Book picks similar to
Boulevard of Broken Dreams: The Life, Times and Legend of James Dean by Paul Alexander
biography
non-fiction
film
biography-memoir
Clara Bow: Runnin' Wild
David Stenn - 1988
She catapulted to fame after winning Motion Picture magazine's 1921 "Fame and Fortune" contest. The greatest box-office draw of her day she once received 45,000 fan letters in a single month, Clara Bow's on screen vitality and allure that beguiled thousands, however, would be her undoing off-camera. David Stenn captures her legendary rise to stardom and fall from grace, her success marred by studio exploitation and sexual scandals.
Lulu in Hollywood
Louise Brooks - 1982
Eight autobiographical essays by Brooks, on topics ranging from her childhood in Kansas and her early days as a Denishawn and Ziegfeld Follies dancer to her friendships with Martha Graham, Charles Chaplin, W. C. Fields, Humphrey Bogart, and others are collected here. Originally published: New York: Knopf, 1982.
Moving Pictures: Memories of a Hollywood Prince
Budd Schulberg - 1981
Moving Pictures is his fascinating remembrance of growing up amidst the glamour, swank, courage, triumphs, defeats, cabals, and double-crosses of an industry in the making. His utterly candid account includes unsparing portraits of outsized characters in all their power, venality, charm, pettiness, and vindictiveness. As a book on the early days of the movies in Hollywood, this one is hard to beat. Abundantly illustrated with black-and-white photographs.
My Girls: A Lifetime with Carrie and Debbie
Todd Fisher - 2018
The stunned public turned for solace to Debbie’s only remaining child, Todd Fisher, who somehow retained his grace and composure under the glare of the media spotlight as he struggled with his own overwhelming grief.The son of "America’s Sweethearts" Debbie Reynolds and Eddie Fisher, Todd grew up amid the glamorous wealth and pretense of Hollywood. Thanks to his funny, loving, no-nonsense mother, Todd remained down to earth, his own man, but always close to his cherished mom, and to his sister through her meteoric rise to stardom and her struggle with demons that never diminished her humor, talent, or spirit.Now, Todd shares his heart and his memories of Debbie and Carrie with deeply personal stories from his earliest years to those last unfathomable days. His book, part memoir, part homage, celebrates their legacies through a more intimate, poignant, and often hilarious portrait of these two remarkable women than has ever been revealed before.With thirty-two pages of never-before-seen photos and memorabilia from his family’s private archives, Todd’s book is a love letter to a sister and a mother, and a gift to countless fans who are mourning the deaths of these two unforgettable stars.
Stories I Only Tell My Friends
Rob Lowe - 2011
During his time on The West Wing, he witnessed the surreal nexus of show business and politics both on the set and in the actual White House. And in between are deft and humorous stories of the wild excesses that marked the eighties, leading to his quest for family and sobriety.Never mean-spirited or salacious, Lowe delivers unexpected glimpses into his successes, disappointments, relationships, and one-of-a-kind encounters with people who shaped our world over the last twenty-five years. These stories are as entertaining as they are unforgettable.
Marilyn
Norman Mailer - 1973
Mailer, the winner of two Pullitzer Prizes, was the first writer to explore the relationship between Monroe and Bobby Kennedy.
Rita Moreno: A Memoir
Rita Moreno - 2012
Born Rosita Dolores Alverio in the idyll of Puerto Rico, Moreno, at age five, embarked on a harrowing sea voyage with her mother and wound up in the harsh barrios of the Bronx, where she discovered dancing, singing, and acting as ways to escape a tumultuous childhood. Making her Broadway debut by age thirteen--and moving on to Hollywood in its Golden Age just a few years later--she worked alongside such stars as Gary Cooper, Yul Brynner, and Ann Miller.When discovered by Louis B. Mayer of MGM, the wizard himself declared: "She looks like a Spanish Elizabeth Taylor." Cast by Gene Kelly as Zelda Zanders in Singin' in the Rain and then on to her Oscar-winning performance in West Side Story, she catapulted to fame--yet found herself repeatedly typecast as the "utility ethnic," a role she found almost impossible to elude.Here, for the first time, Rita reflects on her struggles to break through Hollywood's racial and sexual barriers. She explores the wounded little girl behind the glamorous facade--and what it took to find her place in the world. She talks candidly about her relationship with Elvis Presley, her encounters with Howard Hughes, and the passionate romance with Marlon Brando that drove her to attempt suicide. And she shares the illusiveness of a "perfect" marriage and the incomparable joys of motherhood.Infused with Rita Moreno's quick wit and deep insight, this memoir is the dazzling portrait of a stage and screen star who longed to become who she really is--and triumphed.
Dear Cary: My Life with Cary Grant
Dyan Cannon - 2011
When they began living together, she was 25; he was 58. Three years later, they married, but within a year and a half, she left him, amidst reports of loud arguments and spanking episodes. Their divorce, finalized in 1968, was a major news splash even in that pre-TMZ, pre-internet era. Grant died in 1986, but Cannon has continued to wrestle with the details, the rights, and the wrongs of their relationship. Dear Cary is a memoir that celebrates and scrutinizes the great love of her life.
Alfred Hitchcock: A Life in Darkness and Light
Patrick McGilligan - 2003
Acclaimed biographer Patrick McGilligan re-examines his life and extraordinary work, challenging perceptions of Hitchcock as the “macabre Englishman” and sexual obsessive, and reveals instead the ingenious craftsman, trickster, provocateur, and romantic.With insights into his relationships with Hollywood legends – such as Cary Grant, James Stewart, Ingrid Bergman, and Grace Kelly – as well as his 54-year marriage to Alma Reville and his inspirations in the thriller genre, the book is full of the same dark humor, cliffhanger suspense, and revelations that are synonymous with one of the most famous and misunderstood figures in cinema.
No One Here Gets Out Alive
Danny Sugerman - 1980
With an afterword by Michael McClure.
George Lucas: A Life
Brian Jay Jones - 2016
Conceived, written, and directed by a little-known filmmaker named George Lucas, the movie originally called The Star Wars quickly drew blocks-long lines, bursting box-office records and ushering in a new way for movies to be made, marketed, and merchandised. It is now one of the most adored-and successful-movie franchises of all time.Now, the author of the bestselling biography Jim Henson delivers a long-awaited, revelatory look into the life and times of the man who created Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, and Indiana Jones.If Star Wars wasn't game-changing enough, Lucas went on to create another blockbuster series with Indiana Jones, and he completely transformed the world of special effects and the way movies sound. His innovation and ambition forged Pixar and Lucasfilm, Industrial Light & Magic, and THX sound.Lucas's colleagues and competitors offer tantalizing glimpses into his life. His entire career has been stimulated by innovators including Steven Spielberg and Francis Ford Coppola, actors such as Harrison Ford, and the very technologies that enabled the creation of his films-and allowed him to keep tinkering with them long after their original releases. Like his unforgettable characters and stories, his influence is unmatched.
Jimmy Stewart: A Biography
Marc Eliot - 2006
Despite the indelible image he projected of innocence and quiet self-assurance, Stewart’s life was more complex and sophisticated than most of the characters he played. With fresh insight and unprecedented access, bestselling biographer Marc Eliot finally tells the previously untold story of one of our greatest screen and real-life heroes.Born into a family of high military honor and economic success dominated by a powerful father, Stewart developed an interest in theater while attending Princeton University. Upon graduation, he roomed with the then-unknown Henry Fonda, and the two began a friendship that lasted a lifetime. While he harbored a secret unrequited love for Margaret Sullavan, Stewart was paired with many of Hollywood’s most famous, most beautiful, and most alluring leading ladies during his extended bachelorhood, among them Ginger Rogers, Olivia de Havilland, Loretta Young, and the notorious Marlene Dietrich.After becoming a star playing a hero in Frank Capra’s Mr. Smith Goes to Washington in 1939 and winning an Academy Award the following year for his performance in George Cukor’s The Philadelphia Story, Stewart was drafted into the Armed Forces and became a hero in real life. When he returned to Hollywood, he discovered that not only the town had changed, but so had he. Stewart’s combat experiences left him emotionally scarred, and his deepening darkness perfectly positioned him for the ’50s, in which he made his greatest films, for Anthony Mann (Winchester ’73 and Bend of the River) and, most spectacularly, Alfred Hitchcock, in his triple meditation on marriage, Rear Window, The Man Who Knew Too Much, and Vertigo, which many film critics regard as the best American movie ever made.While Stewart's career thrived, so did his personal life. A marriage in his forties, the adoption of his wife’s two sons from a previous marriage, and the birth of his twin daughters laid the foundation for a happy life, until an unexpected tragedy had a shocking effect on his final years.Intimate and richly detailed, Jimmy Stewart is a fascinating portrait of a multi-faceted and much-admired actor as well as an extraordinary slice of Hollywood history.
Get Happy: The Life of Judy Garland
Gerald Clarke - 2000
The girl with the pigtails, the symbol of innocence in The Wizard of Oz. The brightest star of the Hollywood musical and an entertainer of almost magical power. The woman of a half-dozen comebacks, a hundred heartbreaks, and thousands of headlines. Yet much of what has been written about her is either inaccurate or incomplete, and the Garland the world thought it knew was merely a sketch for the astonishing woman Gerald Clarke portrays in Get Happy. Here, more than thirty years after her death, is the real Judy.
Child Star
Shirley Temple Black - 1988
Born in 1928 in southern California, Shirley Temple was extraordinary from the start. At the age of three, she began acting, often in exploitative films directed and produced by some abusive studio executives. But Shirley's talent and perseverance could not be thwarted, and she soon entered a fruitful relationship with Twentieth Century Fox. Before long she was making films with the top stars of the day, including Gary Cooper, Carole Lombard, Lionel Barrymore, Joel McCrea and many others. There was something magical about Shirley Temple that cheered the soul of America during the Depression. She was the number one movie star of the nation for four consecutive years, from 1935 through 1938. In Child Star Shirley Temple Black reveals the whole story, the ups and downs of life as a Hollywood prodigy--including numerous kidnap threats and even a murder attempt against her.
Audrey Hepburn
Barry Paris - 1996
The most ambitious and personal account ever written about Hollywood's most gracious star-Audrey Hepburn by Barry Paris is a "moving portrayal" (The New York Times Book Review) that truly captures the woman who captured our hearts...With the insights of family and friends who never before spoke to a Hepburn biographer-and never-before-published photographs-Paris has created an in-depth portrait of the actress, from her childhood in Nazi-occupied Europe, through her legendary career, and into her UN ambassadorship.