"The Panic in Needle Park," Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation, 1971

Did you ever take heat from film critics?

I'm sure I did, but I try not to pay attention. [laughs]

Further thinking about "In Hollywood," it seems to have been quite a few years since you've worked in film or television. What's going on with your HBO biopic on newspaper maven Katharine Graham, and relatedly, did you have any trepidation about working in that industry again?

I have not clue one, because at this moment, I'm not working on it. I did it about three years ago, and it's kind of in limbo at HBO. I think the last time I worked on it was over the summer. And no, basically, I needed the work. I like working in [the industry]. I took on the Katharine Graham project specifically because I wanted to go back to work. It was a project that was brought to me by ICM. HBO already wanted to do it.

Will 1972's "Play It as It Lays," which you helped adapt from your own novel, ever see a re-release or make it to DVD?

I don't think so. I don't know why it would at this point. I thought maybe it would come out around the time that everything was coming out on DVD. But if it didn't, it didn't, you know? [laughs]

Why aren't you credited as a co-screenwriter on Otto Preminger's [1971 comedy] "Such Good Friends"?

We took our names off it. We didn't have to, because I don't think we would've gotten a credit anyway, even if we did it in contention. My recollection is that there had been a draft before us, I'm not sure of this. But we certainly weren't the shooting script. The shooting script was Elaine May, who didn't use her name either. I never saw [the film]. I was totally sick of the project at that stage.

Happily, I have not had a whole lot of time, so I've tried to watch the Academy [screeners], but there's something different about watching them in your kitchen. It doesn't quite work. For one thing, your attention strays. [laughs] I liked a lot of them, actually, for different reasons. I watched "Che" all one weekend. It was a fascinating way to watch it; I came to live with it. I thought "The Reader" was interesting. I only watch pictures that I think there will be something that catches my interest to begin with. It wasn't a question of seeing a lot of pictures cold.

Now that I know you no longer loathe film criticism, may I ask what it was about "Che" or "The Reader" specifically that intrigued you?

Well, I mean, I could sit down and write it, but I don't talk well off-hand. [laughs]

[Additional photos: "The Panic in Needle Park," Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation, 1971; Joan Didion, courtesy of Knopf, 2005]

"The Panic in Needle Park" opens for a limited one-week run at the Film Forum in New York, beginning on January 30th.

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Erin

Whoa, I was not expecting this. Very awesome, Aaron!