Impostor: Or Whatever Happened To Richard Beymer? [Paperback]

Richard Beymer (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 5, 2007

A fictional autobiography of a self-obsessed Hollywood actor¿s failed attempt to find out who he is in the midst of madness, murder, mayhem, masturbation and meditation, while secretly making home movies of the girl next door with his 1950¿s wind-up Bell and Howell 16 mm camera.

Product Details

• Paperback: 328 pages
• Publisher: Richard Beymer (September 5, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0615175511
• ISBN-13: 978-0615175515
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.5 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,810,371 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars What is this autobiography when not being what we think it is?, February 19, 2008

By 

Phyl L. Good (Toronto, Ontario Canada) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Impostor: Or Whatever Happened To Richard Beymer? (Paperback)

When you read "Impostor: or Whatever Happened to Richard Beymer? (an unauthorized autobiography)," the one thing you should not attempt to do is try to discern the autobiographical from the fantastical. The questions would drive you as crazy as he - or his literary representation at least - appears to be, in the book.

Did he or his mother spend time in a mental institution? Did he really have a brief dalliance as a young man that resulted in very eyebrow-raising results later in his life? Did he really rent that New York apartment, with its sinister connections to the apartment next door?

Did he really die by gunshot? Or on an operating table?

Is he really from another planet??

See what I mean?

The book takes the form of a movie script that attempts to chronicle the life of George (Beymer's alter ego) from his early teen years till the present. But the bizarre disconnects begin when we realize that George himself is actually writing and filming the script as it goes along. He is both a character inside the film and the observer who chronicles all the events, watching himself live (and die?). Add to this the time shifts, replaying of events with different characters and outcomes, and Spaceman George's desperate attempts to escape this planet once and for all, and the book is both confusing and exhilarating from beginning to end.

The format of a movie script is logical, given Beymer's line of work, but it might take some getting used to for those more accustomed to reading a linear narrative in prose form. But once the reader has made the mental shift from "prose" to "script," the story thrusts itself forward, with all its convolutions.

The premise of the book is that all Beymer's life has been an act, which is symbolized by George's obsession with filming absolutely everything that happens to him and the people around him. The inside cover of his book reads: "Who am I when not being who I think I am?" This encapsulates George's search for what is essentially an escape from Ego. And yet, even while he tries to escape from himself, he himself appears never to have fully participated in his own life. After all, he was supposedly filming it rather than experiencing it directly. The constant refrain in the book, especially from female characters, is that he never puts down the camera; he is always fretting about his life while not actually living it. So there is a contradiction in his own quest: he seeks to know who the "real George" is when all the acting stops, yet he also fights to escape from the "I."

The implications of the book, especially when it's assumed to contain some genuinely autobiographical elements, are disturbing. One senses that the dislocation Beymer suggests, between his actor persona and who he really is, is genuine. What is being chronicled here seems to be a very long struggle to discover his real identity, coupled with sadness that what began as a very promising career seemed to fizzle and never quite fulfill that promise. When one begins with a triumph like West Side Story, where does one go from there?

When you read the blurb on the back of the book, the impression of sadness is strengthened. "Richard Beymer is somewhat famous for acting in certain films and television shows bla bla bla..." The book itself is described as "a totally nonsensical contrivance that most likely will never get published." The blurb concludes, "In spite of evidence to the contrary, Beymer continues to think he exists...and so on and so forth bla bla bla..."

This resembles nothing so much as a tactic we all use at times, when trying to shrug something off as unimportant even though it would have been very important if only it had gone further, gotten noticed, been a success, etc. We play something down in this self-deprecating way because it really matters to us, and not because it doesn't. This blurb is humourous, but when you combine it with the contents of the story - the search for self, for success, for release - it comes across more wistful than amusing.

If you want to learn the straight, linear facts about Richard Beymer's life story, this is probably not the book you're looking for. But if you want an account of how things looked and felt from the inside - through the sex, drugs, failures and successes, all the seeking, and even the possible answers to Beymer's lifetime quest - then this crazy, careening, heart-wrenching movie script is exactly what you're looking for.

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Return to the Mothership, December 8, 2007

By 

Michael Creedon (Oakland CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Impostor: Or Whatever Happened To Richard Beymer? (Paperback)

There are by now hundreds, if not thousands, of reviews of IMPOSTER, by Richard Beymer, but I find just cause to add yet another. I do not feel that my predecessors have taken the book seriously enough. It is not just "powerful and relevant to nothing." It is powerful and relevant to the core problems of living: "Who Am I? Why am I here? How do I decide what to do with my life? And one of the preposterous answers passed down through the schools of hidden wisdom through the ages is: live in the I AM. Now the reader can say the author in using his mock-heroic character, the immortal George Oops, who plays all the key roles in the book, is mocking the I AM too, but if so, he mocks it as he accepts it.

Once we get inside the book, we find it is a backwards history of George Oops, and it takes place in a mental hospital, nut ward---places I have come to know well myself---and the reader may choose to identify George Oops (certainly the best name in all of literature) with Richard Beymer if he chooses. George is the writer, the leading actor, a bit player, the center of his Scheherazade-load of memories, he's everyman. And he's an imposter. Because who he really is is I AM. Here, now, nameless, in the instant, Being. His goal: to get back to the Mothership---interpret that as you may: mother, nirvana, the Universe, God, Oneness, Home---but we don't need to interpret too much. He tells us where he so desperately wants to go: the Mothership. Where he came from and where he must return.

IMPOSTER is one of the funniest books I have ever read. Completely devoid of self-indulgence, loaded with irony and a refusal to take himself seriously in any way, the author spews out characters that are real, speak their own language, and impart bits of wisdom that our dear George Oops can only see later. The character George Oops, not the writer, always at his typewriter, wears a plastic grey (cheap, we get the impression) spacesuit at all times in constant preparation for his ascension to the Mothership. Isn't this how we should all live, rather than in our Armani's and fashionable clothes or cut off Levi shorts and polo shirts? Meaningful life is not happening in the insane asylum, and let's face it folks, that's where we hang our hats, in the loony bin.

In form, IMPOSTER once again is unique. It contains, within a loose novel form, chunks of screenplay, sideruns of short story, poetic rhapsodies. When I first picked it up and saw this, I thought, "I'm going to have trouble reading this." I've read almost no screenplays, very few plays (just the classics). So I thought I wouldn't be able to follow it. Au contraire, my sweet rabbits. It works like a charm. It must have taken years to get it all clicking together, but it does.

My main feeling at the end was admiration for the courage of George Oops. I started signing my letters George Oops. As I said, it's the best name I've encountered in all of literature. His craziness is his sanity; it leads him back through the muck of his life to the Mothership, and it doesn't seem farfetched to me that this is what the few of us must do who would reach whatever Mothership is for us. You can only stay in a rotting marriage for so long.

So, though this is one of the funniest books I've ever read, it is also one of the most serious. It is a great help to anyone on a spiritual quest, and a rare gem in the cluttered fields of literature. If the name Richard Beymer, who played down his movie career, is what brought you to this book, fine. But the fact that it's a great book is not that Richard Beymer wrote it. IMPOSTER is a great book on its own, and it would be even if the author were anonymous.

One last remark. We read books for many reasons, and the nice thing about this book is that it in itself can be read on different levels. It can be read as science fiction, or maybe a science fiction spoof, if you want to be picky. It can be read just to keep you laughing. It can be read as an expose on "reality." And it can be read as a spiritual guidebook by a man that's lived it. It is not much help as a "how to" book for setting up your Christmas tree, but hey, he never claimed it was. George Oops wanted to, but Richard had to put his foot down.

My hat is off to George Oops and Richard Beymer, for exploding out of karma, for escaping the insane asylum. No longer need George fear those husky dorks in white hospital coats, no longer need he fear the funny jackets with the extra ties and the extra-long sleeves, the asylum attendants who have chased him through life.

Whatever happened to Richard Beymer? Here you have it. And I bet there was a whole lot more. This is who he is when he's not who he thinks he is. In between the words there is the big I AM.

Footnote: My personal thanks to (Dr.) Pamela Paradowski who drew my interest to Richard's work years ago, kept my interest up, and helped me realize that my own life is a "creative joy."

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Preposterous IMPOSTER amuses & confuses, December 31, 2007

By 

Christopher J. Jarmick "Word Lover" (Seattle, Wa. USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Impostor: Or Whatever Happened To Richard Beymer? (Paperback)

Ambitious, outrageous, revealing, frustrating, repetitious, funny, no make that f***ng hilarious at times, playful, sad, annoying, 100 pages too long, poorly paced, self-indulgent, quirky, tricky, goofy, stupid, smart, silly, obvious, passionate, surprising, like a puppy wanting to go chase the ball over and over again--it will exhaust you.

Impostor (rather than "Imposter") is a flawed, everything-and two kitchen sinks semi-fictional-memoir self published by actor/celebrity Richard Beymer. Beymer starred in West Side Story and made himself famous again 20 or so years later in the Twin Peaks television series. But don't expect tales about famous directors or working on movies and bedding starlets. Some of that is within the prose... but in dream-like stream of consciousness bursts of writing that zig and zag through a myriad of come-ons and self indulgent fantasies and ideas that will wear out most readers pretty fast. Instead, consider this an experimental work of fiction and enjoy the fun-house ride.

It starts quick and reveals most of its bag of tricks too soon,meaning it feels repetitious by the time you are 50 pages into it. But then again.. so what... why trust the reader to keep going if you don't lay it out for them? It's full of goofy revelations, half-baked philosophies, and it begins to feel like Kurt Vonnegut's Kilgore Trout is now an actor and frustrated filmmaker named Richard Beymer whose not quite sure how honest and truthful he wants to be about his life and thoughts about life that he wraps it up inside a 70s movie that should have been directed by Monte Hellman and Bob Rafelson--except it's a period piece done in 2007 that tries too hard. Or maybe you'll think of Hunter S.Thompson's adventures on Acid with his lawyer. It's manic, off-the-wall, frustrating, repetitious, annoying but clever enough and often funny enough to overcome its flaws and reward the patient reader with interesting insights, attitudes and plenty of spicy entertainment. It dares you to keep up with it and then makes it nearly impossible to do so. Oh screw you and all this game playing and nonsense. No wait... you crafty son. . . of . . . a. . .I'm gonna hang in there and play this game.

Beymer invents or perhaps that's invests himself as George a split personality who believes he's an alien cast in a life-long movie where he plays a very flawed personality struggling artist and actor who is trying to film everything he does. Got that? Good. Beymer's a trickster who wants to pull the rug out from you constantly and believes if he keeps hopping around using various literary devices and tricks he'll create energy and excitement and wit. Sometimes he's right. At other times he tries way too hard and the milk starts to spoil and go sour. Then, just as you start to give up and get too frustrated, Beymer throws something at you that works or is revealing enough you give the book another chance, and then another. It's baaad, it's good, it's awful, it's entertaining. It's challenging and different.

So who cares. Buy it and try to read it. You'll get some laughs out of the book and if you stick with it, a little bit more than that.