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Last week when riding in the Gawker car service to the HQ, there came from underground a terrible rumble. When asked what it was, the driver snorted and replied through thinly veiled animosity, "The subway." Interesting, but not for us. It is, though, for David Israel, who has a terrific understanding of this blue-collared mode of transportation. Seems the man finds much inspiration in it and fashioned a screenplay out of his interests. After the jump, the author tells you about this, as well as talking to sheep and shutting down strip clubs with a hidden Dictaphone. You pervs, we know what you're thinking.

Age: 36
Occupation: Writer
Location: Brooklyn

1. Having penned a little something in celebration of the subway's 100th birthday, what would you do to make these rollercoaster death rides more comfortable for those of us who do not like them enough to celebrate the beast's centennial?

Interesting that you should mention beasts. I was recently speaking with Bonnie, daughter of Dolly, the cloned sheep, on this very subject. She shared her thoughts with me, which were spot-on.

She said, not as sheepishly as you might expect, One of my mother s great hopes was to live to see the completion of the infamous 2nd Avenue line. Rather then believe that that hope died with her, I prefer to trust in the MTA when they say they will have a fully operational East Side line by the turn of the next century. If we can produce a mammal in a petri dish, goddamnit we should be able to tunnel up 2nd Avenue. The massive crowding on the 4, 5, and 6 lines must be mitigated. As it is now, a rush-hour passenger waiting at any of these platforms need only lift her hooves off the ground to be carried away with the throng and packed into the arriving car like cattle on their way to the slaughterhouse.


2. Two big moments in your life were random events that led to big things: (1) You met the man in charge of editing and publishing Leonard Bernstein's music and unexpectedly told him you were going to work for him, which you did two months later, and (2) you met a Random House editor on the 4 train who later went on to publish your work. Do you believe in karma, and do you thank your lucky stars daily?

I think I believe in focus more than anything else. I get the oh you re so lucky line every now and then. But it hasn t been luck as much as it s been good fortune paid off after mountains of enervating grunt work. Bernstein s assistant, my editor at Random House, these people didn t approach me after all, I approached them. For each of those fortunate encounters, there were dozens upon dozens of poorly executed and often humiliating phone calls, letters, meetings, and lunches that went nowhere. That produced nothing. Nothing except a thicker skin. The thing is not to lose focus. You can t take rejection too hard. Even after Random House was ready to sign me, I still had agents who refused to represent the novel, who still thought me an untalented fly-by-nighter unworthy of their time.

As for karma, I lump that in with nepotism and trust funds. I actually know a couple artists who ve made good careers off that lot. They re the ones always looking behind them, threatened, afraid of who s coming up next. They d do better to thank their lucky stars and take a tip from their stockbrokers: never look back.

3. Your novel, Behind Everyman, has the tagline "a novel for guys and the women who rescue them." Having not received an advance copy, I ask out of total ignorance if this was written to reverse the "chick lit" trend and come at it from a man's side?

Well, the book comes at the familiar story of boy meets girl from the man s perspective, in the same way that perhaps Hornby s books do. But I think my book, while written for guys, will actually find a bigger audience with women. So the subtitle is there to appeal to them, a little group hug tagline, something to welcome them into the fold.

4. Writers often compare their novels to children, saying, "Which one of my books do I like the best? Oh, I could never answer that. That's like asking, 'Which one of my children do I like the best?' " To which I ask, how are your ovaries feeling these days? Got another one up in ya?

(Intentional unabashed plug follows; producers, directors, studio heads, take note:)

To keep on the train track here, I really have written a script based on the subway. Not just a mockery like in my Newyorkish piece, but a real TV pilot in the spirit of the great HBO shows. No one has picked it up yet, but then again, no one has really seen it either. I ve been too busy putting the finishing touches on my second novel, tentatively titled The Pervert, the Hypochondriac, and the Feminist.

5. New York question for a New Yorker: What era, day or event in New York's history would you like to relive?

Call me a masochist, but I wish I d been in NYC during the 70s. Especially 76 and 77. The Blackout, the graffiti, the bell-bottoms, some of the best Top 40 Hits of all time: Play That Funky Music, Right Back Where We Started From, the theme from SWAT, You Should Be Dancin, Tonight s the Night, Brown Sugar I don t know, maybe it s because I was only nine-years-old at the time, but I d love to do it all over again. This time in a real city.

Top Five Most Humiliating Jobs

5. ASCAP Spy: In college I worked as a real, honest-to-goodness spy for ASCAP (American Society of Authors, Composers and Publishers). My partner and I were basically paid to shut down strip clubs that weren t paying their licensing fees. With hidden Dictaphones and a wad of singles, we d spend a couple hours in a club, sometimes traveling across three state lines to get there, and notate every song that was played. Most Humiliating Moment on the Job: One of the strippers was giving me a lap dance and said, Sheeeet, someone s got a nice package. Sadly, it was only the Dick-taphone she rubbed up against.

4. Roy Rogers: One of my high school jobs. For the first couple weeks I actually liked this job. All the free French fries a guy could eat? Hell yeah. Most Humiliating Moment on the Job: Discovering a few weeks later that all the other workers were throwing cockroaches into the Frialator. No joke. Haven t eaten at Roy Rogers since.

3. Texaco: I was fifteen-year-old at the time. Underage. The only job I could get because my father rented an apartment he owned to the manager of the station. Paid under the table, of course. I had to ride my bike after school several miles in the snow sometimes all for a whopping $4/hour. Most Humiliating Moment on the Job: Any one of the many conversations with the other, much older, drugged-out, grease monkeys that worked the pumps:

Grease Monkey A: Yo! Man! I got so fucked up last night down at Ott s!

Grease Monkey B: Man, I don t even remember last night. Me and Jimmy went to the Priest concert got a hold of some serious fuckin weed. Yo, Dave (they were always calling me Dave) what did you do last night man?

15-year-old Dave: Ummm. Played Atari?

2. Video Store: Sometime after Texaco and before Roy Rogers. I was paid minimum wage to reshelve video boxes at the local video store (VHS had just hit, but most people were still renting BETA tapes at that time). Most Humiliating Moment on the Job: Whenever anyone I knew came into the store.

1. Arranger for the accordion-playing polka-bandleader, Johnny Dyno: Though the pay was okay ($100 per arrangement), who really wants to spend their college weekends cranking out parts for a ten-piece polka band, arranging such hits as the Slovenian Picnic Waltz and The Irish Washerwoman ??? Most Humiliating Moment on the Job: When Dyno called to complain about one of my charts. He said the alto sax part was too difficult. He said, Whodaya think I got on the horn? John fucking Coltrane? I was so ashamed I hung up my hat as an arranger for good and went down to the local Texaco to see if they had work. At least now I could boast about how shitfaced I d gotten the night before.

—Andrew Krucoff and Chris Gage conduct a daily interview series for Gawker.