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David Mamet Turns to Cartooning
Posted: Nov 07, 2007
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LOS ANGELES (AP) -- David Mamet found an immediate outlet for his creativity during the Hollywood writers strike.
In a cartoon published Tuesday on the op-ed page of the Los Angeles Times, Mamet played the labor dispute for laughs, appearing to lampoon Writers Guild of America strikers.
The cartoon, drawn in a rough scribble, shows two men, each wearing a "WGA on Strike" button. One, with sunglasses and a palm tree-decorated shirt, says: "Whaddaya think, will we end up on the breadline?"
"I don't touch carbohydrates," the other cartoon figure responds.
Mamet, a Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright ("Glengarry Glen Ross") and a screenwriter, also is creator and executive producer of the CBS TV series "The Unit."
The show remained in production Tuesday, the day after the union went on strike against producers, but Mamet was observing the walkout, as was fellow executive producer Shawn Ryan, a show spokesman said.
A request for comment from Mamet was made to his agent Tuesday but there was no immediate response.
Ryan, creator of "The Shield," is a member of the WGA negotiating committee.
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While not everyone's cup of tea, David Mamet's plays fascinate me. He has a finesse with direct, course, punchy dialogue that other playwrights like to imitate. Mamet dialogues may be hard to play onstage, for some anyway, because the writer seems to want lines to fall one on the other -- even interrupting what came before -- like rapid machine gun fire. Some actors just can't get into the rhythm.
I like his films as well. "Glengarry Glen Ross" is one hateful, vindictive, foul-mouthed film, and I mean that in the best possible way. It has one of the best casts you'll ever see in one film, and is probably the most intense dialog-driven film this side of "12 Angry Men."