David Simon on ‘The Colbert Report’
04.08.10
David Simon, who I shouldn’t have to tell you is the creator of “The Wire” and “Treme,” was Stephen Colbert’s guest last night. It’s a great interview to watch, because as much as I love Simon’s work, he has a tendency to take himself so seriously that he’s not always the best ambassador of his own work. Enter Colbert, who says things like:
["Treme" is] just like “Sex and the City,” except the city is New Orleans, and instead of sex, it’s heartbreaking despair.
You say that “Treme” is “Glee” for black people… are you saying that there are no gay black people?
Video of the entire interview is below. It includes a good clip from “Treme” that I hadn’t seen before, and I’ve spent a lot of time watching every little clip of “Treme” that I can find.
Anyway, “Treme” debuts this coming Sunday, and I recommend you watch it. You know how everyone who’s watched “The Wire” can’t stop talking about how great it is? Well, this is your chance to get in on the ground floor. You either watch it now, or you resignedly make a resolution to watch the entire damn series on DVD six years from now after getting sick of people talking how you need to watch it. Join us, or we’ll annoy you with pseudo-intellectual conversations stemming from white guilt.
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The only questions that I would ask Simon would surround the potential nudity of Khandi Alexander.
You either watch it now, or you resignedly make a resolution to watch the entire damn series on DVD six years from now after getting sick of people talking how you need to watch it.
Seriously, have you been hiding in my living room this week?
Look Matt, I’m with you on The Wire, no arguments there, but (and I know you probably won’t admit this) but I think you know that Treme does not look like it’s going to be a good show. It looks like up-its-own-ass Post-Katrina sentimentality. Don’t drink the kool-aid just cause Simon’s involved; everything he’s been attached two except for the first four seasons of the wire has been complete crap. And yes, that does include Generation Kill.
Colbert is a guilty pleasure of mine. Like black chicks.
Don’t drink the kool-aid just cause Simon’s involved; everything he’s been attached two except for the first four seasons of the wire has been complete crap. And yes, that does include Generation Kill.
That opinion negates your entire argument. You may not like “The Corner” or Generation Kill, but to call them “complete crap” comes off as ineffective Internet hyperbole from a hypercritical cynic. At the very least, Simon’s dedication to realism (I was in the same Marine Division at the same time as the characters in GK, and its ability to capture the characters and setting was flawless) deserves fair criticism, not the casual dismissal of what Dave Eggers calls the “venally impatient and yet startlingly lazy cultural bystanders.”
This is why I ask you people to tell jokes. Because I will own your ass with big words if I have to.
Own us with big words huh? Oh yeah, the intellectual and distinguished Blogger, heroically shaping the cultural which other venally impatient bystanders mock with uneducated contempt. So much smarter and astute then his readers, he only dumbs it down for the ignorant masses, how he longs to be able to write for Slate. Oh look, he can quote middling writers, he’s so smart.
And what about Treme?
OHHHHHHHHH. Someone just got PWND!!! TOTAL PWNAGE!!!
I agree with your point, M-Uff, but quoting a pompous jackass like Eggers is no way to “own” your opponents asses.
fight! fight! fight!
This is why I ask you people to tell jokes.
*record scratches, everyone freezes*
The fuck you mean, “you people”?
RALLY ROUND THA FAMILY!!! WITH A POCKET FULL OF SHELLS!!!
Now now, don’t push the Slate button. I won’t take that bait.
Quoting Eggers is unseemly because it’s cool to hate him, but I can’t very well lift his words without crediting him.
There’s a difference between making fun of things for the point of humor — which I do because it’s fun and a nice way to pass the time (and make a living) — and calling things that are highly regarded “complete crap” because you’re too cool to fall in line with the conventional wisdom and/or you resent it because people you hate like it, or whatever. I don’t know and won’t assume the reasoning behind your argument, but the fact that we’re having this discussion at all is less fun than just saying David Simon looks like he has toadstool DNA.
Okay, that was fun, but let’s not do this, I need this site to get through the day. I retract the “complete crap” and replace it with, “For me, it was sort of really crappy” – especially the last season of the wire”.
And Treme? Up-its-own-ass Post Katrina sentimental bullshit? Come on, your with me on this one, I can feel it.
And Treme? Up-its-own-ass Post Katrina sentimental bullshit? Come on, your with me on this one, I can feel it.
I’ve developed an innovative approach in that I’m actually going to watch the series first and, after I’ve seen it, then I’ll formulate an opinion.
@Nitty: I think you’re rushing to judgment. I had a conversation yesterday with someone who said that the “Treme” ads didn’t really get him excited for the show. I said, “If you had seen ads for ‘The Wire’ before you had seen any episodes and therefore had no emotional investment in the characters, would you be particularly excited about it?” He said no.
It’s possible that you’re right about “Treme.” But if I’m going to criticize it (or praise it), I’m going to wait until after I watch it. Until then, I’ll just be holding on to these high expectations and my penis.
“Look at me Brad, I’m a man now! Just like you, except I don’t look like a faggot and talk all educated.” Maybe i was still euphoric from having finally watched The Wire but i thought Generation Kill was magnificent.
@matt
any more room? i have tiny hands
I’ll only watch Treme if Omar french-kisses that beautiful boy Brandon.
Ah, this is what I love about the internet. NittyGritty is either a troll or a contrarian hipster who beats of to Tim and Eric.
Oh, I hate hipsters. I harass and arrest them any chance I get. Also, Generation Kill was excellent.
Matt,
How can you reserve judgment for Treme until you’ve seen it, but jump all over Twist of Kate before it’s ever aired? It’s just hypocritical and lazy. Twist of Kate deserves a chance!
Not sure what a troll is, Contrarian sounds about right. Call me a hipster and prepare to fight to the death.
Gotta agree that I’m cautiously optimistic for Treme. I often felt watching The Wire that I was supposed to like it rather than actually like it. For all the wonderful dramatic moments and novelistic scope of the storytelling, there were an awful lot of really, really dreadful attempts at collegial humor (at least the Police and the Gangsters) and many moments that felt inauthentic – Omar’s out-of-nowhere knowledge of Greek mythology anybody? What I loved about the show, and yes, I am so, so, so white, was that I got to see a different part of the American experience that is so infrequently covered by our mass media. Like Mad Men, Breaking Bad and to lesser extent Friday Night Lights, when The Wire was good, it was sublime – when it cut to needless black on black lesbian sex, it was just another premium cable show trying to get eyeballs. (And I say lesser for FNL only because I am so often delighted at it’s un-TV moments that seem to be more plentiful than on Mad Men and Breaking Bad.) Penis joke.
YAYYYY That was fun… Can we go again???
If you are going to get into a cool internet fight about “everything Simon has done except The Wire”, you should at least mention Homicide: Life on the Street, which was probably the second-best cop show ever.
i was pronouncing it ‘treem’ in my head. luckily, i havn’t embarrassed myself at any of my polo matches or art auctions.
THIS MOTHERFUCKER DON’T CARE FOR THE 2 FANS HE HAS OUTSIDE OF THE U.S. WE’RE 20% OF YOUR GROSS PAGE VIEWS! COLONIAL VIDEO POSTING MOTHERFUCKER
@THIS:
i’d like to subscribe to your newsletter.
@Menace I pronouncing it wrong in my head too, I thought Colbert was making a joke.