Jeffrey:

Before we begin, Mr. Segretto, let me thank you for the kind words regarding my potential. I myself believe that I have written a couple of books worth reading, although I don”t know if it”s possible for anyone to read them anymore. Johnny Astronaut is totally out of print and the remaining 1,000 copies of I, An Actress are sitting in a warehouse in Jacksonville, Florida, waiting for someone to break in and liberate them from their confines. One of these days I should just post the PDFs and let people take them for free. After all, what”s the point of writing something that no one can read?

Having said that, I must take umbrage with your review of “Suite 208 Does David Lynch.” Although you were correct in noticing the references to Mr. Lynch”s work, I feel you failed to grasp the complexity behind our screenplay. You noted that the Unnamed Man keeps a basketball in his mouth, but you failed to note the other crucial costuming choice. On his head, he wears a pair of headphones. Now, if I were to tell you that he was listening to “Planet of Ass” in those headphones, how would that affect your reading of the plot?

I know David Lynch refuses to discuss the meaning of his films, but I feel like I would be remiss if I were to pretend I didn”t know what we were doing. The basketball clearly represents sexual repression; this should be obvious to anyone with so much as a two-week crash course on film interpretation at ITT. When Mr. Hughes removes the basketball from his mouth, he is removing the metaphorical (and literal!) “cork” that keeps his strange sexual desires inside where they cannot cause harm to children or power tools. As he announces his intention to ask a question of the Jeffrey character (who, I should note, is loosely based on Tristan Tzara, founding member of the Dada movement), he speaks in the heightened voice of a young man on the cusp of discovering his sexuality.

Founder of Dada and sexual freak, Tristan Tzara.

As “Jeffrey” slowly turns toward his officemate, the sexual desire heightens and expands to encompass the entirety of the office setting. When “Jeffrey” speaks, it is with an alluring, high-pitched voice that envelops both the Unnamed Man and the audience in a web of seduction. As the two characters grapple with the mental repercussions of their illicit office affair, the deer become locked in heated combat. The sensual tones of “Planet of Ass” overtake the soundtrack and the characters”faces begin to melt with the realization that they”ve entered into a forbidden sexual world from which there may be no escape (a common theme of Mr. Lynch”s work as well.)

It is important to note that the antler fight ends on a shot of Mr. Hughes — he”s clearly been the aggressor in the situation, and it is his rejection of the untoward affair that ultimately leads to the break between the two characters. As he returns to the “comfortable” world of repression, he speaks with two, much deeper voices — a satirical representation of the depths to which we must crawl as we begin to embrace our sexual identities. However, we shouldn”t leave the scene thinking all has been sorted: a blood-curdling scream punctuates the Unnamed Man”s final line, telling the audience that the Unnamed Man”s (read: Everyman”s) reign of sexual terror is just beginning. “Jeffrey” turns away from the scene, seemingly too disgusted to look any further, and the Unnamed Man puts his basketball cork back where it belongs. Indeed, with the knowledge that the Unnamed Man was listening to “Planet of Ass” in his headphones, we now realize that the “Jeffrey” character did not actually exist, further heightening the psycho-sexual implications of the entire scenario.

As for your comments about my acting, I won”t defend myself too much lest I come across as defensive, but I will say this: the director, Brendan Hughes, was an insufferable ass throughout the entire filming process and the performance that you see came at the end of a brutal, twelve hour day of shooting in which I was forced to spend most of that time lying in a pit of dirt covered by mouse fetuses. (Hughes decided to excise this footage from the film, a decision which I regretfully admit did make the movie stronger.) If my performance seems to lack affect, it is only because I was desperately afraid that I would be beaten to death if I were to upstage the tyrannical Mr. Hughes”s “performance.” Under the circumstances, I believe I showed great moxie. In fact, Michael Medved referred to my performance as “a whiz-bang of a roller coaster ride … a corker!” But then you, Mr. Segretto, live in “New York”, so you probably think Michael Medved is some kind of ultra-conservative shit-for-brains Sarah Palin-ass-licking no-taste-having rest stop cockmuncher instead of what he actually is: the most important film critic of our generation and every other one, too.

On the Awkward Press scale of pizzas, I give “Suite 208 Does David Lynch”: 6 Pizzas!!!

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