JULIE SALAMON is an American author, critic and storyteller. She worked at The Wall Street Journal for sixteen years, spending eleven years as the paper’s film critic. Later she became a staff journalist at The New York Times, where she was a TV critic and arts reporter. She's written books— fiction and non-fiction, for adults and children -- and produced articles for magazines that include The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, Vogue, Bazaar, and The New Republic. So far, her career adds up to hundreds of articles and eleven books with more than 3 million published words.
Julie’s subjects and books have received wide critical and popular attention, among them the international best seller THE DEVIL'S CANDY, considered a Hollywood classic, and WENDY AND THE LOST BOYS, the New York Times best-seller biography of playwright Wendy Wasserstein. Several of the books have been optioned for screenplays. Her latest book, AN INNOCENT BYSTANDER, published in June, 2019 by Little, Brown, explores the riveting story behind a shocking act of international terrorism. She has just completed UNLIKELY FRIENDS, a memoir for Audible Original, scheduled for release in 2021.
Julie has spent her adult life in lower Manhattan and is board chair of BRC, a leading non-profit organization in New York City that provides housing and treatment services to thousands of homeless adults. She also serves on the Board of Trustees of the the American Jewish Historical Society and The Village Temple. We spoke recently about the thirty-year anniversary of her year writing The Devil's Candy, how that experience and her book resonate today, and her current work as a writer and philanthropist.
Visit Julie Salamon's website here, and order her books here.
Dave Watson: It’s the thirty-year mark of the release of Brian De Palma’s film version of The Bonfire of the Vanities. You wrote a unique, seminal book, The Devil’s Candy, about the making of that movie where the director kept you by his side throughout the process. Looking back, what do you think of that experience now?
Julie Salamon: It was one of the great experiences of my lifetime - a crazy, fascinating, amazing year.
DW: Do you remember, view, or see things differently now than you did then?
JS: I certainly hope so! Sad commentary on my personal growth if my world view was set in stone thirty years ago. Yet one aspect of my personality remains the same, the part that gave me the chutzpah to take on this gargantuan task: I have always been curious about how things really work. One thing that changed momentously for me after the Bonfire experience was my ability to feel good about writing negative reviews. It’s no accident that I left a wonderful position—as film critic for The Wall Street Journal—three years after The Devil’s Candy came out. I became more interested in pursuing the longer form of books.
DW: I have viewed mainstream feature films differently ever since I read your book. What are some of the biggest lessons or distinctions you wanted readers to take away from reading it?
JS: There is so much P.R. and falderal built around movies, to build them up or tear them down. I didn’t write the book to teach readers lessons per se, but for me the great lesson was to understand better the warp and woof of Hollywood filmmaking. To see firsthand how often there’s a fine line between genius and disaster. In retrospect, the story is instructive in how the most talented people can convince themselves they are on the right path, often for the wrong reasons.
DW: You revealed so much about the director, the stars, the industry, and many have worked steadily since then. Has the industry changed since the early ‘90s? It’s hard not to imagine studios not exerting control over mega-budgeted Marvel/DC comic movies. Yet the most successful films, thinking of last year’s Parasite, appeared to firmly have a director’s stamp on them.
JS: Then as (probably) now, much has to do with the budget and the track record of the director. The more money at stake, the more control exerted by those holding the purse strings. Then as now, individual directors can demand more control if they’ve had box office success.
DW: You’ve written several nonfiction books since then. You have an amazing ability to reveal what I s happening right in front of you while getting out of the way as narrator. Has that always been a facet to your writing?
JS: Sometimes I get out of the way and sometimes I don’t. It really has depended on the story. Many critics have said my non-fiction has the style of fiction, which I hope means that the stories read well, not that they are made up! At heart I am a storyteller so ultimately the story I am telling dictates the form as it unfolds.
DW: Who are nonfiction writers that you admire? Why?
JS: There are so many! Off the top of my head (peeking at my bookshelf): Tom Wolfe, Jill Lepore, Yiyun Li, Rebecca West, Bill Bryson, Barbara Ehrenreich. All brilliant, all great storytellers, all driven to dig out large and small truths.
DW: You were also the film critic for The Wall Street Journal. How did that come about?
JS: Quite by accident. I’d gone to work as a financial reporter for the Journal right out of school, though I had no expertise in finance and no desire to be a financial reporter. The Journal newsroom was great training for a young journalist. After five years, I was looking to change beats, to something in the culture area. The Journal was just starting its daily arts coverage. I approached the editor about writing for him. I “auditioned” by writing articles on a variety of subjects. But when I mentioned I was movie-mad, the editor had me try my hand at criticism and liked what he saw.
DW: You also write children’s books. Was this a secondary direction in your writing career?
JS: I wrote the children’s books just after my second child left home for college. The books became a way for me to think about—through fiction, featuring cats and dogs—a chapter of my life that was coming to a close.
DW: You are also involved in charity work with homelessness in New York City. How is that going during the pandemic? This is such an unusual time. What do you see on the front lines that’s fighting this epidemic?
JS: Yes, for thirty years I have been involved with BRC (brc.org), a wonderful organization that serves people who are unsheltered. I am now board chair. The organization has done incredible work in this most difficult time. BRC has 1000 employees –many of them front line workers, who provide services to roughly 3,000 people a day. Amazingly, thanks to extraordinary mindfulness of CDC guidelines, and I’m knocking on wood, the Covid infection rate among staff and clients has been well below the city’s rate.
DW: What’s next for you?
JS: I just completed writing and will soon be recording an Audible Original memoir, which should be available this spring, tentatively titled, Unlikely Friends.
DW: Finally, what is your favorite cinematic moment?
JS: Reading this question I immediately had three images in my head.
Clip: The Sound of Music
The Wizard of Oz
Lawrence of Arabia
Dave Watson, founder and editor of Movies Matter, is a writer and educator in Madison, WI.
Julie’s subjects and books have received wide critical and popular attention, among them the international best seller THE DEVIL'S CANDY, considered a Hollywood classic, and WENDY AND THE LOST BOYS, the New York Times best-seller biography of playwright Wendy Wasserstein. Several of the books have been optioned for screenplays. Her latest book, AN INNOCENT BYSTANDER, published in June, 2019 by Little, Brown, explores the riveting story behind a shocking act of international terrorism. She has just completed UNLIKELY FRIENDS, a memoir for Audible Original, scheduled for release in 2021.
Julie has spent her adult life in lower Manhattan and is board chair of BRC, a leading non-profit organization in New York City that provides housing and treatment services to thousands of homeless adults. She also serves on the Board of Trustees of the the American Jewish Historical Society and The Village Temple. We spoke recently about the thirty-year anniversary of her year writing The Devil's Candy, how that experience and her book resonate today, and her current work as a writer and philanthropist.
Visit Julie Salamon's website here, and order her books here.
Dave Watson: It’s the thirty-year mark of the release of Brian De Palma’s film version of The Bonfire of the Vanities. You wrote a unique, seminal book, The Devil’s Candy, about the making of that movie where the director kept you by his side throughout the process. Looking back, what do you think of that experience now?
Julie Salamon: It was one of the great experiences of my lifetime - a crazy, fascinating, amazing year.
DW: Do you remember, view, or see things differently now than you did then?
JS: I certainly hope so! Sad commentary on my personal growth if my world view was set in stone thirty years ago. Yet one aspect of my personality remains the same, the part that gave me the chutzpah to take on this gargantuan task: I have always been curious about how things really work. One thing that changed momentously for me after the Bonfire experience was my ability to feel good about writing negative reviews. It’s no accident that I left a wonderful position—as film critic for The Wall Street Journal—three years after The Devil’s Candy came out. I became more interested in pursuing the longer form of books.
DW: I have viewed mainstream feature films differently ever since I read your book. What are some of the biggest lessons or distinctions you wanted readers to take away from reading it?
JS: There is so much P.R. and falderal built around movies, to build them up or tear them down. I didn’t write the book to teach readers lessons per se, but for me the great lesson was to understand better the warp and woof of Hollywood filmmaking. To see firsthand how often there’s a fine line between genius and disaster. In retrospect, the story is instructive in how the most talented people can convince themselves they are on the right path, often for the wrong reasons.
DW: You revealed so much about the director, the stars, the industry, and many have worked steadily since then. Has the industry changed since the early ‘90s? It’s hard not to imagine studios not exerting control over mega-budgeted Marvel/DC comic movies. Yet the most successful films, thinking of last year’s Parasite, appeared to firmly have a director’s stamp on them.
JS: Then as (probably) now, much has to do with the budget and the track record of the director. The more money at stake, the more control exerted by those holding the purse strings. Then as now, individual directors can demand more control if they’ve had box office success.
DW: You’ve written several nonfiction books since then. You have an amazing ability to reveal what I s happening right in front of you while getting out of the way as narrator. Has that always been a facet to your writing?
JS: Sometimes I get out of the way and sometimes I don’t. It really has depended on the story. Many critics have said my non-fiction has the style of fiction, which I hope means that the stories read well, not that they are made up! At heart I am a storyteller so ultimately the story I am telling dictates the form as it unfolds.
DW: Who are nonfiction writers that you admire? Why?
JS: There are so many! Off the top of my head (peeking at my bookshelf): Tom Wolfe, Jill Lepore, Yiyun Li, Rebecca West, Bill Bryson, Barbara Ehrenreich. All brilliant, all great storytellers, all driven to dig out large and small truths.
DW: You were also the film critic for The Wall Street Journal. How did that come about?
JS: Quite by accident. I’d gone to work as a financial reporter for the Journal right out of school, though I had no expertise in finance and no desire to be a financial reporter. The Journal newsroom was great training for a young journalist. After five years, I was looking to change beats, to something in the culture area. The Journal was just starting its daily arts coverage. I approached the editor about writing for him. I “auditioned” by writing articles on a variety of subjects. But when I mentioned I was movie-mad, the editor had me try my hand at criticism and liked what he saw.
DW: You also write children’s books. Was this a secondary direction in your writing career?
JS: I wrote the children’s books just after my second child left home for college. The books became a way for me to think about—through fiction, featuring cats and dogs—a chapter of my life that was coming to a close.
DW: You are also involved in charity work with homelessness in New York City. How is that going during the pandemic? This is such an unusual time. What do you see on the front lines that’s fighting this epidemic?
JS: Yes, for thirty years I have been involved with BRC (brc.org), a wonderful organization that serves people who are unsheltered. I am now board chair. The organization has done incredible work in this most difficult time. BRC has 1000 employees –many of them front line workers, who provide services to roughly 3,000 people a day. Amazingly, thanks to extraordinary mindfulness of CDC guidelines, and I’m knocking on wood, the Covid infection rate among staff and clients has been well below the city’s rate.
DW: What’s next for you?
JS: I just completed writing and will soon be recording an Audible Original memoir, which should be available this spring, tentatively titled, Unlikely Friends.
DW: Finally, what is your favorite cinematic moment?
JS: Reading this question I immediately had three images in my head.
- The opening of The Sound of Music when Julie Andrews is singing the title song as she charges across the Alps. No wonder that one of my books, a novel, is The Christmas Tree and features nuns!
- The moment in The Wizard of Oz when Dorothy lands in Oz and the film turns from black and white into color. I first saw this as a child in Seaman, Ohio, the rural Appalachian village where I grew up. Our first TV was black and white so I think I’d seen the movie three or four times until I realized Oz was in color!
- Omar Sharif’s entrance in Lawrence of Arabia. Still get the chills when I see it, pretty impressive when you consider I’m watching a man ride across the desert on top of a camel.
Clip: The Sound of Music
The Wizard of Oz
Lawrence of Arabia
Dave Watson, founder and editor of Movies Matter, is a writer and educator in Madison, WI.
