Customer Reviews

Honky-Tonk Parade: The New Yorker Profiles

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

If you haven't read anything by John Lahr, this is a great place to start. You might become addicted. I especially enjoyed Lahr's profiles of Cole Porter, Dame Edna, and Kenneth Tynan, but I was glad I read every one of them. Highly recommended if you enjoy intelligence, insight, and style in your reading.

John Lahr is a profoundly talented writer and these profiles may be his best work yet.

In about ten thousand words you get a thoughtful and lively portrait of a remarkable person - but that's obvious. What makes Lahr unique is that he effortlessly achieves something more: the people Lahr portrays are performers, that is to say these folks are masters at hiding who they actually are. Lahr is unrivalled at finding these entertainers and letting them and their work speak. Each profile is full and living, a master-class in the art of the profile.

Especially remarkable are his portraits of Ang Lee, August Wilson, Bill Hicks, Billy Connolly, Dame Edna, Laurence Fishburne, Judi Dench, Tony Kushner, and Mira Nair - there are many more.

These are Lahr's insights into show people living and dead, American and otherwise, from Richard Rodgers to Tony Kushner. Lahr's best book remains his full-length biography of Orton but here he's perceptive in short bites about performance and performers. He's assumed the mantle of Kenneth Tynan (profiled here) but not his limitless addiction to the razzle-dazzle: his profile of Judi Dench for one is less flattering than Tynan would have made it. It's Tynan minus the sugar rush. If you're already the kind of person likely to buy the book you won't learn a lot from it - but you'll have a good time anyway.