LitFilm 2024: How to Come Alive with Norman Mailer Screening & Talkback

Documentary, dir. by Jeff Zimbalist
U.S., 2023, 102 min

How to Come Alive with Norman Mailer explores the rollercoaster life of America’s most controversial and bestselling author of the 20th Century, Norman Mailer. Propelled by his tremendous ego and contrarian spirit, Mailer’s ceaseless visibility in the public eye lasted 6 decades, during which he had 6 tumultuous marriages, 9 beloved children, 11 bestsellers, 3 arrests, and 2 Pulitzer Prizes. Prophet, hedonist, violent criminal, literary outlaw, and social provocateur, Mailer’s ideas about love, anger, fear, and courage cut to the core of human nature, are more relevant than ever today, and point to a prescription for waking ourselves up, shaking free of society’s expectations, and coming alive as a people. This film will be followed by a conversation with Mailer's son, John Buffalo Mailer, Mailer's aunt, the writer Barbara Wasserman & his cousin, Peter Alson. Olivia Rutigliano of Literary Hub will moderate.

---

PARTICIPANTS

John Buffalo Mailer is an award winning producer, screenwriter, actor, and author, having had a hand in making over 25 movies to date. He is currently developing a scripted dramatic series of his father’s life with director James Gray and producers Rudy Langlais, Jennifer Gelfer, and Martin Tuchman.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Peter Alson is an author, editor and publisher. His books include the highly acclaimed memoirs Confessions of an Ivy League Bookie (Crown, 1996) and Take Me to the River (Atria, 2006), as well as One of a Kind (Atria, 2005) and Atlas (Ecco, 2005), and a novel, The Only Way to Play It (Arbitrary Press, 2020). His articles have appeared in many national magazines, including Esquire, Playboy and The New York Times. He has written screenplays for Paramount and various independent producers, and his TV pilot, Nicky’s Game, starring John Ventimiglia and Burt Young, appeared in the New York Television Festival and the Vail Film Festival. He lives in New York with his wife, screen and television writer Alice O’Neill, and their daughter, Eden.

Barbara Wasserman is the author of the memoir Love of My Life (Arbitrary Press, 2021). Before retiring, she worked as a researcher on television documentaries an as an editor at Simon & Schuster. She has lived in Greenwich Village for the past 69 years.

Olivia Rutigliano is an Editor at Lit Hub and its vertical CrimeReads, as well as an Editor at their parent company, the publishing house Grove Atlantic. Her essays and criticism have appeared in Vanity Fair, Vulture, Lapham's Quarterly, the Los Angeles Review of Books, The Baffler, Bright Wall/Dark Room, Public Books, and elsewhere. She has a PhD in English and theater from Columbia University, and is a specialist in the history of mass entertainment from the late 19th through the 20th centuries.

 

All screenings are free but require reservations. Times subject to change. For the full LitFilm roster, go here.