NOT SINCE CARRIE: FORTY YEARS OF BROADWAY MUSICAL FLOPS

NOT SINCE CARRIE: Forty Years of Broadway Musical Flops. Ken Mandelbaum. St. Martin's Press; 1991.

This very entertaining survey of flop Broadway musicals is not just a list of mega-bombs that were hated by critics and public alike, but a serious look at what went wrong with certain projects that should have and could have been great. Mandelbaum makes it clear that if is often simply more fun to watch, dissect and laugh about major Broadway disasters than it is projects of genuine quality, and that there are people who are sorrier they never got to see "Carrie" on Broadway than the latest hot ticket offering. But Mandelbaum also discusses why some musicals seemed doomed to failure from the outset due to bad ideas or unlikely source material and why others had great ideas, librettos or scores but still made little dent at the box office. Along the way you're given information about shows you may never have heard of and closed early that were still worthwhile or had excellent scores, many of which were recorded. However, in the final chapter Mandelbaum discusses shows that didn't deserve the ignominy of failure, but for me he almost overturns the whole book with his singling out Jerome Moross' The Golden Apple, a through-sung borderline opera that updates the story of the Odyssey to a post-Civil War period. With a terrible book and only one really memorable song (and a couple of other decent ones) amidst a lot of dribble, it's hard to believe Mandelbaum actually thinks this is a masterwork. Candide, yes; Apple  no. Oh well, to each his own.

The book was published nearly thirty years ago -- how time flies! -- so the reader has to supply his  own postscripts. For instance, Peter Allen bombed on Broadway in Legs Diamond -- he not only starred but did the songs -- yet years later the show about Allen (The Boy from Oz) was a success. There have been numerous revivals of Carrie at various theater companies. The bomb At the Grand was retooled into the successful Grand Hotel, even using some of the same songs. And so on.

Verdict:  Engaging, informative, thoughtful look at what makes some shows succeed while others fail. ***. 

KIM NOVAK, RELUCTANT GODDESS

KIM NOVAK, RELUCTANT GODDESS. Peter Harry Brown. St. Martin's; 1986.

This is the story of Kim Novak, a "manufactured" star who was signed to a contract because of her looks and then had to learn how to act on the run, so to speak. However, with the right roles and sympathetic directors, Novak was able to give good and sometimes very good performances in such films as Vertigo, Picnic, Middle of the Night, and others. On some occasions, such as in the wretched biopic Jeanne Eagels, she sunk to the level of the material. Novak had several boyfriends -- including the very married Ramfis "Ram" Trujillo, son of the Dominican president -- and got engaged more than once, but seemed to have commitment-phobia until she married British actor Richard Johnson [Deadlier Than the Male] for a union that lasted less than a year; the two remained friends. However, her later marriage to Dr. Robert Malloy has lasted over forty years. Novak apparently never wanted an acting career or movie stardom -- at least she didn't thirst for it as others did -- and when her glory days were over she didn't spend much energy on trying to make it back to the top, preferring wedded bliss and comparative anonymity over "Hollywood." The book has some behind-the-scenes stuff such as a report on William Holden's embarrassment over doing a sexy dance with Kim and her bad relationship with Laurence Harvey while doing the remake of Of Human Bondage, and some selections of her poetry indicate that she was a better actress than poet. This is a readable, entertaining, if comparatively superficial, bio of the star. Did she or did she not have a real affair with Sammy Davis Jr.? -- the book won't give you a conclusive answer, although Novak has always maintained the two were just warm friends who admired one another.

Verdict: Not a great, exhaustive book on Novak, but interesting and absorbing. ***. 

JACK LEMMON

JACK LEMMON. Michael Freedland. St. Martin's; 1985.

This overview of Lemmon's life and career is a fast read which gives most of the facts and highlights without digging too deeply, but it does manage to get across Lemmon's character, his devotion to acting, and his approach to certain challenging roles, such as in Some Like It Hot and Days of Wine and Roses. The book briefly discusses his first marriage, then his relationship with actress Felecia Farr, which led into his second, long-lasting marriage which was not without its problems, although this book downplays them considerably. His film work is certainly not ignored, and the book explores his working and friendly relationships with director Billy Wilder and actor Walter Matthau, with whom he collaborated numerous times. Along the way Lemmon did television and stage work, but his most frequent appearances were in films. He appeared in such early works as Betty Grable's penultimate film Three for the Show, the dreadful It Should Happen to You, and the vastly over-rated The Apartment. Frankly Lemmon was guilty of shameless mugging in some of his films, such as Luv, but he developed into a fine dramatic actor in such movies as The China Syndrome, Missing and Save the Tiger, for which he won a Best Actor Oscar (he had won a supporting Oscar for Mr. Roberts). Published in 1985, this book doesn't go into his later major triumphs in Glengarry Glen Ross and in the stage and TV adaptations of Long Day's Journey Into Night.

Verdict: A nice book on Jack Lemmon, but hardly the last word. ***.  

FATAL CHARM: THE LIFE OF REX HARRISON

FATAL CHARM: THE LIFE OF REX HARRISON. Alexander Walker. St. Martin's; 1992.

This superb biography takes a thorough, exhaustive look at the life and career of Rex Harrison, highlighting his enormous talent and good points while unsparingly detailing his less admirable traits, which were many. Walker covers Harrison's early British films and stage work, his coming to America to appear in Anna and the King of Siam with Irene Dunne, his triumph in both the Broadway and movie versions of My Fair Lady, and his many marriages to the likes of Collette Thomas, Elizabeth Rees, Lilli Palmer, and Rachel Roberts, among others. Roberts was a particular handful, an alcoholic whose behavior in public was often disgusting, and who even after her divorce from Harrison and his subsequent remarriage never stopped trying to get him back. Then there are the numerous affairs, the most publicized of which were with Carole Landis (who committed suicide over him) and Kay Kendall [Les Girls], whom Harrison married, divorcing Palmer, after learning Kendall had only a couple of years to live. Walker's biography maintains a balance between Harrison's career and personal life, analyzing his performances, and is bolstered by many interviews and comments from friends and co-workers.

Verdict: A damned good show! ****.

BEAUTIFUL: THE LIFE OF HEDY LAMARR

BEAUTIFUL: THE LIFE OF HEDY LAMARR. Stephen Michael Shearer. St, Martin's; 2010.

This excellent biography scrutinizes the life and career of one of the world's most beautiful women, Hedy Lamarr, who was an Austrian-born Jew and came to the U.S. before the outbreak of WW2. She caused a sensation with a nude scene in the German-language Ecstasy, then made her first movie in Hollywood with Charles Boyer as her leading man: Algiers. Lamarr may not have been an acting genius but she was talented, and gave some perfectly convincing performances in many of her movies, which included The Strange Woman, Samson and Delilah, Crossroads, and White Cargo wherein she famously played the sexy Tondelayo. As for her private life, she had six unsuccessful marriages which had an emotional and financial cost on her and her husbands, numerous boyfriends, and in her later years was immersed in several lawsuits -- in addition to her repeatedly claiming that her expensive jewelry had been stolen -- and more than one arrest for shoplifting. Without the "protection" of the studio system, Lamarr got involved in often disastrous foreign productions, and playing Joan of Arc in Irwin Allen's Story of Mankind did her no good whatsoever. She also got a reputation for being "difficult" at times. Her last film was The Female Animal in 1958, in which John Gavin was replaced by George Nader, who was a better actor. Lamarr got back in the spotlight in her later years when it was revealed that she and composer Georges Antheil had developed technology that eventually led into the creation of cell phones and the like. (For more on this, see the documentary Bombshell.) Lamarr had two natural children, and adopted one boy that she didn't have much to do with in later years. Lamarr was furious about the publication of her ghost-written autobiography, "Ecstasy and Me," failing to vet the book and discovering it portrayed her as a nymphomaniac who had sex with both men and woman. (Shearer states that no evidence of lesbian affairs has ever been uncovered, not that any sophisticated person would care.) Beautiful is a well-researched, very well-written biography that is understanding of its subject without glossing over any of her flaws. Shearer is also the author of the similarly worthwhile "Patricia Neal: An Unquiet Life." "Beautiful" would make a good mini-series, if only there was a modern-day actress would could play Lamarr!

Verdict: Excellent bio! ****. 

MY WAY: AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY PAUL ANKA

MY WAY: AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY. Paul Anka with David Dalton. St. Martin's Press; 2013.

Seeing Anka in some low-budget films early in his career, I remembered how my sister had been a big fan of his, and recalled some of his early hits which he both wrote and performed ("Diana;" "Put Your Head On My Shoulder;" "Puppy Love"). My curiosity sparked, I decided to give Anka's memoir a try. Although he's hardly the most riveting figure, there was enough interesting material about the music industry back in the day, and how it's changed, to keep me reading -- at least at first. Aggressive and talented, the 15-year-old Canadian Lebanese teen successfully promoted himself into a career in New York and elsewhere. Anka writes how the "British Invasion" of the Beatles and others wiped out most of the other teen idols of the period, and Anka had to reinvent himself as a Las Vegas club act and write songs for singers other than himself (Sinatra's "My Way" is the most famous, although Anka only contributed lyrics to a French melody). The early sections of the book, in which Anka tells of interacting with performers he spent a lot of time with while on the road in buses and hotels, are more interesting than the rehashed stuff of the later chapters, in which Anka tries to make himself a mini-member of the Rat Pack. Frankly, the stories about Sinatra and the gang and all the mobsters simply seem recycled from other books. If we're to believe Anka, every famous person he encountered became a close friend. The most jaw-dropping moment occurs when Anka writes of ending his 38-year marriage to his first wife because "getting divorced from Anne was just something I had to do for myself." Huh! Quite a few pages later Anka writes how in his sixties he got involved with a much younger personal trainer whom he married and who apparently took him to the cleaners. While I wouldn't exactly call the book a "tell-all," there is some material about Sammy Davis Jr..'s  bisexuality (already mentioned in more than one previous book) and an anecdote about Angie Dickinson giving her husband Burt Bacharach a blow job while she was driving in their car, something Dickinson probably didn't need to see in print. Lest you think this makes My Way a fascinating read, be advised that for much of its length the book is just tedious name-dropping. The material is so badly organized, jumping around in time and back and forth from subject to subject (such as Sinatra), that it's as if the co-author just took Anka's stream of consciousness ramblings and absolutely made no attempt to make them coherent. Things are repeated -- and even contradicted -- throughout the book. Despite this, the book received some startlingly good reviews, such as an embarrassing one from the Huffington Post. Anka clearly did not know Donald Trump would become president, or he would have played him up even more in the book.

Verdict: Some people should not write their life stories. **.

THE PERRY MASON TV SHOW BOOK

THE PERRY MASON TV SHOW BOOK. Brian Kelleher and Diana Merrill. St. Martin's; 1987.

This heavily illustrated book looks at the creation of Perry Mason, gives us a history of the character on radio and in films, explains how the show came together, and offers backgrounds of the creative team and chapters on Raymond Burr and all of the major players. Over half of the book is given over to brief synopses and limited credits for each and every episode of the 9 year show, some of which -- for shame -- sort of give away the ending! The book explores how the National Association of County and Prosecuting Attorneys were so upset at Hamilton Burger's (William Talman) depiction, that a scene was included in which Mason praises his opponent in no uncertain terms. There is also a section on some of the early Perry Mason telefilms which also starred Burr.

Verdict: The ultimate Perry Mason TV book has yet to be written, but this tome has some good information and lots of photos. ***.

SOME ENCHANTED EVENINGS

SOME ENCHANTED EVENINGS: The Glittering Life and Times of MARY MARTIN. David Kaufman. St. Martin's; 2016.

Mary Martin went to Hollywood early in her career, but although she appeared and even starred in a few movies, she was dissatisfied with her film work and had much greater success on Broadway. Like many artists, this very talented woman lived for her work, and had a problematic, but ultimately loving, relationship with at least one child, her son Larry Hagman, famous as "J. R" on Dallas. Martin's marriage to her son's father did not last long, but she had a much longer union to her second husband, the mostly gay Richard Halliday, who guided her career when he wasn't alienating people with his temper and his alcoholism. Her shows included One Touch of Venus, South Pacific, Peter Pan, The Sound of Music, and for my money made the best Annie Oakley when she did Annie Get Your Gun on the road and for television. Some Enchanted Evenings also looks at Martin's work in less successful shows, such as the musical Jennie, and the play Legends, in which Martin was teamed with Carol Channing. The book hints at a "special relationship" between Martin and Janet Gaynor (Gaynor's husband, interestingly enough, is the only person quoted in the book who knocks Martin), as well as Jean Arthur, without ever really elaborating.When a reporter spoke to Martin about Larry Hagman, and asked what it's like having an icon for a son, she responded, "My dear, my son is a star. I am an icon." Although the author mentions his husband in the acknowledgments, the book does on occasion betray a kind of amusingly old-fashioned take on LGBT issues.

Verdict: Exhaustive, well-researched, imperfect, but very readable bio of the venerable entertainer. ***1/2.

WOODY THE BIOGRAPHY

WOODY: THE BIOGRAPHY. David Evanier. St. Martin's; 2015.

This "biography" of filmmaker, comic and actor Woody Allen is much more of a rumination on the man than a full bio, although Evanier does his best to hit all the important bases. The author doesn't really start to get into his subject's life story until a quarter of the way into the book, and focuses on certain key films while virtually ignoring many others. In more or less chronological order he also looks at Allen's relationships with wives, girlfriends, and children -- Louise Lasser, Diane Keaton, Mia Farrow, and others --  and ends up the book with a long dissection of the sordid Woody-Mia Farrow mess. clearly coming down on Allen's side. Evanier doesn't necessarily gloss over Allen's failings as both filmmaker and man (he deservedly hates Stardust Memories, for instance, as well as Interiors, and isn't blind to Allen's character flaws) but the book does function primarily as a defense of some of Allen's actions and especially of Mia Farrow's charges of child molestation. (We must remember that his lover Soon-Yi, was an adult at the time their affair began, but still one has to wonder at the inappropriateness, vulgar audacity, and staggering lack of sensitivity that led to Allen having a relationship with his girlfriend's daughter, who was also the sister of his own children. Soon-Yi's motivations for taking up with a comparatively homely middle-aged but famous and wealthy man I'll leave to others to ponder). Woody: The Biography has some interviews with people who know and worked with Allen, and an interview with Dick Cavett is reproduced in its entirety but functions more as padding than anything else. Although Allen did not cooperate with the book as such, he did agree to answer some of Evanier's questions via email, but these don't seem to have provided that much enlightenment.

Verdict: Interesting read, but only an average bio. ***.

LANA: THE LIFE AND LOVES OF LANA TURNER

LANA: THE LIFE AND LOVES OF LANA TURNER. Jane Ellen Wayne. St. Martin's; 1995.

This fairly short, readable volume provides an overview of the life and career of Lana Turner, whose acting talents were always questioned (in spite of giving some effective performances in certain films such as These Glamour Girls and A Life of Her Own), and whose troubled marriages and love life were widely reported on in the press. Lana, who apparently was always "Lana Turner," seemed to marry men who were less interested in the woman herself and more in her beauty, fame and money. She is a perfect example of someone who seems to have everything but whose personal life provides only heartbreak and emotional turmoil. The biggest scandal in La Turner's life was when her daughter, Cheryl Crane, stabbed Lana's brute of a lover, Johnny Stompanato, to death -- Crane wrote her own book, but questions still remain about this incident, which was turned into the book and movie Where Love Has Gone with Susan Hayward in the Lana role. Lana documents virtually every affair Turner had, as well as most of her movies, medical issues, and later years which were undeniably difficult for an aging glamour queen. One of Turner's ex-husbands, actor Stephen Crane, appeared in Cry of the Werewolf. Jane Ellen Wayne also wrote Stanwyck.

Verdict: Page turner for Turner fans and movie star enthusiasts in general. ***.

ORSON WELLES'S LAST MOVIE: The Making of "The Other Side of the Wind"

ORSON WELLES'S LAST MOVIE: The Making of The Other Side of the Wind. Josh Karp. St. Martin's Press; 2015.

"Orson Welles's Last Movie" pretty much begins with a meant-to-be-funny-but-isn't anecdote in which Welles is confronted by a homophobic Ernest Hemingway and reacts by acting like a "faggot" in front of him, leading to a battle and then the two collapsing into laughter. The anecdote may be apocryphal but it does somewhat figure in this convoluted story of Orson Welles and his attempts to finish -- or not finish -- The Other Side of the Wind. The book almost unfolds like a mystery as the reader wonders why few people have ever seen the completed footage of the film despite the fact that there is quite a lot of it. Disgusted with interference from studios who took final cut away from him for The Magnificent Ambersons and other films, Welles decided to go the independent route, and hired several people to help him who were devoted to the charismatic actor/director and willing to work insanely long hours for a comparative pittance. (Meanwhile Welles continued to live quite well and indulge his enormous appetite.) The plot of The Other Side of the Wind deals with a film director who, much like Welles, is making what he believes will be his final film while his world falls apart around him. Welles reportedly based the lead character on "macho men" like Hemingway and director John Huston, who plays the lead in Welles' movie. The Big Reveal at the end is that the director, who has affairs with most of his leading ladies, is actually more attracted to his leading men, and in love with the latest male star who has, apparently, only been using him. The big butch guy who is secretly gay and kills himself was a stereotype even in the seventies -- even The Sergeant came out earlier -- so Welles may not have been as ahead of his time as he thought he was. How self-revealing Welles was being with his screenplay (which was mostly in his head) is also open to debate. In any case, due to legal entanglements and the fact that the owners of the film won't release the rights (without a huge pay out, one suspects), it is unlikely the general public or film enthusiasts will ever see any of the movie. Those who have seen the footage claim that certain sequences have the same remarkable imagery and camera work of Citizen Kane, but whether it's as good a movie is another question [one suspects it has moments of brilliance but may not have added up to a whole even if it was finished; and the gay angle sounds awkward]. Author Karp isn't a film scholar, but Orson Welles's Last Movie is well-written and well-reported, and is a completely absorbing look at a gifted, difficult artist trying to make a movie outside of the studio system and putting it together like a patchwork quilt.

Verdict: Very good read with interesting details and a "cast" of dozens really pulls you along. ***1/2.

JUDY & LIZA & ROBERT & FREDDIE & DAVID & SUE & ME

JUDY and LIZA and ROBERT and FREDDIE and DAVID and SUE and ME. Stevie Phillips. St. Martin's Press; 2015.

Picture this: The wife of David Begelman, who is having an affair with Judy Garland, knocks on the door of the latter's hotel room, and the two women get into a screaming, hair-pulling, vicious scratch and claw cat-fight while the staff of the prestigious hotel try gingerly to tear them apart. Sounds good; sounds dishy? Did this really happen, or was it wildly exaggerated? Who knows? That's what most readers will be interested in -- the dirt and the hysteria -- and Phillips is only too anxious to deliver. I admit I'm caught in the middle when it comes to this book. On one hand I get a little tired of obsessive fans of any celebrity who get hysterical if an author says anything even the least bit naughty or remotely human about that celebrity. On the other hand, Judy and Liza does tend to seem like one more example of a writer picking apart a corpse. Like other writers before her -- John Carlyle of Under the Rainbow comes to mind --  the essentially unknown Phillips attaches herself to Garland because she knows a book written without her on the cover will sell very few copies.

Stevie Phillips worked for David Begelman and Freddie Fields at their agency, where she was first assigned the difficult task of tending to an often inebriated, drug-addicted Garland as she went on the tour that would eventually lead to her comeback. [The stuff Phillips gleefully digs up on Garland makes the Broadway show End of the Rainbow seem like an old-time Disney movie in comparison.] After she finally parted from Garland, Phillips became an agent for her daughter, Liza Minelli (Robert Redford, Al Pacino, and others soon followed -- for a time), and helped to build up her career until Minelli [Cabaret] ultimately betrayed her. Judy and Liza is in part a memoir of Phillips' "life" with Garland, in part a biography which shows how far she rose in the business despite being a woman. She freely admits that she was in it for herself, not for women in general, but her claim that she later embraced feminism may seem a little hollow what with her first independent producing project being The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas.

Although Phillips admits that Garland had a sense of humor, the author doesn't seem to see the humor in many of the situations she describes, incidents that Garland would probably have heartily chortled over herself. True, some of these situations were hardly amusing and were more pathetic than anything else. Phillips understandably lost patience with Garland's behavior and stayed with her as her lap dog out of blind ambition. Along the way Phillips bashes anyone who might have angered her while saying what wonderful friends they all were. Robert Redford went to another agency -- BAM! he has too many moles on his face. Super-agent Sue Mengers got more press than Phillips did -- BAM! Mengers was practically a fat cow. It's one thing for her to bash former boss, lover and crook David Begelman, but she's absolutely vile about the poor guy who closed down the real whorehouse in Texas that the play and movie were based upon -- apparently he ticked her off as well -- and seems to have it in for lesbians in general. First we're to believe that Garland made a crude pass at Phillips. That Garland may have been gay or bisexual is one thing; that she would have the poor taste to virtually try to molest the rather homely Phillips is something else. In the book's most hilarious and suspect scene, Phillips suggests that a whole bevy of voracious lesbians tried to have their way with her in a dressing room. Maybe this is Phillips' fantasy ...!

Which brings us to the book's credibility. It has already been mentioned by others that apparently Phillips has never been mentioned in any Garland biographies. Some of the anecdotes, such as the aforementioned cat-fight, seem exaggerated if not fabricated. There's probably enough true stuff in the book to make the rest seem plausible, and there's no secret that Garland was hardly the first or last star to be so difficult to deal with as to be nearly monstrous at times. While one can applaud Phillips' becoming successful in a male-dominated profession, she never comes off like a likable person. She admits dumping her first husband, whom she never loved, and marrying two more glamorous types who turned out to be stinkers (according to her); she is now alone in her dotage.

What Judy and Liza and Robert makes clear is that, as Phillips states, there really is no loyalty in Hollywood. While professing her love and admiration for Garland, she drags the woman out kicking and screaming on every other page, illustrating the worst aspects of Garland's character  -- and the author's.

Verdict: Undeniably a good read, and well-written (much of this is quite well-done and entertaining), but it's mostly gossip, and even on that level is not a must-read. **1/2 out of four.

LADIES MAN: AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY -- PAUL HENREID

LADIES MAN: AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY. Paul Henreid with Julius Fast. St. Martin's; 1984.

Debonair and suave without being especially handsome in the Hollywood tradition, Viennese-born Paul Henreid nevertheless became a romantic leading man in such pictures as Now, Voyager, Deception, and Casablanca, among others. In his autobiography, written with Julius Fast, Henreid is fairly frank about those days and the more difficult days afterward, when he was unofficially blacklisted and then simply became too old to be a leading man. He writes of his television assignments -- acting but especially directing --  the motion pictures he directed (such as Dead Ringer), touring with "Don Juan in Hell" with Agnes Moorehead and Ricardo Montalban, and his happy marriage and children. Along the way he relates anecdotes of the many different actors that he worked with along the way, such as leading ladies Bette Davis, Hedy Lamarr, and Ingrid Bergman. Henreid also appeared in Stolen Face and Exorcist II: The Heretic, among many others.

Verdict: Very interesting insider bio. ***.