Average customer rating:
- One Eyed Visionary
- Great book, intresting facts, great, candid shots!!!!
- For Photograghy Fans Too!
- Photo by Sammy Davis Jr.
- Great photos complement this wonderfully written book!
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Photo by Sammy Davis, Jr.
Burt Boyar
Manufacturer: HarperEntertainment
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 0061146056
Release Date: 2007-02-06 |
Book Description
Sammy Davis, Jr. will forever be remembered as one of America's finest entertainers. An all–around performer who could sing, dance, and act, Davis broke racial barriers in the entertainment world and became the only non–white member of the Rat Pack. Only now, however, is Davis's talent as a photographer finally being recognized. In this previously unpublished collection of black and white photography, readers will be fascinated by Davis's portrayals of A–list performers, iconic world leaders, and scenes from everyday life. Davis's subjects include dozens of classic celebrities–such as Frank Sinatra, Marilyn Monroe, Paul Newman, and James Dean–who are often photographed at their most casual and revealing moments.
Accompanying the pictures is an assortment of remembrances by Burt Boyar, a longtime friend and traveling companion of Davis who collaborated with the entertainer on both of his autobiographies. Through a series of memorable anecdotes, Boyar reflects on Davis's many achievements as well as the private moments they shared as friends. Along with Davis's candid shots of ordinary life–from a group of children laughing to a baseball game at the Washington Monument–these stories reveal a side of the performer far removed from his Rat Pack persona.
The release of this book will also coincide with the release of Burt Boyar's upcoming documentary, Sammy Speaks, created from his extensive archive of taped conversations with the star.
Customer Reviews:
One Eyed Visionary.......2007-09-25
Few have personified the phrase "self-made man" as did legendary entertainer Sammy Davis, Jr. (1925-1990). The world remembers Davis for his varied and extraordinary accomplishments as an actor, singer, musician, dancer, and comedian.
But hardly anyone outside his circle of friends and family has been familiar with his photography--until now. With this hefty book, interspersed with reminisces by longtime friend Burt Boyar (who co-wrote Davis's autobiographies Yes I Can and Why Me?), his old fans and a new generation can revel in hundreds of images that reveal yet another significant facet of Davis's far-reaching talents.
Though Photo lacks the singular thematic focus of books published by such photographer-celebrities as Dennis Hopper and Gerry Spence, that's no drawback for this posthumously published volume. Rather, it pulls the reader into the exciting world of nightclubs, casinos, and Beverly Hills homes in which Davis moved, mostly from the late 1940s through early '70s. A voracious shutterbug, he took his photography seriously: his compositions are strikingly iconic, employing sophisticated use of line and form. Yet, his pictures are mostly snapshots--in the best sense of the word: they capture their subjects spontaneously, and his joie de vivre suffuses his work. Think of it as a highly stylized family album packed with candid portraits of "Rat Pack" pals Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Joey Bishop, Peter Lawford, and Shirley MacLaine, as well as other famous friends like Nat "King" Cole, Tony Curtis, Janet Leigh, Sidney Poitier, James Dean, Marilyn Monroe, Jerry Lewis, and Bill Cosby.
Among the more touching aspects of this book are the portraits of his actual family: his parents, his second wife May Britt and their children, and his third wife (and widow) Altovise Gore Davis. The most poignant are the many shots of actress Kim Novak, the first great love of Davis's life, who was forced by Columbia Pictures studio chief Harry Cohn to break off their relationship (interracial relationships were strictly taboo in 1950s Hollywood, not to mention in society generally).
One photograph, despite its matter-of-fact framing, is particularly chilling. Through the window of a passenger train en route to Miami, Davis snapped a picture of an elderly white gentleman on a station platform holding a cigarette, standing before a pair of double doors over which the foreboding phrase "WHITE WAITING ROOM" is painted. Davis's photographic abilities and inclinations were such that we see a mostly glamorous world through his eye. Thus, when we arrive at this jarring image, it's impossible not to apprehend it from his point-of-view--and also not to feel the sense of injustice that he must have experienced in the Jim Crow South as he clicked the shutter.
As Davis's show business career took off, many venues--even north of the Mason-Dixon Line--were happy to let blacks perform onstage; but the same headliner artists weren't even permitted to drink at the bar, use a dressing room, or occupy one of their hotel rooms. Photographs from Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s 1963 "I Have a Dream" speech at the Lincoln Memorial, and portraits of politician friends Senator Robert Kennedy and President Richard Nixon, give silent witness to Davis's largely forgotten achievements as an outspoken civil rights advocate.
Photo is a coffee-table book that won't spend much time on the coffee table if your houseguests are anything like mine. Because of a car crash in 1954, Sammy Davis, Jr., was left with only one eye. But what an eye this cat had!
Great book, intresting facts, great, candid shots!!!!.......2007-08-09
This book is so fun. It has so many candid great photo's, really intresting history on Sammy Davis Jr. and his relationship's. I really enjoyed this book. Great coffee table book.
For Photograghy Fans Too!.......2007-06-22
I originally picked up this book as a curiosity and found its links to a bygone era utterly fascinating. The subject matter, i.e., rat pack photos were wonderful but the photographic mastery of Davis Jr. is, I think, equally as stunning. A look into Davis Jr.'s remarkable life is given by him in the way, like other great photographers, he insightfully choses to document and communicate with his subjects through the lens. Again, like many great photographers, the images are powerful and soft, crisp and dazzling. More talent revealed from a man who had more in his baby finger than most of us have coursing through our entire bodies.
Bravo. Well done.
Photo by Sammy Davis Jr........2007-05-28
An excellent "coffee table" book that graphically recalls the fifties and sixties, and the hedonistic style of the Rat Pack and Sammy's many friends and colleagues. Beautifully captures the mood and style of the period.
Great photos complement this wonderfully written book!.......2007-04-21
An extremely fun book that reminds the reader of a very happy period of US entertainment history (including old Hollywood, the Rat Pack, and more). Lets the reader see Sammy's world from the camera's view, and what a great world it must have been. Boyer is a talented writer and put together a fabulous collection of photos. A perfect book for the coffee table that includes some great stories to go with the rare photos. A must have for any fan of mid-century Hollywood.
Book Description
Every month in Esquire, the captains of industry (Jack Welch) and the pop culture icons (Gene Simmons, Loretta Lynn), the leaders (Rudolph Giuliani) and the loudmouths (Don Rickles), reveal their philosophy of life in the What I’ve Learned column. Ten entertaining years’ worth of their often-humorous, always thoughtful advice, along with stunning portrait photography, is gathered in this sharply designed compilation. The contributors include Muhammad Ali, Bill O’Reilly, Faye Dunaway, former Secretary of State Robert McNamara, Hugh Hefner, Elvis Costello, Lou Reed, Suge Knight, and Julia Child.
Customer Reviews:
Full of info!.......2007-02-19
I bought this book for my 19 year old son. He had heard about it and now is always quoting things from it. He found it very,very intersting!
An enjoyable read.......2006-11-10
This book is an fascinating and entertaining peek into the real people we see on the big screen. The interviews are brief, one page each, and that is good and bad. Good because it can be read in short bites, bad because it leaves the reader wanting more. The "stars" are people too. This is a glimpse into who they are.
Fantastic portraits.......2006-07-01
Have always enjoyed "The Meaning of Life" page on Esquire - and to see a large collection of these - and many that i've missed - in one book is just great!
So many different popular characters and personalities and interesting views on the ways of life.
Good book.......2006-03-19
I found this book very interesting. I found out a lot about people that I liked and learned about new ones as well. Very good book, light reading and fun. Highly recommend.
Insightful, Interesting, and Fun.......2005-03-12
Opinions on some of life's most talked about subjects from past and present; writers, painters, musicians, politicians, actors, etc.... great stories and insightful views on religion, sex, faith, gender differences, relationships, etc..... easy to read and very witty. If your interested in what shapes extraordinary people into who they are then this book is for you. I loved it from the first page. I read this book from start to finish in one sitting. Thats a first.
Book Description
Maybe the Moon, Armistead Maupin's first novel since ending his bestselling Tales of the City series, is the audaciously original chronicle of Cadence Roth -- Hollywood actress, singer, iconoclast and former Guiness Book record holder as the world's shortest woman.
All of 31 inches tall, Cady is a true survivor in a town where -- as she says -- "you can die of encouragement." Her early starring role as a lovable elf in an immensely popular American film proved a major disappointment, since moviegoers never saw the face behind the stifling rubber suit she was required to wear. Now, after a decade of hollow promises from the Industry, she is reduced to performing at birthday parties and bat mitzvahs as she waits for the miracle that will finally make her a star.
In a series of mordantly funny journal entries, Maupin tracks his spunky heroine across the saffron-hazed wasteland of Los Angeles -- from her all-too-infrequent meetings with agents and studio moguls to her regular harrowing encounters with small children, large dogs and human ignorance. Then one day a lanky piano player saunters into Cady's life, unleashing heady new emotions, and she finds herself going for broke, shooting the moon with a scheme so harebrained and daring that it just might succeed. Her accomplice in the venture is her best friend, Jeff, a gay waiter who sees Cady's struggle for visibility as a natural extension of his own war against the Hollywood Closet.
As clear-eyed as it is charming, Maybe the Moon is a modern parable about the mythology of the movies and the toll it exacts from it participants on both sides of the screen. It is a work that speaks to the resilience of the human spirit from a perspective rarely found in literature.
Customer Reviews:
One of my all-time favorite books.......2007-07-30
My title says it all. I'm not going to write a long, involved review. Suffice to say, I read a lot. A LOT. And this one is definitely in my top 5.
I noticed below under "tag suggestions" that it has "gay fiction" and "gay classic" (I assume because the author is gay), and I want to point out that (from what I remember) there is no homosexuality in this book. (Not that there's anything wrong with homosexuality, yada, yada, yada...)
It's funny and touching. I've read it several times over the years, and it's always stayed with me.
His "Tales of the City" books are great too, but this one just stood out for me as an all-time great.
Not Maupin's best work.......2005-10-17
I did not care for this work about the drarf although I imagine she like so many people who are different had a very difficult time in life the suibject matter was not my cup of tea as to reading material. It's a well written piece of work if you're into dwarfs' life stories.
Surprisingly fantastic.......2004-12-05
Received this book out of the blue from a seller on Amazon who bundled this with an order I placed. Tossed it aside for half a year before I sat down to read it last night and did NOT put it down until the last page -- then went back to the beginning once more. Touching, warm, creative, full of personality. At worst, it's entertaining. Do read it.
Fantastic.......2004-02-01
This is one of the best fiction books I have read. As an average sized person, I found this extraordinarily enlightening as to the difficulties and prejudices that little people go through each and every day. It was one of the most unique love stories ever and it really, truly made me feel the full gamut of emotions. If you buy one fiction book in your life, this is the one.
Oh, triple wow.......2003-12-13
Armistead Maupin has been one of my favorite writers since way back when his Tales of the City was serialized in the San Francisco Chronicle. I read all of them and then just kept going, reading everything he's ever written. Maybe the Moon is one of his most poignant and one of his best.
For this masterpiece, we have a change of venue from SF to LA, and instead of the broad humor with which Maupin painted the characters in the Tales series, he's delved deeply into the development of his protagonist, Cadence Roth, a dwarf. Although teensy, there's nothing small about her personality, a personality that is thwarted only by the fact that she rose to movie fame wearing a highly-recognizable costume in a famous sci-fi movie - and by contract she's forbidden from revealing her real ID. We follow her from one career disappointment to the next, and her personal life isn't very hopeful, either. In spite of a bit of a shocker ending, Maybe the Moon (great title, very apt) is really a paean of hopefulness for people who are different, and you end up smiling thru your tears.
Book Description
In response to the increasing convergence of technologies in the entertainment industries, this thoroughly updated and revised fifth edition makes the casebook more timeless. Providing contract templates covering book publishing, recording contracts, actor agreements, video game agreements, and internet agreements, among others, this new edition is more useful and illustrative of the business of entertainment for lawyers, students, and industry professionals than its competition. Introductions, notes, and cases are fully updated to take into account recent changes in the industry. This classic casebook is essential to students at law schools throughout the country and to industry professionals trying to keep up with this ever-changing field of law.
Customer Reviews:
Table of Contents:.......2007-08-12
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction 1
Global Overview 1
Standards Governing Preliminary Injunctions, Motions for Summary Judgment, and Attachments 6
Ch. 1 Representing Talent 13
Ch. 2 Talent Contracts 67
Ch. 3 Acquisition of Rights: Rights of Personality and Identity 157
Ch. 4 Acquisition of Rights: Ideas and Other Property 281
Ch. 5 Contract Performance, Exploitation Obligations, and Limitations on Exploitation 353
Ch. 6 Remedies 431
Ch. 7 Literary Publishing 525
Ch. 8 Music Publishing 549
Ch. 9 Sound Recordings 581
Ch. 10 Films 625
Ch. 11 Television 657
Ch. 12 The Internet, Multimedia, and Emerging Technologies 689
Ch. 13 Theatre 773
Table of Cases 803
Index 831
Excellent.......2006-05-20
A book that has it's groundings firmly set into the the real world, dealing with real problems and real people, providing real life examples and presenting all the legal aspects of the entertaintment business. In this forth edition things have been turned up a notch and the information just got a little hotter, with even more revealing information and an interesting online section. As good as this book is there is something on the market that surpasses it, the excellent "How To Make A Furtune In The Music Industry By Doing It Yourself: Your Personal Step-By-Step Guide To Having A Successful Career In The Music Business. ... To Sell Music, Book Shows And Get Noticed!" by author Ty Cohen, a book that contains the latest and best information concerning the world of music producingA book that has it's groundings firmly set into the real world, dealing with real problems and real people, providing real life examples and presenting all the legal aspects of the entertainment business. In this forth edition things have been turned up a notch and the information just got a little hotter, with even more revealing information and an interesting online section. As good as this book is there is something on the market that surpasses it, the excellent "How To Make A Fortune In The Music Industry By Doing It Yourself: Your Personal Step-By-Step Guide To Having A Successful Career In The Music Business. ... To Sell Music, Book Shows And Get Noticed!" by author Ty Cohen, a book that contains the latest and best information concerning the world of music producing.
A helpful examination of the entertainment business.......1999-05-05
As an attorney teaching an entertainment law course to undergraduates at the University of Notre Dame, I've found this text book to be very useful. Not only does it address and examine legal issues that face entertainment industry persons, it examines *how* the entertainment industries actually work. The vast majority of my students have found this book to be useful and worthwhile.
Average customer rating:
- The Danger of Drugs
- entertaining, true that heroin doesn't affect atleticism
- Transforming the ugly into the beautiful
- Don't pollute your mind or give it any artistic credence
- My favorite
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The Basketball Diaries: Movie Tie-In Edition
Jim Carroll
Manufacturer: Penguin (Non-Classics)
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
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ASIN: 0140249990 |
Customer Reviews:
The Danger of Drugs.......2007-04-12
This odd mix of biography and novel takes some terrible situations and turns them into a quest for purity. You won't be able to put it down.
entertaining, true that heroin doesn't affect atleticism.......2007-04-02
fun story, sure it's dark but you know what you're getting when you pick it up. I like that this book despite being a novel shows how heroin use doesn't cause health problems other than its addiction. too bad he became a thug on it, which also doesn't need to go hand in hand with drug use despite popular misconception. loved the movie, the book is about as good. can relate to more of this book than probably anyone on amazon (nyc, prep school, former precocious poet & dope user, successful shooting guard, thriving today). not saying that to brag but to say it holds up enjoyably as hell well as an odd mix of biography and novel.
Transforming the ugly into the beautiful.......2007-03-07
This is the best book that I have ever read. It is so well written that it takes your breathe away. In this book he transforms horrible awful situations into a quest for purity. I didn't want this book to end.
Don't pollute your mind or give it any artistic credence.......2007-02-01
Overcompensation for his fundamental assessment that he is unredeemed trash. Tedious, self absorbed, and boring in a way that only a life of getting a next fix or hustle can be...which means that the majority of Carroll's worldview is the stall of a public bathroom. The lame narrative contrasts with Trinity School days and the clean-cut world of athleticism and basket ball versus his rough trade street life is such an obvious transition anyone else would have fallen asleep before making it up as their effort to construct his life as a work of art. One suspects this poetry was originally written on toilet paper and should have been flushed. Unfortunately it was preserved; and the whole disgusting mess is served up here. Don't pollute your mind or give it any artistic credence.
My favorite.......2006-12-31
I absolutely love Jim's style of writing. So I'm a big fan of the "basketball diaries". Overcoming my own addiction issues I can relate with some of the stories in the book also. Read the book, skip the movie.
Book Description
During their marriage, Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz filled over 100 scrapbooks with all manner of memorabilia. Now fans can take a rare peek at the details of the famous TV couple's lives with this fantastic replica composite. LUCY & DESI, our exclusive, real-life scrapbook of the couple's lives, contains 25 interactive, three-dimensional paper-engineered replicas of actual items--from Desi's report card to important telegrams--which have never been published before. Vintage snapshots of happy family moments, touching love letters, passports, and other precious minutiae, with more than 150 photographs, both black-and-white and color, fill this wonderful, engrossing look back at the golden years of television comedy, when Lucy and Desi charmed America with humor and song. This official scrapbook is a must-have for the millions of devoted fans.
Customer Reviews:
FANTASTIC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!.......2006-01-14
If you are a Lucy Fan then you simply must buy this book! I just received mine and sat mesmorized by it, it is now my favorite Lucy item I have. I have an enormous collection of everything to do with Lucy or I LOVE LUCY you can imagine and this Scrapbook is so incredible.....it's honestly as if you are looking at the original scrapbook and you are even able to pull out inserts on several pages.....passport, letters, etc. I am not joking, if you are a collector of Lucy things and you do not have this Scrapbook then you are missing an incredible addition to your collection. The price is really great considering all you get. Words truly are not enough....I'll never ever get tired of looking at this!!!! Don't just think about buying it, buy it this minute!!!
lucy & desi the real -life scrapbook .......2005-09-21
The scrapebook was execellent. I enjoyed every little thing about it. It was great of all the document that were in there. This is a great book.
pop culture fanatic in Ohio.......2005-09-04
I picked up this book on a whim. In all honesty, I was "blown away" by it. Whoever put this thing together did a wonderful and pain-staking job duplicating items glued and tucked within the pages of the original scrapbooks. Passports, holy cards, letters from presidents and celebrities and much more is reproduced to look like the originals. I found myself getting lost in the lives of these people and the decades in which they lived. Mostly, I closed the book with the realization that even icons like Lucy and Desi are flesh and blood people, drawn to their heritage, celebrating their children and accomplishments, and mourning the loss of dreams and friends along the way. Each yellowed news clipping and lovingly preserved souvenir is a reminder of the ties that bind us all.
Amazing.......2005-07-22
This is simply priceless. Worth every penny you spend on it and more! Everything looks so authentic. I especially liked reading the letters and seeing Desi's passport! A must-have for any Lucy and/or Desi fan.
a marvelous album.......2005-03-01
I'm one of millions of fans of Lucille Ball and her handsome husband Desi. The love between Lucy and Desi (despite their difficulties/different backgrounds and expectations) was romantic, palpable, just so real, that it lit up their tv show and the movies they made together.
Here is a scrapbook containing many little personal items and minutia from their days together, so that both Lucy and Desi return to life before our eyes. Browsing through it is a joy.
Average customer rating:
- A Lifetime of Research on Vaudeville -
- A Trans-Atlantic view
- Outstanding vaudeville history
- The Best Vaudeville Book Ever
- Vaudeville - Brought Back to Life
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Vaudeville, Old and New: An Encyclopedia of Variety Performers in America, 2 volumes
Frank Cullen ,
Florence Hackman , and
Donald McNeilly
Manufacturer: Routledge
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Binding: Library Binding
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ASIN: 0415938538 |
Book Description
This is a one-of-a-kind reference work to the history of vaudeville, performance art, burlesque, revue, and comic opera. Author Frank Cullen has done deep research, including archival work and personal interviews, to uncover the rich history of this American art form. Most of the artists profiled here are not examined in other reference books. This will be a must-have for students of theater history and performance art, and also for anyone interested in the cultural history of America.
Customer Reviews:
A Lifetime of Research on Vaudeville -.......2007-04-05
This is from my review published in "In The Groove" Magazine - April 2007
Frank Cullen LOVES Vaudeville in all it's forms, whether it's the baggy pants comics of burlesque, the "specialty acts" like strongman or eccentric dancers who graced the stages of New York and around the circuits in the 1920s, or the singers who went on to make some of the most popular records of their day. This passion is obvious in the recent publication of the huge two-volume 1300-page compilation Vaudeville Old & New: An Encyclopedia of Variety Performers in America (Routledge). Now in his 70s, Cullen saw his first Laurel & Hardy film at the age of nine and was hooked. (Yes, Laurel and Hardy both appeared on the vaudeville stage early in their careers and Cullen devotes six pages to them.). He started reading and watching and listening in his high school years and had a brief acting career as well. In the mid-1980s he formed the American Vaudeville Museum in CT and began publishing the quarterly Vaudeville Times (which I mentioned here last year). Now relocated to New Mexico, Cullen has put his energies into this fascinating book. The peak years for "Vaudeville" were 1905-1925, with over 2,000 theaters around the US. As many as 50,000 performers were in the business during that period. Obviously, not all are in the book but a good mix of the known and the "lesser known" are here. Record collectors will recognize many of them. There are the recording Bakers (Belle, Josephine and Phil) as well as the Smiths (Mamie, Bessie and Kate). Other recording artists covered in much detail include, Eddie Cantor, Sissle & Blake and Moran & Mack. The performers are listed alphabetical from A (Abbott a& Costello) to Z (Zetts Weekly, a rival to Variety, published in 1921). There are sections devoted to each of the "circuits" and the impresarios as well. Photos of the performers and sheet music covers are on many pages. In fact, you'll find a lot of performers who you've only known from sheet music covers. The very handy Bibliography and a 30-page Index, make the book even more useful. Whether you start from the beginning and read it straight through, or use to look up an artist you found on a recording, you'll find this book a great resource. It's a tribute to the hard work and passion of the author. Highly recommended!
Steve Ramm "Anything Phonographic"
A Trans-Atlantic view.......2006-12-01
All that you could ever want to know about vaudeville is contained in a monumental two-volume work, Vaudeville Old and New: an Encyclopedia of Variety Performers. It surpasses anything previously written about the American equivalent of British music hall and will stand as the major reference work on the subject for many years to come.
Given its scope, there are entries about entertainers whose names will mean nothing to the average British reader. But that is more than offset by the comprehensiveness the authors bring to all they touch. It is fascinating, for instance, to get an American take on British artistes who became big stars in the U.S., the likes of Vesta Victoria and Alice Lloyd. We learn more about such top-liners as Al Jolson and Danny Kaye and find the answers to all manner of questions. What was so special about Fanny Brice? What brought Sid Caesar's career to a halt? And who knew that the distinguished commentator, Walter Winchell, started out in vaudeville?
The books' essays about burlesque and music hall are as good as you'll likely to get and the fine writing evinces some deft and delicate touches: a description of Beatrice Lillie, for instance, is as "a treasured English tea-rose with thorns" is spot on. The "new" in the title is no false promise. The encyclopedia is bang up-to-date with entries on Britain's Chris Simmons, for example.
The extensive knowledge and deep love of vaudeville by the author, Frank Cullen [working with Florence Hackman and Donald McNeilly], shine through in each of these tomes' 1,300 magnificent pages.
Richard Anthony Baker
Outstanding vaudeville history.......2006-11-19
A monumental and definitive encyclopadia by an outstanding theater historian. This tome is everything you wanted to know about vaudeville and its performers. It is destined to become the bible for historians and researchers of early American popular theater.
Frank Cullen's knowledge and articulation of the facts of vaudeville, old and new, is a welcome and needed addition to a genre sadly overlooked by the public. Vaudeville was America's first national pasttime and laid the foundation for the world of entertainment in our contenporary culture.
Nicely laid out, easy to read, ample photographs and humor make the two-volume set a must for libraries, archives and theater buffs, or anyone who has an interest in American social history.
The Best Vaudeville Book Ever.......2006-11-10
Frank Cullen, longtime publisher and head writer of the Vaudeville Times magazine, has finally published his 2 volume biographical encyclopedia of vaudeville. For those who don't know, vaudeville was the main form of live entertainment in America from 1880 to 1930 and it continued even as late at the 1960s. This book carefully catalogues who was who in vaudeville, tells the major reason they became famous or were important, and offers biographies and descriptions of everything connected with the subject.
Along with the work of Professor Anthony Slide, these tomes by Frank Cullen constitute the most important documentation of this major form of American popular culture. Vaudeville is rapidly being forgotten today as its participants die off and younger audiences cannot even recognize the term. Cullen's work honors the performers and offers invaluable insights into what the experience was like.
The book is well written and, like vaudeville itself, immensely entertaining, whether you are reading about familiar stars such as Al Jolson or the completely forgotten ones such as the great Eddie Leonard. There is nothing to complain about in this effort-- if you want to know all about vaudeville, this is the magnum opus. It is lavishly illustrated and has about it that aura of love and care that comes when a writer is totally engrossed in his subject matter and approaches it with honesty, integrity and admiration.
Of course I have to tell you that I am biased because I'm in the book. I once was in "the show business" in vaudeville and there are only a few of us still alive who made it into the Cullen opus. But those of us who are left can assure you, dear reader, that all those vaudevillians who are encapsulated within would be proud of this book. It costs a good bit but it's got everything you need to know about a subject that once was close to the hearts of so many Americans. What's really fun is watching old movies on Turner, admiring the work of stars such as Eddie Cantor, Ruth Etting, or Trixie Friganza, and then keeping these volumes by your bed to look up the bios! Of course at my age that passes for high adventure! So, thanks, Frank, and good night Mrs. Calabash, wherever you are. If you know the meaning of that last phrase you'll love this book. If you don't you should read it anyway.
Vaudeville - Brought Back to Life.......2006-10-25
This massive two volume work is without a doubt the greatest tribute to vaudeville and its performers ever written. It brings back to life an important aspect of show business that has almost been forgotten.
In this book you relive the lives and stories of a group of hard working entertainers, many of whom went on to give birth to the motion pictures, radio, and television industries. Most of the stars of the years between 1925 and 1960 got their start in vaudeville.
You won't read this book in one night, but it could provide a thousand nights of some of the greatest entertainment you've ever experienced.
If you love show business and all of it's aspects, then you will absolutely love this masterful work. It may just be what is needed to help resurrect the spirit of a long deceased tradition.
Average customer rating:
- Dietrich: the Lord of Discipline
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Marlene Dietrich: Life and Legend
Steven Bach
Manufacturer: William Morrow & Co
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Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 0688071198 |
Book Description
"The finest picture-star biography I have read"
-Peter Bogdanovich, Los Angeles Times
In an achievement as grand and sweeping as Dietrich's own life, Steven Bach reveals the woman and examines her myth in a biography that will stand as the ultimate authority on a singular star. Based on six years of research and hundreds of interviews-including conversations with Dietrich herself-this is the last, best word on one of the century's greatest movie actresses and performers, an icon who embodied glamour and sophistication for audiences around the globe.
Customer Reviews:
Dietrich: the Lord of Discipline.......2002-06-26
Having read Maria Riva's book on her mother along with Dietrich's own autobiography, I didn't really expect any new revelations from this book -- but I couldn't have been more wrong! Mr. Bach is to be congratulated on his fascinating and respectable work honoring Miss Dietrich and her life. What a remarkable performer and a remarkable human being. We could sure use a few more like her in today's world. This is a must read for fans of the Lady and the Legend!!
Book Description
In a career that spanned six decades, as a star of stage and screen, Marlene Dietrich created an unforgettable image. She was an international icon.
But that public persona masked the very private woman we meet in this biography. Spoto's story follows Dietrich from pre-war Berlin to Hollywood, which made her a star, to the nightclub stages of the 1950s and '60s, where she polished the legend.
From an unorthodox 52-year marriage to self-imposed seclusion, from her penchant for men's clothing to a lusty appetite for both sexes (Gary Cooper, John Wayne, Maurice Chevalier and George Raft), BLUE ANGEL reveals Dietrich in all her idiosyncratic glory.
"The fabulous book that tells it all. . .a great biography, a provocative appraisal." (Cosmopolitan)
Customer Reviews:
No "Angel".......2004-04-17
Donald Spoto tends to write pleasant, sometimes very insightful biographies that tend to look at different aspects of the stars they focus on. "Blue Angel," however, is not up to par. While his biography of actress Marlene Dietrich is well-written, he seems too disconnected from his subject.
Marlene Dietrich was a dominant sex symbol alongside the distant Greta Garbo. Her big break came with Josef von Sternberg, a German director who found the struggling actress and made her his muse, lover and inspiration. Dietrich kept spreading her wings in Hollywood, and in the 1940s she entertained Allied troops for her adopted country.
Spoto does a pretty good job of covering Dietrich's many-faceted life. Hausfrau and actress, Berlin cabaret and Hollywood, he checks it all out and describes it with a fair amount of detail. And despite the varied nature of Dietrich's love life, he at least tries to keep his tone professional and detached. (Even when describing Dietrich placing a bouquet of violets in a rather, um, intimate place)
What's Spoto's biggest problem? He seems to have no idea what made Dietrich tick. When describing the real Dietrich -- the woman behind the image -- he seems genuinely befuddled by her real personality, and spends too much time speculating on her motivations. However, he sheds a great deal of light on Dietrich's mystique, and how it was created by von Sternberg.
Donald Spoto's "Blue Angel" sheds some light on the not-so-angelic Marlene Dietrich, but his lack of insight into Dietrich's mind makes it a somewhat frustrating read.
No mere specter of a star.......2001-08-31
I found this book an enjoyable and informative read, though at times presented romantically and subjectively. The author does a fine job presenting Dietrich from many angles, truly fleshing her out (Spoto is irritatingly fond of the word "plump" to describe Dietrich's early adulthood)... Spoto seems to approach his subject with celestial reverence, as though trying to conceal his own crush behind a web of historical voyeurism (the discussion of debauched 1920s Berlin is particularly gratifying and grounding). Sometimes he speculates too much on possible motivations instead of simply offering the facts, but he also makes good use of others' reminiscences of Dietrich to back up some of his insightful conjectures. In short, a charming book, though not riveting.
Amazon.com
Only a handful of showbiz biographers can lay claim to posessing the literary acumen of writers like Michael Holroyd and Peter Ackroyd. Nick Tosches is one of these writers, and his unauthorized biography of Dean Martin stands as a testament to his genius. Several inimitable sequences in which Tosches adopts his subject's perspective (most of which are regrettably unsuitable for quotation here) make the book a real standout.
Dino is a fascinating portrait of a man who had it all--money, fame, women--and didn't give a damn about any of it and suggests that, even as he wallowed in the excesses of Hollywood and the Rat Pack, Martin stayed critically aloof from that world, albeit often in a booze-and-pill-addled haze. He got into showbiz precisely because it required so little effort of him: "I can't stand an actor or actress who tells me acting is hard work," he once said. "It's easy work. Anyone who says it is hard never had to stand on his feet all day dealing blackjack." Nobody could impress Martin. While Frank Sinatra would do anything just to hang out with reputed Mafioso, the Mob would have to make special trips to ask Martin in person to play a show at one of their casinos.
Tosches' portrait, written only a few years before Martin's death in 1996, depicts its subject as nothing so much as a Zen master without the spiritual anchor; after sampling everything that life had to offer and finding it lacking, Martin spent the last years of his life waiting to die in virtual seclusion.
Customer Reviews:
Gold from Dreck.......2007-05-17
To spin gold from such low material--the life of a minor pop figure who was huge and rich as a king in his tasteless time--shows Tosches' genius as a writer. The book is self indulgent, overwritten at times, but generally entertaining and often hilarious and brilliant. Right up there with his biography of Jerry Lee Lewis, it tells us more about what we are as Americans than most of us want to know.
Echoes of Flippo...........2007-04-28
Why spend so much time and energy piling up every erratic fact that others have done the legwork for.....just throwing them in there in the worlds most superfluous concoction....as if that isnt bad enough, and than taking all these liberties to interject what your subject, in this case Dino, is thinking?!? I hate that!
IF you have ever read somethign Chet Flippo wrote....and wanted to gag(because he just makes things us and shoves them in his books like they are facts.....dialogue....intimate moments....blech), then you may find this milder but gobbled up jabberwocky to be tedious.
I read it. I expect more from Tosches. HE is brilliant when he wants to be. He lazied out on this one.
a book full of excerpts.......2007-04-01
Mr. Tosches presents an interesting ealry career of dean martin's life, his career with jerry lewis and his life with sinatra, bit the later years are hurried in this book. Either the author needed to make this a larger book or planned on a second volume.
heart of darkness .......2006-08-31
Tosches is a hit or miss proposition, I believe, because the places he goes, the corners, the shadows, are too big, too crushing for even a great mind like his. At his worst, he is like the Dennis Hopper character in "Apocalypse Now," a professional who has gone too far up river, seen too much and been made a babbling fool. Other times, though, he is Kurz, speaking the darkest truths that leave the rational shuddering and praying to God in their beds at night. Liston, Jerry Lee Lewis, and, here, Dino. Black, black hearts all. In Tosches' world, virtue is a sucker's game, unless, as in "Hellfire" it is the Jekyll to sin's Hyde. Mobsters inhabit the "shadowlands" and do most of the getting across here, not glorified but certainly portrayed as the best players in all the various rackets. And don't kid yourself, existence is the big racket and everything else is a racket subset. For all we know, Tosches is right. I haven't seen this written anywhere, but I think "Dino: Living High in the Dirty Business of Dreams" is the great Tosches manifesto on existence. His portrait of Dean Martin, enormously talented, driven to sing but never work too hard, the great interest in nothing, the inpenetrability, the lovelessness, the booze, the pills, the disconnect, could be considered sad, but that sadness would be a projection of the reader, not the author. Tosches tells Martin like it is. When Sinatra calls, why the hell should he pick up the phone? He doesn't need anybody. Nothing means anything. Dean finds himself in a fantastic scene, late in the game, on the set of a forgotten Western holding a toy gun. He had more money than anybody; what the hell was he doing there? And, indeed, what the hell is anybody doing anywhere? Love is a racket, fame is a racket, power and money, rackets. Marilyn Monroe, John Kennedy, Sinatra, all sorts of mobsters, they all drift through, banging this one, sucking up to that one, getting bumped off for talking about stuff from the "shadowlands." Jerry Lewis is "the monkey." Dean looks at all this, puffs the cigarette, drinks the drink, plays the golf, watches the Western, pops the chickie, checks out. For Martin, Tosches says it was a conscious disengagement: He just didn't want to do any more than he did, if that. But Dean Martin was extremely productive across his many decades. Still, he half-heartedly participated in his own life. Tosches says it's because Dean thought it, everything, was all just crap. You get the sense a lot of the time Tosches thinks the same thing, but instead of just checking out himself, he delves into the void. He finds the troubled subjects in the lights but still in the margins and teases the existential grist right out of them. This book is a helluva read and it's got laughs and it's got wonder and it's got stories and it's not afraid to quicken the blade through the garbage. But as much garbage as Dean produced, he was really good -- he could sing and act, he had incredible looks and charm, his comic timing was winning. He just didn't have time for all the living and loving and all that other stuff everyone else does. Not interested. In the end, the world pays Dean back. He outlives everyone. Even his son, Dino Jr. But in a way, this only better validates his truth. And in the end after the end, he vanishes up into the dust haze. You couldn't take your eyes off him, so he never had to lift a finger to make you come along.
How It Really Was!.......2006-08-26
Read this book to learn the truth, written by someone who had no ax to grind; the facts and not false memories to make a career and money off a dead person.
Another Imposter on MYL : A Dutiful Daughter's Memories, August 12, 2006 I got too close to the truth for comfort and so had to find it on my web site about the shenanigans of the stars there who act like so much ____________ Now hear this: a fan's expose of what is really happening.
Dean Martin was successful in the Fifties as an actor, singer, t.v. show host and yet we young people back then though he was just a drunk. He was a member of the rat pack, not that that is saying a whole lot. Sinatra was a bigger lush than Dean could ever be, and all those wives of his! I do remember how he was fascinated with the lovely Lainie Kazan on his television music show, and perhaps that is what caused his divorce.
The author of this book has related how her 'mother's house' was next door to Rosemary Clooney. I guess Ira Gershwin lived on the other side of Rosie? I do remember that before the talented Dean died, he was living as a bum (like James Agee in New York), with a beard and same old clothes. There was no one to care for him in that condition. I ask you, where was this 'devoted' dauthter then? She is the second to make money off the deceased singer. First Jerry Lewis, after all of his tantrums and allegations, refusing to a reunion with Dean Martin. Now, the absent daughter who is using her dead father's fame as her own.
She has wormed herself into a slot on Music of Your Life, after first playing around with Les Brown, Jr. there in Branson, Missouri, getting to be top dog for two hours daily; now, she has her own weekend slot and all night on Sundays. Here is how she is described on their web site: Deana, who is an accomplished actor singer, entertainer and author, in addition to being the daughter of her famous father, has quickly become a Music of Your Life listener favorite with her great behind- the-scenes stories. Between concert and book tours, Deana produces the annual Dean Martin festival! When I was fifteen, I could sing just as well as she can. And to think that she collaborated on her CD (thanks to MYL) with Jerry Lewis, it's a sacrilege after all he did to her dad she supposedly is devoted to. With a daughter like that, who needs enemies. The writer of the book, DINO, shows how he died in virtual isolation. We all knew that.
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- Renegade Kids, Suburban Outlaws: From Youth Culture to Delinquency (Contemporary Issues in Crime and Justice Series.)
- Resident Evil 4 Official Strategy Guide (PS2) (Official Strategy Guides (Bradygames))
- Retrofitting Blade Runner: Issues in Ridley Scott's Blade Runner and Phillip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
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