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The National Education Association of New Mexico, an organization of professionals who believe that investing in public education is an investment in our state's economic future. And by a grant from the Healey Foundation, Tau's New Mexico. Hello, I'm Lorraine Mills and welcome to report from Santa Fe. Today our guest is Joe Lanzale, Champion Mojo Storyteller and author. Thank you for joining us. Thank you for having me. I'm glad to be here. Well, we're lucky to have you. You're here on behalf of George Martin and the John Conto Theater. We've been showing your movies and you've been doing author talks and so I'm very lucky to have you. Thank you. Let's take a little bit and look at your awards and that'll be half the show. I'm going to try to sound up some of them for people who are not familiar with your work.
You've written over 30 novels and collections of short stories, comics, TV, film, newspapers, short story collections, anthologies. What did you say? 40 years of hard work to become an owner at the same station? Yeah, that's the way it works, right? George and I talked about that. George Martin. Yes. Well, I'm glad that it wasn't just 40 years of hard work. Well, no, I mean, it really, you know, that's the way it looks to people. I was actually doing quite well before but it just seems as you gain prominence as time goes on and you produce more material and you have more readers. Word of mouth. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. It all comes down to words. Absolutely. Now, the awards you've gotten, the Edgar award, eight Brahms, nine, but who's can't? Nine. No, no, no. Yeah, yeah. Nine Brahms Soakers. Right. I got the Lifetime Achievement and Grandmaster Award. Oh, my goodness. And you also got the Horror Writers Association Lifetime Achievement Award. The British Fantasy Award, the Herodotus Historical Fiction Award. What is that?
I got that for the bottoms. There's a book I wrote, takes place in 1930 and it has to do with a crime in East Texas River bottoms that this boy discovers a body and then it goes from there. And I, you know, I don't want to tell too much. I don't want to run it. But I think it's very atmospheric. It's about to be filmed by with Bill Paxton as director and probably be filmed this fall. Wow. Red screenplay, guy that wrote it, Brent Hanley also wrote frailty that Bill Paxton directed. Right. So they're a good team. Oh, real good team. You also got, I love this, the Inc. Pot Award for your Contributions to Comics Fiction. Yeah. Well, that was comics. It was a comic award, but it was a Contribuse for Science Fiction and Fantasy. So yeah, it's nice. It's nice recognition. And you are writer and residence at the Stephen F. Austin University and what is the name of your hometown? Nacodosis. That's why I had you say it. Yeah. So clearly you're a Texan. Tell me. It's a Native American name. Tell me a little about your background. Then I want to talk about your field. Well, I was born in Playwater, Texas, which is a really small town and maybe a short distance from Nacodosis.
It's not real real far. And I grew up poor and I grew up close to the River bottoms. I spent a lot of time in the woods and in the River bottoms with the water moccasins and you know the alligators and the wild pigs. So that's my background and a lot of my work reflects small town as well as very rural areas. So it's had a great influence on my work. It's sort of like the baseline to everything I do or nearly everything I do. Well also we'll talk about your influences a little bit because you were very fond of Mark Twain. Very much so. And as the first real American author that wasn't in some European tradition and also film noir and to think that you combine those are two elements that the right talk to me about. Well you love a film noir. Yeah. Some of this too I was talking about the other night we had the interview and I was saying that a lot of what I write is of course my love for Twain and the fact that it connected to my rural background. I'm reading Huckleberry Finn and I'm bound by the river. Of course the Sabine River is not the great Mississippi but it is an interesting and long
and fascinating river and I was on it a lot. And then the film noir is that Gladewater was just an old oil town that had gone bust. But when it went bust it left behind a lot of what they called all field trash you know and so it had a wide variety of characters that I grew up with. My father as I mentioned before he he couldn't read or write and he later on he got to where he could kind of dope out the newspaper but because of that and being in this kind of tough environment I think he pushed me to do better and my mother was a big influence because she was a big reader and I think they were kind of ahead of their time. And where I grew up with during the 50s and the 60s there was a lot of racism a lot of things that were unpleasant and so when people talk about the past always being this idyllic time it's like I was telling people before I think that's because you're 10 years old you don't have to pay bills. You don't know what's going on around you so you always look at that as a better time and your children will look at their past probably as a better time.
But a lot of those things that I saw those shadows I like to think of them the river, the shadows, the trees all sort of combined into my home. Well and not only do they combine in your work but you describe them so you're really a good writer and the country sort of colloquial tone that you have let's look at a few of your books. There's a series that start happening Leonard this is just one of them how many happen landed books. There are eight novels and three novellas and two short stories now wait a minute. What is it about a novella who said that? Oh whether it was a Williamson or that mom I think he said that the easy way a novel is easy way to write a short story and I believe that yeah yeah okay but you like novellas I like novellas and short stories past you. And who are happened Leonard I know I read the books but I want to happen to a great extent and probably if I had not met my wife I would have probably taken this slightly different avenue. So a lot of his character and background not necessarily all the things that happen to him but I worked the jobs he worked I worked in the Rose Fields I was a bouncer I've worked
to every kind of horrible job you can imagine Leonard is a combination of several people I've known but they're all both characters are actually based on real people have mostly me but not entirely you know and certainly it all comes out of the background. And you're your environment if you're any kind of writer at all your environment sort of dictates to some extent what you're going to write about if you're in tune with your environment and I am I mean I'm very much in East Texan I'm very much in love with where I come from warts and all and there are a lot of warts but there's a lot of good stuff to do. Well in these books in the series that happen Leonard they're detective stories there's thrillers they're very exciting they're so funny they are just funny and there's you know the dark side one of the one of the real gifts that you have and you're writing is to blend humor and tragedy I mean it just they're flip sides you know Robert Block who wrote psycho once said that you know they're just the opposite ends of the coin I mean flip sides of the coin rather yeah one side's humor one side's not it's like Mark Twain
said there's no humor in heaven meaning that most everything that's humorous is based on human misery and when you think about it that's about 99.9% especially if it isn't your misery other people's misery yeah yeah I think Twain said that you always you know you liked it when it you liked that when it was someone else yeah yeah I want to look at some of your other recent books because we have so many we could I could hide behind a sack of your books with these and I do at home oh yeah so this is your recent novel called the thicket now this refers to a geographical part of Texas yes the big thicket the big thicket a lot of people when they think of Texas they think of it looking somewhat like New Mexico or Arizona and of course West Texas had certainly that element in some of Northwest Texas but when you get over into East Texas that's over by Louisiana and the cultures there's different it's not so much Western as it's farming land and farmers and a little bit of the Southwest mixed in a little cage and mixed in tremendous amount of black culture of course and Hispanic culture it is permeating it more more now it's always been there but I think it's even more so now and so it's a really interesting place
in a combination it's a it's a gumbo and but it's got lots of trees it's got lots of water and it's got lots of sweat well thicket you would think that's right the thicket is one of the you know biggest areas in the United States of just wild trees wild country and the trees are huge you know it's not like the little scrub brush or we're seeing out here we don't think of these as trees these are bushes you know when we see trees out here we say that's a tree that's a bush I know you say that about a river sorry well I remember you know there's only we were only one natural lake in East Texas and that's cattle lake there are a lot of you know man-made or human-made lakes only one natural one could you say that the thicket that was kind of a coming of age definitely it's a coming of age story I guess it's an adventure story to some degree it is I like to think that I use satire quite a bit I like to think that I use a commentary about you know real life and how I see it and how I think people act with other people and all the social issues
are there too you know I it's not that I sit down with this heavy list of things I want to do but I think if you're doing you're living in this world and you're interested in it it's going to come out it's going to come through the pros yeah yeah we'll do one more what wait it's also a little bit about father and son isn't there so yeah the especially in saying cold in July for example I think that's a big thing and I think it's true in a lot of my work and I think it's even true somewhat in the thicket not so much father and son but as the family of your choosing not necessarily the one you're born with but the one you would prefer which can be the one you're born with or the one that you make but with the father's sentiment in your own life did your father get to see the writer you would be yes you know I had just become a full-time writer he saw the cover to my new novel he my mother had read to him some of my short stories that had been published and he always told me says I'm not worried about you I know you're going to do fine you know so I'd
always felt good I had that I had my father say you're okay you're going to do okay yeah it means a lot to a man yeah well it does now we're going to get to some of your books that have made into films all right this one cold in July is now a movie yes tell me about who stars in it okay this is father and son and the most it's called a neon war thriller that twists and turns and cold in July are just like riveting yeah well you know that the movie has been they've been trying to make it for years there there was a seven-year option then a big lull and another seven-year option that finally they got the script they got Michael C. Hall you know most famous for Dexter they got Sam Shepard who's you know playwright Pulitzer Prize winner great actor and then they got Don Johnson another great actor who has all the charisma that you can actually muster and put into a human being you know and when he walks on into the scene you know he owns that scene he owns everything you know but it's it really is it's about
fathers and sons I don't want to give too much away but I think that the main character Michael C. Hall is sort of looking for a father figure someone to say you know you're you're masculine or you're a guy or whatever maybe too much he's looking for that and he has his own son and he's trying to be a father to him too and I think even more in the book these things are are brought out but the film actually touches on it quite a bit and it's a powerful film I'm very pleased with it so powerful that when it showed at the cans film festival you got a five-minute standing deviation it did we were we were all you know we were excited that people like the film they started clapping and we thought that's great and then it just went on and on and on and I thought wow wow right yeah and there was a you know it was a free dinner after we're two which was I was looking at my watch yeah yeah yeah well one of the reviewers and it has received amazing reviews said it's sort of as if John Grisham were channeling Elmore Leonard and directed by the Cohen brothers or Amy it's by the Cohen brothers Jim Michael is the director of this and I I
don't mind the comparisons but I have to tell you Jim's a real talent unto himself and he was here the other day for question and answer he's also a brilliant guy wrote the introduction to the paperback edition great director I think you're fixing to see a lot from him in fact he's going to be looks like he's going to be working more with me on a television series about happen Leonard if that if that actually you know that's certainly they're they've got it in the mill sun dances announced it and we've we're hoping that it gets beyond that point and actually takes place but Jim will be directing that if it does terrific director you're going to hear a lot from him good good well I want our audience to know that when you know it's it's tough it's a you know there's a lot of violence and dark side but the fact is you sit then that movie theater you think you're going somewhere and it changes around so many times that I just people are just just on the edge of their seat just can't believe what's happening next it's very satisfying I've had people tell me when in the book and in the film you know they said well I was reading the book and I knew what was going on and then all of a sudden I didn't know what was going on and then
I knew what was going on and then I didn't and I didn't and that's kind of what I'm after and I think that the film nailed that too and I was so pleased that Jean Cocteau is showing the the film and I I was had we had great attendance the other night great questions and answers afterward I was glad to see my friend David Morrell there the creator of Rambo yeah so it was fun yeah um we're speaking today with Jo Lancio who famous writer and and author of the book on which cold in July was made based and many others but um I'd like you to tell me a little about your creative process because in that question offered uh an answer session you had mentioned how the idea for this develop please tell us that well I have to say that this one's unusual to the rest of my work but some short stories happen like this a lot but not novels and my wife and I had uh we were looking for a new house at that time and we went out and looked at this one and I looked up and there was a bullet hole in the ceiling and of course my writer's mind started working why is that bullet hole there and I asked the relative she had no answer or if she did she wasn't telling and uh I thought
first okay it must have either been an accident or a domestic disturbance but anyway I went home that night and I went to bed and I woke up I probably been asleep about an hour and I went in and I washed my face I had this dream about this burglar breaking into the house certainly inspired by the bullet hole and then I thought well that's weird and I went back to bed and a few hours later I woke up again went back and washed my face I had more of this story and it was organized not not dream story it was organized and I could feel my mind directing it like a film as I was doing it and by the morning I had an entire story and uh I I told my wife said it was weird dream last night and I said you know you she said well tell me and I told her she said wow yeah that's a good novel I said you think so and she said yeah I do and we had a friend that was a editor at bantam books at that time who was coming to visit with us and when I got when he got there my wife said telling him that telling that story yeah okay I told him the story he said sold you know he said to send you the stuff and I'll uh you know make it make it happen and yeah and that was Greg Tobin a good editor over at bantam and I wrote the book and you know and the rest is history I guess
as they say yeah well I'll tell you other people would see a bullet hole and not not go there well that's a writer's mind yeah and you know you could go all kinds of different ways with that bullet hole you got to tell a lot of different stories well you told them and there were things in the newspaper too that you know all these little things mishmash talk about gumbo yeah yeah um another film of years that I've seen this kind of a cult classic actually you're sort of a cult author yourself and that was Bubba Hotel and the basic premise it's Elvis is in the movie not the real Elvis but the one of the premises that you base this on and I'd love to know how you thought this up was that okay at one point in it is very a jaded point in his career that Elvis had traded lives with an Elvis impersonator yeah well you know when I first thought of this story it was a totally different story at that time it was during all the Elvis sightings I don't know if you remember that yeah but after Elvis died people saw him down to seven eleven you know and so it was this whole thing Elvis was alive so that kind of nestled in the back of my brain my brother I mentioned
was for 17 years older than than I am and and he married a lady from Memphis Memphis still married to her Mary Louise and she had gone to school and graduated with Elvis Presley and of course I grew up during the time when JFK was assassinated so I pulled his character into it my mother had to spend some time in a rest home due to an injury so I spent a lot of time there and all of these things again I keep coming back to this gumbo this stew because for me that's how it works I don't have like this one ingredient I have these sort of things it's sort of like Italian cooking those don't go together except when you eat and you go we out they do yeah and that is one of the things that is so fresh and tantalizing about your writing because you would never think you know sitting there to read the book that this would go together and it works and it's really quite compelling I thought it was the biggest loser I had written I was oh my god this is awful I'd send it in I was going to write the editor and withdraw it and I got a letter in the mail so this is the best thing we got we loved this and I thought yeah it was good I just let you know let him have it and I've been happy I did and I love the film I want to come back to your dad again
because not only did he not read and write but he was your father during the depression and he was he lived during the depression and he lived I mean that's what I meant I'm not like a father formed by the depression and and had those values and you know he made he worked many many jobs one of the things he did was train wrestlers and boxers he didn't train them he fought he was he was a wrestler in a boxer and what he did he would catch the train and go from another town to a fair and they have boxing and wrestling for money and in fact that actually created what became professional wrestling in time but at that time he they were just making money seeing who was gonna win this bout so to speak and my mother would say when they got low on money he hit the train and you know they would and he said he always brought money back so we won enough yeah and then but he worked every kind of job and didn't he give you some early instruction as a yeah yeah he was my first instructor he taught me self-defense and then that led to me
going into judo and of course I've been in martial arts now 51 years that's what I wanted to talk with you because you were the founder and the grandmaster or something called she told right martial science and we all hear about martial arts yeah but this is martial science and I really I read a lot about it and I'm intrigued tell us about it well I started in these different systems you know boxing and wrestling and then I went into judo in hot kido in kimpo in taekwondo and when taekwondo was new to the country in hot kido and kimpo different different things and I sort of blended them and one day I was teaching and one of my students after and I've been doing 30 something years says you know you're not really teaching anyone system I said no I guess I'm not and he says you ought to start your own system I went off you know I can't do that but I started meeting these other grandmasters who were coming to seminars and they said whatever you're doing is really really good and you should do this and and in time I was recognized by the international martial arts hall of fame in the United States martial arts hall of fame and Texas martial arts drive and and so I've been doing it for a long time and even though I'm older I still teach you
know just not as frequently but I own a school in Naked Oceans well one of the things that I read not at all being a martial arts person but that you it's a system where you don't have to be in the little outfit you don't have to warm up 20 times before it do it it's it's from the modern life you do you do you do workout and we do wear the uniforms in practice and stuff but it's trained in such a way that what I mean by that is that when you certainly warm up and do all that but if you're on the street you don't have times excuse me while I put my uniform on when I do a few you know squats you should be able to work cold so we we have the exercises in the class of people don't hurt themselves but the art is designed to be able to be used cold when needed yeah and strike quick fast hit hard hit fast go to the house that's something and also that that the individual can pick and choose the moves that you start out with the different things and then you find what what fits you I mean I think Bruce Lee and G Cundo used to do that you know you sort of keep what works for you and you throw out the rest but you have to have the
experience to know you can't decide for yourself like you know the first week you're there yeah but it gradually you gradually dictate what works for you through experience yeah and you said that um all the belts and all the levels it's not about that no better to be have a lower level of a belt but be a humble yeah absolutely present instead of a grand our ninth degree black belt is absolutely new cause yeah we we have we have belts for you know just so you can kind of keep it with where you're going but it's not a that's not one of the important aspects of our art the and our science because we use a lot of things that have to do with joints and bones and muscle and I you know we go in and say okay now this works because of this and I'm certainly not doctor science yeah but we've had we've worked with people who are and to try to find out why something works or why something's more powerful why something's more effective yeah um what is the connection between writing and the martial arts well the major one's discipline second one's confidence there's a there's economy of motion you know and they're they're like 31 different
concepts and principles that we use in in our system but you know you could boil them down to 10 you could expand them to 120 because there's different ways of slicing these ideas but generally writing living life martial arts they're all the same you uh in one of the question and answers I went to one of your pieces of advice for writers is to be fearless well that's certainly part of the martial arts connection that's another thing but what is it what are the advice you have for writers you know and how did you end up being a writer I mean really well you know I I coming books my mother gave me coming books when I was young I could read before I went to kindergarten and I was uh I had a natural ability to read fast and at that time retain it I was getting a little older my retention line quite as good but I immediately discovered pencils I wanted to write I wanted to draw and I wanted to write and my mother could see that in me and she kind of directed me in that direction you know pushed me that way and the more I read and the more I saw in films and comics the more I wanted to do it and so I so my process is pretty much
you know I can be flexible but I like to work in the mornings I like to work about three hours I like to work no less than three to five pages a day if I get more than that I'm I'm happy I go over it and polish it as I go and then when I'm finished I do an overall polish of the book and I'm done you know but there's no telling without a compute I mean with a computer without a typewriter how many times I've revised used to I'd have a trash can full of paper you know after the end of every every session you know um you know your wife says you married her for her typewriter because you've been writing longhand yeah yeah she uh she had a little Montgomery Ward's portable typewriter when we first met and that's we always joke that it married me for the typewriter I said she married me for my car it was like this forward that smoked and terrible you know the seat springs so uh you know we knew what we were getting into but you also said that writing chose you I didn't really yes I want to say when I discovered pencils I wanted to do it and I mean I do believe that you're directed toward without knowing it I don't think you're
naturally born to be a writer it's a human created art so at some point it was created so you're not born to be it but you're born to be creative maybe you maybe some maybe everybody has some creativity but some people have more but if you can weld that through drive and experience and put in your butt in a chair and uh reading a lot and working and not making excuses uh you know you might be able to do it and so what are you working on now well right now I'm working on a new happenliner novel so oh good we'll see how that good I love those I will close down and it would be wonderful if it did become a series I certainly hope so right now I would say it looks very very good but you know you never know yeah yeah um I want to one book I didn't show you have these wonderful collections of short stories so this is another new one bleeding shadows how many are in here 20 I think 20 there they're so good yeah that's a big one it's a big collection it's got novellos it's it's even got a mark twain uh pastiche oh yeah called called uh dread island uh hi I mixed uh mark twain uncle remus uh hb lovecraft uh and a lot of other historical things into
this one story thank you works well the other one I really want our audience to this is cold in july this is the book it came out in what 1989 originally yes originally this book is forever but it is available in theaters as a fabulous movie starring sam chepard and don johnson and um um what kind of awards you got the standingvation at cans what else what what has come to you from this movie well you know that book never won an award that book but it's just always been one of those that people liked and they just kept but you know the book itself though has been very rewarding because it's kind of one of those things that comes up all the time that people always ask about it goes in and out of print so it never stays out of print very long it's in it's in ebook form as well so it's it's been very good to me but you know a lot of my books have actually been option for film and I've written screenplays myself for Ridley Scott for example and john Irvin that were never not Irving by the way but Irvin that have never been uh never been made so
actually books and films uh they go hand in hand sometimes but that book was my was the one that opened those doors for a lot of different things books hand film yeah and who what are you reading now uh right now you know what I'm doing I've got a stack of comics this high I went to the comic book store here in Santa Fe oh well yeah oh well so but I I write comics too so uh-huh and graphic novels you know that's kind of the same thing with us old guys used to call funny books and comics right but graphic novels is kind of like the uptown way of saying you know hardback comics or freight paper comics well all of your awards and fantasy and science fiction and and what was the Italian the most influential oh I mostly influential foreign writer I got that not just month or so ago you know yeah yeah but it's it's funny because I've had the opportunity to write cartoons or Batman animated series and then comics and some people will read read this or see this and then they'll all gradually come back to the whole body of work yeah which has been very and then you've got to because your fans are legion our guest today is Joe
Lanziel thank you so much for taking the time I appreciate it yeah it was fun thank you and I'm Lorraine Mills I'd like to thank your audience for being with us today on report from Santa Fe we'll see you next week Past archival programs of report from Santa Fe are available at the website report from Santa Fe dot com if you have questions or comments please email info at report from Santa Fe dot com report from Santa Fe is made possible in part by grants from the members of the National Education Association of New Mexico an organization of professionals who believe that investing in public education is an investment in our state's economic future and by a grant from the Healy Foundation tells New Mexico
Series
Report from Santa Fe
Episode
Joe Lansdale
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KENW-TV, Eastern New Mexico University, Portales, New Mexico
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KENW-TV (Portales, New Mexico)
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cpb-aacip-bc046d12b93
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Description
Episode Description
This week's guest on "Report from Santa Fe" is award winning author and martial arts grand master Joe R. Lansdale. He has won nine Bram Stoker Awards, an Edgar Award for Best Novel by the Mystery Writers of America, the Horror Writers Association Lifetime Achievement Award, the British Fantasy Award, among many others.The new movie thriller "Cold in July" was based on Lansdale's book and stars Michael Hall, Sam Shepard and Don Johnson.
Broadcast Date
2014-06-14
Created Date
2014-06-14
Asset type
Episode
Genres
Interview
Media type
Moving Image
Duration
00:36:41.635
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Producer: Ryan, Duane W.
Producing Organization: KENW-TV, Eastern New Mexico University, Portales, New Mexico
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KENW-TV
Identifier: cpb-aacip-633e55e4e86 (Filename)
Format: DVD
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Citations
Chicago: “Report from Santa Fe; Joe Lansdale,” 2014-06-14, KENW-TV, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC, accessed August 2, 2025, http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-bc046d12b93.
MLA: “Report from Santa Fe; Joe Lansdale.” 2014-06-14. KENW-TV, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Web. August 2, 2025. <http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-bc046d12b93>.
APA: Report from Santa Fe; Joe Lansdale. Boston, MA: KENW-TV, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Retrieved from http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-bc046d12b93