An adoring but surprisingly ill-informed book about a Broadway legend.
Final interviews with the greatest composer and lyricist in Broadway history.
New Yorker staff writer Max had wanted to meet Stephen Sondheim (1930-2021) ever since, in 1977, the author’s mother brought home a signed copy of the album Side by Side by Sondheim. Falling in love with the “tricky rhythms and harmonic improbabilities” and characters who “were made of doubt, of missteps, of ambivalence,” Max became a lifelong fan. In 2016, he wrote to Sondheim’s assistant to propose a profile and a short piece for the New Yorker. To the author’s surprise, Sondheim responded and agreed to what would become a series of interviews from 2017 to 2019. Those interviews form the bulk of this book. It’s a little crass when Max says he felt he had a better chance than previous journalists of getting the famously guarded Sondheim to open up because “he was old now. Coming to the end, to state it plainly.” He admits that, before the first interview, “I could not recall even the most rudimentary things about him,” and that, thanks to his lack of knowledge, “I would be able to push him just far enough out of his routine to get a fresh glimpse of who he was.” That’s a dubious theory and, as this book proves, a flawed one. Much of the information has been documented elsewhere. But Sondheim was a fascinating raconteur, and the book shines when Max allows him to discuss his work. Among the best sections are those about Sondheim’s difficulties trying to compose a musical based on films by Luis Buñuel, a project he didn’t complete; a long conversation on the genesis of the original Merrily We Roll Along; and little-known tidbits—e.g., that A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, Sondheim’s Broadway debut as composer and lyricist, was the first show ever to be workshopped.
An adoring but surprisingly ill-informed book about a Broadway legend.Pub Date: Nov. 22, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-06-327981-0
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Sept. 16, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.
A former New York City dancer reflects on her zesty heyday in the 1970s.
Discovered on a Manhattan street in 2020 and introduced on Stanton’s Humans of New York Instagram page, Johnson, then 76, shares her dynamic history as a “fiercely independent” Black burlesque dancer who used the stage name Tanqueray and became a celebrated fixture in midtown adult theaters. “I was the only black girl making white girl money,” she boasts, telling a vibrant story about sex and struggle in a bygone era. Frank and unapologetic, Johnson vividly captures aspects of her former life as a stage seductress shimmying to blues tracks during 18-minute sets or sewing lingerie for plus-sized dancers. Though her work was far from the Broadway shows she dreamed about, it eventually became all about the nightly hustle to simply survive. Her anecdotes are humorous, heartfelt, and supremely captivating, recounted with the passion of a true survivor and the acerbic wit of a weathered, street-wise New Yorker. She shares stories of growing up in an abusive household in Albany in the 1940s, a teenage pregnancy, and prison time for robbery as nonchalantly as she recalls selling rhinestone G-strings to prostitutes to make them sparkle in the headlights of passing cars. Complemented by an array of revealing personal photographs, the narrative alternates between heartfelt nostalgia about the seedier side of Manhattan’s go-go scene and funny quips about her unconventional stage performances. Encounters with a variety of hardworking dancers, drag queens, and pimps, plus an account of the complexities of a first love with a drug-addled hustler, fill out the memoir with personality and candor. With a narrative assist from Stanton, the result is a consistently titillating and often moving story of human struggle as well as an insider glimpse into the days when Times Square was considered the Big Apple’s gloriously unpolished underbelly. The book also includes Yee’s lush watercolor illustrations.
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.Pub Date: July 12, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-250-27827-2
Page Count: 192
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2022
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.
A coffee-table book celebrates Michelle Obama’s sense of fashion.
Illustrated with hundreds of full-color photographs, Obama’s chatty latest book begins with some school portraits from the author’s childhood in Chicago and fond memories of back-to-school shopping at Sears, then jumps into the intricacies of clothing oneself as the spouse of a presidential candidate and as the first lady. “People looked forward to the outfits, and once I got their attention, they listened to what I had to say. This is the soft power of fashion,” she says. Obama is grateful and frank about all the help she got along the way, and the volume includes a long section written by her primary wardrobe stylist, Koop—28 years old when she first took the job—and shorter sections by makeup artists and several hair stylists, who worked with wigs and hair extensions as Obama transitioned back to her natural hair, and grew out her bangs, at the end of her husband’s second term. Many of the designers of the author’s gowns, notably Jason Wu, who designed several of her more striking outfits, also contribute appreciative memories. Besides candid and more formal photographs, the volume features many sketches of her gowns by their designers, closeups on details of those gowns, and magazine covers from Better Homes & Gardens to Vogue. The author writes that as a Black woman, “I was under a particularly white-hot glare, constantly appraised for whether my outfits were ‘acceptable’ and ‘appropriate,’ the color of my skin somehow inviting even more judgment than the color of my dresses.” Overall, though, this is generally a canny, upbeat volume, with little in the way of surprising revelations.
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.Pub Date: Nov. 4, 2025
ISBN: 9780593800706
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 7, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2026
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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