A Quote by Tama Janowitz

I feel like I sort of missed the eighties. At the time, we didn't know we were having fun, which is probably the way it always is. — © Tama Janowitz
I feel like I sort of missed the eighties. At the time, we didn't know we were having fun, which is probably the way it always is.
I feel like I sort of missed the eighties. At the time, we didn’t know we were having fun, which is probably the way it always is.
I don't know if any of you feel this way, but it's like eventually, you see a woman come on screen and you go, "Oh, thank God!" You just sort of need a break from all this testosterone, which happened, I think, in one of my films, The Hurt Locker. I was in it for like five minutes, and people were like, "You were in that movie!" And I was like, "Well, kind of." And they were like, "No, you were!" 'Cause they needed a woman!
It's always fun to play the innocent, no matter what you're doing. If you feel like you're doing the right thing, you can get away with a lot comedically. I had definitely missed not having a conscience.
I always say to people, the Eighties were so inventive because people wanted to stand out. By the time we got to the Nineties, everyone wanted to fit in. It was all about having the same pair of trainers and the same pair of jeans. That's fatal. Whereas the Eighties you would never be seen in the same pair of jeans that somebody else was wearing.
The films that I loved growing up were the science fiction films from the late seventies and early eighties [films], which were more about the people and how they are affected by the environments that they are in. Whether they are sort of futuristic or alien of whatever they are; that was the science fiction that I loved. So that is what we tried to make, the sort of film that felt like those old films.
There are a bunch of different movies I feel that way about. However, there is a debate because as you may know after MST3K ended there have been things like Cinematic Titanic that are the children and the grandchildren of this way of dissecting movies and making fun of them and in a way celebrating the absurdity of those movies as well. There are certain movies that sort of fit into the MST3K paradigm which is hidden gems, these weird horror/sci-fi/fantasy movies.
I think Australians do well here because we feel a bit naughty, like we're in America and if they only knew how much fun we were having, we'd all get thrown out, you know.
If you look back on the period, the 1980s has never been seen as cool. You think of the music, and it always has a kitsch quality to it because everyone looks so ridiculous. Even the Nineties, with The Stone Roses and other bands, was cool before the Eighties. It really missed the boat! The Sixties was always cool, even then. That was my Dad's era and I was always jealous of that. But now, as an adult, looking back, we were part of this mental time. It was the most enormous amount of tribes that could have ever existed in one place.
Everybody loves music and it's fun - you feel like you're not working out. It makes the time go by quick and you're having fun and, especially if you take a class, there's the energy of other people and you're laughing.
Never underestimate the importance of having fun. I'm dying and I'm having fun. And I'm going to keep having fun every day because there's no other way to play it.
I hate being too serious about anything. If I'm with my friend, I want to be having fun with him or her. And if anybody is reading my story, I want them to be not only reading the story, but I want them to feel they're having fun; that they're enjoying it. So any way you can make it more informal, more fun-filled, more amusing - instead of just a dry story that goes on and on - if there's any way to do that, I like to try and do it.
The late '90s were a really bad time for people trying to be rock stars, you know what I mean? It seemed like everyone was a one-hit wonder on the radio. We had friends who had a hit single on the radio and sold 500,000 records, and then they couldn't get arrested a year later. I had this feeling at the time that that was not possible anymore, so the idea of becoming the biggest band in the country—it seemed laughable. I felt that having those sort of ambitions was foolish, because there was no way that was going to be possible. If you saw it that way, you were just deluding yourself.
Darkness is important. If you were having fun all the time, you wouldn't know what dark is.
I'm into having a good time and showing people you can have fun. Because for a long time, the West Coast, it wasn't about having fun. It was about gang banging; it just wasn't fun no more. So now I'm bringing fun back.
And even if you didn't fall in love in the eighties, in your mind it will feel like the eighties, all innocent and airbrushed, with bright colors and shoulder pads and Pat Benetar or the Cure on the soundtrack.
The story of our band is that we were this relentless touring band in those early years. We were leaving day jobs and going off on the road and having fun and seeing the country for the first time. We were playing Chinese restaurants and basements and record stores and houses. We were crashing on floors and it was all new and exciting. It was like a vacation. It didn't feel like work. I couldn't wait to go on tour back then. I would be sitting at my day job or my apartment, just itching to go. There were so many adventures that were about to happen.
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