In dem Roman American Psycho von Bret Easton Ellis gibt es eine fiktionale Talkshow mit dem Titel “The Patty Winters Show”. Der Protagonist schaut diese Talk Show jeden Tag und Gespräche über das aktuelle Thema bei Patty Winters ziehen sich wie ein roter Faden durch das Buch.
Ich fand die fiktionalen Themen dieser Show in ihrer Absurdität schon immer faszinierend. Sie sind vielleicht nicht gleich der vielzitierte “Spiegel der Gesellschaft”, aber sie untermauern noch einmal die Gesamtaussage des Buches und vor allem das Gefühl, dass es gegenüber unserem sogennanten “normalen Alltag” entwickelt. Daher hab ich einmal alle Themen dieser Talkshow zusammengetragen:
I’m about to ask Dibble if he watched The Patty Winters Show this morning - the topic was Autism - but he gets out on the floor before mine and repeats the name of the restaurant, “Thaidialano,” and then “See you, Marcus” and steps out of the elevatoopen the cartons of Japanese foor.
“Did you see The Patty Winters Show this morning?” I ask. ..On Autism?”
“No.” She smiles as if somehow charmed by my addiction to The Patty Winters Show. “How was it?”
I pick up this morning’s Wall Street Journal and scan the front page - all of it one ink-stained senseless typeset blur. “I think I was hallucinating while watching it. I don’t know. I can’t be sure. I don’t remember,” I murmur, placing the Journal back down and then, picking up today’s Financial Times, “I really don’t know.” She just stands there waiting for instructions. I sigh and place my hands together, sitting down at the Palazzetti glass-top desk, the halogen lamps on both sides already burning. “Okay, Jean,” I start. “I need reservations for three at Camols at twelve-thirty and if not there, try Crayons. All right?”
While I stretch, The Patty Winters Show I watched this morning comes back to me. The topic was Big Breasts and there was a woman on it who had a breast reduction since she thought her tits were too big - the dumb bitch. I immediately called McDermott who was also watching it and we both ridiculed the woman through the rest of the segment. I do about fifteen minutes of stretching before heading off to the Nautilus machines.
Because of this excursion I have no time for a morning workout, and since I overslept, owing to a late-night-predawn coke binge with Charles Griffin and Hilton Ashbury that started innocently enough at a magazine party none of us were invited to at M.K. and ended at my automated teller sometime around five, I’ve missed The Patty Winters Show which actually was a repeat of an interview with the President, so it doesn’t really matter, I guess.
The Patty Winters Show this morning was about Real-Life Rambos.
The Patty Winters Show this morning was about Perfumes and Lipsticks and Makeups.
On The Patty Winters Show this morning were descendants of members of the Donner Party.
The Patty Winters Show this morning was about UFOs That Kill.
The Patty Winters Show this morning was about the possibility of nuclear war, and according to the panel of experts the odds are pretty good it will happen sometime within the next month.
On The Patty Winters Show this morning the topic was Toddler-Murderers. In the studio audience were parents of children who’d been kidnapped, tortured and murdered, while on stage a panel of psychiatrists and pediatricians were trying to help them cope - somewhat futilely I might add, and much to my delight - with their confusion and anger. But what really cracked me up was - via satellite on a lone TV monitor - three convicted Toddler-Murderers on death row who due to fairly complicated legal loopholes were now seeking parole and would probably get it. But something kept distracting me while I watched the huge Sony TV over a breakfast of sliced kiwi and Japanese apple-pear, Evian water, oat-bran muffins, soy milk and cinnamon granola, ruining my enjoyment of the grieving mothers, and it wasn’t until the show was almost over that I figured out what it was: the crack above my David Onica that I had asked the doorman to tell the superintendent to fix.
The Patty Winters Show this morning was about Shark Attack Victims.
The Patty Winters Show this morning was Aspirin: Can It Save Your Life?
The Patty Winters Show this morning was about Nazis and, inexplicably, I got a real charge out of watching it. Though I wasn’t exactly charmed by their deeds, I didn’t find them unsympathetic either, nor I might add did most of the members of the audience. One of the Nazis, in a rare display of humor, even juggled grapefruits and, delighted, I sat up in bed and clapped.
Courtney calls, too wasted on Elavil to meet me for a coherent dinner at Cranes, the new Kitty Oates Sanders restaurant in Gramercy Park where Jean, my secretary, made reservations for us last week, and I’m nonplussed. Even though it got excellent reviews (one in New York magazine; the other in The Nation) I don’t complain or persuade Courtney to change her mind since I have two files I should go over and The Patty Winters Show I taped this morning hasn’t been watched yet. It’s sixty minutes about women who’ve had mastectomies, which at seven-thirty, over breakfast, before the office, I couldn’t bear to sit through, but after today - hanging out at the office, where the air-conditioning broke down, a tedious lunch with Cunningham at Odeon, my fucking Chinese cleaners unable to get bloodstains out of another Soprani jacket, four videotapes overdue that ended up costing me a fortune, a twenty-minute wait at the Stairmasters - I’ve adapted; these events have toughened me and I’m prepared to deal with this particular topic.
The Patty Winters Show this morning was about a new sport called Dwarf Tossing.
The Patty Winters Show this morning was about women who married homosexuals and I almost called Courtney up to warn her - as a joke - but then decided against it, deriving a certain amount of satisfaction from imagining Luis Carruthers proposing to her, Courtney shyly accepting, their nightmarish honeymoon.
[…]open the cartons of Japanese food and dump their contents over him, but to my surprise instead of sushi and teriyaki and hand rolls and soba noodles, chicken with cashew nuts falls all over his gasping bloodied face and beef chow mein and shrimp fried rice and moo shu pork splatter onto his heaving chest, and this irritating setback - accidentally killing the wrong type of Asian - moves me to check where this order was going - Sally Rubinstein - and with my Mont Blanc pen to write I’m gonna get you too… bitch on the back of it, then place the order over the dead kid’s face and shrug apologetically, mumbling “Uh, sorry” and recall that The Patty Winters Show this morning was about Teenage Girls Who Trade Sex for Crack I spent two hours at the gym today and can now complete two hundred abdominal crunches in less than three minutes.
The Patty Winters Show this morning was about Aerobic Exercise.
Later, around two, in bed, I’m unable to sleep. Evelyn catches me on call waiting while I’m listening to messages on 976-TWAT and watching a tape on the VCR of this morning’s Patty Winters Show which is about Deformed People.
The Patty Winters Show this morning was about Concentration Camp Survivors.
The Patty Winters Show this morning was about Salad Bars.
The topic on The Patty Winters Show this morning was Has Patrick Swayze Become Cynical or Not?
“So did you watch The Patty Winters Show this morning?”
“No, I was out jogging,” she says, leaning in. “It was about Michael J. Fox, right?”
“No,” I correct her. “It was about Patrick Swayze.”
“Oh really?” she asks, then, “It’s hard to keep.track. You’re sure?”
“Yes. Patrick Swayze. I’m positive.”
“How was it?”
“Well, it was very interesting,” I tell her, breathing in air. “It was almost like a debate, about whether he’s gotten cynical or not.”
“Do you think he has?” she asks, still smiling.
“Well, no, I’m not sure,” I start nervously. “It”s an interesting question. It wasn’t explored fully enough. I mean after Dirty Dancing I wouldn’t think so, but with Tiger Warsaw I don’t know. I might be crazy, but I thought I detected some bitterness. I’m not sure.”
She stares at me, her expression unchanged.
Talking animals were the topic of this morning’s Patty Winters Show. An octopus was floating in a makeshift aquarium with a microphone attached to one of its tentacles and it kept asking - or so its “trainer,” who is positive that mollusks have vocal cords, assured us - for “cheese.” I watched, vaguely transfixed, until I started to sob.
Today has not been bad: I worked out for two hours before the office; the new Robison Hirsch restaurant called Finna opened in Chelsea; Evelyn left two messages on my answering machine and another with Jean, letting me know that she’ll be in Boston for most of the week; and best of all, The Patty Winters Show this morning was in two parts. The first was an exclusive interview with Donald Trump, the second was a report on women who’ve been tortured.
I’m tired and I need to rest. At my apartment I lie in bed, too distracted to have sex with her, so she leaves, and after watching a tape of this morning’s Patty Winters Show, which is about the best restaurants in the Middle East, I pick up my cordless phone and tentatively, reluctantly, call Evelyn.
The Patty Winters Shows were all repeats. Life remained a blank canvas, a cliché, a soap opera. I felt lethal, on the verge of frenzy.
This morning’s topic on The Patty Winters Show was People Who Weigh Over Seven Hundred Pounds - What Can We Do About Them?
Afterwards I watched a repeat of an old Patty Winters Show that I found on what I originally thought was a videotape of the torture and subsequent murder of two escort girls from last spring (the topic was Tips on How Your Pet Can Become a Movie Star).
The Patty Winters Show this morning was about a boy who fell in love with a box of soap.
The Patty Winters Show today was - ironically, I thought - about Princess Di’s beauty tips.
“Spuds McKenzie is on The Patty Winters Show tomorrow.
I did a line of cocaine I found in my medicine cabinet when we first came back to my place, and the Cristal takes the edge off it, but only slightly: The Patty Winters Show this morning was about a machine that lets people talk to the dead.
The Patty Winters Show this morning was about Home Abortion Kits.
The huge new television set is on in one of the rooms, first blaring out The Patty Winters Show, whose topic today is Human Dairies, then a game show, Wheel of Fortune, and the applause coming from the studio audience sounds like static each time a new letter is turned.
Tuesday night, at Bouley, in No Man’s Land, a fairly unremarkable marathon dinner, even after I tell the table, “Listen, guys, my life is a living hell,” they utterly ignore me, the group assembled (Richard Perry, Edward Lampert, John Constable, Craig McDermott, Jim Kramer, Lucas Tanner) continuing to argue about allocating assets, which stocks look best for the upcoming decade, hardbodies, real estate, gold, why long-term bonds are too risky now, the spread collar, portfolios, how to use power effectively, new ways to exercise, Stolichnaya Cristall, how best to impress very important people, eternal vigilance, life at its best, here in Bouley I cannot seem to control myself, here in a room that contains a whole host of victims, lately I can’t help noticing them everywhere - in business meetings, nightclubs, restaurants, in passing taxis and in elevators, on line at automated tellers and on porno tapes, in David’s Cookies and on CNN, everywhere, all of them having one thing in common: they are prey, and during dinner I almost become unglued, plummeting into a state of near vertigo that forces me to excuse myself before dessert, at which point I use the rest room, do a line of cocaine, pick up my Giorgio Armani wool overcoat and the .357 magnum barely concealed within it from the coatcheck, strap on a holster and then I’m outside, but on The Patty Winters Show this morning there was an interview with a man who set his daughter on fire while she was giving birth, at dinner we all had shark…
On The Patty Winters Show this morning the topic was Beautiful Teenage Lesbians, which I found so erotic I had to stay home, miss a meeting, jerk off twice.
Men Who’ve Been Raped by Women was the topic on The Patty Winters Show this morning.
While getting dressed to meet Jeanette for a new British musical that opened on Broadway last week and then dinner at Progress, the new Malcolm Forbes restaurant on the Upper East Side, I watch a tape of this morning’s Patty Winters Show, which is split into two parts. The first section is a feature on the lead singer of the rock band Guns n’ Roses, Axl Rose, whom Patty quoted as telling an interviewer, “When I get stressed I get violent and take it out on myself. I’ve pulled razor blades on myself but then realized that having a scar is more detrimental than not having a stereo… I’d rather kick my stereo in than go punch somebody in the face. When I get mad or upset or emotional, sometimes I’ll walk over and play my piano.” Part two consists of Patty reading letters that Ted Bundy, the mass murderer, had written to his fiancée during one of his many trials. ” ‘Dear Carole,’ ” she reads, while an unfairly bloated head shot of Bundy, just weeks away from execution, Hashes across the screen, ” ‘please do not sit in the same row in court with Janet. When I look over toward you there she sits contemplating me with her mad eyes like a deranged seagull studying a clam… I can feel her spreading hot sauce on me already…’ ”
Bigfoot was interviewed on The Patty Winters Show this morning and to my shock I found him surprisingly articulate and charming.
Tuesday morning and I’m standing by my desk in the living room on the phone with my lawyer, alternately keeping my eye on The Patty Winters Show and the maid as she waxes the floor, wipes blood smears off the walls, throws away gore-soaked newspapers without a word. Faintly it hits me that she too is lost in a world of shit, completely drowning in it, and this somehow sets off my remembering that the piano tuner will be stopping by this afternoon and that I should leave a note with the doorman to let him in. Not that the Yamaha has ever been played; it’s just that one of the girls fell against it and some strings (which I used later) were pulled out, snapped or something. Into the phone I’m saying, “I need more tax breaks.” Patty Winters is on the TV screen asking a child, eight or nine, “But isn’t that just another term for an orgy?” The timer buzzes on the microwave. I’m heating up a soufflé.
In The Patty Winters Show this morning a Cheerio sat in a very small chair and was interviewed for close to an hour. Later this afternoon, a woman wearing a silver fox and mink coat has her face slashed in front of the Stanhope by an enraged fur activist.
The Patty Winters Show this morning was about girls in the fourth grade who trade sex for crack and I almost canceled with Lambert and Russell to catch it.
On the TV screen in Harry’s is The Patty Winters Show, which is now on in the afternoon and is up against Geraldo Rivera, Phil Donahue and Oprah Winfrey. Today’s topic is Does Economic Success Equal Happiness? The answer, in Harry’s this afternoon, is a roar of resounding “Definitely,” followed by much hooting, the guys all cheering together in a friendly way. On the screen now are scenes from President Bush’s inauguration early this year, then a speech from former President Reagan, while Patty delivers a hard-to-hear commentary. Soon a tiresome debate forms over whether he’s lying or not, even though we don’t, can’t, hear the words. The first and really only one to complain is Price, who, though I think he’s bothered by something else, uses this opportunity to vent his frustration, looks inappropriately stunned, asks, “How can he lie like that? How can he pull that shit?”
Tomorrow, on The Patty Winters Show, Doormen from Nell’s: Where Are They Now? I sigh, shrug, whatever.
While I’m dressing the TV is kept on to The Patty Winters Show. Today’s guests are women with multiple personalities. A nondescript overweight older woman is on the screen and Patty’s voice is heard asking, “Well, is it schizophrenia or what’s the deal? Tell us.”
“No, oh no. Multiple personalities are not schizophrenics,” the woman says, shaking her head. “We are not dangerous.”
“Well,” Patty starts, standing in the middle of the audience, microphone in hand. “Who were you last month?”
“Last month it seemed to be mostly Polly,” the woman says.
A cut to the audience - a housewife’s worried face; before she notices herself on the monitor, it cuts back to the multiple-personality woman.
“Well,” Patty continues, “now who are you?”
“Well…,” the woman begins tiredly, as if she was sick of being asked this question, as if she had answered it over and over again and still no one believed it. “Well, this month I’m… Lambchop. Mostly… Lambchop.”
A long pause. The camera cuts to a close-up of a stunned housewife shaking her head, another housewife whispering something to her.
The shoes I’m wearing are crocodile loafers by A. Testoni.
Natürlich gibt es keine Garantie für die Vollständigkeit dieser Liste der Themen der Patty Winters Show.
An dieser Stelle möchte ich mich noch von der Verfilmung von American Psycho distanzieren, da sie alle intelligenten Teile des Buchs weglässt. Außerdem ist Christian Bale ein wirklich schlechter Schauspieler.
PS: Es scheint auch eine Band zu geben, die The Patty Winters Show heißt.