Pretend It's a City

I could listen to Fran Lebowitz all day. A lot of her observations are astute, clever and very funny. She's brilliant at describing New York and New York life, mixed in with a little of her personal biography, I was left wanting to know more about her. She would make a mint if she ever wrote her memoirs.

What a wonderful treat this is! The concept of the film is incredibly simple. It's a conversation but really it is Fran talking. About everything, mostly about NYC and also about everything. And to see Scorsese barely saying 2 words but laughing hard almost throughout it, yet to be completely gripped is such a surprise. You hang onto Fran's every word.

My personal favourite so far, I haven't finished the series - I'm on episode 6 and don't want to finish it just yet so I can enjoy it for a bit longer - my favourite moment so far is Fran talking about believing all the women who have called out the men taking advantage of them or abusing them: the me to movement. It is so empowering and validating because, as a woman who was once a girl and a young woman, I have been through all that and think exactly like Fran. This is just a small nugget of beauty of the whole series. There are so many, many more moments like this.

And what adds to its beauty is the fact that a woman who talks about being so angry and is ranting and raging about this and that can talking about things that are so inspiring and moving and hopeful. Thank you for such a treat.

As an overseas visitor to NY for over 40 years I have loved the humour that you hear there when visiting. Fran Lebowitz has a brilliant way of describing NY and all it's travails Without doubt one the funniest clever and laconic delivery of lines by an individual. I loved Jackie Mason and his jewish influences in humour and Fran matches it all the way. Loads of laugh out loud moments and Martin Scorsese laughing with her is wonderful also. A joy and a must see!

A love letter to New York from a critical perspective. These conversations between Fran Lebowitz and Martin Scorsese, which continue the documentary "Public speaking" (HBO, 2010), reel off diverse topics with a sense of humor. You could say that it is a snobbish, old-fashioned and curmudgeon look, but that is precisely one of the virtues of Lebowitz's thoughts. And, above all, it is a chronicle of cultural life in a magical and dark city.

If you've read Fran Lebowitz's clever essays from back when she used to write (i.e., before she succumbed to what has to be the world's longest case of writer's block) and you enjoy her sarcastic wit, you will no doubt enjoy this show. It is pretty much episode after episode of her riffing on various topics. I loved it! She is such a careful and original thinker with a razor sharp wit. Her style of humor, which stops just short of insult comedy, is pretty much what she's been doing since the seventies, but strangely, it suddenly feels very timely here.