Stephenie Meyer emerges to appear on 'Oprah' today

Stephenie Meyer, author of the wildly popular "Twilight" series, will appear on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" this afternoon (the show broadcasts at 4 p.m. in many markets). The television appearance is a rare one for the author, who apologizes to fans on her website for "doing the hermit thing this last year."

Meyer is being lured out by the shine of "New Moon." The second film to feature Robert Pattinson as vampire Edward Cullen and Kristen Stewart as Bella Swan opens wide on Nov. 20. Meyer writes on her website, "I am so pleased and amazed and thrilled with what [director] Chris Weitz has done with 'New Moon' that I want to talk about it, and to show my support for him."

Earlier this week, serious "Twilight" fans submitted their too-specific-for-Oprah's-show questions to Meyer through the Twilight Saga website, which will be posting her answers on Monday.

Oprah will be the only talk show host to get time with Meyer, apparently; she writes that she's doing only this one interview. After that, she'll slip back into the dark.

-- Carolyn Kellogg

Photos: Stephenie Meyer, credit: Vince Bucci/Getty Images. Oprah Winfrey, credit: Warren Toda/ EPA

Spike Jonze to sign behind-the-scenes book on 'Wild Things' film Sunday

The movie "Where the Wild Things Are" has sparked bookish interest around LA. Dave Eggers' young-adult reworking of the tale, "The Wild Things," has been on our hardcover bestsellers list for two weeks. Will the enthusiasm continue for Spike Jonze? The film's director has a "Wild Things"-related book that he'll be signing at the independent bookstore Family on Sunday.

"Heads On and We Shoot" is a behind-the-scenes look at the making of the film, with drafts of the screenplay, character sketches, random ephemera (like this on-set playlist) and photographs that reveal the puppetry workings and computer animation. The 240-page oversize book is unusually constructed -- it folds like an accordion -- and includes forwards by both Jonze and Eggers.

On Sunday, Jonze will be signing books and  answering questions. Things are set to get underway at 5 p.m. Be warned: Family is a tiny shop, barely big enough to hold one Wild Thing in full gear.

-- Carolyn Kellogg

Photo: Spike Jonze on the set of his movie "Where the Wild Things Are." Credit: Warner Bros.

Kerouac documentary at the Arclight tonight

Jack Kerouac's 1960 visit to Big Sur was not a happy one; although he set out to find some peace in the wilderness of the California coast, instead he reckoned with his own disquiet. He did, however, manage to write about his experience in the 1962 book "Big Sur" -- and the trip is now brought to life in the new documentary "One Fast Move or I'm Gone: Kerouac's Big Sur."

The film screens tonight at L.A.'s Arclight Cinema. Director Curt Worden and producer Gloria Bailen will be there.

In the movie, musicians, writers and poets who have been influenced by Kerouac read his text and narrate the circumstances of his ill-fated trip. It's "a chronicle of a man being eaten by ants," Tom Waits says in the movie. "Like a snail crawling across a straight razor."

Music from the film -- by Benjamin Gibbard of Death Cab for Cutie and Jay Farrar of Uncle Tupelo -- is being released today. The two hadn't met before they came together around Kerouac. His work continues to resonate, with the likes of Sam Shepard, Patti Smith, Aram Saroyan, Robert Hunter, S.E. Hinton and Lenny Kaye appearing in the documentary.

NPR did a piece on the film this morning. And for those of you who can't make it to one of tonight's Los Angeles screenings, the trailer is after the jump.

Wednesday is Maurice Sendak night at Cinefamily

As the opening date for the Spike Jonze film version of "Where the Wild Things Are" looms, one L.A. movie theater is turning its attention back to the author of the iconic children's book. On Wednesday, Cinefamily on Fairfax will hold a tribute to Maurice Sendak.

The Sendakian schedule includes the documentary "Tell Them Anything You Want: A Portrait of Maurice Sendak," directed by Jonze and Lance Bangs. Bangs, who will be in attendance, will answer questions. Vintage animated adaptations of "Where the Wild Things Are" and "In the Night Kitchen" will be screened, along with short films made by Bangs and Jonze during the production of the new movie. Cinefamily promises the films "capture a sometimes melancholy but always wickedly funny Sendak as he reflects on his Depression-era childhood in the Brooklyn shtetl, a joyous day at the World's Fair, the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby, his books 'In the Night Kitchen' and 'Higgledy Piggledy Pop!,' his two beloved Hermans (Melville, and his German shepherd namesake), and a long-buried secret."

As Cinefamily has strong familial ties to the independent bookstore Family just up the street, there might even be copies of Sendak's books for sale. Originally published in 1963, "Where the Wild Things Are" has won a Caldecott medal, been an American Library Assn. notable book and has stolen the hearts of generations of wild children. Tickets to the event are $12.

-- Carolyn Kellogg

Photo: Maurice Sendak. Credit: Skirball Cultural Center

John Krasinski and David Foster Wallace's endless summer

As summer winds to a close, so too has Infinite Summer -- the online readers group that challenged the brave and the bold to take on David Foster Wallace's 1,088-page novel "Infinite Jest."

To celebrate, Skylight Books is hosting a closing party tomorrow at 8 p.m. Joining in will be actor John Krasinski ("The Office"), who makes his directorial debut with the upcoming film "Brief Interviews With Hideous Men" -- based on another Wallace book -- to read some excerpts and sign posters. Appearing also will be Wallace's longtime literary agent Bonnie Nadell; Kathleen Fitzpatick, who taught with him at Pomona College; and other special guests.

The 29 year-old Krasinski, whom most everyone knows as Jim from "The Office," got permission to film Wallace's story collection from the author himself before Wallace died a year ago.

"I remember him being so soft-spoken and so nice," said Krasinski during an interview with Rebecca Harper on Hulu.com. "He put me at ease right away. I remember him being flattered that someone had taken up this book and tried to run it up the hill."

Krasinski started his adaptation of "Brief Interviews" while waiting tables in New York. When he was cast in the pilot for "The Office," he used the money to buy the rights to the book.

Written as a series of 23 short stories, "Brief Interviews" lends itself to easy transcription into other media. Vince Passaro's review in Salon notes that "Wallace writes of young boys at the pool, middle-aged men in uncomfortable sexual situations and [a] woman who unbearably narrates her pathologies in the neo-vocabulary of healing and therapy."

For Krasinski, the book arrived with "almost near-perfect dialogue and the biggest challenge was editing it down to a piece that could actually fit into a watchable movie rather than an epic miniseries or something."

So which characters made the cut from the page to the screen? You'll have to see the film to find out. Due Sept. 25, "Brief Interviews With Hideous Men" marks Krasinski's debut as a writer-director. It's also the first time that any of Wallace's fiction has been adapted for the screen.

-- George Ducker

photo credit: Ricardo DeAratanha/Los Angeles Times

Slaughterhouse 90210: Where high meets low

Slaugterhouse 90210, a tumblr blog and column at Details, takes images from pop culture and captions them, hysterically, with literary quotes. A picture of Crockett (Don Johnson) and Tubbs (Philip Michael Thomas) from "Miami Vice" is accompanied by Milan Kundera: "The only relationship that can make both partners happy is one in which sentimentality has no place and neither partner makes any claim on the life and freedom of the other" ("The Unbearable Lightness of Being"). And so on.

Perhaps the image above would be captioned, "Laboring through a world every day more stultified, which expected salvation in codes and governments, ever more willing to settle for suburban narratives and diminished payoffs -- what were the chances of finding anyone else seeking to transcend that, and not even particularly aware of it?" (Thomas Pynchon, "Against the Day"). But that's just me, and I don't hold a candle to Maris Kreizman. She's the 31-year-old New Yorker who is the true genius behind Slaughterhouse 90210. 

Jacket Copy: Did you really start with just Vonnegut and "90210"?

Maris Kreizman: I knew I wanted to start a blog that featured my favorite literary quotes, but I thought that quotes alone would be a bit too precious or boring. And I have always been a connoisseur of crappy TV. So I figured what better way to indulge my guilty pleasures than by pairing them with more high-minded fare?

Once I had the idea, I needed to come up with the perfect name to convey that high/low juxtaposition. Fortunately, my co-workers are very skilled at wordplay. Some rejected blog names: Third Rock From the Sun Also Rises, How I Met Your Motherless Brooklyn, My So-Called Life of Pi. Once I finally settled on the name, the tagline came naturally. And I do happen to use a lot of Vonnegut and "90210" on the blog, so it fits.

JC: Do you usually begin with the literary quote or with a photo?

MK: It depends. I keep a list of shows and characters I eventually want to feature, and I'll keep them in mind when scanning for quotes. I am still trying to find the perfect quote that just screams "Charles in Charge." I think I should look into Marilynne Robinson's "Housekeeping" for that.

Meanwhile, sometimes I come across a great book passage, and I spend hours searching Google Images to try to find the characters that embody it. Like, I knew there was a Miranda July quote I wanted to use that was about people who date outside their own size groups. It took a few tries (Jim & Pam, Carrie & Mr. Big) before I settled on a more fanciful interpretation: Kermit and Miss Piggy.

JC: Do you find yourself running on a theme – say, several pictures from "Diff’rent Strokes" or a series of quotes from Tolstoy?

MK: I try my best not to duplicate shows or authors within a single week. However, some shows have such great casts and so much subtext that they lend themselves to frequent postings: "Mad Men," "Freaks & Geeks" and "Arrested Development" are a few of my go-tos. I'm also really influenced by the books I'm currently reading. When I read Kate Christensen's "The Great Man" I wanted to quote every single sentence because each and every character description was so spot-on. I think I limited myself to three.

JC: Where do you find the quotes – do you have books of them, or do they pop into your head, or something else?

MK: I have a little secret: Good Reads. Good Reads has a section of users' favorite quotes, and you can search all quotes by key word and by theme. It ends up being much more current and fresh than your standard Bartlett's. When I wanted to use a photo of Tim Gunn, I was able to search for the term "elegant" and find a bunch of quotes that applied. The winner was a Louisa May Alcott quote that captured Gunn to a T. (Another confession: I haven't read every book I quote -- I've read about half of them. I just bought a copy of Somerset Maugham's "Of Human Bondage" because I figured that I'd quoted so much of it that it was time to actually read the whole thing!)

JC: What kind of reactions have you gotten? Have you found that matching up literature with TV (and movies) leaves anyone baffled?

MK: The feedback has been generally positive. It's been great to see how many book worms there are who also have a soft spot for pop culture.  I think the bafflement really only comes when people can't immediately recognize the TV show in the post. My father, for instance, never really gets my "One Tree Hill" references.

JC: When you were in high school, what did you do more: read books or watch TV? Did you ever read books WHILE watching TV?

MK: I did A LOT of both. I still do. And I'm proud to say that Brenda Walsh  and Jerry Seinfeld and Alex P. Keaton informed my way of thinking just as much as Sylvia Plath or Margaret Atwood did.

JC: Is there anything that you’d not lampoon?

MK: Probably not -- watch out, Fox News hosts. ...

But many of my posts aren't meant to lampoon -- they're more like tributes. For instance, my very first post was a photo of Logan and Veronica from "Veronica Mars," whom I paired with a quote from Elizabeth McCracken's "The Giant's House." It was just a pure appreciation of my favorite TV characters and my favorite book.

I'm still looking for the perfect quote by Elisa Albert to pair with a scene from "Six Feet Under." Elisa was the first author whose works I acquired when I was an editor at Free Press, and I think she and Claire Fischer are soul sisters in terms of their ability to find humor in dark places. I'm glad my blog allows me to show my appreciation for some of my favorite sharp-tongued women.

Photo: "Friends," Season 1, 1994-95. Credit: Warner Bros.

'Where the Wild Things Are' comes to Hollywood with Spike Jonze, Dave Eggers and others

Want to be one of the first to see "Where the Wild Things Are"? You can -- and hear Spike Jonze, Dave Eggers, Catherine Keener and the young actor Max Records (yes, he plays Max) answer questions afterward -- if you go to the special Oct. 1 preview screening at the Arclight. Tickets have just gone on sale this afternoon.

The screening is to benefit the 826LA literary centers, founded by Eggers, who co-wrote the "Where the Wild Things Are" script with director Jonze.

Here in Hollywood, you'll get to see the movie and listen to the post-film Q&A for $75. A $200 VIP ticket will secure premium seating and a pass to the VIP after-party at Space Fifteen Twenty, which is a short distance up Cahuenga from the Arclight -- walking distance, even by Hollywood standards.

The after-party is hosted by a bevy of co-sponsors and will have drinks and things, from what we hear, and generally fabulous literary and film people wandering around.

If tickets here sell out, there will be separate screenings in all cities that are home to 826s: San Francisco, New York, Seattle, Chicago, Boston, New York and Ann Arbor, Mich.

-- Carolyn Kellogg

Photo: Warner Bros.

When the Beats moved to Paris

In 1956, as the obscenity trial of "Howl" was underway, Allen Ginsberg, Peter Orlovsky and Gregory Corso decamped to Paris. American and British artists and associates joined them there, at a cheap, dirty hotel at 9 Route Gît-Le-Coeur in the city's Latin Quarter. The hotel already had a clientele of oddballs and prostitutes, pimps and police, but it became known among a certain set as the Beat Hotel.

That's also the name of a coming documentary by Alan Govenar and Alan Hatchett. Its main window into that time is Englishman Harold Chapman, who left a job waiting tables and hitchhiked to Paris to photograph it. He wound up meeting Ginsberg and Corso, moving into the hotel and, some said, trying to become invisible so he could photograph the people who passed through. But he's not invisible; he's interviewed extensively in the film, and his photographs constitute much of its visual content.

In the trailer, he says Ginsberg had "quite a different style." He continues:

That's one of the things I learned from Allen. That you don't have to worry about the conventions of  composition in photography, or anything, you just invent your own, and so forth. Just do whatever you like.

Chapman's pictures appear in the photo book "The Beat Hotel," published in France in 1984. Copies are available from AbeBooks for $100 to $300. A cheaper version of the story -- if a longer, less pretty read -- is Barry Miles' 2001 history "The Beat Hotel: Ginsberg, Burroughs and Corso in Paris, 1958-1963."

And then there's the coming documentary, which will have the pictures, older men looking back on the period, and, if the trailer is any indication, a really snazzy beat-jazz score.

-- Carolyn Kellogg

'The Lovely Bones' heads to screen

Alice Sebold's 2002 novel, "The Lovely Bones," was on the L.A. Times bestseller list for months, and now we can catch a glimpse of the author's debut book as it heads to movie screens. Although it won't be in theaters until December, the trailer can be viewed on YouTube, Apple.com and the movie's official site.

Directed by Peter "Lord of the Rings" Jackson, the movie stars 15-year-old Saoirse Ronan. It's her second big literary adaptation. She also starred in "Atonement," and, as in that movie, she has to go to some dark places. In "The Lovely Bones," Susie Salmon is raped and murdered at 13; she narrates the book from the afterlife, but she can't quite move on.

In our 2002 review of the book, Paula L. Woods explained:

[Susie] lingers at school with her classmates, especially Ruth Connors, a girl she barely knew in life who happened to be standing in her path when her "soul shrieked past Earth." But most of all, Susie hovers heavily over the lives of her family, anxiously watching her father become obsessed with finding her killer, her mother's slow withdrawal from her family and marriage, her younger sister's desperate attempts at toughness, her baby brother's lonely confusion.

At times Susie's yearning for the living is so visceral, so acute, that she tries to reach out to them and succeeds: casting her image into a pile of broken glass, communicating with her brother, making a life-changing appearance to Ruth and Ray. At other times, she is a cosmic witness to their pain and anguish, trapped in her inability to be neither on Earth nor in heaven as surely as the ships are trapped in her father's glass bottles or her beloved penguin is imprisoned in its perfect snow globe world.

This seems like it would turn out either really well or really poorly on film, but Jackson seems up to the challenge. The images in the trailer switch between a yellowed, almost gritty 1970s look and a crystal-clear CGI for the afterlife. If the wig on Mark Wahlberg is not winning fans, the magical music by the Cocteau Twins has.

Most important, this trailer seems to capture the seemingly incompatible elements -- the horribly creepy and compelling thriller aspects and openhearted sense of soaring possibility -- that the book combined with success. Of course, it's only a trailer; there's a whole movie on the way.

-- Carolyn Kellogg

Photo: Alice Sebold. Credit: Robert Durell / Los Angeles Times

Where the wild things are furry

In June, I heard about a version of "Wild Things" by Dave Eggers and Spike Jonze with a fur cover, but I didn't quite believe it. As you can see: believe it.

"Wild Things" is a 300-page book for 9- to 12-year-old readers, an expanded version of Maurice Sendak's "Where the Wild Things Are" picture book. It's coming out in October, timed, of course, to coincide with the release of the "Where the Wild Things Are" movie, directed by Jonze and scripted by Jonze and Eggers.

"I've never seen a movie that looked or felt like this," Sendak said at Comic-Con, "and it's his personal 'this.' And he's not afraid of himself. He's a real artist that lets it come through the work. So he's touched me very much. He has touched me very much."

Who knows if that also applies to the tactile book above. I don't know -- it looks, um, matted. And kind of creepy. But maybe that's the point.

And because I can't help but look forward to the movie, the latest trailer is after the jump.