Bret Easton Ellis

This guy is such a douche. How nasty is he to that girl at the end?

But the only questions he really wanted to answer were his own.

That girl was an idiot... she was projecting her boring self.. she deserved IT!

As much as it's democratic and breaks down the barrier between the artist and audience, the Q&A at the end end was really emabarassing, it's no wonder Ellis was more interested in kvetching with his i-phone than anything else. In fact Ellis didn't even seem like he wanted to be there....I'm surpised no-one asked any questions about his best book Glamorama, the audience were just a bunch of bogans and gogans (Gay Bogans) that have been sucked into the surfaces and controversies of his lesser works..

And why does the Wheeler Centre always get the dullard Alan Brough to do interviews? He has the charisma of a hessian sack of unscrubbed potatoes!

asides from that great peice of video work and archive footage of BEE at this point in time, Ellis's 'empire'/post 'empire' analogy is a work of genius, will be interesting to see how he explores this in his future works, though the notion of 'maifest destiny' grinds on unabated...

I thought he dealt with the moronic questions from Gen Y "fans" pretty well. I mean honestly, when that girl stood up and started slurring about how we were all "inner city hipsters" that had come to see him...and that she was an "educator" (of what? God help the poor kiddies...) then really she deserved everything she got from BEE. It was embarrassing, along with the other questions about WWF and so on. God.

He was great - exactly what you'd expect. Pretentious, opinionated, mildly subversive...and he was honest about his mood at the time. What more would you want for twenty bucks or so? Got my books signed, so I was rapt.

Just a polite reminder to be polite on this thread. We're not keen on hearing anyone called a "douche", "idiot", "hessian sack of potatoes" or, perhaps most insultingly "inner city hipster" but we're also not going to stand in the way of debate and discussion. Please consider the people you may be commenting on as not all of them have the same good humour as Mr Easton Ellis.
Just a reminder to "play nice" and stay away from name-calling, especially calling anyone a hipster.

Don't agree with any one of the comments above, but that is maybe because I am of the baby-boomer vintage. I was probably the only baby-boomer at the Athenaeum to hear the BEE. Just loved the whole evening, it was highly entertaining.
So for me he bridged the gap between generation x and y and baby-boomer.
I will now give my son who is soon to be 38 a BEE book.

Love. I thought he was a totally engaging, entertaining and piss funny.

I actually thought the potato sack man did an adequate job of convening this shindig.

I agree with the above. The best course an interviewer can take with BEE is to sit back and enjoy the ride.

Just to clarify, it was the last girl who asked BEE a question that described herself as an "inner city hipster" - her words, not mine.

I would have described her as something else altogether. But keeping it nice...

I'm surprised at the negativity for Alan Brough. I hadn't seen him do anything for the Wheeler Centre before, so can't compare, but I thought he did an incredible job with someone who wasn't that easy to interview. He impressed me more than BEE did to be honest. And please Wheeler Centre don't allow audience questions any more. They're just embarrassing and awful.

Dude, there's one rule that you can never break: Don't go the Brough.

I have to support the praise for Alan Brough. Ellis's vibe on the night was 'challenging' to say the least, and Brough realigned his interview to allow Ellis to go on off-topic tangents and complain about book tours while remaining relaxed and good-natured. I walked away from the evening a little less a fan Ellis but a new fan of Brough.

Ditto Alex, you're on the money. Alan Brough did a spectacular job! He left BEE to his own devices and altered his questions as he went, flexible and adaptable. BEE was a challenge to watch, you weren't quite sure if he was going to get up and walk out! But he was very entertaining all the same. The last question was a shocker, and really brought down the whole tone of the evening, everyone was pretty chirpy up until that point. I'd say get rid of the audience questions, but I kind of like cringing at the awfulness of it all.

Just a flat out great night. I've been raving about it ever since. Well done everyone involved.

Understand where you're coming from Emma. We were mostly jesting about the "inner city hipsters" line anyway.
There's so many great opinions flying around about this event we're going to feature them in a Daily today.

I was not a big Ellis fan before I went but came away from the event converted.
Thanks to everyone involved for a really enjoyable evening. Now I've got some reading to do.

While Bret was on the subject of actors doing his audio books I thought this one for IMperial Bedrooms was quite impressive:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Ff3V0bHrBs

You are ok

Last question - hehe.

Wow. Wish I had gotten to see this live. I feel a little sorry for the woman at the end, he said something kind of offensive to her, and i think it shocked her into asking her question quite stupidly, it was also an unnecessary question, but so were all of them. I found through this whole thing Bret Easton Ellis first turned me off with his extreme antagonism and condescension towards the host, but later on seemed to be a bit more comfortable and honest, still rude, but not in the same way, Not sure if that makes any difference.

Disappointed with the pithy comments in this forum. Mr. Ellis is a talented writer and interesting personality and was not being rude but rather witty. It appears that there was a slight misunderstanding with the question or the answer, the former being sort of stupid anyway. Thank you to the Wheeler Centre for hosting Mr. Ellis.

Shit. I didn't know BEE would be in Australia. Great interview.