A freelance writer whose work has appeared in American and English publications, I recently completed a novel, THE TAME MAN, and a screenplay adaptation, DEVOTED LADIES. I currently am based in NYC. I’ve published essays, articles, cover pieces, as-told-to articles and reviews–plus a deliciously anonymous film and pop culture blog. Publications include The London Times Sunday Magazine, The Guardian Weekend Magazine, Inside New York, Time Out New York and others. I’m a former Editorial Assistant at Harvard Review, worked in publicity at New Yorker Films, and was a co-founder of Firewater Films. I was awarded a Mellon Foundation Grant, and received two Fiction Fellowship Grants at Columbia University.
I am also an editor for the Reading List, and have edited many fiction and non-fiction book-length titles, both developmental/structural deep edits and line editing. I provide proofreading and copy-editing services for writers, corporations and marketing firms. I’ve created content and copy-edited websites, brochures and marketing materials for major urban centers like the Javits Center as well as for huge annual events, such as the New York International Auto Show, and the Global Pet Expo.
Expertise
Content Editor (online) 7 Years
Editor: 10+ Years
Writer: 10+ Years
Specialty
Film Arts & Humanities 10+ Years
Books & Literature 10+ Years
Health/Addiction Issues 10+ Years
Marketing Copy and Copy Editing 7 years
Industries
Educational Publishing 10 Years
Film 10+ Years
Media/Culture Content 10+ Years
But LORD. . .Blah blibbidy blah. This is far too formal for us. You and I never rested on formality in the past. So let’s get down to it, shall we? Q & A Time?
Q: Dana– Where are you and how can I get a grip on you?
A: Massaged with avocado oil and wrapped in combed yak every night before ascending the rosewood steps to my bowered bed, I am somewhere in Manhattan; curious, misplaced, and utterly impossible to get a grip on (primarily due to the avocado oil). Lately I’ve also been enjoying a little Trollope in bed. Christ, I forgot how good he is! Seriously the best.
Q: What are your interests? And will you please eat cheese crackers while you list them?
A: I don’t know who you are, but I like you. I am mouth-scattering cheese cracker crumbs as I tap away at the keyboard. My interests include cooking, travel exercise and, of course, 19th Century literature. I also quite enjoy films, cinema, movies, and occasionally flicks. I can be found riding my horse Bill Clinton through Central Park underpasses, while wearing a veil and weeping softly for what might have been. Then I check my phone to see what’s on Netflix.
Q: I do hope you love romantic comedies where women are taught not to be so damned uptight, the complete works of Garry Marshall, and any movie where people kiss and a crowd applauds. Also–Isn’t it hilarious when men pretend to be young boys with mental disorders?
A: No. I prefer movies like Cecil B. DeMille’s Cleopatra, where actresses play seaweed-covered clams who offer jewels to visiting Romans. That seems a better way to go through life than wearing a pencil skirt + stilettos and hoping A. Sandler will rock your world. I do like The Lady Eve, Kieslowski’s Trois Couleurs, Avoir est Etre, Santiago, RKO in the Thirties, Warner Brothers pre-code, Stanwyck and Arthur, Lubitsch and Leisen, each moment of bitchery in Stage Door, and every crazy-soaked frame of Polanski’s Bitter Moon.
Q: Talk to me of books. Not yours.
A: I like Austen, Thackeray, Trollope, Dickens, Fitzgerald. The redoubtable Ruth Rendell when she writes as Barbara Vine. Raymond Chandler. Anything Jeanine Basinger has to say about Film. Right now I am reading Pictures at a Revolution by Mark Harris, and Monty Python Diaries 1969-1979 by darling Michael Palin. Plus, I do adore a little Balzac in the morning.
Q: What’s the best time you’ve ever had licking stamps?
A: Most definitely Terence Stamp that night in Galway Bay. It was a while back, but he had a lovely pomegranate flavor.
Dana Dunbaugh Burnell 