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Notes on a Cowardly Lion: The Biography of Bert Lahr Kindle Edition
Notes on a Cowardly Lion is John Lahr’s masterwork: an all-encompassing biography of his father, the comedian and performer Bert Lahr. Best known as the Cowardly Lion in MGM’s classic The Wizard of Oz, Lahr was a consummate artist whose career spanned burlesque, vaudeville, Broadway, and Hollywood. While he could be equally raucous and polished in public, Lahr was painfully insecure and self-absorbed in private, keeping his family at arm’s length as he quietly battled his inner demons.
Told with an impressive objectivity and keen understanding of the construction—and destruction—of the performer, Notes on a Cowardly Lion is more than one man’s quest to understand his father; it is an extraordinary examination of a life in American show business.
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherOpen Road Media
- Publication dateJanuary 22, 2013
- File size21813 KB
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Product details
- ASIN : B00AW54DI8
- Publisher : Open Road Media (January 22, 2013)
- Publication date : January 22, 2013
- Language : English
- File size : 21813 KB
- Text-to-Speech : Enabled
- Enhanced typesetting : Enabled
- X-Ray : Enabled
- Word Wise : Enabled
- Sticky notes : On Kindle Scribe
- Print length : 640 pages
- Best Sellers Rank: #900,960 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #198 in Theater History & Criticism
- #483 in Performing Arts History & Criticism
- #714 in Performing Arts (Kindle Store)
- Customer Reviews:
About the author
John Lahr writes for The New Yorker, where he was for 21 years the Senior drama critic of the magazine. A veteran of all aspects of the theatre, Lahr has contributed behind-the-scenes portraits, reviews, and Profiles, and has expanded the magazine's drama coverage beyond Broadway to include the work of international theatre and regional companies.
A former theatre critic at The Nation, The Village Voice, and British Vogue, among other publications, Lahr has published seventeen books on the theatre and two novels, "The Autograph Hound," and "Hot to Trot." His book "Dame Edna Everage and the Rise of Western Civilization," won the 1992 Roger Machell Prize for best book on the performing arts. His other works include "Light Fantastic: Adventures in Theatre," (1996) and "Show and Tell: New Yorker Profiles," (2000). In 2001, he edited "The Diaries of Kenneth." His expanded New Yorker article on Frank Sinatra was made into a book with photographs, "Frank Sinatra: The Artist and the Man." Lahr's most recent book is "Honky Tonk Parade: New Yorker Profiles of Show People," published in 2005.
Lahr served as literary adviser to the Tyrone Guthrie Theatre in Minneapolis in 1968, and as Literary Manager of the Vivian Beaumont Theatre from 1969 to 1971. He was the co-producer of the 1987 film "Prick Up Your Ears," based on his Joe Orton biography of the same title, and was the editor of "The Orton Diaries." Lahr has also written numerous movie scripts. His short film "Sticky My Fingers. . . Fleet My Feet" (directed by John Hancock) was nominated for an Academy Award in 1971.
Lahr is a two-time winner of the George Jean Nathan Award for Dramatic Criticism. In 1968, he became the prize's youngest recipient; he was honored again in 1993. Lahr has written many stage adaptations, which have been performed in England and the United States, including:"Accidental Death of an Anarchist," "The Manchurian Candidate," "The Bluebird of Unhappiness: A Woody Allen Revue," and "Diary of a Somebody," which began at the Royal National Theatre, played the West End, and later toured England. He co-authored the Tony Award-winning "Elaine Stritch at Liberty," which won the 2002 Drama Desk Award for outstanding book of a musical. Lahr, who was the first drama critic to win a Tony Award, is the son of the comedian Bert Lahr, whom he wrote about in his biography "Notes on a Cowardly Lion." He divides his time between New York and London and maintains a Web site at www.johnlahr.com.
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Irving Lahrheim was born at the end of the 19th century and his life was similar to many of his peers who grew up in New York City. The poverty was grinding and suffocating and even very young children needed to learn how to make their own way in life.
Lahr was an intense sort of person who found his calling on the vaudeville stage. Gradually he experienced everything a performer could, from vaudeville to burlesque to legitimate theater to Hollywood films and finally television.
He is most widely known for his role as the Cowardly Lion in The Wizard of Oz, but he didn't get that part by chance. It was custom-written FOR HIM, and the team of professionals who brought the classic movie to life had the greatest respect for his style and technique.
It's a great book, with a detailed description of the entertainment industry and of Lahr in his roles of husband and father. He felt more secure on the stage, being laughed at by several hundred strangers than he did in his well- appointed residence, surrounded by people who knew and loved him best.
The appendix offers complete scripts if his best- known stage routines.
This biography is a delight.
Funny, sad, it runs the course of an interesting man's life.
I understand now that it's because this remarkable comedian, this man who's work was much acclaimed, this performer who made thousands laugh, worked primarily on stage. Written by his son John, the book was, gratefully, written back in the 60s, just before his father passed away. As a result, all the remarkable talent behind the scenes and on the stage, that made his fathers work possible, still existed, they were all still alive.
It gives me a true appreciation for this creation of the stage and the work that he did. It saddens me that I'll never see most of it and the bits and pieces that are left will never be seen in it's proper environment, in a Broadway house. I highly recommend the book.
And any bit of Bert Lahr's work that you can get your hands on. Myself, being a product of the 60s & 70s, I wonder how much of it would hold up. Some that I've seen puzzles me. It needs context.
Would his work still be funny? If played on a Broadway stage, would he still get that 60 second laugh from an audience? (that's a long laugh) I'm not really sure. Tastes change and mature. They grow in different directions as a society changes. I'd like to think that they would. I'll never know. But I'd also love the opportunity to go back to that time when he was at his peak and watch him work an audience with the craft he'd created. It was a fascinating journey.
The second half of the book became a critical analysis of Bert's approach to his work along with possibly a judgement of his personal weaknesses that got in the way of his limited success. (Proper disclosure must acknowledge that I was not a fan of Lahr. He did not play well to the camera. His most success was in live theater of which I never witnessed)
The print of this 1969 hardcover published edition I recently purchased on Amazon was quite small and difficult to endure for such a book length. Although I was eager to read and absorb the fascinating story of Bert Lahr's life, I also kept an eye to what seemed a never-ending narrative. I presume this copy being advertised is a republished effort in easier-to-read format.
With actors, there are the roles they play for the audience and the roles they play in their real lives. Lahr is revealed to be a sad, complex man behind the public personae.
While his father was distant in many ways, John's love and respect shine through this "warts and all" biography of man who played one of the most beloved characters of the silver screen.
For anyone with a love of theater history, this provides good background of the development of musical theater. For actors, there is the struggle of character development and behind the scenes give and take between performers.
The person side shows a man born into poverty and his struggle to break free from his past. Yet he found once he got there, the struggle to maintain that position. All through his triumphs, he always feared losing it all. His insecurity of not being good enough. The reality of climbing to success and the evolution and decline of his career.
Maybe that is why the Cowardly Lion is his most iconic role because they had so much in common.