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CONVERSATIONS WITH MY AGENT

Name: CONVERSATIONS WITH MY AGENT
Author: Rob Long
ISBN: 0-525-94222-X

by Rob Long ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 13, 1997

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The road to sitcom hell is paved with yucks galore in this sharp and sprightly Hollywood tale. Long had one of the best jobs in America. As co-executive producer of the sitcom Cheers, he was responsible for writing and running one of television's greatest cash machines. Then Ted Danson decided to leave, and the show was suddenly over. All of the power and status that Long and his writing partner Dan Staley had accumulated quite suddenly evaporated. The only way back was to start again, so after the feverish grunion-like courtship of a number of studios the two men signed a two-year development deal to create a television series. It was a marked change from the busy, meat-grinder schedule of Cheers. ``A development deal,'' Long explains, ``is one of those entertainment industry creations that when described, sounds suspiciously like goofing off.'' Eventually, guilt intruded into Long and Staley's late-to-work, long-lunch, home-early schedule, and they began creating a sitcom. That's when their troubles really began: endless meetings, duplicitous agents, lies and uncertainty, and, most of all, bureaucracy. ``The main reason television sitcoms are so bad,'' Long suggests, ``is that too many educated people are involved in creating them.'' Much of the book is taken up with hilarious conversations, not only with Long's agent, but with all manner of familiar Hollywood types. Long is preserved from the pitfalls of Hollywood clichÇ by his deft sense of timing and his keen ear for the industry's various tangled argots. Eventually, after any number of funny but frustrating travails, he and Staley produced a show that ran one unsuccessful season on a start-up network. Long will undoubtedly go on to greater successes, but those two years were hardly wasted. After all, they produced this finely wrought comic gem.

Pub Date: Jan. 13, 1997

ISBN: 0-525-94222-X

Page Count: 192

Publisher: Dutton

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1996

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

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NUTCRACKER

by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996

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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

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER AND THE MOUSE KING
by E.T.A. Hoffmann ; adapted by Natalie Andrewson ; illustrated by Natalie Andrewson

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER
by E.T.A. Hoffmann & illustrated by Julie Paschkis

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TO THE ONE I LOVE THE BEST

EPISODES FROM THE LIFE OF LADY MENDL (ELSIE DE WOLFE)

by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955

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An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.