Comedian-actor-producer King tries his hand as philosopher- king with the guidance of Amanuensis to the Stars Chase (Josephine: The Hungry Heart, with Jean-Claude Baker, 1994, etc.). They produce the prototypical showbiz autobiography: not a lot of depth, but high and wide with firsthand theatrical anecdotes. As advertised, the names do, indeed, drop. In a storm, a blizzard, a hurricane, a tornado the names appear. Famed political and sports figures take their bows, but mainly, perforce, the leading characters in King's yarns are comrades in grease paint. The original angry young comedian, now in his seventh decade, appears to have introduced Martin to Lewis, pushed Lena Horne to her comeback, bucked up Garland when she needed it, become Sinatra's pal and worked Siegel and the Mob in the early days of Vegas. From his days of boxing and drinking and tummeling in the Catskills at age 15, he fought his way up to perform for the queen and, even better, to join to pantheon of Friar zanies and Hillcrest Club funny men. He became an actor (specializing, it turned out, in mobsters and rabbis) and a producer. He had the juice, he reports. Throughout, he remained married to his childhood sweetheart, Jeanette. It must not have been easy for her. (Jeanette has the last word, and it's the most revealing chapter of the book). If the names of Georgie Jessel, Don Marques, James Barton, Leon and Eddie, or the Ritz Brothers mean anything at all to the reader, King's (Is Salami and Eggs Better Than Sex?, 1985) monologue in one is a turn that will have special resonance. Comedians no longer brandish cigars. An epoch is ending, and Alan King, playing the part of The Old Vaudevillian for all it's worth, offers his valedictory. (16 pages b&w photos, not seen) (National radio satellite tour)
Pub Date: June 1, 1996
ISBN: 0-684-80384-4
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 1996
The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the...
Elie Wiesel spent his early years in a small Transylvanian town as one of four children.
He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions.
Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2006
ISBN: 0374500010
Page Count: 120
Publisher: Hill & Wang
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2006
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
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