38 of 38 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Dueling bios, November 26, 2007
This review is from: Ethel Merman: A Life (Hardcover)
Finally, a worthy biography of Ethel Merman, one of the 20th century's greatest performers, has been published -- two, in fact, in honor of the 2008 centenary of her birth. They supersede all previous attempts. The question now is, which to buy? I've just read both. Here's my take.
If you had the books in front of you, the first thing you'd notice would be the difference in length. "Ethel Merman" by Brian Kellow is 326 pages, including the (rather incomplete) index. "Brass Diva: The Life and Legends of Ethel Merman" by Caryl Flinn is a much-weightier 542 pages, including a more-detailed index. That's indicative of their very different approaches. Kellow adeptly hits the highlights of Merman's personal and professional lives, and places them in historical context. Flinn, a university professor, goes for the comprehensive and scholarly approach. There are advantages and disadvantages to both.
Here's an example. Flinn spends five paragraphs sorting through all the stated dates for Merman's birth, before settling on the correct one: 1908. Kellow simply notes the right date. And that points to Flinn's main shortcoming: Having obviously done a tremendous amount of research for the book, she's loath to exclude anything.
I got the sense while reading Kellow's that he wants to convey the woman behind the image (he succeeds). As a professor of women's studies, Flinn seems to care more about how Merman was perceived, specifically as a woman in a certain time period. If Kellow and Flinn had decided to collaborate on a single book, we might have had the ideal Merman biography.
As it is, Flinn at times tends to overreach in an attempt to deconstruct, as in this doozy after a Merman quote: "Again, this seems less the real Ethel Merman talking than the voice associated with 'Ethel Merman,' the public production, whose iconoclastic toughness was being extended to her body itself, almost a Deep Throat avant la lettre." Ironically, Flinn's book is an intellectualized approach to an admitted non-intellectual. If Merman would have lived to read this, I imagine she would have said something like, "What the hell is she talkin' about, anyway?"
Where Flinn's approach works better than Kellow's is in giving details of Merman's professional productions. For example, she meticulously covers each of Merman's movie shorts, including plot synopses -- that's valuable and interesting information, particularly since the shorts aren't all readily available for viewing (something one can only hope an independent DVD company will eventually rectify). Kellow hardly touches on them at all. On the other hand, as features editor for Opera News, Kellow has a better grasp of the evolution of Merman's vocal style.
Interestingly, despite Flinn's greater focus on the details, Kellow is also the one to set the record straight on certain stories. For example, he convincingly puts forth what he's found to be the real reasons why the "Anything Goes" book by P.G. Wodehouse and Guy Bolton was rewritten by Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse. In this case, Flinn seems to accept the version put forward publicly at the time. In other cases, she tends to list all opinions as to what occurred in a certain situation, rather than try to figure out what actually happened. Again, my sense is this is because, to Flinn, perception and reality carry equal weight.
As you might expect, Kellow and Flinn share many of the same sources. Flinn had at least one advantage: access to Merman's scrapbooks (compiled with her father). They are referenced constantly, but they really add little of note.
In the appendix of his book, Kellow lists Broadway appearances, film appearances, and television appearances. This is where one would like to see more detail. Surprisingly, Flinn's appendix is hardly more extensive. Under stage work, she adds the musical numbers by act, and then she has a filmography.
In the end, Kellow's book is the one to get. But if you're a fervent Merman fan, then you'll also want to get Flinn's for the extra details (albeit too many) and cultural perspective.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Just in time for the Merman Centannary, January 5, 2008
This review is from: Ethel Merman: A Life (Hardcover)
January 16th, 2008 will mark the 100th anniversary of the birth of Ethel Merman. (In her autobiography she claims it was 1912.so to be fair we can celebrate again in 2012.) Brian Kellow offers a well-researched and fairly definitive overview of both her career and personal life.
If you read Ethel's two autobiographies (1955 and 1978) as well as Bob Thomas's I Got Rhythm and Geoffrey Mark's sloppily researched The Biggest Star on Broadway, and combined the best of all of these the result would be what Brian Kellow has accomplished: a thoughtful portrait of a lady who became the top star on Broadway from 1930 to 1970.
At this point there is not a great deal of new information, but Kellow goes to greet lengths to dispel the myth that Merman at the height of her career was little more than a loud, vulgar diva who drank a lot. She was tough in a business that at the time demanded women be tough or else they'd be taken advantage of. Her level of professionalism, however, was enviable. In a 40-year career she missed only a handful of performances due to illness and always gave the same performance closing night as she did opening night.
Kellow's book would have been enhanced had he included a detailed discography, and he repeats the same basic listing of shows (with only the songs Merman sang) and films that appeared in her 1978 book Merman.
All in all it's an enjoyable read and an accurate portrayal of this legendary lady.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
