It's been an exciting few months for "cultured" people who like things like Jonathan Franzen, Noah Baumbach, and premium cable. We first started hearing the rumblings of an HBO adaptation of Franzen's 2001 novel The Corrections back in September, when Brooklyn indie darling Noah Baumbach threw his hat into the director's ring. Then, at this month's New Yorker fest, Franzen took a break from name-dropping Oprah to confirm the deal, adding that the adaptation would be a full four-year series. And now, the casting rumors are upon us! more ›

Great American Stoner Novelist Jonathan Franzen confirmed yesterday that he is indeed adapting his 2001 National Book Award-winner The Corrections into an HBO series. He told a packed session at the New Yorker Festival that the story of the complicated lives of the Lambert family would be a full four-year television series. He also confirmed that indie filmmaker Noah Baumbach is involved with the project, ostensibly as director. Watch Franzen discuss the show with New Yorker editor David Remnick below: more ›

Rumors are swirling that Brooklyn-indie film favorite Noah Baumbach is adapting Brooklyn-lit poster boy Jonathan Franzen's widely read The Corrections for HBO, which could cause white people everywhere to spontaneously combust with joy. more ›

Writer Elif Batuman wrote a 3,195 word essay for the Guardian about her stressful time in New York when she did not win the National Book Critics Circle award, but all anyone wants to talk about is big time novelist Jonathan Franzen's drug stash. That's because two-thirds of the way into her story, she heartlessly narcs out the author. Revealing a conversation that Franzen probably didn't realize was on the record for a major newspaper (because it wasn't at that time!), Batuman describes how she was jonesing for weed at the awards after-party, and turned to Franzen to score: more ›

If you didn't figure it out from every other book on the subway, 2010 was the year of Steig Larsson. And it wasn't just in bookstores, the late Swedish writer was a hit with the library crowd too. The New York Public Library today released its list of most checked out books and the Lisbeth Salander-starring Millenium trilogy dominated with all three top spots. The rest of the top five was rounded out with James Patterson's The Postcard Killer and Jonathan Franzen's Freedom. Larsson's series also had two of the five spots on their list of eNYPL books, but not the top spot. That honor went to Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol. And now you know! more ›

President Obama has upset 9/11 responders, pissed off Rep. Charles Rangel, and enraged X-Box enthusiasts in the past, but this time he's gone too far: Last weekend, the President was given an advanced readers copy (A.R.C.) of the new Jonathan Franzen book "Freedom," which has been getting rave reviews for weeks (the NY Times calls it "a masterpiece of American fiction"). However, "Freedom" isn't available for purchase until next Tuesday! more ›

• Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: A hostage situation at Rockaway Boulevard and 147th Street in Queens, a train job at East 180 St in the Bronx and a pedestrian was struck at West 66th and Amsterdam in Manhattan
• The disgruntled former employee who shot and killed a former supervisors and injured two others at Co-op City is claiming self-defense.
• The Politicker finds out that Lieutenant Governor David Paterson supports non-citizen voting (but Paterson is quick to point out he didn't speak to the Spitzer administration about his views)
• The city sold less Snapple, the official drink of the city, than projected because of too much vandalism at vending machines, which perhaps proves it really is a NYC drink.
• The driver of a Volvo died during an accident on the Staten Island Expressway this morning; a drunk driver who was driving on the wrong side of the road hit the Volvo and a Cadillac Escalade.
• The Bouwerie Lane Theatre will house a residence, a retailer on the bottom floor and perhaps a hotel, according to Lost City.
• How one Hollywood couple with child likes to personalize their hotel room whenever they vist NYC (last item).
• In addition to Oprah's Book Club, Jonathan Franzen also hates the Broadway adaptation of Spring Awakening.

READING: Jonathan Franzen reads at the Bam Cafe tonight, but not after a buffet that include wine from the Pine Ridge Winery and other treats. There will also be a live acoustic performance and a Q&A with Franzen. more ›

MOVIES: Don't forget, the Bryant Park movies start tonight! The movie won't begin until sunset - which is about the same time the rain and thunder are scheduled to begin. Tonights features in Alfred Hitchcock's thriller, The Birds. Be an early bird (heh) and get there at 5 for a good spot on the lawn! more ›

. It starts at 7PM and is free. more ›

Wow, Gothamist takes a break to re-read The Chronicle of Narnia and suddenly contemporary literature is rocked! The big stories: The Smoking Gun's expose on bestselling author James Frey's lie-laden memoir (and Oprah book), A Million Little Pieces, and the NY Times'investigation in JT Leroy, revealing he doesn't quite exist! Next, we'll find out JK Rowling is a marketing scheme cooked up by the British government! The Smoking Gun's article about Frey's lies seems so thorough that TSG will certainly be able to write the Cliff's Note for it. Sure, it's a compelling story, and sure, some writers embellish their memories...but embellishing whole parts? Wil this drive Frey fan Lindsay Lohan back to the brink? Now, all the 2003 blustering about people wanting to kick the crap out of Frey makes even more sense - remember Neal Pollack's issues with James Frey? And Jonathan Franzen must be looking pretty good to Oprah now. more ›

Over at Beatrice, Emily Gordon is blogging about this past weekend's New Yorker Festival. She puts Jonathan Franzen and Zadie Smith into the high school popularity paradigm, hears Steve Martin play banjo with Earl Scruggs and gets to revel in a Tom Cruise as dog impression. Gothamist didn't get to make it to this year's festival (we were a little slow to pull the intellectual cognoscentic trigger), but we will try to right that by getting the insane collection of 4,109 New Yorker issues on eight DVDs. more ›

Thanks to Product Shop NYC (who also reports that the New Year's Eve act at Madison Square Garden will be...The Black Crowes), Gothamist is salivating over this year's New Yorker Festival line-up. Edie Falco! The RZA! Ricky Gervais! Trey Parker and Matt Stone! Sleater-Kinney! And Wallce and Gromit in The Curse of the Were-Rabbit! The New Yorker Festival runs September 23-25, and tickets will go on sale on August 25. The tickets range in price from $5 to $50, most being in the $15-30 area, and the programs range from the highbrow (reading by Ian McEwan, Town Hall Meeting on Iraq) to the delightfuly low (A Salute to the Three Stooges). Here's a list of the programs. more ›

Dale Peck, Writer more ›

Disclosure: Gothamist started to read The Effects of Living Backwards (called a "mess - a goodmess, an ambitious mess" by the official Amazon reviewer) last fall but then realized our apartment was a mess so we tried to clean it and found that mix CD we got for our birthday ages ago, so we bopped around to that while we tried to organize our CDs but then This Old House came on, so we just watched that. more ›

The Association of American Publishers announced that Oprah Winfrey would be resuming the book club, but in a different form - this time, focusing on classics. "Speaking lovingly about the 'slow, sensual art of reading,' Oprah said that reading, especially reading great literary works, 'is my favorite gift to myself,'" which is a huge sigh of relief for the publishing industry (at least for the publishers with classics - better get some publicists on that dusty Hawthrone) after they freaked out when she "retired" the book club. Anyway, that's great, Oprah. That way, the authors can't bitch about you picking their books, like that whole Jonathan Franzen thing. Look at the past Oprah books. And if you need any other inspiration, the omni-Oprah site.
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