An Interview Series by Matt Martin
This past summer, I met up with Don De Grazia before the start of the Softball Fury’s first game of the year in the intermediate co-ed 16-inch softball league. De Grazia—author of American Skin, full-time professor at Columbia College Chicago, and avid 16-inch softball enthusiast—shared six beers with me near field #4 in Lincoln Park and talked Chicago, softball, and the popularization of Malort.
MM: So how’s your summer been going so far?
DG: Summer in Chicago, you can’t beat it. I mean, is that OK to say? It doesn’t sound like bloviating boosterism, does it? It’s just really how I feel.
MM: Reading anything good?
DG: A lot of great short stories. Just finished Tolstoy’s The Kreutzer Sonata, and it’s as powerful as the piece of music it’s named after. A story called “Tender” by a guy named Michael Wisniewski in the current Chicago Quarterly Review. Now I’m re-reading Richard Brautigan’s story collection Revenge of the Lawn.
MM: Seen any good movies?
DG: I was pretty impressed by Spring Breakers. I never really understood why James Franco existed. Or why Harmony Korine still existed, for that matter. But Spring Breakers cleared those mysteries up for me.
MM: Working on any projects?
DG: Yeah. Couple books, couple film projects. Just co-wrote a screenplay with Irvine Welsh, which was a blast.
MM: Planning on taking any trips anytime soon?
DG: No, I’m going to continue my summer staycation here in Chicago.
MM: Advice for young writers?
DG: Even if you’re a prose writer at core, learn all the forms—screenplay, stage play, television script, webisode, etc. The times are changing, but there’s no telling how, exactly. The narrative form of our time is the literary telenovela—The Sopranos, The Wire, Mad Men, etc.
MM: What is the mystique behind 16-inch Softball for a true Chicagoan?
DG: I really think that it’s primarily the fact that it’s fun. It’s a genuinely competitive sport that people of all ages and skill levels can participate in. You can play co-ed games without pitchers getting their noses broken, like you see happen in 12-inch a lot. A team of older guys who have played 16-inch all their lives stand a chance of beating a team made up of younger jocks. You don’t need mitts. It’s fun. Personally, I’ve always been really taken with the story of its origin—the origin of the game of softball: On Thanksgiving day, at Chicago’s Farragut Boat Club, in 1887, a bunch of Harvard and Yale grads were sitting around, drinking, and waiting for ticker-tape updates on the Harvard-Yale football game. Someone took a boxing glove and tied it up with a hand wrap, and they went into the gym and played a game of baseball, using a broom for a bat. That was the first softball game ever, and within days someone had an actual ball that size sewn up. The idea was that indoor-baseball could be played during Chicago’s long winters. That didn’t catch on, but the big balls did, obviously. 12-inch eventually became the softball standard, but Chicagoans stuck with 16. I can’t get enough of that story, and I tell it every chance I get, but most people think I’m just making up some nonsensical tale for my own amusement.
MM: Could you learn lessons about life from 16-inch softball?
DG: You never really appreciate your finger joints until their gone?
MM: Okay, lightning round.
(I happened to have a small flask filled with Malort, so we prepared ourselves by being properly lubricated.)
MM: Bulls or Blackhawks, who had the greater dynasty?
DG: Bulls, obviously. But this Blackhawks dynasty isn’t through yet, so we’ll have to wait and see how it all shakes out.
MM: Stones or Beatles? Why?
DG: Stones. Just personal preference. The 60’s and 70’s Stones albums have aged a lot better—to my ear.
MM: If you got stuck in a silo underground and couldn’t come out, but had a DVD player and only one DVD, what DVD would it be?
DG: I’d like to say some piece of art like La Dolce Vita, or a classic like On the Waterfront—and I do really love those movies—but the honest answer is Repo Man. Watching that movie is like hanging out with an old buddy who has the same sense of humor as you.
MM: Same question, but what cable channel would it be?
DG: It’s too much of a distraction. I don’t believe in having cable. I believe in having friends who have cable, so you can drop by and watch shows On Demand.
MM: Same question, but what book?
DG: Probably The Brothers Karamazov.
MM: Game of Thrones: yes or no? Why?
DG: Yeah. I never thought I’d like a soap opera about dragons. It’s kind of embarrassing. Next question.
MM: What’s your idea of a perfect day?
DG: I don’t think you can plan perfect days. Certain things happen by chance, improvisational skills shine, eccentric choices turn out to be acts of genius, etc. I’ve found that efforts to plan the perfect day usually end in disappointment. But you can plan good days, and a good day for me starts with a good writing and reading day, includes some sort of physical activity, and ends with a good meal and probably a good movie.
MM: Which person from Chicago history do you most identify with?
DG: It would be arrogant to say I identified with a one-of-a-kind legend like Mike Royko, but he was my hero in many ways. When the news came on TV that he died, I cried, which startled me. But it shouldn’t have. I felt like he was a friend of mine.
MM: If you had to read one paper, which would it be? Tribune or Sun-Times?
DG: If I could only pick one? I guess The Trib, because I would want to keep reading Rick Kogan.
MM: North Side or South Side? Why?
DG: I have a lot of South Side friends, for some reason, but the North and Northwest sides are where my family’s roots are, so that’s that.
MM: Why do White Sox fans so rabidly despise Cubs fans? And, in turn, why are Cubs fans completely disinterested with Sox fans?
DG: I have to confess I spent most of my life saying that the White Sox were my second-favorite team. But somewhere along the way, that was no longer an option, and my heart turned black. It’s very sad to see this great metropolis torn apart by civil war—brother against brother, husband against mistress, mother against suckling infant. The Cubs vs. Sox insult-offs that you and John Freyer do at Come Home Chicago are great. You two are very evenly matched. You crush the Sox fans, and Freyer comes right back with devastating blows to the North Siders. I actually took the Cubs’ side against him in a match at a different event, years ago, and he won most of the rounds, but I maintain that I had the best line: “The South Side has the most beautiful women, the strongest men, the most loyal dogs, the best pizza, the best Italian beefs, and the best baseball team in Chicago. And any South Sider will tell you all of this while sitting on the back porch of his Wrigleyville studio apartment.”
MM: If you were going to live anywhere other then Chicago, where would it be?
DG: Prague.
MM: Favorite Chicago Live Music Venue?
DG: Metro
MM: Favorite Chicago Theater Venue?
DG: Second City.
MM: Favorite Chicago Restaurant?
DG: Chef Dirk Flanigan helped make The Gage my favorite restaurant. Wherever he ends up next will instantly become my favorite restaurant.
MM: Greatest 2 dive bars in Chicago? Why?
DG: I’d say Southport Lanes, but there there’s nothing dive-y about it. I’m very fond of Konak in Andersonville, and, since Joe Shanahan bought it—The Gingerman [Tavern], or whatever it’s called now.
MM: Favorite beach?
DG: Not a beach guy. But I’ll say North Avenue, since I do sometimes enjoy sitting at that boat bar and having a drink before walking across the bridge to play softball.
MM: Favorite coffee shop?
DG: I went to Safari Cup on Southport for many years, exclusively, but Safari closed down not long ago, and since then, I’ve been playing the field.
( Finally, as the sixth of what turned out to be many more beers was cracked and we had to start warming up for our game, I asked De Grazia the coup de grâce of the interview.)
MM: You’ve been championing Malort for as long as anyone can remember.
(Among his many Malort-related accomplishments, De Grazia is responsible for the universally acclaimed drink, The Malort Lauderdale, as well as The Malort Girls, who for the last three-and-a-half years have handed out free shots of Malort at the Chicago-centric live reading series, Come Home Chicago.)
MM: I remember you telling the very first Come Home Chicago audience: “We are now entering a Malort renaissance, and YOU are the vanguard.” And people thought you were joking. Now that Violet Hour is serving a boutique Malort made at a local craft distillery and waxed-mustached-fixie-bike-enthusiasts are embracing Malort, how does it feel knowing you championed the revival of the once great, then forgotten, now adored, shot of choice for hipsters and Chicago band-wagoneers everywhere? And, in turn, what would you like to say to them, and as a follow up to that, what should we be on the look-out for now?
DG: I don’t consider myself a hero. I’m just a regular guy who did what anyone would have done in the same circumstances. I didn’t get into Malort-advocacy for the fame and the glory and the recognition. By the way, you neglected to mention that I named and helped invent the Regal Stiegl, a Malort cocktail made with Stiegl-Radler that was invented at Southport Lanes some time ago.
The Malort Girls, from the start, were kind of absurdist theater, creating the fantasy that there was a Chicago literary series sponsored by Malort. Now there actually are Chicago literary series sponsored by Malort. It’s crazy. But I love it. I have to say, I was always more attracted to the fact that Malort was this weird Chicago tradition that should never be allowed to die than I was to the ironic element, but there’s no denying that it’s hilarious to give people their first shot of such a strange tasting liquid. The thing is, as you know, I genuinely like Malort, and so do a lot of people. Chicago bartenders have actually been trying to invent the perfect Malort cocktail for a pretty long time now. My grandpa, who was what they would call nowadays “an alcoholic” liked Malort. He would drink it in the morning sometimes. I do think that there is some kind of stomach-calming medicinal quality to Malort, along the same lines as bitters. But, like I said, a lot of people genuinely like it. It really is an acquired taste. Most people don’t like their first beer, either, do they? But complicating this whole conversation now are rumors that the Malort formula is being toned down to appeal to a wider market. I can’t really tell, because it started going down easy for me a long time ago, but I think it would be a huge mistake to tinker with that formula. Remember New Coke?
The girl who catches for our softball team has a girlfriend from Sweden who comes to watch our games sometimes. In Sweden, apparently, the category of botanical that Malort belongs to is called something that roughly translates to “burn wine.” She brought me several airplane bottles of various brands of “burn wine” from Sweden, and I have to say it was the most insanely unpleasant taste bud experience of my life. You know how people try to come up with ways to describe how horrible Malort tastes? Well, those descriptions make Malort sound like delicious nectar compared to this stuff from Sweden. I know, as a writer, I should try to describe how this stuff tastes. But there are no words. I’ll just say that it made everyone who tried it genuinely enraged, and, at the same time, profoundly depressed.
As for the next big thing? Novelties like kickball and dodgeball have run their course, leaving a great void. A great yearning. People find themselves searching for something eternal. Obviously, we are entering a 16-inch softball renaissance. And you are the vanguard.
(The Furies won 10-6. De Grazia pitched four strikeouts—a personal best and an unheard of feat in 16-inch softball—and I went 2-2 with an RBI and 2 runs.)
DON DE GRAZIA is a full-time fiction writing professor at Columbia College Chicago, where he also earned his BA and MFA. After completing his master’s thesis, American Skin, De Grazia sent it off to London’s prestigious publisher, Jonathan Cape, who offered him a contract. In January 1998, American Skin was published in the U.K. Hailed as an American classic, the book was so highly acclaimed by critics that it caught the attention of publishers around the world, and in April 2000, American Skin was released in the U.S. by Scribner. A flood of positive reviews appeared in the New York Times Book Review, the Washington Post, the Chicago Tribune, Kirkus Reviews, Publishers Weekly, and the San Francisco Examiner. It is now in its fourth printing and was recently anthologized in The Outlaw Bible of American Fiction. A member of the Screenwriters Guild of America, De Grazia is currently adapting the script for American Skin. He has written for the Chicago Tribune, Chicago Reader, and other publications. He resides in Chicago, where he is at work on his second novel, Reel Shadows, a chapter of which appeared in the March 2009 issue of TriQuarterly. De Grazia is also the co-founder of Come Home Chicago, a series that celebrates our city’s unique storytelling tradition with readings and entertainment held at the legendary Underground Wonder Bar.
MATT MARTIN is a writer, actor and producer, a graduate of the Second City Conservatory program in Chicago, owns a bachelors and working on a masters in Fiction Writing from Columbia College Chicago. Matt is the Interviews editor for Hypertext Magazine. Has been published in Hair Trigger, Trilling, Mad Licks, and Fictionary. Matt also writes a sports blog for Chicago Now, and would love to be able to make a living from doing something related to the arts, but until then will kindly endeavor to make that happen, and also hopefully collect a pension from the city in 25 years.
Photo Credit: Cat Jimenez
