Customer Reviews

Edward Albee: A Singular Journey

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

I'm amazed at some of the one star reviews for this book. (Well, maybe not that amazed. Anyone concerned over whether Elaine Stritch or Carol Burnett won a Tony might best spend their time under a hairdryer reading Cosmo rather than a serious book like this.) Gussow, courtesy of his friendship with Albee, provides priceless insights into the source of many of his works, how they spring from his life, his relationship with his mother. He is even handed in evaluating Albee's plays, carefully explaining why many of his plays failed to please critics and audiences. Albee has been candid with Gussow, and his candor is of great value to aspiring writers. We see the links between personal life and artistic creation. This is a MAJOR study of an important playwright, required reading for all serious theatre folks. The one complaint: Gussow's closeness with Albee, while never seriously compromising the book, does make one sense kid gloves being used from time to time. That aside, this is a riveting look at one writer's life.

Albee, the playwright of "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?," and other plays, is given a deluxe biographical treatment here from a writer who has known him for almost forty years...and sometimes worships him a little too much.

Albee was adopted by a wealthy, yet emotionless set of parents. His father, Reed, was absent, and his mother, Frankie, was cool and detached. This upbringing, where he was seen more as a possession than a family member, would of course affect his writings. Constantly kicked out of schools, and never graduating from college, Albee turned to writing, his first success being "Zoo Story."

"Zoo Story," a short play about a fateful meeting of two men in a park, received mixed notices from assorted playwrights and critics. Here, biographer Gussow overextends his protection of his subject too much. He dismisses the honest critiques of two playwriting giants- Thornton Wilder and William Inge, because they did not understand or like Albee's works. However, a bland positive response by Samuel Beckett is treated like a Dead Sea Scroll, to be picked apart and treasured. I have read "Zoo Story," and it is wordy and preachy.

Albee's next big success was "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?," which was turned into a powerhouse film by Mike Nichols. Again, Gussow is flagrant in his criticism of someone involved with the film in order to placate Albee, and here, Nichols. The film's screenwriter, Ernest Lehman, is harshly criticized for opening the play slightly, yet just copying Albee's play. The bio's author, and Albee, make a point of needling Lehman's screenwriting credit on the film. Yet, Elaine May copied the French film "La Cage Aux Folles" word for word, adding what could be described as copious scenes at best, then took a big giant screenwriting credit for Nichols' "The Birdcage." Watch both films back to back sometime, it is eye opening.

Gussow also fumbles in his outline of Albee's life. In Albee's less successful years, he is writing weird experimental plays with subjects like a man with three arms, and one play where two of the characters are sea creatures. After mounting all of these failures, Albee is defended endlessly by Gussow, who suddenly contributes an entire chapter about Albee's alcoholism. The alcohol is both a reason his plays were not celebrated, and a defense of the brilliant man.

The entire beginning of the book chronicles the complete lack of love Albee's parents had for him, yet the death of Albee's father is glossed over, barely mentioned. I had to reread the sentence a few times, since no followup is made about Albee's reaction. A whole chapter is devoted to his mother's demise, and her revenge on her own son in her will. More is written about one of his former lovers and honest critics, a frustrated musician. This "A Star is Born" redux is written about nicely.

Gussow does do well in describing Albee's assorted forays into theater, as playwright and director. Dirt about Donald Sutherland and Frank Langella is dished around. The bio's author is honest in Albee's lacking skills as a director, coming to the theater as a playwright and not an actor.

Albee, who prefers to be called a writer who is gay, as opposed to a gay writer, also has kind words for his longtime partner of over twenty years. Albee says a gay writer writes about being gay, whether the work is good or not is moot, since the writer knows the subject and is putting in the final word. A writer who is gay is not tied down to just homosexual topics, and is free to explore society without audiences looking for gay subtexts that do not exist. "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" is a seering look at two heterosexual couples, the sexuality of the playwright is nonessential in light of his characters and their actions.

Gussow wisely keeps talk of Albee's lesser known plays, and the ones readers probably have not read anyway, to a minimum. Albee's triumphant comeback play, "Three Tall Women," is covered extensively. The play is about his mother, and so much more.

Reading this biography will make you curious to seek out some of Albee's other plays, just to see what makes him tick. Over seventy now, he is definitely an interesting man, and Gussow does catch that fact better than anything.

I recommend this book to theater lovers, and any writer who needs a little inspiration.

With all due respect to Tennessee Williams, Arthur Miller, Lillian Hellman and William Inge, Edward Albee is the most important American playwright to emerge since Eugene O'Neill. I don't say best because "best" is too subjective a term to be applied to the arts. Albee is important because of the influence his work has had on playwrights such as Arthur Kopit, Sam Shepard, John Guare and David Mamet. Mel Gussow has produced an indelible portrait of this artist. One revels in Albee's current success - The Tony Award for "The Goat or Who is Sylvia?" and a Pulitzer Prize for "Three Tall Women." However, what Mr. Gussow's biography illustrates brilliantly is that Albee hasn't staged a "comeback." Indeed, Albee never went anywhere - it was the audience and the critics that abandoned Albee. Throughout the past forty years Albee has continued to produce masterful plays - award winning plays - "A Delicate Balance," "All Over," "Seascape" and "The Lady from Dubuque" - plays which are finally gaining the recognition and stature they deserve.

The personal story is here as well. Albee was adopted and raised by people who were emotionally aloof to the needs of a gay adolescent. The relationships with Terrence McNally and Jonathan Thomas (his companion for the past thirty years), friendships with John and Elaine Steinbeck, Carson McCullers, William Flanagan, Alan Schneider and all those leading ladies from Uta Hagen, Colleen Dewhurst, Jessica Tandy and Irene Worth to Marian Seldes, Rosemary Harris, Elaine Stritch and Maggie Smith. The story of how the Pulitzer Prize board denied him the honor for "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" even after the prize jury had voted unanimously for the play. It's all here - warts and all - best of all is the happy ending.

Mel Gussow takes the reader on a singularly intelligent, yet emotionally astute journey into Edward Albee's works and life. He also evokes the New York scene in which Mr. Albee began his career. A beautifully balanced biography of a major figure in the American theatre. I loved it.

Mel Gussow's abilities as a journalist and his personal friendship with Edward Albee allow him to make this the definitive biography of a great American playwright. I came to read this as I prepared for attending a performance of The Goat or Who is Sylvia?. The theater company had recommended this as the best biography they had found.

Chronicling the life of someone who has become an icon of the American theater is difficult, but Mel Gussow is able to combine the personal, literary, and show business details in a dramatic narrative that does justice to Edward Albee. I was intrigued to discover that among Albee's partners was one of my other favorite playwrights, Terence McNally, but the biography highlights all of Albee's relationships and the importance of each to him and his friends. The difficulties Albee encountered as an adopted child were keen and exacerbated by parents who combined a daunting distance from their son with an attitude that was colder than most New England winters.

His precocity and early development of an inscrutable individuality did not serve him well in the several schools that he more visited than occupied in his youth and it took the combination of Greenwich Village in the fifties and some tentative literary efforts with friends including William Flanagan and McNally among others to bring him to the point of his first success, The Zoo Story. He never looked back and within what would be an amazingly short time for a dramatist of lesser genius he was conquering Broadway with Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?. The rest of the story includes successful dramas (A Delicate Balance, Three Tall Women and others); yet there was not always the appreciation his work warranted or he deserved. Published in 1999, Gussow's biography does not include the past decade and Albee's most recent successes as he has achieved the status of America's greatest living playwright, but it provides a rich and rewarding panorama of Albee's ascent to the apex of American literature.

I have not finished, but am completely enjoying the life story of one of America's finest playwrights. I became intrigued by something on the internet and then purchased this book. Before long I needed to read some
of his plays. I began with his Pulitzer Prize winning "Who's Afraid of
Virginia Woolf?" I am really getting a deep picture of Edward Albee and
highly recommend "A Singular Journey" for anyone who loves the whole process of writing and sharing our life stories. This book was written by
Mel Gussow, thanks to him and the wonderful Edward Albee, readers will
travel for a time through the life and mind of one incredibly brilliant
individual.

I received this book as a gift from the author's son and daughter-in-law. It's simply an amazing story, perhaps the only thing more amazing than Gussow's writing is the man that he writes about. Gussow captures Albee's natural speaking wit and amazing story in an absolutely brilliant way.

Albee is without doubt my favorite living playwright, so I'm a little biased, but I read and enjoyed this book, and felt like I got to know Albee a lot better in the process, without losing any of my respect for him.
Since his plays are so much about family and the pursuit of "success", it's worthwhile to know about how Albee--who was adopted--grew up. I recommend this to anyone who admires Albee's plays, and also to sceptics who want more insight on the ideas and the man behind them.

The primary strength of the book is that the author has known Albee since _Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?_ opened on Broadway. This isn't written by someone who just decided to do a book but by someone who has been preparing to write it for years without knowing it. There's depth here, insight into the plays and the man behind them.

This is a very good biography of Albee, and the best book available on the great playwright, but for those who consider 'The Zoo Story' and 'Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf' to be his sole significant works should look for lighter reading. The book refuses to be salacious, sticks to the facts and offers very to-the-point criticism on Albee's plays. Albee emerges as a figure of some mystery and extraordinary talent. The book does not find any powerful new insight as in, for example, Tom: The Unknown Tennessee Williams, but the book does move along nicely and is highly informative.
Overall, a good read for Albee's fans.
(By the way, what's up with all of the short 1-star reviews of the book, does someone have a personal vendetta against the author?)