New Ed Burns Interview

There's a fantastic and lengthy Ed Burns interview up at the British-based lovefilm.com. Incidentally, The Wire is now on the BBC. Burns discusses Generation Kill, The Wire, and even divulges that he's submitted a movie proposal to HBO called "Jakarta." His pitch: "The Wire is today, Jakarta is tomorrow." Go on...

The more reticent of the Burns-Simon creative team, Burns has done fewer interviews than David Simon, but has a lot of great information on the philosophy and work behind the shows. Ed Burns essentially "lived" The Wire's Cops-Drug World, Baltimore Schools, and Generation Kill's soldiering while Simon was the more creative voice. Definitely a great team. Burns even discusses my favorite Wire theme- The Wire as urban anti-western. Burns' take on GK is equally enlightening. I really need to read Evan Wright's book.

My favorite one-liner take on President Obama's love for Omar:

LF: Going back to Obama, he said that Omar was his favourite TV character…

EB: Well, I think he said it and then, realising what he said, he backed away from that. As If they thought he were a homosexual black stick-up guy. [Laughs]

[Note the sweet British-ized British-ised spelling]