Customer Reviews

The Immortal Count: The Life and Films of Bela Lugosi

5 star:		(7)
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2 star:		(1)
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In 1974 Prof. Arthur Lennig wrote a biography of Bela Lugosi called "The Count". Long out-of-print, I've seen used copies selling on Amazon-internet for as much as $600. In 2000, Lennig penned "Stroheim", a cerebral study, challenging the myths of Stroheim's life. "Stroheim" is now considered the ultimate biography of Erich von Stroheim. In 2003, Lennig released "The Immortal Count", an expanded, re-written analysis of the life and films of Lugosi. Using all new records and actual Hungarian data, Lennig shatters accepted legends; he re-explores this great actor's legacy. Lugosi himself recalled for the press his early starring role in "Hamlet" at Hungary's Royal National Theater. But it never happened. He played only a small supporting role as Rosencrantz. In 1955, at the end of his life, Lugosi voluntarily submitted himself to Los Angeles authorities for drug rehabilitation. "I've been an addict for 20 years!" he proclaimed. It never happened. His fourth wife Lillian(who lived with him for 23 years) testified that he began taking pain-killing medications in 1943. Blessed with grace and talent as a young man, Lugosi acted in plays and films in Hungary and Germany; enticing young women and attracting married ones as well. Appearing on a Los Angeles stage in "Dracula" in 1928, he began a torrid affair with the famous 23-year-old siren Clara Bow. He was 46. After starring in Universal's 1931 "Dracula", and being offered the lead in "Frankenstein", Lugosi enjoyed a few years of glittering Hollywood success. But poor fiscal decisions, bad business managers, five marriages, and horror-film typecasting ushered Lugosi into years of low-paying roles in minor B-Pictures. And no money. From legal records and other information, Lugosi was virtually penniless in 1921, 1924, 1932, 1937-1938, and from 1953 on to his death. So much for the Hollywood dream. Once a proud, old-world European, he now faced hardship and embarrassment. Battling depression and alcoholism, Bela Lugosi died ignored and forgotten in Hollywood on August 16, 1956. His entire estate was valued at less than $1900. "The Immortal Count" bravely dissects the ironic life and amazing legend of one of the 20th Century's greatest performers. In 1931, the horror film industry was born: Universal Pictures' "Dracula". The star, Bela Lugosi, was paid just $3500. Last year, I saw an old Bela Lugosi poster(50 years old) selling on EBAY for $5,000. Sadly, Lugosi would never know the world's true calculation of his unique talents. "The way you walked was thorny, through no fault of your own. But as the rain enters the soil, the river enters the sea, so tears run to their predestined end. Your suffering is over, Bela my son. Now you will find peace."

By now, everyone knows that Arthur Lennig has reworked his 1974 mini-cult classic THE COUNT. What I didn't know was the extent to which he did.

THE COUNT was tough to come by when I was a kid trying to read about Lugosi, Karloff, and Chaney Jr. My public library had it, and my brother and I would check it out on alternative weeks to keep it in our possession (seemingly, no one else was clamoring for it). When Lennig released the rewrite, I kept waiting for the price to fall (it never really did), so a year later, I caved in and bought it.

I'm glad I did. Lennig has expanded the book beautifully, utilizing the latest scholarship and revising entire chunks. He's also re-evaluated the credibility of some of his sources (Caroll Borland among them), and integrated some of the opinions of Gregory William Mank. The new book also softens some of the pot-shots he took at Karloff in 1974, and casts Chaney Jr. in a far less unfavorable light. The Epilogue is really interesting and up to date. In fact, the one fault is that Lennig may still have too much affection for Lugosi to be truly objective--but that's a "fault" easily excused if you have the same "fault" yourself!

In all, THE IMMORTAL COUNT is a terrific read, nicely updated, and a great addition to your library.

My impression upon reading Lennig's biography is that it's just too adoring of it's subject, too set on defending him against his detractors (living or undead). That shouldn't necessarily be a bad thing, but even though "The Immortal Count" tells the story of Lugosi's life and career in great, great detail, Lennig's fannish admiration of Lugosi prevents him from being in any way objective. Again and again he dismisses any account of Lugosi's bad behavior or Lugosi's difficulty with English or any negative comment anyone ever put on record regarding Lugosi. Lennig is up front and honest about subjects of public knowledge such as Lugosi's poor career decisions and his drug and acohol addiction. But he's very defensive of Lugosi against any negative comments or perceptions. This often leads to contradictions. Lennig bemoans the portrayal of the aging, bitter foul-mouthed Lugosi in the film "Ed Wood". According to Lennig, Lugosi was never known to use foul language. Later in the book, Lennig quotes Lugosi himself calling his last wife a b***ch and complaining in a crude manner about erectile disfunction. Lennig is accepting of every flattering comment made about Lugosi and dismissive of every unflattering one. In the end you can't help but feel that you're often not getting the full story, just the part most sympathetic to Lugosi. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it gives the book a feeling of being slanted and incomplete. (And the book would be nearly half it's length if Lennig didn't synopsize in great detail over many many pages all of Lugosi's major and some not-so-major films when a nice paragraph would have done nicely.) All in all, a good book, but not yet the definitive biography of "The Count."

This is a total rewrite of the author's first edition of 1974. It tells a fascinating story about a man and his talents and his demons. A man that made some very bad career choices because of his cavalier attitude about money. It tells the whole tale, warts and all, and gives a very lucid picture of an intelligent, talented actor that was ever the dedicated craftsman, no matter how bad the picture was that he was in.

The book especially casts some light on Bela Lugosi Jr. and his lawsuits dealing with his father's image. The light it casts does not portray Junior in a pretty picture.

The only negative criticism I have is the author's penchant for going into multi-page synopses of Lugosi's pictures interwoven with the text. I found this to interrupt the flow of the book, but that is my personal opinion. Perhaps for others, the synopses would be more than welcome.

But that minor personal criticism does not deter me from giving the book 5 stars. Well-researched, well written, a must for any Lugosiphile!

I was a little apprehensive when I first started considering reading this book. I'd gathered the impressed that the author, Arthur Lennig, was a close friend of Bela Lugosi's, and that this book was very partial in Lugosi's favor and that it might shy away from any of Lugosi's faults.

Fortunately that was not entirely the case. The author only met Lugosi a handful of times in his adolescence, although he does seem to practically worship Lugosi. The author did point out many of Lugosi's faults, mistakes and bad judgments but usually followed them immediately with some sort of excuse. But, at least, the faults were indeed provided.

I have not read any other biographies on Bela Lugosi (nor have I read anything else by Lennig), so I can't compare The Immortal Count to others, but this one definitely seems to cover Lugosi's entire life - at times even on a day-by-day basis. The research certainly appears to have been exhausting, as in providing movie budget costs and salaries paid down to the penny (which, actually, seemed a little unnecessary) and precise dates of even minor events.

The author also provides details of many of Lugosi's films - sometimes scene-by-scene. What I enjoyed about this part was the pointing out of various tidbits about the films, like scenes being re-arranged or cut out for censors (which were extremely harsh), and events behind the scenes. I did, however, find myself wanting to get through a lot of these parts rather hurriedly because, let's face it, not all of the films Lugosi was in are classics and some of these story descriptions were, I found, a little dull and longer than necessary.

What I found most interesting was reading about Lugosi once he'd become a "has-been." Even in his 70s, and with the only acting offerings coming from Ed Wood, he was still driven to somehow revive his career up until the day he died. A sad end to a life filled with unfortunate circumstances (both by his own fault and outside irritations). He did, at least, truly shine in a handful of his cinematic gems. There wasn't, isn't and will never be anyone who performs like Lugosi.

I also found the information concerning Lugosi's son and his last wife quite interesting. The reason for this is because several months ago I watched the Dracula Legacy Collection DVD, in which his son is interviewed. The fact that Universal would interview his son at all, in and of itself, is intriguing considering, according to this book, all of the legal battles that his son started with Universal over the use of his father's likeness as Dracula.

Also, something I remember the son saying in this interview is that he and his mother (Lugosi's second-to-last wife) made the decision to bury Lugosi in one of his Dracula capes - and he specifically stated that it was not his father's idea. However, in the book, his last wife, Hope Lugosi, told the mortician that it was Lugosi's wish to be laid out in the cape.

And I laughed aloud when the author talked about how Gene Simmons, from KISS, was going to portray Lugosi in a film adaptation of Lugosi's life. Fortunately, that never happened.

An excellent read for anyone interested in the subject. I do recommend it, just keep in mind that many facts are there even if they're a little shrouded by the author's admiration for Lugosi.

This book has much to recommend it primarily because the author unlike so many biographers knew his subject personally and even though he was a great fan of Lugosi's in earlier years is dispassionate enough with the passing of time to write a fair and balanced account of his life. There is much anecdotal material here that whets the appetite and even for the younger viewers today not familiar with the Lugosi legend Lennig helps everyone come away with the feeling of having known this troubled man personally. If I have any criticism of the book at all it would be the amount of text devoted to giving dialogue from Lugosi's movies, for one who has seen most of them I know this material intimately already, still this manages also to be a positive for those less familiar with his roles. Several pages of pictures not seen in any other Lugosi biography I know of including many of the author as a young man with his then hero. The material included here is not new , however Lennig's personal spin on Lugosi, his films, family and personal demons succeeds in being both informative and entertaining.

First off, I admit that it pains me to find fault in such an obvious labor of love. Mr. Lennig must certainly be the Greatest Living Bela Lugosi Fan, and it shows. The Immortal Count is painstakingly detailed in its accounts of both the content and construction of Lugosi's films. But for all its technical prowess, Lennig's writing vacilates between professional criticism and amateurish defensivness.

For example: The author laments the he himself was maligned in another book, Universal Horrors. Like a child who's just been called a bad name, Lennig makes reference to "smart-ass critics." Does anyone reading this book CARE what other critics think of the author? It's a moment of self-indulgence that does not belong in what should be--by virute of volume alone--the definitive study of the films of Bela Lugosi.

There is much concensus among film critics that Lugosi himself often bended the truth to his will, especially in interviews conducted during his final years. Reading THE IMMORTAL COUNT, one suspects Arthur Lenning has, himself, succumbed to the same malady. He appears ready to defend his subject's shortcomings at every turn. While such hero worship can be charming, in this context it seems unprofessional.

The other, somewhat lesser, problem I found with the book is that the author often feels it necessary to give virtually shot-by-shot descriptions of the films. Lennig has many "behind-the-scenes" tales to tell, and these should make up the bulk of the material.

If the film descriptions could be trimmed, and the irrelevant asides excised, I believe THE IMMORTAL COUNT would be very close to the defintive Lugosi history we fans have been waiting for. As it stands, it's a lovingly-crafted but highly-flawed work.

This would have been a great biography except for one fatal flaw. The author insists of spending page after page summarizing most of Bela's movies. That doesn't make for an interesting read, so you start skipping big chunks to get back to the biographical part of the book. After a while, you just end up frustrated. This book should be re-released with the film summaries removed or cut down to a paragraph each. If we want to know everything that happens in the film, we'll watch it!

In a word, Lennig's book is too long by half at least. Endless synopses of ancient and ridiculous movies when Bela's life at the time of production is what would be interesting. I found myself skimming through page after page of movie plot, searching for a crumb of what was going on in Lugosi's life at the time. The beginning chapters are fine: Hungary at the time of Lugosi's birth, his childhood, etc. But enough with the movie plots. As I said, way too much synopses of films and plays, too little of the Immortal Count.

One of my enduring movie loves is Bela Lugosi. This is the man we picture when we think of a Dracula. This is the man our common psyche recognizes as the quintessential European sophisticate vampire. We do not envision the gnarly old hallitosis sufferer of Bram Stoker's novel. We envision Bela Lugosi.

This is a warts-and-all biography, which I think paints a fair, even portrait of Lugosi. The writer, Arthur Lennig is a life-long Lugosi fan but does not allow sentiment to cloud his canvas. He portrays Lugosi as a stubborn, superior, dominating, passionate, talented, bon vivant. You're left with a great sense of the man as a human being.

But here's where we differ - Edward D Wood Jr.

Lennig is scathing of Ed Wood at times. And we've all heard the endlessly spouted anecdotes about him being the worst director of all time, directing the worst movie of all time and so on. Some even say that Ed Wood's movies have sullied the legacy of Lugosi. Other things I've read about the whole Lugosi/Wood situation is that Ed Wood took a sad, broke and broken old man addicted to pain meds whose life had no meaning anymore, and put him in front of a camera again, gave him a new audience. This gave Lugosi a new lease of life because he was able to do what he did best once more - act, perform. I can't mark down Lennig's books on this point though - a lot of it is personal taste and opinion and I'm happy to just agree to disagree on this point.

But Lennig cannot be faulted on his research. His detail is meticulous, especially on the areas of his life that must have been the most difficult to reasearch - his early years in his native Hungary.

Well written, not always flattering, but always honest, this is a must read for all horror buffs and Lugosi fanatics.

I have no problem at all saying that this book is the difinitive work on the life of Bela Lugosi.