I-D magazine

2004

He sits in the eye of the storm, calm, like the kid who knows his house is a former missile silo: impenetrable. Celebrities and their press agents swirl in sparkling perfumed crowds. Photographers pearl in bunched strands, their blinding flashes blowing off in his face, but still, he sits on the bed, just present but seemingly not touched by any of it, almost as if he is allowing his body to be present, but his soul is safely ensconced elsewhere. I am studying him, after retreating to crouch into a hidden patch on the floor behind the bed behind him. It makes me feel protected. He helps me feel that way somehow. I know if I needed him, he would be there. It is the wrap party, the celebration of the completion of filming of my book, The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things. Asia Argento directed it and plays my mother. In the film there is Jackson, my mother's boyfriend. He gets seduced by a ten year old after that child dresses up as his mother. Manson has that role. The part of a man I had sex with when I was ten. And he played the role with intuitive vulnerable brilliance that few gave him credit for possessing until they saw him in the Michael Moore film Bowling For Columbine. That night was also a celebration of my 24th birthday. He gifted me with a painting he had done. It is of an inexplicable looking child/ adult - haunted, pained, pointedly sexless, achingly crafted. Manson has had gallery shows and the painting he gave me was on the cover of the program. I look at his painting when I need to find words to shape into what lives outside the bounds of the known protected world. I realized watching Manson that night, as folks who did not know him approached him with various forms of trepidation, and those that did entered his space with joyful respectful welcomed warmth, that he has created a safety zone that exists in the realm of the perilous. His sense of self in exploring boundaries is absolute and completely who he is, and because he does so instinctively with the occupying genius to craft his curiosity into art that allows the rest of us to leer, explore or play in his creations, even in the safety of our own homes. But the deeper you go with Manson, the more you are confronted, and that is the journey he invites you on. To be a little bit scared, to be willing to go to uncomfortable places you wouldn't normally go to, to see through eyes that are shaded in the abnormal. Who else could play a man that has sex with a child in such a heartbreaking portrayal that makes you weep for him as well?

Anything you want off the record, by the way, just let me know - I only interview people that I like.
I was the same when I was a journalist.

You were a journalist? I didn't know that.
Yeah, right before I started the band. I was hired by a record company to do the bio for the pretentious Yngwie Malmsteen. I cheated my way into the whole scenario. I sort of lied my way into a job on a new magazine in Florida and ended up becoming the senior editor in two months. But I was quickly bored of the side of the microphone I existed on. I wanted to be answering the questions: I didn't want the answers to be too boring.

And you got to work with a record company?
Yeah. I thought I could use my connections to do the same thing with a record deal. The hardest part was being in front of people and saying what I thought. Writing it was easy and very important to me. To get up in front of a crowd for the first time was really difficult, but it was only difficult that once. I never had stage fright since then.

When I do interviews I can tell when I'm really connecting to somebody or when they are just idiots.
I hated school but I loved creative writing class. My thirst for knowledge made me self-taught; I can't get enough of books. I was at that 18-year-old age where I wanted to take my imagination and put it out there. I ended up finding that music was a very suitable way to do it, but I don't think it's the only thing that could contain me. That's why if I can't fit an idea into a song, I paint.

That painting you gave me for my birthday was just beautiful.
Painting is much more personal because it is something I do alone and I don't feel like there is an audience. I was very happy when I had my first art exhibition that people liked the work, because I had never intended to show it or sell it - it was something I did for myself. The piece that I gave you I chose as the centerpiece of the art show, it's called The Hand Of Glory. It goes back to witchcraft and the idea that when you take the hand of a criminal, you can have this extra power. In the picture the child is very ambiguous - even more than androgynous. To me the picture represented how the adult world just robs the magic of childish thinking, the sadness of growing up. That's something that I fight, because the most genius ideas are in the minds of children and lunatics. I describe myself as somewhere in between.

It's just very moving and powerful. When I found out that you were somebody that was on the horizon during casting for the film, I was like 'fuck, yeah'- it was so visceral and so automatic.
Whether it be acting or directing them, movies -and books - are what I love more than anything. I liked the fact that it wasn't typecasting for me, and particularly getting a better understanding from you to not portray this person a s a predator or as evil, so much a s being a victim of circumstance, sort of pathetic. I think I came across as very sad. It made me wanna be in movies. It's a small part, but it made a big difference for me.

It reminds me of this phrase that I like - I think it's a movie title: At Play In The Fields Of The Lord. I feel like being an artist is like playing in the fields of the Lord. Whatever you wanna call ' The Lord'. Our society likes to typecast people. People are so cut off from being creative. 'I don't have a creative bone in my body' - to me that's like saying 'I like to rape small children'. How pathetic, how frightening, how horrifying is that? I think there's such jealousy over people who are creative; it's like you can't be good at too many things.
There was a time when artists had a different level of respect. It's not even about celebrity and fame. I've always wanted to be a success at being an artist, but I never really cared for being a success at being a product. I'm not saying that I don't want any money for what I do, or I want to be underground. Any artist that says that is full of shit. But success isn't defined by how the world perceives me on TRL. I like to get a reaction from a fan or to see the faces on a crowd when I'm performing, or to hear how you enjoyed my painting. And to know how I feel when I go to bed at night, knowing that I did what I wanted to do today. The perfect utopia would be for artists to replace politicians and the government. But what you said about religion - I always think God in any culture is more or less about creation. An artist creates things and puts them in the world, and to me that is spiritual, that is God. That's the thing I believe in.

So when did you start painting?
In high school I really loved art class. I had my own version of Mad magazine. I would do cartoons and photocopy them at my Dad's work- he sold carpets at a shitty carpet store and I would sneak in and make photocopies, staple them and I would sell them to my friends for 50 cents. That ended up getting me kicked out of Christian school, because the content of my magazine had some profanity, which I was happy about of course. I was in tenth grade. Then I think I read No-one Here Gets Out Alive, the Jim Morrison book, and that for some reason made me want to write. Stephen King's horror fiction really stuck with me at the time too.

Have you ever met Stephen King?
No, I was 19 years old and I was writing stories and I was trying to get them published. I actually saved all my rejection letters. I put them in my autobiography and it ended up being a New York Times bestseller. I thought that was the ultimate irony. It ends up being the same intent and the same imagery that exists now in everything that I do. It was born there already, back in that time. I hadn't touched a paintbrush for some time, except I would make my own flyers for my band, but it was more cartoonish. There wasn't as much of the pain and spirit put into it as when I paint.

It seems you are true to what interests you and what baffles, surprises or intrigues you. And you have the bravery to explore things seriously where most people don't. I think that's what people respond to. One thing I realized when I was studying to be a writer is that anyone can tell the truth, and I didn't give a shit. But when someone told that story with humor and art and craft… HOLY SHIT!
I totally agree with your point, and that ties in very strongly with where we are in entertainment and culture: we're in a very, very bad place that needs salvation. I'm not trying to be a hero-if anything I'm a villain - but I want to make the world a place that I can still live in; that's why I do what I do. But I have to do it even more so now because of reality television, which is completely devoid of any creativity -it's us. When I say 'us' I don't mean me, it's people sitting around watching other people's boring lives and living vicariously through that.