Special: Mitchel Stevens’ Guide to Ben Kharakh’s Interview with Ben Kharakh

Editor's Note: The following column is part of an anonymous weekly humor column chronicling the struggle of a new, young journalist out in the working world. You may find the author's previous posts in the archives. --The Ed.


Like many fashionable, highly sought-after writers that spent their evening pounding rotgut gin and watching those Indian soap operas uploaded to YouTube, I have an unhealthy interest with Ben Kharakh.

It started out when I wrote about an interview he did for Gothamist with Red Eye host Greg Gutfeld. From there, I—along with The Apiary—have come to consider Ben as some sort of robot, or android, or Astromech droid with a wig.

(Personally, I assumed he was co-controlled via iPhones by Jen Chung and Jake “Alpha Kitty” Dobkin.)

After talking to The Editorialiste—and, I can’t lie, a lot of LULZ from being directed to The Apiary’s ROBOINTERVIEWER description—we decided that I, Mitchel Stevens, the single greatest freelance writer in all of New York City, I mean, uh, Major Urban City on the East Coast, would examine Kharakh’s interviews.

Am I deterred by the fact that Ben may only be in high school? Nonsense!

(I think he’s in college. I assume, I mean, my High School “ethics” course involved watching The Matrix.)

Anyway, to kick off the latest feature here, I decided to start with an interview where it is BEN who is the INTERVIEW-EEE. Yeah, I don’t know why I hit caps lock there, either.

Interview: Ben Kharakh

Intervieweeeeeeee: Rebecca Curtis, Author. Inspired by Tao Lin, Cultural Masturbator.

I have a question for you: you have some awesome humor pieces on McSweeney's. Why is it that you write funny pieces and not "serious" pieces?

I was always trying to be the funny guy in the group and writing humorous pieces is just an extension of that. Why I try to be funny is a different question all together. I have yet to attempt a serious piece, although I have contemplated it and even have a project in mind called People: The Movie. I'd also like to do something on hubris. It may be that if I attempted a serious piece that it would still have elements of humor in it because of my sensibility.

MS Says: Good start. Wait, he’s been published in McSweeney’s? Shit. And here I thought the time Dave Eggers totally grabbed my ass at Union Hall while Jonathan Coulton smoked a hookah blew my mind.

Seriously, just imagine that. Pretty fucking cool, amirite?

What happens in "People: The movie?"

I would like it to encapsulate a part of the human condition, but outside of that I am unsure. I often like to start my pieces with the title first and work from there. It's even better if the title and the premise are the same thing, like my current screenplay project Undercover Mummy. It's 21 Jump Street meets The Mummy meets Revenge of the Nerds.

MS Says: See, here Kharakh slyly manipulates the interview. Instead of answering a question, he discusses how he titles things and then writes. Much like all of his writing. Not discussed is how Kharakh totally C++ certified or how his statement would be culturally ironic if he name checked “My Science Project.”

How do you think it is that a piece becomes "funny"?

Usually when I write I try to think more along the lines of "good" as opposed to funny. For example, if a boy in an English class was asked what an analogy was, I think a good answer would be "albatross". It's not necessarily funny, but I think that's good. Some people believe that incongruity is at the heart of all humor, others think it's halibut.

MS Says: Man, once you get that whole “I’ve been published in McSweeney’s” thing going, every answer is like Dave Eggers masturbating while Jonathan Coulton sits on a futon smoking a hookah and a midget tap dances to a Kinks song. This is how I believe the McSweeney’s office is when they take a break from saving children and buying everyone in the world a Coke.

Define metaphor: a metaphor is an albatross! I like it. It makes perfect sense. But can you distinguish a bit more between "good" humor and "bad" humor?
What's funny is very subjective and varied in nature, but the one thing that all of my favorite humorists and comedians have in common is that their humor reflects their unique perspective. It doesn't matter if they're political, absurd, observational, or even innovative, as long as what they have to say could only be said by them. After all, if anyone can say what you've got to say, we don't need you to say it.

MS Says: This is boring. I’m going to go make a sandwich.

What are the qualities of a great humorist?

I read a primatologist's essay about the role laughter plays in the lives of chimpanzees. It's used as a means to establish an air of well being in social situations and to show that there is no aggression. Basically it's used for rendering something as harmless. For example, if chimps are play wrestling, they'll laugh before it escalates into a real conflict to show that there is no aggression. For people, humor is an ex-adaptation, meaning that it serves a different purpose from what it once did, thanks to our ability to think abstractly and the advent of humor. Humor, at its core, stems from incongruity, such as surprise, juxtaposition, or irony. When people laugh, they're categorizing that incongruity as harmless. Of course, it all depends on the context. 9/11 was incongruous, but I doubt anyone found that funny. So, humor is all about taking that incongruity and putting it in the right context. The more interesting the context/incongruity, the better the humor. Sometimes it's possible to use a context that's unfunny but the incongruity is so effective that one can't resist laughter. That's always fun.

MS Says: ...

What do you think are the qualities of a great writer?

I imagine they'd be similar to that of a great humorist. I think a mistake people make when judging art is that they make criticisms about what the piece didn't do as opposed to looking at the artist's goal and how close it came to achieve. I think art should be judged for what it is and not what it isn't.

Who are the writers, do you think, that are most consistently and compellingly saying what they want to say in a way that only they would say it?

I don't read enough to be able to give an answer to this question, but there are many comedians that do this well. Paul F. Tompkins, Maria Bamford, Jen Kirkman, Neil Hamburger, Andy Kindler, Todd Glass, and Louis CK, for example.

MS Says: Damn, that was a tasty sandwich. Where are we? Uh huh, “writers,” “blah blah, “great writer,” Louis CK…wait, why is Louis CK on here? Where am I? Good lord, literary types are the worst interviews. Especially when they’re pseudo-literary types. And what is with all these high school and grade school references? Is Kharakh like 12? Dude, Gothamist is totally into child labor. They blind you with kitties—kitties fueled by the blood of underage work-force blogging.

To be honest, I think that literary fiction has to absurd, and/or funny, in some way (even an understated or very subtle way) to be good. For example, Chekhov's stories have an underlying absurdity, and a subtle humor, even though we think of him as a very realist and straight writer. To me, a lot of the "good" contemporary fiction takes itself too seriously to be funny in any capacity. Are there any writers whose work you think *isn't* funny in any capacity? Who are the fiction writers whose work you do find funny?

I think Woody Allen, John Swartzwelder, Neil Pollack, and Douglas Adams are consistently funny. I just read a book called A Woman Trapped in a Woman's Body by Lauren Weedman that I thought was terrifically entertaining. I once read Melmoth the Wanderer by Charles Maturin and didn't think that was funny at all.

MS Says: Holy lord, the Shawshank Redemption is a good film. I mean, seriously, I’m thinking of anything to stop the boredom here. God, I am skipping down a few paragraphs. Wait, better get some coffee first.

How come you do all these interviews? Is this a PR move on your part, and/or do you get tired of hearing self-absorbed writers babble on about their formative moments?
I wanted to be a comedian for a long time, so my first interviews were all with comedians and about their formative years. I thought I'd benefit a lot from learning about them and the art of comedy. Since then, I've expanded to other types of subjects. I never get tired of hearing about formative moments, but my sometimes editors do! Personally, I'm much more interested in bits like that than promoting someone's movie or asking, "Mets or Yankees?" Also, it's great for networking and getting free stuff. I don't think there's any other way that I could have met Todd Glass and Andrew WK if it wasn't for interviews.

MS Says: Paydirt! First off, interviews mean shit in terms of networking and free stuff—unless BK’s talking about the swag you receive in order to promote a talent, i.e. DVDs, shirts, tickets, passes. This is what’s known as “payola.” I think they teach a course on this. Ben should drop the ethics a—wait, he’s already in an Ethics class. WTF, d00d. You are totally failing that. And how are you more interested than promoting a movie o—OH SHIT, THAT’S A GOTHAMIST BURN RIGHT THERE. DAMN. HE BITES THE HAND THAT FEEDS! HE IS HARDCORE. HE IS HARDCORE. HE IS--

You know, “This is Hardcore” isn’t such a bad album. I recently put it back on while I was cleaning my room and discovered it can still speak to the new, middle-upper class derelict created in the shitstorm that is “the creative underclass.”

Oh, fuck that. Who am I kidding? I am all about His Name Is Alive. Where was I?

So your editors do get tired of hearing about writers' formative moments--what do they really want to hear about?

They want the interview to answer the question, "Why should I read this interview?" Although I think that's the job of the intro.

MS Says: …BWA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!! Oh…oh, this is good. This is like watching a man on stilts fall on a banana peel.

Do you get sick of doing interviews?

I only get sick of transcribing interviews.

MS says: BWA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA! Ah. HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA.

Okay, okay, that’s enough. After that Curtis and Kharakh descend into more faux-lit “if you were a tree, how would you change the world in sixteen seconds” questions devised by James Lipton. Suffice to say, this brings a lot of light onto everyone’s favorite Astromech-Interviewer.

Does he seem like a bad guy? Nonsense. Kharakh is a young writer doing what he wants to do, and semi-successful at it. It didn’t really hit me until now that he mainly sticks with a comedy beat. However, this faux-intellectualism is annoying as fuck for a guy who just transcribes his Q&As.

Will I stop from giggling like a school girl every time I look at one of his hard-hitting articles? Probably not. Although he has shown an ability to respond to people like Neil Hamburger one-on-one, but it’s too bad G’Mist won’t let him actually “talk” to any of his interviews for them. That said…

HOW WAS THIS INTERVIEW CONDUCTED?
A) Telephone
B) In-person
C) E-mail/AIM
D) On the back of a dolphin while Tao Lin had his intern slathering Starbucks in sticky wheatpaste made from his brief encounter with Jonathan Coulton smoking a hookah atop a large monkey situated at the center of the universe humming along to “Code Monkey.” Not to mention Kharakh was thinking in portals.

We’re going with D. Code Monkey is a kick-ass song.

-MS

UPDATE: Learned on Tuesday that Ben was released by Gothamist, but luckily he's still doing interviews at Starpulse.com. That said, I wish Ben the best. If only because I still need material. And no longer need to fear Gothamist, as the site now solely run by Jen Chung's iPhone. And a kitten.

Mitchel Stevens’ Guide to Employment and His Life

Editor's Note: The following column is part of an anonymous weekly humor column chronicling the struggle of a new, young journalist out in the working world. You may find the author's previous posts in the archives. --The Ed.


Heya Internet!

Sorry for the late update. Your favorite pseudo-anonymous intrepid reporter was busy all last week at the world’s greatest swag-bag/performance space, featuring plenty of kids crying about how lame it is—when they don’t get free stuff. Man, I know!

You know what else sucks? Work!

You know what you were doing? Work!

You know what is lame when compared to being able to have margaritas early on a Thursday afternoon, and by margaritas I totally mean coffee because I don’t have a blender or lime juice but plenty of gin because that’s totally acceptable in your margarita since I don’t drink wussy drinks like tequila...oh I’m lying, I drink tequila...uh…question mark.

WORK! That’s right!

Oh, but I digress. I’ve been filing and working 30+ hour weeks. Man, work is hard—especially when your contracts shift and change!

Case in point: Part-time job no. 442 paid me half of the fee I was supposed to receive. What the fellow who hired me neglected to say was:

• A.) I would not be paid $X00 per month, despite saying “You’ll get $X00 per month.” (Note: The number is even, below six and higher than two.)
• B.) This person, I would find out a few days ago, in fact had no basis to tell me money since he didn’t handle it.
• C.) I actually got a check for less than $X00.
• D.) If I want $X00, I’d have to write an extra article per week for a sister site, but would have to be approved two weeks ahead of time. And whatever I optioned could be taken by a staff member before I’d be allowed to write it.

Who says online journalism isn’t awesome? I was sort of bummed out about that for a while. Not to mention my OL’ RELIABLE is in a bit of an in-between period—while having a healthy bit of change coming my way—due to ad sales, and a lack there of.

DAILY FREE NEWSPAPER isn’t returning my calls, but would love for me to pitch them for December or January.

And man, the world is a dark, dreary place. Nearly five months since I escaped one hell, and now I can’t even get into another. I looked at an ad to copy-write for some knife company the other day. Kinda tempting. I mean, what else is a poor boy to do?

Well, there is the interview I did with Gothamist’s Ben Kharakh* today. Just now as a matter of fact. Here, take a gander:

How are you?
Fine. A little cold, but whatever.

What is your name?
Mitchel Stevens. Wait, was there more? You just kinda…let it stay flat.

What is your opinion on INSERT TOPIC HERE?
Wait, what? Insert what? A topic? Uh, well, I’m a big fan of my Nintendo DS. I mean, it’s really an ingenious thing when you think about it. The whole concept they’re doing with touch is kinda cool.

How do you like New York?
New-, wait, what? Fine. I guess.

(REFERENCE TO QUESTION THREE)
…oh god, you’re…

DO YOU WANT BIG PENIS NAO TIEM11111111
A SPAM-BOT!

Yes, I have discovered that Gothamist’s own Ben Kharakh is in fact a super-sentient, beta-tested feature available on early builds of Apple’s OS X.2 Leopard. I have it on good word that Jen Chung and Jake “Kitty” Dobkin actually operate Kharakh using their iPhones. It’s apparently just like playing a Nintendo DS.

Anyway, I really shouldn’t mock Gothamist. They’ll send Dobkin’s army of kittens with adorable knives after me. Maybe if I promise to work for them, they’ll help me get a job. Besides, I bet Gothamist at least pays nickels, dimes and belly lint when they say they will.

Oh well. Sorry for the late column and sorry for it being a throw-in. I’ll be back at my regular time next week and regale you about my time spent at “OMG, WTF, WHERE IS MY FREE STUFF” festival last week.

-MS

Mitchel Stevens’ Guide to Employment and Robotics

Editor's Note: The following column is part of an anonymous weekly humor column chronicling the struggle of a new, young journalist out in the working world. You may find the author's previous posts in the archives. --The Ed.

The column’s a bit late these week, kids, due to the nasty weather and all. I know, you may be thinking, “how is that possible with sun and summer-like temperatures?” Especially when the stormy weather comes after my column usually runs.

And the answer for that is located somewhere underneath Fox’s corporate headquarters and Jann Wenner’s safe where the secret to rock and roll success is kept.

(Special note: don’t bother looking for it. It’s just a napkin Jann made at the age of 22. It’s just a venn diagram, a smiley face and the number for a pizza place on Lexington Ave.)

But anyway, it is cold and I have taken to staying inside my lavish cubby hole located somewhere between the BQE and a bottle. Of course, one of my daily rituals is refreshing my Bloglines quicker than you can say, “we regret to inform you…”

The other? Reading Gothamist. Particularly the interviews, since they can range from wonderfully short and (unintentionally) hilarious to the most recent one with Red Eye host Greg Gutfeld.

It is a semi-secret that most Gothamist contributors make a majority of their money at day jobs and write/blog second, which is great. (It’s also not a secret that Gothamist is stingier than Radar Magazine when it comes to reimbursement/payment. Not to mention a tad bit of payola. See below.)

But back to the interview at hand by Ben Kharakh. Now, Gutfeld’s hilarious. It’s worth it sometimes for me to be at the bar, try desperately to pick up a girl who has cable, go to her apartment and then cite performance anxiety*—all so I can then watch Red Eye at 3 a.m.

It’s just too bad that Kharakh either couldn’t get Gutfeld on the phone, couldn’t take the B/D/F/V to Sixth Avenue or schedule a good time to do anything but an e-mail interview. How can one tell it’s an e-mail interview?

An excerpt:

[Gutfeld:] It took three months to work out the kinks, but our show is now the most refreshing, smart and fun hour on television, and that includes Reading Rainbow. More juice? It's grape.

[Kharakh:] Having done this for over half a year, what are some tricks that you've picked up to make it through the day and in what way have you improved

First, there was no punctuation and that’s fine. Normally when one transcribes an interview, you forget things like that. Lord knows this one time I even forgot to do the Q&A. But completely ignoring such a flippant opening, or editing it out? Huh.

Gutfelt goes on, treating the “exchange” as if they were in his lavish, Swinging Sixties bachelor pad and not pounding this out on his office computer. There’s nothing wrong with the e-mail interview, but Gothamist has a long history with running it as if it was conducted in person and as if keeping the reader blind to the truth is ethically all right.

Not to mention they disable all comments for interviews.

But hey, how can I be upset at Gothamist? You can’t hate them. They’re adorable little puppy bloggers with cat fetishes and who dedicate their free time to a network of city-based blogs.

I mean, I’d just like to know if an interview was in-person or via email or phone or iPhone or iChat. That’s all, guys.

Anyway, sorry for pretending to be The Editorialiste today, guys. It is cold and I am mildly cranky.

Before I go, I also must say: Gawker’s Freelancer Action Unit. Wowie Zowie. Finally, I can get paid! No longer do I have to live in fear of unresponsive editors and payments departments! Gawker is back on my side!

…

Of course, Gawker is tied to Radar Magazine, who may or may not be still publishing, New York Magazine, slightly to Time Out New York, OK Magazine…um…you know, in hind sight, maybe it’s better NOT to talk to Gawker. Then again, each editor does make $323 billion dollars per year because bloggers are rich.

Speaking of, it’s time to go fight a cat for some breakfast.

-MS

*Note: Mitchel Stevens does not really suffer performance anxiety. He is a he-man woman hater with a cock that just won’t stop a sensitive writer and nice guy.