Fran Lebowitz needs to talk
The quintessential New Yorker will opine at the Segerstrom Center on Monday
Fran Lebowitz may be a writer who doesn't write much anymore — she's famously suffered from writer's block for decades now — but as a talker she's without peer.
Lebowitz, 72, might be familiar to you through her two acclaimed books, “Metropolitan Life” and “Social Studies.” The essays they contain reflect both her sardonic sensibilities and a quintessential kind of New York City perspective in which it's simultaneously the most wonderful and most annoying place on the planet.
Or you might know Lebowitz from her frequent appearances on television. David Letterman, Bill Maher and Jimmy Fallon often booked her for their latenight talk shows.
And filmmaker Martin Scorsese, a friend and fan, has made both a documentary, 2010's “Public Speaking,” and a 2021 Netflix docuseries, “Pretend It's a City,” about her. (Scorsese also cast her as a judge in “The Wolf of Wall Street,” a role she's also played on a dozen episodes of “Law & Order.”)
But it's onstage, talking to audiences, where Lebowitz works most, traveling the United States and Canada, and more recently overseas, too, talking to audiences about whatever is on her mind, whether they like it or not.
“I like doing this,” she says in the Scorsese film about her live events. “Because it's what I've wanted all my life — people asking me my opinion.”
Lebowitz comes to Southern California this month at venus that include the Segerstrom Center for the Arts on Monday.
To find out what's on her mind as she heads west, we rang her up in the old-fashioned way she requires. As she has no cellphone or computer, you're asked to dial her landline and start talking on her answering machine until she knows it's an expected call and picks up.
Here, with only light editing for length and clarity, is what we heard in our chat with a typically unfiltered Fran.
Q How did you get started doing these kinds of talking-onstage shows, and do you remember the first one you did?
A Yes, because I invented it. I know a lot of people do it now, usually a little differently than I do. But I invented it because I used to give readings, you know, and then sometimes someone would interview me and I might have some questions [from the audience].
And after what seemed like a long time to me I was really tired of reading the same stuff. And I said to the woman who was running the stage in San Francisco, I said, “I don't wanna do the same thing.
Why can't someone just interview me, and then I can answer questions?”
She said, “You can't do that.” I said, “Why not?” She said, “Because no one does it.” Well, now everyone does it.
Q When you first started, were you nervous?
A You know, for some reason, I have never been nervous on a stage or on a TV show or anything. I actually really enjoyed it. I know the world is full of people with stage fright. There was a very successful television talk show host who had this horrible stage fright. I used to think, “You don't have to do this. I mean, this isn't like a law you have to have a talk show.”
Q Your love for New York City always come through clearly, yet you also seem annoyed by it at times.
A I think complaining is part of loving New York. Because all New Yorkers complain. I mean, you could say all people complain, but not all people complain about where they live or things that are intrinsic to where they live. Except like people in L.A. complain about traffic. I always say to people, “You're the traffic. Yes, there's horrible traffic in L.A. — because you drive everywhere.”
The truth is that New York is so hard to live in in every possible way. There's nothing not hard about living in New York. There's a part of me that feels I do this, and there's some reason it makes it worth it. Because there are a billion places easier to live. There's a billion places cheaper to live, for sure. There's many, many places more beautiful to live. It's not Florence; it's not Paris.
I think that the complaining, to me, is just truth-telling. You know, `Yes, can you believe … ?' And every day you leave your apartment and things that were just really bothering you yesterday, guess what? They've been replaced by five new things.
Q You've got 30 of these shows in the next three months in the U.S. and Europe. How would describe yourself as a traveler?
A Very bad. I would describe myself as a very, very bad traveler. Almost invariably I've noticed I'm the angriest person in the airport. It could be a little tiny airport. It could be a gigantic airport. And I realized that although there might be other angry people there, no one is anywhere near me in the level of rage.
Part of that is being old. So that I actually remember when it was really pleasurable to fly. And that's a very bad thing to have in your mind.
Q What makes you so mad?
A I don't have a phone, so I look around and no matter where I am, everyone's on their phone except me. So I realized that when you're on that phone, that's like a place. So it doesn't really matter to some people whether they're on the phone waiting for that flight that's now six hours delayed, or on the phone on the plane, or on the phone where they're going.
I am actually where I am. And where I don't want to be is in the airport. I go to the airport because that's where the plane leaves from. I would much rather the plane left from my apartment but it doesn't. It just drives me insane.
Because as you know, no other business is run like the airlines. No one goes to a restaurant where they order food, then the wrong food comes in. You get this giant check. And then, you know, someone hits you in the face. That's what it is to fly.
Q What's it like for you to leave New York City and get off the plane in Southern California?
A Well, I've spent tons and tons of time in L.A. so L.A. is a familiar place to me. But if you're asking me, obviously I prefer New York to L.A. — that's why I live in New York. But I have been to many, many places [on tour] that make L.A. look like Paris. Many.
So I like cities, and L.A., I know it's a city, but it's not a city. So my next favorite city in the United States is Chicago. I know it's freezing there but I don't care. A lot of people live in places because they like the weather. I would never live in a place because of the weather. Who cares?
Q Do you drive when you're out here?
A I used to but I don't anymore. Unlike many New Yorkers, I drive, because I grew up in New Jersey. When I say I spent a lot of time in L.A. I'm sure it adds up to years. And for many years I stayed in the same places, people's houses, friends and stuff.
And I have not a bad sense of direction, but such a terrible one that I could stay in the same place, month after month, and go to the same places and get completely lost. So one of the upsides of sitting in the back of the car instead of the front of the car is if we get lost it won't be my fault.