One Battle After Another, the new loose adaptation of Vineland by director Paul Thomas Anderson, has gotten Thomas Pynchon's blessing, according to an interesting article at The Film Stage:
“ 'Realistically, for me, Vineland was going to be hard to adapt. Instead, I stole the parts that really resonated with me and started putting all these ideas together. With [Pynchon’s] blessing,' Anderson notes, confirming he’s one of the rare individuals on the planet who has crossed paths with Pynchon, the reclusive postmodernist author whose new book Shadow Ticket arrives just after One Battle hits theaters."
Describing the new movie, the article says, "While the story of revolutionaries is inspired by Thomas Pynchon’s 1990 novel Vineland (moving up the events a few decades), Anderson’s film barely lifts a sentence from its source material, instead using just the basic structure to tell a story all his own."
I have not crossed paths with Pynchon (that I know of, of course) but when I read Chapter 11 of Vineland, I did wonder if Pynchon has been to Oklahoma, where I grew up and lived for any years and still have relatives; the description of Oklahoma City was accurate, and the details of the big storm coming into the city sounded like it came from someone who was familiar with Oklahoma's violent thunderstorms. I ran a couple of searches, but I can't find any proof Pynchon has traveled to Oklahoma.
2 comments:
Pynchon does very well with those sorts of details. The Southern California details in Inherent Vice ring very true as well.
TRP lived in Manhattan Beach for a while, so we know details about the Los Angeles area in CoL49, Vineland and Inherent Vice are based on being there. I lived in San Pedro for 10 years, on the LA Harbor, and was very familiar with Palos Verdes, Redondo Beach, Hermosa Beach, Torrance...all areas I can "see" in my mind as he describes driving around there. He'd make his way up the 405 to cut up to UCLA and do research in the library there. He has a fantastic memory for the place.
He's been very candid about using maps and travel guides to depict places he hadn't been. However...
The 10-15 people who "track" TRP's moves over the years say he was quite itinerant in the 17 years between GR and Vineland, from CA to NY, but stops in other areas of the US to visit old friends. He could have actually spent time in OK City. At this point I wonder if we'll ever know.
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