Little Known Facts A Novel - By Christine Sneed Page 0,75

be. If something like this—someone else’s words rather than a doctor’s prescription—brings you comfort, you shouldn’t sneer at it.

Elise, who doesn’t know anything about Isis, except that I talk to a psychic from time to time, thinks I should just be able to put Melinda’s memoir out of my mind, as does Anna. I know they’re right because there have been a lot of things printed about me that I’d prefer not to have out there. But nothing this personal, especially not from someone whom I was very close to at one time. When I met Melinda, she was beautiful, sweet, in need of rescue from low self-esteem and a bad marriage, and also endearingly starstruck, but not in the annoying way that fans sometimes are. She didn’t feel compelled to tell me every other minute how much she loved my work, how much better I was than every other actor, how her parents and friends would never believe she had met me—could she take my picture? Great! How about a few dozen more?

People are buying this memoir, and they aren’t buying it because they love how Melinda writes. I’m trying to feel flattered, but it’s not easy. She’s definitely not a writer, and she won’t ever write another book, unless she gets on the children’s book bandwagon, which it seems everyone, including the guy who trims the neighbors’ hedges, is probably about to cash in on.

My brother says I should sue for slander, but I don’t see the point. The book is already out there, living its own sorry life, having its sordid affairs, and unless every copy can be hunted down and destroyed and every reader’s memory of it wholly erased, the damage is done. Why bring more attention to it? I also have no desire to stand in a courtroom with Melinda a second time and look on the weary, knowing face of a judge who is likely to think we are both spoiled children.

We are a cheating species, both male and female, whether or not we are famous. Why, I would really like to know, does this fact continue to surprise and scandalize so many people?

Some people say, Isis included, that I should thank Melinda. After all, I’m getting older, and although I keep doing respectable work and might have the kind of longevity Clint Eastwood has had, I do know that the laws of gravity apply to me, despite what that Vanity Fair columnist wrote. I realize that I won’t always be interesting to moviegoers or journalists. I also realize that there is a date of expiration to all of these good times, one that I can’t predict; probably no one can, not even Isis. And this is something I have to live with because it can’t be burned away on the first day of every new year.

E. MUST-SEE

When you’re waiting for the reviews to come out, it’s like waiting for a hurricane to hit—you feel an almost unbearable tension and anxiety, but one that I think a lot of movie people are addicted to. To be talked about favorably, even fawningly; to see your name in the New York Times, the Guardian, Le Monde, La Repubblica, Der Spiegel, and any other major newspaper that still publishes movie reviews—this is one of the things people like me aspire to.

Some of the highlights—

More than 20 critics agree: Bourbon at Dusk, 4 out of 4 stars. A masterpiece. Bourbon at Dusk is the year’s first must-see.

—New York Times

Elise Connor is a revelation, an actress of the finest caliber. A star has indeed been born.

—Los Angeles Times

Renn Ivins proves that he can write and direct with the same intelligence and suppleness with which he acts. You really need to see this movie. As with Spike Lee’s When the Levees Broke, Ivins and his co-writer Scott Jost have gotten to the heart of one of the biggest tragedies and failures of leadership in recent memory.

—The Oregonian

Marek Gilson is in his finest form. Think Newman and The Hustler.

—Entertainment Weekly

If you see only one movie this year, make sure it’s Bourbon at Dusk. I can’t stop thinking about it.

—Chicago Tribune

A truly humane portrait of a New Orleans family struggling to survive both the communal and personal horrors of life after Hurricane Katrina.

—FilmCritic.com

One of the few bad ones (and try as I might, I can’t forget what this fucker wrote):

As if the world needs more tragedy porn. Ivins does a passable job as director, but couldn’t he have cast less pretty actors?