generation.

That’s the creative itch that keeps me obsessed with these five novels. That and the idea that by the time readers get to the four and fifth books the allegory for Trumplandia that I’ve come up with makes total sense. Of course that’s what would happen, I want readers to say to themselves when we discover how fucked up the small Southern town I’ve come with is by that point.

Call your agent (one day.)

But we are talking about five novels. Things are moving really fast at the moment — I’m currently at about the fourth chapter mark of either a really good first draft or a mediocre second draft. Let me be clear, however, I’m pretty much doing this in a total vacuum.

I don’t have a muse. I have no one to talk to. No one likes me and I have no friends. But I can tell a Goddamn good story. So, lulz, only time will tell, I guess.

After Trumplandia — The New Modern Era: Postmodernism & A Potential Pop Culture ‘Reset’


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Being old sucks. You can’t date cute 24 year old women without seeming like a creepy old man. You face ageism at every turn. And you’re left with a lot of wistful memories about this or that thing you could have done better or different a decade ago.

And, yet, at the same time, being older does give you some perspective on life. You start to be old enough to see macro trends that were once completely obscured. So, let’s talk about pop culture over the last, say, 50 years.

For me, the “Modern” media world starts with the films of the late 1970s and early 80s. That was Modern. I was too young to understand what was going on, of course, but those films like Being There, Annie Hall, Manhattan, The Empire Strikes Back and All That Jazz established the “modern” world. Such films established what was “real” for my little developing mind.

On a personal level, it wasn’t until Neo took The Red Pill in The Matrix that we entered the modern post-Modern era of media. (I say this only because, as I understand it, the original post-modernism happened in 1968 when the French intelligentsia grew disillusioned with Communism after the invasion of Czechoslovakia.)

After The Matrix, I would say the modern post-modernism was epitomized by The Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind. What a great film.

The point of all of this is, because of the Rona, it’s at least possible that we’re in for something of a reset in media. There will be the New Modern as opposed to the Post-Modern. There are a shit ton movies that have been delayed because of the Rona, so it’s possible that as all those movies get unclogged from the system that one of them might be That Movie that makes a huge impression on the tinder minds of Gen Z and starts the whole process over again. I would note in passing that one might point to the extreme post-modernism of Fleabag as a sign that such a reset is just about to happen.

Or not. Who knows.

But the Rona is such a huge macro event that has put a pause on the media world, it definitely seems that if any such reset is going to happen, right about now would be a great time for it to happen. And if you throw in the ultra-extreme post-modernistic nature of the Trump Era — and it’s rather abrupt conclusion, that, too might indicate Something Big in pop culture is happening.

It make take us years to see it, though.

Phoebe Waller-Bridge, #Hollywood, #JodiKantor & The #Novel I’m Developing & #Writing

Some thoughts.

Phoebe Waller-Bridge & The #Novel I’m Developing & #Writing — I Think We All Know a ‘#Fleabag’


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

One of the thing I’m really focused on right now is developing character. I have canon and plot, but squat when it comes to character. I am struggling to figure out the motivation of individual characters.

I’ve decided to think back to my time in Seoul’s expat scene in the 2006-2008 time frame. I met a number of pretty colorful people at that time — one of them being myself — and I’m using my extremely romanticized memory of these people as the basis of a number of the novel’s central characters.

One of those central characters is based on a very unique woman I knew in Seoul named Annie Shapiro. She’s tragically dead now, but in life, she dramatically changed my life.

We all know a Fleabag.

Ms. Shapiro was my Fleabag.

In fact, I would go so far as to say if Ms. Waller-Bridge wanted a follow-up to Fleabag, she should do a novel based on the life of Annie Shapiro. The two women kind of look a like, though Shapiro was younger than Waller-Bridge when she died.

Anyway, I’m inspired by what I remember of Shapiro as the basis of my heroine’s character. Shapiro was both my Fleabag and my manic pixie dream girl. So, my heroine is very much in the Fleabag – manic pixie dreamgirl spectrum if you shoved her into a vat of Lisbeth Salander. I like the idea that my heroine, but for events out of her control, would be a focused manic pixie dreamgirl with a very dark side.

The reason why Shapiro was so crucial in my life was she introduced me to a world I would otherwise never have experience. Of course, my actual life in that world was a complete disaster. It was all my fault. But I have all these memories from my time in Seoul that I can tap into.

I’m really focused on character, character, character. I don’t have forever, so I hope to start writing again around May 1st. But I’m going to think a lot in advance of that.

But the key thing is I really find a lot of inspiration in Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s honesty with Fleabag.

V-Log: The Honesty of #Fleabag in The #Trump Era Of Lies

Some thoughts.

Fleabag As The Quintessential Trump Era TV Show

Some thoughts. (The Fleabag stuff starts about 6 minutes in.)

V-Log: Of Fleabag, Lisbeth Salander & The #Thriller I’m #Writing

Some thoughts.

The Striking Difference in Reaction Between American & British Press To Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s ‘Fleabag’

Shelton Bumgarner

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

I have something of a celebrity crush on Phoebe Waller-Bridge. She did one of those goofy gimmick interviews and in it she said the best advice she ever got was to “Always to always smell nice, you don’t know who you’re going to hug.”

Well, I’ve watched a lot of interviews with Ms. Waller-Bridge about her hit show “Fleabag,” and it seems as though some more advice would be: British press is going to treat your show different than American press. One thing that keeps coming up in British interviews about the show is how “feminist” it is. I don’t recall an American interviewer mentioning it once.

I think that it is a testament to where the two cultures are right now. As I understand it, the UK never really went through the late 70s women’s movement like America did. There’s a reason why Page 3 girls are continue to linger in British culture. So the American audience for Fleabag doesn’t even think about if the show is meant to be “feminist” or not. They just think it’s funny.

I know I, at least, did not even think about the “feminist” aspect of the show until I kept seeing poor Ms. Waller-Bridge asked about it again and again and again by her British compatriots.

Anyway, I bet she does smell great.