Where Did I Go Right?: You're No One in Hollywood Unless Someone Wants You Dead [Englisch] [Taschenbuch]

"My wink is binding," Bernie Brillstein writes in the middle part of his memoir of a career in showbiz. At this point the movie-star manager has already admitted that he wanted power and prestige as soon as he started in the William Morris agency mailroom. And that he chased after a Don Corleone-ish kind of respect afterward. But even when he became a clout-carrying manager and near-mogul he kept his people-first credo. You suspect he loves it too for the way it echoes the Borscht Belt, since that's the kind of verbal energy he draws on throughout this anecdote-crammed autobiography. He calls himself "show," but in four decades he had to be "business" too, tough enough to tell clients, as he says he did, when to start their career over from scratch. The book begins with a graphically honest memory of his visit to the proctologist with his family when he was 24--something he guffaws off, but it's probably not far from the sort of reality check he regularly gave clients like Jim Henson, Norm Crosby, Lorne Michaels, John Belushi, and Brad Pitt. He cops to a gambling addiction, a love of "high class call girls," and to the way he stole from Laugh-Into invent Hee Haw. But he also brokered Lorne Michael's big break with SNL, produced Dangerous Liaisons, and eventually got News Radio and The Sopranos on the air. He candidly assesses professional pains too, including Michael Ovitz's pathology, Garry Shandling's riddling neuroses, and the loss of Belushi and Henson. "I care," he writes finally, "because that's who I am." It's easy to smile at that, but by the end of the book it's also easy to believe he means it. --Lyall Bush -- Dieser Text bezieht sich auf eine vergriffene oder nicht verfügbare Ausgabe dieses Titels.

Like The Last Mogul (LJ 12/98) and The Gross (LJ 4/1/99), this is an absorbing inside look at the film and TV industry. A New York native fascinated with show business since childhood, Brillstein has worked as an agent, a personal manager, a producer, and a studio CEO and has worked with Jim Henson, Gilda Radner, Hee Haw, and Saturday Night Live. He writes a moving account of personally accompanying John Belushi's body from L.A. to Martha's Vineyard for burial. The book's subtitle obviously refers to battles with Mike Ovitz, former head of Creative Artists Agency, as well as to Brillstein's concern about the lack of ethical behavior in Hollywood. He laments the rise of disturbing trends thereAinexperienced writers, the power of accountants, and clients making their own deals. But as he muses on retirement, Brillstein sometimes waxes optimistic. And with good reason: his production company has a new hit these days, the critically acclaimed The Sopranos. Recommended for larger public libraries and libraries with film and performing arts collections.AKim R. Holston, American Inst. for Charity Property Casualty Underwriters, Malvern, PA
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. -- Dieser Text bezieht sich auf eine vergriffene oder nicht verfügbare Ausgabe dieses Titels.