The Wrath of a Biographer

I gave a shout out in my Hamilton biography to Ben Stiller, praising the comedian for upholding the principles of classic comedy. But I kind of regret being so nice to Stiller. I asked Stiller to write an introduction to my book and he never bothered to get back to me. Look, I don't want to hold a grudge. I understand that, at the time, Stiller was busy running around the tropical jungles of Hawaii to film Tropic Thunder. This was no little "kitchen sink" drama. This production was mounted at a cost to Dreamworks of $150 million. Stiller wrote it, directed it and acted in it. This had to have been difficult, stressful work. Stiller was filming on the island of Kauai for 13 weeks. Look at a picture of this place.

How can I expect someone trapped for 13 weeks in a hellhole like that to pick up a pen and write a few words for my book? Kauai has the very menacing nickname the "Garden Isle." I'm telling you, these movie stars have it tough. Did you know that they have feral chickens on Kauai?

It is selfish for me to think this guy had the time and energy to write an introduction for my little book. I hear that they don't even have pens on Kauai. If you are on this island and need to write something, you need to extract brown pigment from a cuttlefish.

I am sure that I will eventually get over my hurt feelings. But don't be surprised if they release a second edition of my book and all my references to Ben Stiller have been removed and I have a new passage in which I declare Will Ferrell to be classic comedy's keeper of the flame.