Sunday, January 20, 2008

My Dinner with the Thin White Duke


Piper at Lazy Eye Theatre has tagged me with a meme titled My Dinner With Blank, the rules of which are as follows:

1. Pick a single person past or present who works in the film industry you would like to have dinner with. And tell us why you chose this person.

2. Set the table for your dinner. What would you eat? Would it be in a home or at a restaurant? And what would you wear? Feel free to elaborate on the details.

3. List five thoughtful questions you would ask this person during dinner.

4. When all is said and done, select six bloggers to pass this Meme along to.

5. Link back to Lazy Eye Theatre, so people know the mastermind behind this Meme.

Here goes:

First, let's disqualify dead people, because if I was having dinner with a dead person, famous or not, my enjoyment of the evening would be hampered by the distracting knowledge that my dinner guest is fucking dead. Truth is, any answer to this question is going to be totally arbitrary, as there are a lot of people who I'd be equally happy to be dinner with. Fame isn't the deciding factor - of the famous people I've met, the only ones that have really given me a chill are those whose work I truly respect. With that in mind, I'll invite David Bowie. Does David Bowie count? He's a very good actor, you know. Yes, I believe it would have to be David Bowie.
We'd dine in Berlin, the site of Bowie's most fruitful creative period. I could list an elaborate bratwurst-centric three-course meal here, but you usually order for yourself at a restaurant, don't you? Maybe we wouldn't eat anything; maybe we'd just do a whole lot of cocaine instead (not that I've ever touched the stuff, but when you're dining with Bowie, y'know...).

As for five questions, this is dinner, not an interview. First, if I was coked-up in Berlin with Jareth the Goblin King, I don't know that I'd have anything intelligent to ask. Second, to come prepared with questions would be presumptuous and rude, and would likely ruin the chance of any real insight into Bowie's life or work. As Bowie himself once said, "I don't find it interesting to talk about what I did with my cock in the 1970s." So I would probably just ask him what he did with his cock in the 1970s, and let the conversation progress from there.



Tagged:

Greg at Dreamscape
Allen at Septenary
Milena at Mirrored Lines

7 comments:

Paul C. said...

Sweet, thanks! Just posted mine as well.

Also, Draaaaaaaaaaaaaainage!

Andrew Bemis said...

I told you I would eat youuuu!

PIPER said...

Beautiful. Bowie definitely counts. I don't do coke either, but when in Berlin.

I only suggested a pre-think of questions to avoid the usual (at least with me) Matt Foley-ish "Remember that time" or "Man, you're cool" which I have been guilty of more often than not.

Excellent post.

Andrew Bemis said...

I'd be more afraid of James Lipton-ing him to death, but that says more about my tendency to overthink such thing than the concept of questions itself.

Paul C. said...

Maybe instead of snorting coke you could just smoke a lot of big monkey butt.

And yes, I know that's not the actual lyric. But damn it, it ought to be.

Andrew Bemis said...

I used to think "this mellow thighed chick's just put out of place" was "the smell of fat chicks just put my spine out of place."

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