People are cruel, and I’m glad she survived it. “If I ever said anything critical about her, I’m sorry,” the Fear of Flying novelist told me on Wednesday, “because women have a tough time when they get famous for anything sexual. Also, she points out that real liberation can only happen when women are honest with themselves when they look at their lives.Feminist icon Erica Jong admits she’s among the cynics and doubters-including, as it happens, this reporter-who were wrong about Monica Lewinsky. She tells young women that they are allowed to write and use their experiences. She kept saying that sometimes it feels like your grandparents and your parents are sitting on your shoulders, looking at what you just wrote. She uses the remnants of her fame, but also her incredible experience. But she loves teaching creative writing, she is interested in young writers, especially female. I think she doesn’t assume she is still well-known. How does she see her legacy now? By making this film, she wants to be reintroduced to new readers, I guess? At the end of the film, there is no lipstick at all. #Erica jong movieAnd we told her: “Forget your stylist.” The first time, she looked like a movie star from the 1930s. She became more private, was ready to show herself even when she felt weak. She has been on television and on stage, but I knew that the longer I would be there, the longer we would talk – also about her ailing husband for example – she would change. Is it harder to get something more authentic out of someone like that?Įvery protagonist needs a different process. #Erica jong how toShe is a performer too, as you show in some old interviews – she always knew how to deliver the message. Once she said: “They will put it on my gravestone.” There is some tragedy in that too, being reduced to this one thing. It was just a fantasy! Men always had them and she allowed herself the same thing: the thought of that brief encounter, of having sex with someone and forgetting him. “The zipless fuck,” well, she also finds it fascinating that such a tiny thing became so important. There must be a way to go forward when it comes to women and their destinies. She still thinks about how she can change the world – this attitude is still there. But she seems very interested in how feminism has changed. She became a bit forgotten or looked down upon because of things like the “zipless fuck”. After a while, she said: “I finally get it. When she thought it was over, I told her it was just the beginning. It sounds like she was testing you a little? She realised it was serious and started to talk about everything she has experienced. When we met in person, after two hours she said: “Kaspar, we are going to have a lot of fun.” It didn’t mean anything, so I told her that next time, I was bringing the camera. She wasn’t interested in talking about her life at that point, in repeating all these stories she had told ten times already. But all she wanted to talk about was Trump and I wanted to know more about her. I wrote her a letter and two days later I got a reply: “Sounds interesting, let’s set up a phone call.” Very laconic. I told her: “I haven’t read all your books, I am reading them now, and I don’t have a clear concept.” Which, to her, was quite irritating. I was very honest, because that’s what I learnt from Erica Jong: to be very honest. She was surprised that I wanted to make a documentary. It’s incredible that it hasn’t been done before, also given her notoriety. I was amazed and intrigued by her intelligence, all the contradictions and the humour, of course. I had to know what had happened, where she was now, what it meant for her when she wrote Fear of Flying. Sex was important, but it was more about liberation and what you actually want as a woman. That’s how it was described at the time, which is ridiculous. Then I thought: “Erica Jong?” I remembered the criticism surrounding her work 50 years ago, the accusations of promoting pornography. When her book Fear of Dying came out, I had just finished a film about a woman who knew she was going to die. Cineuropa: Maybe it has to do with my own prejudices, but I was surprised that you directed this film – I was expecting a woman to be behind it.
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