WEBVTT - Roz Chast Draws—and Talks to—Alec Baldwin 0:00:07.320 --> 0:00:10.440 This is Alec Baldwin, and you're listening to Here's the thing, 0:00:11.039 --> 0:00:15.600 My chance to talk with artists, policymakers, and performers, to 0:00:15.680 --> 0:00:20.080 hear their stories. What inspires their creations, what decisions change 0:00:20.120 --> 0:00:26.799 their careers, what relationships influenced their work. If you've ever 0:00:26.880 --> 0:00:29.840 picked up an issue of The New Yorker, chances are 0:00:29.960 --> 0:00:34.000 you've seen the work of cartoonist Ro's Chaste. Her characters 0:00:34.040 --> 0:00:37.320 appear to be hastily drawn in colored pencils by a 0:00:37.400 --> 0:00:41.800 clever child while talking on the phone, But on closer examination, 0:00:41.880 --> 0:00:46.480 you recognize the complex emotions that her drawings contain. Though 0:00:46.479 --> 0:00:49.360 their faces are made up of only a few squiggles. 0:00:49.760 --> 0:00:52.960 You spot a look of resentment in the mother, resignation 0:00:53.120 --> 0:00:56.480 in the father, entitlement in the sun, and defiance in 0:00:56.560 --> 0:01:01.280 the daughter. Chaste gives life to the objects around the 0:01:01.320 --> 0:01:04.080 family as well. She trains her eye on what the 0:01:04.120 --> 0:01:08.479 rest of us don't see, archiving the detritus real or imagined, 0:01:08.680 --> 0:01:11.680 that we lead behind in our wake. You could call 0:01:11.720 --> 0:01:15.760 her an anthropologist of human emotions, but Ros's Chaste prefers 0:01:15.800 --> 0:01:20.520 to keep our title simple. I guess a cartoonist. Yeah, cartoonist, 0:01:20.560 --> 0:01:22.880 And how long have you been doing the pieces for 0:01:22.880 --> 0:01:27.000 the New Yorker since when I started in for the 0:01:27.000 --> 0:01:29.360 New Yorker. For the New Yorker, yeah, and did you 0:01:29.360 --> 0:01:31.319 know how does that work? Did you submit and submit 0:01:31.360 --> 0:01:33.880 for eons and eons and finally got accepted or no. 0:01:34.080 --> 0:01:37.280 I had a very strange experience when I got out 0:01:37.280 --> 0:01:40.160 of art school. I was starting to take a portfolio 0:01:40.200 --> 0:01:43.560 around and I was doing cartoons for various places. I 0:01:43.600 --> 0:01:46.160 actually thought I would wind up working for the Village Voice. 0:01:46.200 --> 0:01:47.960 That was sort of my goal, because that's where I 0:01:48.000 --> 0:01:51.920 pictured myself. You know, Jules Feiffer did cartoons for the 0:01:52.000 --> 0:01:54.280 Village Voice, and I thought, well, if I work really 0:01:54.320 --> 0:01:56.080 hard and if I'm really lucky, and if there's a 0:01:56.160 --> 0:02:00.120 receptive editor, that's where I'll be. My parents subscribed The 0:02:00.160 --> 0:02:02.280 New Yorker, and so at some point I thought, well, 0:02:02.560 --> 0:02:04.640 I might as well try them. But I really did 0:02:04.680 --> 0:02:07.720 not think that that was where my cartoons would be because, 0:02:07.800 --> 0:02:12.359 especially in my cartoons were not what they had in 0:02:12.400 --> 0:02:17.040 the magazine, and uh, but I thought, uh, how would 0:02:17.040 --> 0:02:19.359 you describe what was in the magazine? And they were 0:02:19.360 --> 0:02:22.960 mostly single panel cartoons with a gagline underneath a lot 0:02:22.960 --> 0:02:25.359 of them were funny. I liked a lot of the 0:02:25.480 --> 0:02:28.320 art in them. I loved, you know, Charles Adams and 0:02:28.600 --> 0:02:31.400 Ed Coren, Jack Ziegler, there were a lot of Gay 0:02:31.520 --> 0:02:33.639 Wilson when he appeared. There were a lot of cartoons 0:02:33.680 --> 0:02:36.280 that I liked. But I just did not see my 0:02:36.360 --> 0:02:38.760 stuff in there. I guess because of the single panel thing, 0:02:38.800 --> 0:02:42.840 and especially back then, my stuff was lots of panels, 0:02:43.000 --> 0:02:47.080 and they were really really tiny. The boxes were about 0:02:47.160 --> 0:02:50.679 postage stamp sized, and in fact, the editor of The 0:02:50.680 --> 0:02:52.280 New Yorker told me that I had to start making 0:02:52.320 --> 0:02:55.040 them bigger because um, they were just very hard to see. 0:02:55.120 --> 0:02:59.120 But I think, in this sort of logical but sort 0:02:59.120 --> 0:03:01.880 of slightly in main way, I thought, if I just 0:03:02.080 --> 0:03:06.440 draw really small, like, nobody will get really angry with me. 0:03:07.000 --> 0:03:09.360 So anyway, one time, and it was in April of 0:03:09.639 --> 0:03:12.280 seventy eight, I dropped off this portfolio of cartoons to 0:03:12.280 --> 0:03:14.320 The New Yorker. I had called them up and found 0:03:14.320 --> 0:03:16.480 out when they saw stuff over the transome. I didn't 0:03:16.480 --> 0:03:22.200 know anybody there. I didn't know computers the internet paper right, 0:03:22.320 --> 0:03:24.800 and I didn't know how many cartoons. Was the editor 0:03:24.840 --> 0:03:29.359 then William Shaun and uh Lee Lawrence was the cartoon 0:03:29.400 --> 0:03:31.680 the art editor. There was no cartoon editor. He was 0:03:31.720 --> 0:03:34.360 in charge of all the art, the covers, the inside. 0:03:34.400 --> 0:03:36.720 You know, there wasn't that much art. There was the cartoons, 0:03:36.720 --> 0:03:38.720 there was the covers. They were spot drawings, and that 0:03:38.800 --> 0:03:41.080 was pretty much it. When I came back next week 0:03:41.120 --> 0:03:43.839 to pick them up. I had about sixty cartoons in there. 0:03:43.880 --> 0:03:45.720 I really did not know what I was doing. There 0:03:45.800 --> 0:03:48.040 was a note from him to come back and see him. 0:03:48.240 --> 0:03:50.320 Turned out i'd sold a cartoon and he told me 0:03:50.360 --> 0:03:52.920 to come back every week. So that's kind of what 0:03:52.960 --> 0:03:55.360 I've been doing. Would you would say that you're in 0:03:55.440 --> 0:03:58.200 the if they do they do double issues, so they 0:03:58.200 --> 0:04:01.440 probably put out what about fifty issues or forty eight 0:04:01.440 --> 0:04:03.640 issues a year, something like that, And you'd say that 0:04:03.680 --> 0:04:06.680 you appear in the magazine how often per year? It 0:04:06.760 --> 0:04:11.080 goes on streaks? I mean it's uh, they'll take whatever 0:04:11.080 --> 0:04:14.240 you've got. No, no, I mean it's weird stuff you 0:04:14.280 --> 0:04:16.839 send them, no tons because I mean they reject at 0:04:16.920 --> 0:04:21.200 least of the stuff you submit. Yes, the way, there's 0:04:21.240 --> 0:04:23.719 I don't know, maybe forty cartoonists on staff, and we 0:04:23.800 --> 0:04:27.880 all submit a group of cartoons. Every week. I send 0:04:27.920 --> 0:04:32.480 in usually six to eight cartoons, and um, sometimes they 0:04:32.480 --> 0:04:35.360 take one, sometimes they don't take any. Every blue moon 0:04:35.440 --> 0:04:38.640 they take too. But the overwhelming majority of what I 0:04:38.680 --> 0:04:41.719 turned in is rejected. Where does that go? It goes 0:04:41.760 --> 0:04:47.039 on top of my file cabinet with its other reject brethren, 0:04:47.720 --> 0:04:51.640 the graveyard, Graveyard chest imagination. Yeah, but you know, then 0:04:51.640 --> 0:04:56.560 I publish somewhere else. I used to do sonics cartoons 0:04:56.560 --> 0:05:00.800 for a Scientific American UM and read book. Uh, you 0:05:00.839 --> 0:05:03.640 don't put them online on a website. That is ross 0:05:03.720 --> 0:05:14.760 chess rejected cartoons, man, I so they don't go on 0:05:14.800 --> 0:05:28.279 a website website, Okay, Now, Crumbler and UM, so much trouble, 0:05:28.560 --> 0:05:31.960 so much trouble, and they're just bad anyway, And anyway, 0:05:32.360 --> 0:05:35.200 sometimes I redraw them and and I reworked them. And 0:05:35.480 --> 0:05:37.680 you know, because if I'm really stubborn about a joke, 0:05:37.720 --> 0:05:39.440 if I think this could be a good joke, if 0:05:39.440 --> 0:05:43.040 I just need to make it better, you know. So 0:05:43.120 --> 0:05:44.839 where did you go to art school? I went to 0:05:45.000 --> 0:05:47.840 Rhode Island School of Design. You went to Rid, Right, 0:05:48.040 --> 0:05:50.599 What did you study there? You study art? And I 0:05:50.680 --> 0:05:53.960 started out. I started out in graphic design because I 0:05:54.000 --> 0:05:56.839 thought I would be practical, and I hated it. It 0:05:57.000 --> 0:06:00.560 was just, you know, a lot of it's like this 0:06:00.640 --> 0:06:05.640 was about learning to be neat and measure exactly, and uh, 0:06:05.680 --> 0:06:07.920 I really was not good at that. I had been 0:06:07.960 --> 0:06:10.200 cartooning since you were a child. Yeah, you started when 0:06:10.200 --> 0:06:11.719 you were young. I started when I was really little. 0:06:11.760 --> 0:06:13.000 And I think a lot of it had to do 0:06:13.080 --> 0:06:15.080 with that I was an only child and my parents 0:06:15.080 --> 0:06:17.320 were a lot older, and there was one way to 0:06:17.520 --> 0:06:22.440 kind of keep me entertain after Known'm kidding, ha ha. 0:06:23.080 --> 0:06:27.039 And the chasti and psychological condition was that in the 0:06:27.080 --> 0:06:29.920 early drawings as well. Oh, I think ross chest as 0:06:29.920 --> 0:06:35.600 a child, what's the point help me going to the library? 0:06:36.279 --> 0:06:38.919 I like the library. What's the point of going to 0:06:39.000 --> 0:06:43.680 the movies? We have snacks at home. No. I think 0:06:43.680 --> 0:06:46.240 when I was a kid, I drew everything. I mean 0:06:46.240 --> 0:06:49.360 I like to draw people. I liked, you know, funny 0:06:49.480 --> 0:06:55.440 remarks and conversations and yeah, you know, I just like 0:06:55.520 --> 0:06:57.480 to draw. And then when you left Wristee, what did 0:06:57.480 --> 0:07:00.440 you do before you started? I'm not coming who. You 0:07:00.480 --> 0:07:02.320 became with the New Yorker and so you graduated risdy 0:07:02.360 --> 0:07:05.560 Win in so it was only a year before you 0:07:05.640 --> 0:07:09.120 submitted to Sean. Yeah, yeah, so it was actually less 0:07:10.320 --> 0:07:12.480 the other work you do as an artist during that 0:07:12.520 --> 0:07:14.680 period of time. I mean, do you wind up? Is 0:07:14.680 --> 0:07:16.360 this the beginning of you making your living as a 0:07:16.400 --> 0:07:20.560 cartoonist right away? Um? I started out actually doing illustrations. 0:07:21.000 --> 0:07:23.360 They were terrible. I was doing cartoons on my own, 0:07:23.680 --> 0:07:25.600 but I never thought that I would be able to 0:07:25.640 --> 0:07:28.080 make a living at first as a cartoonist. You know, 0:07:28.120 --> 0:07:30.960 I was living in my parents apartment and that was enough, 0:07:31.280 --> 0:07:35.800 and I sort of made up a weird illustration style 0:07:35.840 --> 0:07:38.720 that was like a pastiche of all the popular styles 0:07:38.760 --> 0:07:41.640 of the day, and they were pretty terrible. I did 0:07:41.640 --> 0:07:44.520 not get much work, and at some point I just thought, 0:07:44.520 --> 0:07:46.880 you know what, I'm just going to try submitting the 0:07:46.920 --> 0:07:49.160 cartoons because this is really what I like to do, 0:07:49.760 --> 0:07:54.680 and at least if nobody takes them, then i'll know that, 0:07:54.800 --> 0:07:57.080 you know, I tried. So I don't know if I 0:07:57.120 --> 0:07:59.760 even thought it out that far, or whether it was 0:07:59.800 --> 0:08:02.840 really that the illustrations weren't getting any work at all. 0:08:02.880 --> 0:08:04.760 And when I started doing the cartoons, that's when I 0:08:04.760 --> 0:08:07.400 started getting work. I started selling to do the illustrations 0:08:07.400 --> 0:08:09.920 look like were they in? They're not in the style? 0:08:10.360 --> 0:08:13.800 When when you're when you're an artist and you do illustrations, 0:08:14.600 --> 0:08:18.160 it's it's it's like you draw birds like Audubon, you 0:08:18.200 --> 0:08:21.520 don't draw birds like Ross Chest draws cartoons and people. 0:08:21.560 --> 0:08:23.760 They're not squiggly lines of people with their hands up 0:08:23.800 --> 0:08:27.280 around their mouths. They were just like these fake kind 0:08:27.320 --> 0:08:33.640 of Milton Glazer mixed with a little weird abstract e 0:08:33.920 --> 0:08:37.280 kind of junk. Because at Rizzy, I was taught like, 0:08:37.679 --> 0:08:40.200 you don't want to be too tight when you draw, 0:08:40.280 --> 0:08:42.160 so there was like a kind of like fake loose 0:08:42.320 --> 0:08:46.439 kind of thing tossed off. Well they were not tossed off. 0:08:46.440 --> 0:08:49.120 They were fake loose, you know. They were like to 0:08:49.200 --> 0:08:52.840 look like they were just horrible, and I didn't like 0:08:52.920 --> 0:08:54.880 doing them. I mean, that was the worst part. It 0:08:54.960 --> 0:08:56.920 was just someone that taught you then, who helped you 0:08:56.960 --> 0:08:58.960 that you remember, who was a great mentor of yours. 0:08:59.320 --> 0:09:01.720 Um I was in high school. I went to the 0:09:01.800 --> 0:09:04.400 Art Students League on week on. It was one Saturday 0:09:04.400 --> 0:09:08.200 a month, and I had yeah, yeah, and that's I mean, 0:09:09.000 --> 0:09:12.400 I could not say that I know anatomy my any 0:09:12.400 --> 0:09:14.800 stretch of the imagination, but it's where I took a 0:09:14.840 --> 0:09:18.160 lot of figure drawing and I loved the Art Students League, 0:09:18.160 --> 0:09:21.719 and I had an amazing teacher there named Andrew Lucash. 0:09:21.960 --> 0:09:25.960 I like that a lot. When you start working with 0:09:26.280 --> 0:09:28.920 for the New Yorker. How long does it go on 0:09:29.040 --> 0:09:33.320 before you're making a living just doing that? Um, I 0:09:33.360 --> 0:09:38.400 don't think I've ever I've always done other things illustrations, 0:09:38.840 --> 0:09:43.480 um and tossed off kind of phone. Know. What happened 0:09:43.640 --> 0:09:48.000 was once my style got known through the New Yorker, 0:09:48.080 --> 0:09:50.680 then people would hire me because it was okay to 0:09:50.760 --> 0:09:55.000 draw my style. And uh, I remember doing some illustration. 0:09:55.040 --> 0:09:58.280 I think what was that magazine? It wasn't called I 0:09:58.320 --> 0:10:00.679 can't remember. Maybe it was it have been missed, I 0:10:00.720 --> 0:10:04.240 can't remember. Somebody's closet. It was just like I had 0:10:04.240 --> 0:10:08.240 all these clothes and these arrows with words like sick, yuck, 0:10:08.440 --> 0:10:10.320 throw out, you know, and it was like I couldn't 0:10:10.360 --> 0:10:13.600 incorporate the jokes and the writing into the illustrations. And 0:10:13.640 --> 0:10:18.040 so you know, in the years after that, after my 0:10:18.240 --> 0:10:20.520 cartoon started appearing in New Yorker, I was able to 0:10:20.600 --> 0:10:23.280 get illustration work, but they knew what I did. I mean, 0:10:23.320 --> 0:10:26.520 every once in a while, something weird would happen, like, UM, 0:10:26.559 --> 0:10:29.560 a magazine would say. I think it was seventeen magazine. 0:10:29.559 --> 0:10:32.960 I I illustrated a booklet for teenagers about I don't 0:10:32.960 --> 0:10:35.920 even manners or something, and they said, could you make 0:10:35.960 --> 0:10:40.640 your people look more contemporary? And I thought, they don't 0:10:40.679 --> 0:10:42.680 look contemporary? You know. I just thought, well, this is 0:10:42.720 --> 0:10:45.560 how I draw contemporary people, you know, I mean, what 0:10:45.600 --> 0:10:47.079 are they supposed to wear a different sort of hair 0:10:47.120 --> 0:10:49.400 band or something. I just I don't know. It's just like, 0:10:49.480 --> 0:10:51.800 no matter what I put on my characters, they look 0:10:52.280 --> 0:10:55.160 how they look. They said, okay, and then we went 0:10:55.200 --> 0:10:58.400 on from there. Sean was the editor when your first 0:10:58.400 --> 0:11:02.640 commit was got Leeb. Next after that it was Sean Gottlieb, 0:11:02.920 --> 0:11:06.000 Tina and David. How does that change the perception of 0:11:06.040 --> 0:11:09.760 your work? Editor to editor and then art director and 0:11:09.920 --> 0:11:13.640 cartoon editor and on and on. Have you had a 0:11:13.679 --> 0:11:17.280 different reception for your work over the last several years? Um? 0:11:17.520 --> 0:11:22.920 I was very panicky when Tina Brown took over, because 0:11:23.520 --> 0:11:27.160 I think several people were because I had the impression 0:11:27.200 --> 0:11:33.440 that she liked only topical stuff. And I think that 0:11:33.440 --> 0:11:37.319 that a lot of my cartoons during that time became 0:11:37.320 --> 0:11:40.240 more topical. But the thing with very topical cartoons is 0:11:40.720 --> 0:11:42.679 you know, you can't really include them in a collection. 0:11:42.800 --> 0:11:46.160 I mean, who really cares about Monica Lewinsky joke right now? 0:11:46.679 --> 0:11:50.320 So you know, I felt like if I could do 0:11:50.400 --> 0:11:53.840 them in a way that was still my stuff, it 0:11:53.960 --> 0:11:58.840 was all right. But um, that were your fears assuaged? 0:11:58.960 --> 0:12:00.959 Once she got there, that she get your it was 0:12:01.000 --> 0:12:03.280 all right, it was okay. But I think there is 0:12:03.320 --> 0:12:07.760 some differences. I think so, I think so, um, and 0:12:08.280 --> 0:12:10.080 who knows how much of it was in my own, 0:12:10.480 --> 0:12:12.920 you know projection. Another thing I thought about was just 0:12:12.960 --> 0:12:14.840 pure writing. Have you done a lot of writing and 0:12:14.840 --> 0:12:19.280 do you do writing aside from doing the cartooning, because 0:12:19.320 --> 0:12:21.280 so much of what you do involves writing. In this 0:12:21.440 --> 0:12:24.839 book that you have about now is so beautifully written 0:12:24.840 --> 0:12:27.240 in terms of the honesty and the well, thank you, 0:12:27.280 --> 0:12:30.480 thanks um. I think that one thing I have always 0:12:30.520 --> 0:12:35.840 loved about cartoons is that they have writing and they 0:12:35.880 --> 0:12:41.000 have pictures. And it's not just like an illustration. In 0:12:41.160 --> 0:12:45.920 the best cartoons, the best graphic novels graphic uh you know, storytelling, 0:12:46.240 --> 0:12:48.800 The words and the pictures play off each other. The 0:12:48.880 --> 0:12:53.440 illustration is not necessarily a literal illustration of the words 0:12:53.480 --> 0:12:55.520 that you see on the page. It could be moving 0:12:55.559 --> 0:12:57.640 the story forward or back, or could be like in 0:12:57.679 --> 0:13:01.160 total contradiction to what's written. Um, there's some sort of 0:13:01.920 --> 0:13:05.360 thing going on between the two of them. And what 0:13:05.400 --> 0:13:08.640 I love is that I don't have to choose. Like 0:13:08.720 --> 0:13:12.280 in this book, there are times where a picture served, 0:13:12.559 --> 0:13:14.360 you know, best, to tell what I wanted to tell, 0:13:14.840 --> 0:13:17.480 And there were parts where I really wanted it needed 0:13:17.520 --> 0:13:20.520 to be all text. You know, the pictures would not 0:13:20.600 --> 0:13:23.680 have helped, would have in fact attracted. And I do 0:13:23.800 --> 0:13:27.320 like to write. I have written, Um, I've written for 0:13:27.360 --> 0:13:30.560 The New Yorker, I've written a Talk of the Town piece, 0:13:30.720 --> 0:13:35.440 I wrote shouts and murmurs. I've written an obituary um 0:13:35.520 --> 0:13:39.800 for uh wonderful cartoonist Leo Collum. Um. I like to write. 0:13:39.960 --> 0:13:43.360 I like to write mostly though, UM, I like cartoons. 0:13:43.760 --> 0:13:46.880 You do, Yeah, Are you much of a television watcher? 0:13:48.240 --> 0:13:54.160 Someone who's who's very funny and and humorist certainly applies 0:13:54.320 --> 0:13:57.280 to you when your work, Like any good cartoonist. Um, 0:13:57.400 --> 0:13:59.880 what kind of television do you watch? Oh? God, I 0:14:00.120 --> 0:14:02.920 love so many of these, you know, repeating the series 0:14:02.960 --> 0:14:06.880 that have been on. Oh my god, I watched yeah 0:14:07.120 --> 0:14:09.520 Bench last night, I watched three episodes of broad Church, 0:14:09.800 --> 0:14:13.480 British show. Um about a little kid who's murdered and 0:14:13.559 --> 0:14:16.199 broad Church is the name of the town. Um, I've 0:14:16.200 --> 0:14:21.320 watched that. I watched broad City, Girls, Madman, What's the 0:14:21.400 --> 0:14:27.280 Wire of No? No, broad City though it was funny. 0:14:28.040 --> 0:14:30.720 Not a sitcom watcher. No, I'm not much of a 0:14:30.760 --> 0:14:35.280 sitcom watcher. Um, I watched sits. Know. When I was 0:14:35.320 --> 0:14:40.120 a kid, I watched a ton of sitcotts, Bewitched, Green Acres, 0:14:40.200 --> 0:14:42.680 I mean, I was obsessed with Bewitched. Where's the Agnes 0:14:42.760 --> 0:14:45.640 More ahead of today? Oh my god, I can still 0:14:45.760 --> 0:14:49.680 hear the credits in my head. I watched Beverly Hillbilly's Island, 0:14:49.720 --> 0:14:53.200 Gilligan's Island, totally yeah. I mean I still see a 0:14:53.240 --> 0:14:55.640 lot of people in terms of Guilden's Island. I still 0:14:55.680 --> 0:14:59.360 have dreams about Ginger. Oh my god, say, at least 0:14:59.480 --> 0:15:04.080 is not like Gilligan weird tied up to a tree 0:15:04.720 --> 0:15:08.120 in my dream Gilligan in this skipper, they're on the 0:15:08.120 --> 0:15:11.520 other side of the island doing the laundry quote unquote 0:15:11.520 --> 0:15:14.960 with I say, I say. And the last TV show 0:15:15.960 --> 0:15:18.560 until the Sopranos came along that I watched with any 0:15:19.640 --> 0:15:23.080 devotion was Mary Hartman. Mary Hartman, Yes, and I was 0:15:23.160 --> 0:15:25.600 addicted to the weirdness of that show. When I was like, 0:15:25.920 --> 0:15:28.960 I forget sixteen or see, I did sort of get 0:15:29.000 --> 0:15:32.720 into the Mary Tyler Moore show. And there were a 0:15:32.760 --> 0:15:34.800 couple of years when I first got out of college. 0:15:35.000 --> 0:15:36.680 Maybe it was the first year I got out of 0:15:36.720 --> 0:15:38.960 college where I was living in the apartment, living in 0:15:38.960 --> 0:15:42.160 my first apartment. Actually it was when I got out 0:15:42.160 --> 0:15:43.520 of college, when I still living at home for a 0:15:43.560 --> 0:15:46.120 while and then I moved into my own apartment that 0:15:46.680 --> 0:15:50.040 I didn't really have much of a social life, let's 0:15:50.040 --> 0:15:54.000 put it that way. And working. I was working, and 0:15:54.040 --> 0:15:57.200 I was working on my cartoons, and I was mostly 0:15:58.040 --> 0:16:03.280 mostly pretty depressed. Big shock, because well I was living 0:16:03.360 --> 0:16:06.800 at home and I just thought, this is still at 0:16:06.800 --> 0:16:08.760 home with my parents in Brooklyn, and I thought this 0:16:08.800 --> 0:16:13.280 is my life. I was twenty two, twenty two, and 0:16:13.320 --> 0:16:15.120 I didn't know how to fill my time. I think 0:16:15.120 --> 0:16:18.240 that was another thing that like, you know, it's it's 0:16:18.240 --> 0:16:22.680 so different now with the Internet, but before it was 0:16:22.760 --> 0:16:25.520 like there were these stretches. I mean, I was also 0:16:25.600 --> 0:16:29.320 in love with this guy and it wasn't reciprocal. Um, 0:16:29.680 --> 0:16:34.960 what do do he was a painter U school. He 0:16:35.760 --> 0:16:43.360 was yeah, yeah, um yeah. But anyway, uh so it 0:16:43.440 --> 0:16:45.920 was it was a very depressing time. And I used 0:16:45.920 --> 0:16:48.720 to watch the Mary Charler Wore Show and also The 0:16:48.760 --> 0:16:51.560 Odd Couple, and there were these things that sort of 0:16:51.600 --> 0:16:55.040 like like I knew if I got to those shows, 0:16:55.400 --> 0:16:57.800 I would like live through the day. It's hard to 0:16:57.800 --> 0:17:01.200 sort of explain, but remember that those shows made me 0:17:01.240 --> 0:17:04.840 feel more. Yeah, they would pay that they'd play that 0:17:04.880 --> 0:17:08.639 opening and gone with the wind. I told someone I 0:17:08.720 --> 0:17:11.159 spent you're a real New Yorker. I spent six months 0:17:11.359 --> 0:17:14.679 on the internet, surfing the carters and the baffles and 0:17:14.720 --> 0:17:18.520 the warrens of YouTube to find the voice of the 0:17:18.520 --> 0:17:21.120 man that was the voice of my childhood. Now, it's 0:17:21.160 --> 0:17:23.760 interesting that you remember the voices. I don't remember that that. 0:17:23.800 --> 0:17:28.320 I remember that Clapboard like really, well, which one do 0:17:28.359 --> 0:17:32.520 you remember? That? Was the four thirty movie? No? That 0:17:32.680 --> 0:17:36.600 was that? That was? I think that the Million Dollar 0:17:36.680 --> 0:17:39.720 movie was the Clapboard was later one? Um, the four 0:17:39.800 --> 0:17:42.480 thirty movie I think had a kind of grandfather clock 0:17:42.920 --> 0:17:45.200 kind of I don't want I don't want to be 0:17:45.359 --> 0:17:49.239 taking you on in the music was do I think 0:17:49.280 --> 0:17:52.000 I've got you here. I don't mean to be lecturing Roch, 0:17:52.480 --> 0:17:54.720 but I'm going to tell you the clapboard and the 0:17:54.960 --> 0:17:58.280 camera on the dolly was the four thirty movie. That 0:17:58.359 --> 0:18:03.560 was the slate the Maybe I'm remembering something really long ago. 0:18:03.760 --> 0:18:06.480 You have been breathing in a lot of chemicals there 0:18:06.520 --> 0:18:09.359 in your cartooning studio, and your memory is failing you. 0:18:09.480 --> 0:18:11.600 The one you're referring to as a famous piece called 0:18:11.600 --> 0:18:14.960 syncopated clock, and that was the Late Show on CBS 0:18:15.680 --> 0:18:18.960 and the Late Late Show on CBS. So the clapboard 0:18:19.040 --> 0:18:24.159 was the ABC. But when did you realize that that 0:18:24.240 --> 0:18:29.080 was a clapartelling this the clapboard in the Okay, sol See, 0:18:29.119 --> 0:18:30.480 I didn't know. I thought it was like a black 0:18:30.520 --> 0:18:32.639 thank you. I didn't know what it was until I 0:18:32.680 --> 0:18:35.920 was much older. A clapboard. It looked like it looked 0:18:35.960 --> 0:18:39.600 like a weird flashboard to me. You were depressed back then. 0:18:40.080 --> 0:18:42.440 The painter wasn't around. You're looking with your parents and 0:18:42.640 --> 0:18:45.720 crazy Ville. How old were you when you moved out 0:18:45.720 --> 0:18:50.359 of the apartment, Uh, twenty three, So you're just there 0:18:50.400 --> 0:18:53.000 for a year, just there for you about yes, yes, 0:18:53.320 --> 0:18:55.920 And then you moved toward to Manhattan. Yes, moved to Manhattan, 0:18:56.240 --> 0:19:00.600 a wonderful apartment on seventy third Street, loved one between 0:19:00.640 --> 0:19:03.840 Amsterdam and Columbus area. It was wonderful. It was it was, 0:19:03.960 --> 0:19:06.800 you know, kind of raddy back then. Not terrible, but 0:19:06.920 --> 0:19:09.200 it was the wild wild West back Yeah, it was raddy. 0:19:09.400 --> 0:19:13.919 You know, they were like linoleum stores in secondhand clothing stores. 0:19:14.040 --> 0:19:17.320 Tinchers was still on Broadway, yes, And the prostitutes used 0:19:17.359 --> 0:19:21.200 to wear like faux fur coats and approach you on Broadway. Yes. 0:19:21.240 --> 0:19:24.320 And as you went up on Amsterdam Avenue, people in 0:19:24.320 --> 0:19:27.199 the summer with like barbecue out of their cars. And 0:19:27.240 --> 0:19:29.560 I remember that because the painter that I like lived 0:19:29.600 --> 0:19:33.280 on two Street in Amsterdam. And whence you crossed like 0:19:33.320 --> 0:19:36.200 seventy nine Street, you were just like, I don't even 0:19:36.240 --> 0:19:38.399 know where I am. How old were you when you 0:19:38.440 --> 0:19:41.880 met your husband? So this is again like a year 0:19:41.960 --> 0:19:43.840 or two later when you met him, were at the 0:19:43.880 --> 0:19:47.240 New Yorker. Well, you know you New Yorker people all 0:19:47.440 --> 0:19:52.000 just commingle, yes, pretty much so much. Yeah, and only 0:19:52.040 --> 0:19:56.359 another New Yorker staff member can understand just you know, 0:19:56.480 --> 0:19:59.040 these are the people we know and really cross paths. 0:19:59.160 --> 0:20:02.359 What did he do? Yeah, Bill. He's a writer, and 0:20:02.400 --> 0:20:07.200 what does he right? Predominantly short humor, talking the town 0:20:07.280 --> 0:20:09.960 and stuff like that. Well, now's some reason why the 0:20:10.040 --> 0:20:16.000 lights in here. Like, I'm surprised, and I'm coming into 0:20:16.040 --> 0:20:20.320 this interview with you having read your cartoons and loved 0:20:20.359 --> 0:20:25.480 your cartoons, and I am a great cavelling, cavetching, whining 0:20:26.040 --> 0:20:30.040 bundle of insecurity myself. I am. I'm a ball of insecurity. 0:20:30.200 --> 0:20:32.240 And for you, of all people, I've got all these 0:20:32.800 --> 0:20:35.919 presumptions about you to ask about the power fluctuations in 0:20:35.920 --> 0:20:38.359 an old apartment building. I'm just surprised, this is an 0:20:38.359 --> 0:20:42.320 old apartment building to take up this carpet his linoleum there, Okay, okay, 0:20:42.480 --> 0:20:47.159 I come completely Joseph's Temple of communication explanation. I just 0:20:47.240 --> 0:20:50.200 wanted to make sure about you don't have some neurological disorder. 0:20:50.440 --> 0:20:53.280 You don't have any neurological disorder as far as I know. 0:20:53.880 --> 0:20:58.240 You know, it's but just you know, there's just things 0:20:58.400 --> 0:21:03.840 going on, electrical things going on. Was trying to talk 0:21:03.920 --> 0:21:07.920 to Charles Schultz is trying to talk to you. He's 0:21:07.960 --> 0:21:10.440 born on my birthday. Actually, really, yes, what did you 0:21:10.520 --> 0:21:14.119 think of that cartoon? Peanuts? When I was younger, I 0:21:14.280 --> 0:21:16.480 liked it a lot. I still think it has some 0:21:16.800 --> 0:21:22.320 fantastic archetypes, but you know, it's not completely my cup 0:21:22.359 --> 0:21:26.800 of tea, but I like it. Charles Adams probably Jane Wilson, 0:21:27.040 --> 0:21:32.920 Charles Adams sort of more odd. Tim Burton definitely definitely. 0:21:34.400 --> 0:21:37.440 Chat said she loved Charles Adams work when she was 0:21:37.560 --> 0:21:40.320 young because, quote, it made fun of stuff you weren't 0:21:40.320 --> 0:21:43.880 supposed to make fun of. Unquote. It's clear she wasn't 0:21:43.920 --> 0:21:46.520 your average kid growing up in Brooklyn in the fifties 0:21:46.560 --> 0:21:50.040 and sixties. In her cartoon A Note on the Author, 0:21:50.240 --> 0:21:53.320 Chaste drew her nine year old self reading the Big 0:21:53.440 --> 0:21:58.520 Book of Horrible Rare Diseases. I'm Alec Baldwin, and here's 0:21:58.560 --> 0:22:01.560 the thing. Take a listen to our archive more in 0:22:01.720 --> 0:22:06.439 depth conversations with artists, policymakers, and performers like Lena Dunham. 0:22:06.760 --> 0:22:09.680 Dunham and Chast both talk to me about their early years, 0:22:10.000 --> 0:22:13.320 but Dunham's plans for her future were way off. Always 0:22:13.320 --> 0:22:15.320 thought I would be like a weird gender and women 0:22:15.400 --> 0:22:18.240 studies teacher who occasionally showed movies at film festivals and 0:22:18.400 --> 0:22:20.440 hung out in my strange apartment that was stacked high 0:22:20.480 --> 0:22:23.600 with books. Take a listen at Here's the Thing dot Org. 0:22:42.080 --> 0:22:44.960 I'm Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the Thing. 0:22:45.760 --> 0:22:49.320 My guest today is Ra's Chast. Can We talk About 0:22:49.400 --> 0:22:52.920 Something more Pleasant? Her graphic memoir about taking care of 0:22:53.040 --> 0:22:56.920 her elderly parents in their final years, was nominated for 0:22:57.000 --> 0:23:00.680 a National Book Award last year. Along with her drawings 0:23:00.800 --> 0:23:03.840 that told the story of her parents, the book includes 0:23:03.920 --> 0:23:08.520 actual photographs of the objects they left behind. While cleaning 0:23:08.560 --> 0:23:12.239 out her parents fridge, Chast found an invention of her 0:23:12.320 --> 0:23:16.760 mother's from the sixties made from mismatched tupperware held together 0:23:16.840 --> 0:23:21.920 with masking tape, called the cheese Tailor. Chast says anything 0:23:22.000 --> 0:23:25.240 to do with death is funny, but the emotional honesty 0:23:25.359 --> 0:23:28.440 of her book produced more than just laughs. The New 0:23:28.520 --> 0:23:32.200