A cartoonish biography of the eccentric comedian (currently the subject of a Milo— Forman biopic starring Jim Carrey) whose edgy, humorless, often hostile performances were considered avant-garde when he died of cancer at age 35 in 1984. Following Andy Kaufman Revealed!, a memoir by Kaufman sidekick Bob Zmuda (1999), journalist and Sinatra biographer Zehme (The Way You Wear Your Hat, not reviewed) asks whether the comedian’s bizarre characterizations, wrestling matches with women, and peculiar obsessions (transcendental meditation, Elvis Presley, chocolate ice cream, conga drums, sexual marathons with prostitutes) were the work of a rare, iconoclastic genius or the result of an undiagnosed mental illness. The answer, it would seem, is a little of both. In early childhood, Kaufman grew sullen when his Long Island mother gave some of her attention to his two younger siblings. Identifying with his showboating grandfathers and the heroes of children’s TV programs, young Andy began to entertain at neighborhood birthday parties. His success, along with his enthusiasm for all things Elvis, brought him to Manhattan, where he emerged from the city’s comedy clubs to practice his trademark annoying stunts. His reading of The Great Gatsby in an effete British accent, his inept “foreign man” (who later became Latka Grava on the TV sitcom Taxi), and his repugnant Las Vegas lounge-singer character shocked audiences who weren’t sure whether what they were seeing was a bad act or subversively clever performance art. Zehme shows how Kaufman, not content with the fame his TV appearances brought him, alienated many who wanted to help him before he died—a nonsmoking victim of lung cancer—as his fame and fortune were ebbing. Funny and tragic, as any comedian’s story must be—even if Zehme holds his subject at arm’s length, implying that a closer look might be too unsettling for Kaufman’s fans. (First serial excerpt rights to Rolling Stone)
Pub Date: Dec. 5, 1999
ISBN: 0-385-33371-4
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 1999
The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the...
Elie Wiesel spent his early years in a small Transylvanian town as one of four children.
He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions.
Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2006
ISBN: 0374500010
Page Count: 120
Publisher: Hill & Wang
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2006
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
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