obviously used to think you know correspondence on TV you know christiane
amanpour obviously in print but I was trying to think of a movie that has a
female were journalists as the lead it's not a thing to be a thing how did I beat
Angelina Jolie to like her kind of thing you don't know no I don't think so and
and to you for you you as a producer of the film as well as the start you felt
like you wanted to bring a different kind of character to the screen as you
said not just imagine being jealous as needed as those people are in a while
yet and tell me why you felt like you needed to do that i mean I just really
look to try to grow and learn how to be a producer i I look for story I try to
make movies that I would want to see that I myself would want to want to be
there if I went to 68th Street and so that's really going to be anything can
be done movie like sisters dumb again in the best possible way like this and so
yeah just you know I think my friends and I my comedy friends in a poem I
wrote off we ought you know before there was a name for the Bechdel test I think
we all had sort of an internal version of like this is just movies do but are
not a thing and and so yeah I like to work on things where women talking out
of women and men have names and they're not just called like white
white male friend derided
underwrite it from here other than the fact that I get done I get scared you
know completed my period
idea of coming into this place and leaving yourself in this job there's
still adrenalynn fueled and a lot of people I know from another would
question his friends of mine you go into this job not necessarily could you have
a perfect life at home a lot of people go into this kind of work because you're
trying to escape something right right or you're running towards a story as
well i mean there's something about like you know people always talk about it
I've read about the idea of being an adrenaline junkie in the book it it's
it's also I can just like a story junkie and you get hooked on these places and I
think that like there's a couple folks in the audience who also covered
Afghanistan and there was something about that country that just got under
your skin it was something about the people there about like how beautiful it
was about watching like the West flood into this place in like you know the
internet TV cell phones western-style clothing
you know in into this place that had been had been kept out for so long that
was just it was an amazing story every day you felt like you were going around
and stories were falling off the trees as a journalist that's just an
energizing environment to be in you also feel like you're covering things that
are about life and death and you never feel so alive as when you're doing that
kind of work if you like what you doing the lean matters and your dinner parties
are talking about like the future of countries and what should be done and
all these sort of a really boring my new show about tribal elders and and he's
got alliances and then you come back here and it's just like you know I was
insufferable when I got back and took about two years before I was not the
person who said $15 for a drink do you know that could buy in Afghanistan
I was I was super not fun at a party at that point but not on trial in that
sense of adrenaline lifestyle with something that you can't familiar with
Tina I meet in the smallest scale way when you try to do as you think ok well
character what what do i have in common would not comment about how can I really
do the same for me but the smallest Galway compared to working at that like
a job where you three years old and completely you you use it as an excuse
to avoid any like boring parts of your life like I can go to my cousins wedding
because I'm kind of a big deal there then I tried to relate to it you did you
have that same sense as well I thought it very interesting and yes sir I think
that's the closest I've ever come to that in terms of being serve all in on
something and and the kind of a drowning of a live show doesn't compare
yeah but we risked embarrassment
not the writers know but I did find that very compelling part of his narrative
which is this if you don't get your so important not to mention the pure
adrenaline and more than one person that does blow to meet each other since 12
came apart in the book but that addiction of not having to deal with
aidid getting out having to leave your boring yet totally totally and I mean
people take it you don't have to do your laundry unit to worry about like
shopping you know you don't have to deal with any of that stuff you know you
don't have to really deal with like your personal life so why don't you go to
your boyfriend's work party in 15 handbags sale in their apartment
actually know how is your home declined doing well I'm starting next week they
do force myself and it took a long time to figure out the business going to be a
book I mean I was over there doing my job and just trying to tell the story of
what was happening in Afghanistan Pakistan and it got to a certain point
where you know Sam Zell about the newspaper cheney became very clear that
I might not have a job much longer he would you know in public sort of you
know sort of speeches he say the Tribunal has this correspondent in
Afghanistan min why does the tribune have a correspondent and so I kind of
figured I probably didn't have job security and you know you're going to
like the death of like you know a certain part of journalism at that
period of time 2008 you know 2009 I had started taking notes at a certain point
on funny things that are so absurd things that I'd noticed you know like
one of them was like this woman I thought Karachi walking to the airport
and she was wearing an abaya full bio and she was holding hands with like a
nine year old son and he was wearing jeans and a t-shirt that said no money
no honey
I kind of fell back asleep right there and so I started taking out some of the
stuff but I also felt like the absurd way we were living over there you know
it's like you're basically in a frat party situation and you're like in
college all over again and everybody's sort of single there even if they're not
single and it's like this weird sort of pressure cooker lifestyle and we had
always talked about writing a funny book what like one of us is gonna write a
darkly comic book a doctor look at it and I love just a color and I loved mash
and so the last year was over there I kind of figured let's try to update
match and see if it's actually a possibility he know and love it when you
started the process of adopting this book will tell the story of how you even
have the book got to you first of all
well it's a it's a somewhat embarrassing story because basically my agent for me
the Times review of the book and watching okok khatami had referred to as
the vote Tina Fey typ character egomaniac anymore I read that book and
so it got all the book and then I thought he really funny and intelligent
and against them it was so funny said in this extreme environment I'm always
looking for something that could be a movie where I'm not lazy or time
magazine
like about the baby well with the movie and so yes I took to the floor and you
operate at the same time do you think you could tell this somewhere so you can
pick up a copy of the book i dnt let some of this
no i didnt and ready with great customer and it is very funny and very specific
and when you're looking to write comedy with anything
specificity is looking for a good team is referring to the women working
magazines which are great but there's become a lack of specificity to that
kind of cake mixes with so much at new aperture onto a world we heard a lot
about and let a lot about but it allowed us to laugh about it allowed us to look
at the absurdity some of the tragic absurdities and that felt so fresh and I
had to figure out how to make kids life interests which now which i think is
that it had to make it into a movie which is to make it less interesting
really has to take away so much to add news or structural things that was a
great reputation and took all of that especially since it was someones like
you have any trepidation are you excited about this place but all in all I mean I
have no trepidation whatsoever throughout life and I went to
Afghanistan for guys like Mike this will be a new adventure