My fondest memory of Corinna Laszlo was the day we were sitting in her basement apartment in the Mission District of San Francisco. We had been talking back and forth excitedly for several hours about the politics of our school the New College of California listening to Mazzy Star at full blast and making pasta when all of sudden the phone rang.

Stopping mid-sentence to grab the phone and turn down the stereo, Laszlo screeched, "Hello!" into the telephone but soon was caught off guard. She settled down into a chair and calmly rolled a cigarette, listening to the voice on the other end.

"Where'd you get my name?"

I figured it was an obscene call and began to make rude noises. "Who is it?" I asked giggling.

"No, I don't think I'd be interested," Laszlo said into the phone. "Because I'm not a rising young actress, that's why," she said and hung up the phone.

"Who was that?" I asked.

"Someone looking for a porn star," she said, shrugging her shoulders. It was some guy from Details magazine. He wanted to do a profile on me as a rising young actress. Can you believe that?"

"And you told him no?"

"Of course I did. I'm not an actress."

"Are you crazy?"

"No," she said. "Not at all."

Laszlo may not be an actress but she played one in the movies once. Her 15 minutes of fame started one night in the old Edge nightclub here when a casting director asked her if she wanted to be in a movie.

A few weeks and some red tape later she found herself immortalized as the random rape victim in Oliver Stone's Natural Born Killers. Since then she has read her spoken word in bars and bistros in San Francisco, Los Angeles and Santa Fe, spent a brief period living in a tent on Stinson Beach outside San Francisco and spent a good deal of time wandering the roads from Austin to the West Coast with a white Labrador retriever named Home.

If Generation X has an anti-heroine, Laszlo may very well embody the role. Shunning publicity for the most part, she's a woman loaded with contradictions and ready to take on the world. I caught up with Laszlo at Warehouse 21 where she's currently working as program coordinator.

Pasatiempo: So is this new gig keeping you busy?

Corinna Laszlo: It's a really good job, actually. Doing the administrative part is dull. What's most appealing about it are the fringe benefits: getting my hands dirty working with kids. I've inherited the Free Food section (the Warehouse 21 zine) and I work with four really bright kids putting it together. I've never done a publication before and I think its really helping me learn how to facilitate projects.

Pasa: Is Warehouse 21 coming along well since its reincarnation?

Laszlo: Oh yeah this place is doing fine. I think it will take some time to get it fully up to speed but we're managing pretty well. And I'm trying to come up with more ways to utilize the space and the resources. My Writers Ghetto project is one of the ideas I have to make that happen.

Pasa: What's that all about?

Laszlo: The idea is to create a salon seminar kind of thing. There are a lot of writers in this town. When you go to spoken word events you see a lot of people who are just drifting around writing. I really want to get a bunch of them together to meet frequently and read their works to each other - like a support group only more manic and productive, I hope.

Pasa: Lately you've been a featured writer at Joe Ray Sandoval's reading events. Is that an accomplishment you're pleased with?

Laszlo: My writing is all about play for the most part. It's this activity that I engage in where I explore myself and issues in my life. It's not something I can stop doing. It's mostly pretty natural. What I get from readings is the fulfillment of a sincere exchange. When people comment about my work, it's mostly to tell me how much they appreciate my frankness about myself and my life.

Pasa: One could say that as the rape victim in Natural Born Killers, you're a symbol of the way the media victimize females. Do you have any comments about that experience?

Laszlo: I think it was an interesting directorial decision on the part of Stone to pull some random non-actress off the street to play that role. Until it happened, I had no idea what was going to happen. So there I was, hogtied and having no idea what the script was about and Woody Harrelson is dancing in front of me with a knife while Skinny Puppy is playing in the background. And he cuts off my panties and I was screaming and it was all really real in a way.

In some ways, I felt like I was the kickoff party for the film. It's the first day of shooting and what better way to get the crew all riled and bonded together than to have a faux rape of some random chick who really didn't know what was going to going on?

Pasa: Did you feel used?

Laszlo: No, not really. I was in film school at the time and I was well-paid. And I got my SAG (Screen Actors Guild) card out of it. Rather than taking it personally, I've thought about it more as a metaphor for the way Santa Fe's talent gets harvested by the outside world. People come in with all sorts of projects and just kinda grab people off the street.

Pasa: As if we were a town chock full of extras.

Laszlo: Exactly. We're not as hip as we used to be but a lot of people have benefited from the draw of Santa Fe.

Pasa: Like Jono Manson and Matthew Andre.

Laszlo: Yeah. And that's great that they can rise to a place where someone will pay them to be themselves. In my experience, it was a little different, but it's OK. It would suck if that were the extent of my 15 minutes, though.

Pasa: How would you like your next 15 minutes to play out?

Laszlo: I'm really kind of into the practice of things, the rehearsal nature of not really trying to get anywhere in particular. Frankly, fame doesn't interest me. Maybe it would if I knew some people who loved their fame, but most people seem to view it as a burden of some kind that gets in their way.

When it comes to goals, I think I want to save the world in some way. Doesn't everyone? But I have a lot to learn if I want to go in that direction.

Pasa: If Details called you today, do you think you'd turn the magazine down this time?

Laszlo: I see myself as some one who's full of contradictions. I don't necessarily feel that I'm a part of that culture, so I wouldn't really know how to present myself to that kind of publication. But hey, yeah. If they called...I guess I'd talk to them. Personality is a commodity out there somewhere. I wouldn't mind getting someone to fund mine.