An inspiring and consistently witty entertainment memoir.
A Grammy Award–winning actor and singer recalls his unique childhood and ascent to notoriety.
In a spirited debut saturated with personality and frank humor, Rannells tells the stories of his youth growing up as the fourth of five siblings in Omaha, Nebraska. The son of an advertising salesman and a former teen model, the author fostered his love of live theater by watching musicals from the 1940s and ’50s and by viewing the Tony Awards broadcast, which “was so much better than the movies; it was live!” Moving swiftly through the trajectory of his budding career, Rannells shares amusing anecdotes on his Midwestern upbringing, being taught “how to throw shade” by his grandma Josephine, becoming a busy “shameless entertainer” on the Omaha theater scene, and his timely decision to come out to his conservative parents mere days before moving to New York City in 1997 to study the arts. These chapters form a descriptive rainbow of personal mishaps as the author describes his sexual awakenings; having to endure priestly inappropriateness while he was a student at an all-boys Jesuit Catholic high school; meeting his best friend, Zuzanna, at an audition; nightclub adventures; and formative work at upstate New York summer stock. Despite a series of rude awakenings and rejections in the business—including an exhaustive tour with Pokemon Live!—Rannells, a model of persistence and dedication, ultimately found his footing and branched out toward a momentous Broadway debut in Hairspray in 2006. Later, he earned a Tony Award nomination for the originating role of Elder Price in The Book of Mormon. The author is a natural raconteur who engages readers with self-effacing honesty about his life’s great expectations and fumbles. His life story will be encouraging and inspirational particularly for theater buffs and readers pursuing a stage career, and musical fans will savor his enticingly told journey from awkward childhood to fame in the spotlight.
An inspiring and consistently witty entertainment memoir.Pub Date: March 12, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-525-57485-9
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Crown Archetype
Review Posted Online: Feb. 2, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
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
This autobiography might almost be said to supply the roots to Wright's famous novel, Native Son.
It is a grim record, disturbing, the story of how — in one boy's life — the seeds of hate and distrust and race riots were planted. Wright was born to poverty and hardship in the deep south; his father deserted his mother, and circumstances and illness drove the little family from place to place, from degradation to degradation. And always, there was the thread of fear and hate and suspicion and discrimination — of white set against black — of black set against Jew — of intolerance. Driven to deceit, to dishonesty, ambition thwarted, motives impugned, Wright struggled against the tide, put by a tiny sum to move on, finally got to Chicago, and there — still against odds — pulled himself up, acquired some education through reading, allied himself with the Communists — only to be thrust out for non-conformity — and wrote continually. The whole tragedy of a race seems dramatized in this record; it is virtually unrelieved by any vestige of human tenderness, or humor; there are no bright spots. And yet it rings true. It is an unfinished story of a problem that has still to be met.
Perhaps this will force home unpalatable facts of a submerged minority, a problem far from being faced.
Pub Date: Feb. 28, 1945
ISBN: 0061130249
Page Count: 450
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1945
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