RESURRECT DEAD ON PLANET JUPiTER

David Mamet Continues to Spread Lies

Maybe the multiple Oscars and the Pulitzer Prize have gotten to his head, but writer David Mamet continues to spread lies about his role in the epic of the Toynbee tiles.

In a recent interview with hipster-porn site suicidegirls.com, Mamet claims: “This is the weirdest thing that ever happened. I wrote this play [called 4 am] about a million years ago that was an homage to Larry King when he was late night talk show host on radio in the 70’s. A guy calls in and he’s talking about the film 2001 based on the writings of Arnold Toynbee. The Larry King character says, “I think you’ll find that 2001 is based on the writings of Arthur C. Clarke.” The guy says, “No, Larry. I believe that you’re wrong there. 2001 based on the writing of Arnold Toynbee tells us that all human life will be reconstituted on the planet Jupiter.” They had this rather silly conversation for ten minutes. It turns out that now you can go on the internet and look up Toynbee tiles. There are these tiles that are showing up all over the country that say in mosaic “Toynbee says all life reconstituted on Jupiter.” You can go to these links and they’ll tell you how to make these tiles and where to put them up.”

Loyal readers will remember that Mamet made a similar claim on NPR’s Morning Edition late last year. Through the assumed credibility generated by nothing more than name recognition, Mamet threatens to assume the “Toynbee Idea” as his own. This is no idle threat. Cultural barometer Wikipedia.com has already begun to propagate the “Mamet falsehood.”

Although most tile research is tight-lipped until the premier of Resurrect Dead, this particular controversy must be recognized and forcefully dismissed. In the possession of the Resurrect Dead team are documents pre-dating Mamet’s 1983 play. Included in those documents is a Minority Association statement acknowledging the first public disclosure of the Toynbee Idea. That disclosure occurred during a 1980 telephone call-in to the Larry King radio show. Mamet almost certainly heard this call and consciously or not, based his play on it. I have taken the wiki-liberty to update the wikipedia page accordingly.

Also interesting in the Mamet statement is the “You can go to these links and they’ll tell you now to make these tiles and where to put them up” part. This means that dirty liar, David Mamet may have in fact once sat at his computer and read dovate.com. If you’re reading this now Mamet, we’re on to you.