Getting 'Naked'

Image credit: Jerry Stahl and Ben Stiller: The Kobal Collection

You've been brutally honest about how you feel about the television industry, and yet you're in demand. How does that work?
Actually, I never dissed the TV industry that much. I basically dissed myself for winding up working there. Anybody who works in television and then complains about their creativity being thwarted should be taken out and dropkicked. That's like signing on as elephant trainer and whining cause you don't get to work with poodles. It is what it is.

You're listed as a consultant/writer to ''C.S.I.'' Given some of the creative deaths and mutilations in ''Plainclothes,'' are you the go-to guy for funky ways to die on the show?
I take no credit for any of the genius material which shows up on ''C.S.I.'' -- except for what you see in my own episodes -- and even then, they give me plenty of help. William Petersen [the series' star] and I actually met in the sauna at the Hollywood Y. We used to sit there and shoot the shit about books. Apparently he'd read some of mine, and for some ungodly reason thought I'd be the right guy to kick down a few scripts for his show. So that's how that happened. To this day I barely recognize him with his clothes on.

What can we expect from future episodes?
My next episode is November 15. It's the S&M episode, called ''Slaves of Las Vegas.'' Just walking on the set and seeing that somebody'd actually written ''I'm a dirty little stink-boy!'' on a blackboard one hundred times made it all worthwhile. So far I've written about a female cannibal and a dominatrix. What's not to love?

No matter what you do, it seems the label ''ex-junkie'' precedes your name. Is that a difficult cross to bear?
Having no legs, no bowel control, and no internet access is a cross to bear. Being called an ex-junkie is nothing. I've been called a lot worse, believe me.

You're also signed up for ''Prison Fish,'' a jailhouse memoir about a businessman who lands in jail and uses his skills as a corporate player to survive. What is it like adapting someone else's real life story?
For my money, Phil Kaufman (''The Right Stuff'') is one of the three or four greatest directors alive, and when I got the call about doing Jimmy Lerner's book, I didn't have to think about it. I was brought in to write a script because Phil had read my prose, which is hugely gratifying when you consider that this is the man who adapted Milan Kundera, Tom Wolfe, and the Marquis de Sade, not to mention everybody's fave sexaholics for ''Henry and June.'' Of course, having seen my own life brought to the screen and having witnessed up close and nine feet high what can happen in that process, I am hugely respectful of the man whose experience I'm trying to transform into a movie. You literally have someone's life in your hands, and your primary obligation is to honor that in every moment you write.