"In addition to writing fiction, you're a staff writer for the and a screenwriter. How do you think of your career? I think of myself as a storyteller. I'm nosy, so once I'm telling a story, I want to know what happens. I do find, with fiction, I can't toggle in and out of it. It's like acting, where you have to stay with that character, in that world."
"I went to see a gender-swapped version of Company on Broadway a few years ago, and it was really not good. I'm a Stephen Sondheim fan, but the whole thing is about a bachelor having a milestone birthday, and they never addressed the way that having a milestone birthday is different for a woman than for a man. I was fuming by the end, and I started thinking about other classics."
"The first draft mirrored it closely. I scratched the itch, and then I let it become its own thing. I thought, if Nick was a woman, particularly a Puerto Rican woman, you'd know a lot more of her business. A Puerto Rican woman from Brooklyn is always going to give you more context, and she's going to give you dish."
Last Night in Brooklyn reimagines The Great Gatsby in 2007 Fort Greene with gender roles reversed, placing women in previously male parts. Alicia, a Puerto Rican woman narrator, lives across from La Garza, a self-made fashionista who hosts legendary parties and seeks to rekindle a romance with financier Devon. The project originated from frustration with a gender-swapped Broadway production and a rereading of Gatsby; early drafts closely mirrored Fitzgerald before transforming into an independent story. The narrator's identity provides more intimate detail and context. Fiction demands sustained immersion comparable to acting, preventing easy toggling in and out of character.
Read at PublishersWeekly.com
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