Thoroughly researched and brightly written, this is fine tribute to the famed moose and squirrel duo and their creators.
Rocky and Bullwinkle aficionados, rejoice: here’s a ripsnorting celebration of the cartoon characters and their human creators.
A voice actor who works mostly in Australia, Scott has been an ardent admirer of Bullwinkle T. Moose and Rocky Squirrel since childhood—the kind of fan who pestered the cartoon’s production company until it finally gave in and allowed him access to the key players, led by Jay Ward and Bill Scott. (He also got to do his beloved moose’s voice in the forthcoming Rocky and Bullwinkle movie.) His history of the series, written over many years, is full of anecdotes about the team’s improbable success with their sarcastic parody of Cold War–era politics, a pun- and double entendre–riddled send-up of “intrigues, spies and history” that first aired in 1959 and enjoyed a cult following for years to come. Born from the ashes of an earlier (“pretty primitive”) cartoon series called Crusader Rabbit, Rocky and His Friends (those friends being, of course, the likes of Dudley Do-right, Sherman and Peabody, Boris and Natasha), the show was startlingly fresh, even downright subversive. Its corporate sponsors, chief among them the food-production giant General Mills, didn’t quite know what to make of the proceedings and raised frequent objections to matters of content (demanding, for instance, that the word “darn” be removed from a script on the grounds that its use would inspire young viewers to take up swearing). Ward and company, however, generally prevailed, and they inspired others to raise the kiddie-show bar. Their enduring work, writes Scott, reminds us “of a time when the sole purpose of cartoons was laughter—not tie-ins with unprepossessing plush toys, or the dictums of network censors concerned with cutting jokes and substituting tedious ‘new age’ relevance.”
Thoroughly researched and brightly written, this is fine tribute to the famed moose and squirrel duo and their creators.Pub Date: July 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-312-19922-8
Page Count: 480
Publisher: Dunne/St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2000
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.
The legendary booze-addled metal rocker turned reality-TV star comes clean in his tell-all autobiography.
Although brought up in the bleak British factory town of Aston, John “Ozzy” Osbourne’s tragicomic rags-to-riches tale is somehow quintessentially American. It’s an epic dream/nightmare that takes him from Winson Green prison in 1966 to a presidential dinner with George W. Bush in 2004. Tracing his adult life from petty thief and slaughterhouse worker to rock star, Osbourne’s first-person slang-and-expletive-driven style comes off like he’s casually relating his story while knocking back pints at the pub. “What you read here,” he writes, “is what dribbled out of the jelly I call my brain when I asked it for my life story.” During the late 1960s his transformation from inept shoplifter to notorious Black Sabbath frontman was unlikely enough. In fact, the band got its first paying gigs by waiting outside concert venues hoping the regularly scheduled act wouldn’t show. After a few years, Osbourne and his bandmates were touring America and becoming millionaires from their riff-heavy doom music. As expected, with success came personal excess and inevitable alienation from the other members of the group. But as a solo performer, Osbourne’s predilection for guns, drink, drugs, near-death experiences, cruelty to animals and relieving himself in public soon became the stuff of legend. His most infamous exploits—biting the head off a bat and accidentally urinating on the Alamo—are addressed, but they seem tame compared to other dark moments of his checkered past: nearly killing his wife Sharon during an alcohol-induced blackout, waking up after a bender in the middle of a busy highway, burning down his backyard, etc. Osbourne is confessional to a fault, jeopardizing his demonic-rocker reputation with glib remarks about his love for Paul McCartney and Robin Williams. The most distinguishing feature of the book is the staggering chapter-by-chapter accumulation of drunken mishaps, bodily dysfunctions and drug-induced mayhem over a 40-plus-year career—a résumé of anti-social atrocities comparable to any of rock ’n’ roll’s most reckless outlaws.
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-446-56989-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2009
IN THE NEWS
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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