Customer Reviews

Louise Brooks: A Biography

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This is arguably the best biography of a film star. Barry Paris has investigated the tempestuous life of Louise Brooks so thoroughly that any other volume on her life would pale by comparison. The book is well written and goes into great detail about Louise Brooks' life and why she seemed to make her suicidal career choices. Mr. Paris also provides his readers with a good background to the world of Louise Brooks. We learn about modern dance when discussing Brooks' invitation to join Denishawn dancers, about George White and the Scandals and Ziegfeld and his Follies when Brooks danced for them and about the silent film world and the struggles of the industry to cope with the advent of sound.

Mr. Paris delves deeply into Louise Brooks' relationship with her family and lovers, and devotes a wonderful chapter on G. W. Pabst and the making of Pandora's Box. While reading the book, I was drawn to see her films and enjoyed them much more with the insight provided by Mr. Paris. The working relationship between the actors involved in Pandora's Box was particularly illuminating and I had a greater appreciation of Louise Brooks' performance.

The most tantalizing aspect of Louise Brooks is her career suicide. One wonders how she could have so casually ended her career in films when she was an up-and-coming star. She was equally difficult with her dancing partners when she briefly returned to professional dancing, and even her the vain attempts to work as a store clerk. Louise Brooks had an astonishing intellect, so much so that many of the men in her life felt threatened by her but despite her intelligence she was never able to find a satisfying life for herself. Eventually, she found a kind of niche in her writing. Mr. Paris examines all of her contradictions thoughtfully but does not present a definitive conclusion. I liked the way the biography stuck to presenting the life of Louise Brooks without any attempt to moralize or judge; the facts and background are left for the reader to contemplate. I found the book very thought provoking.

The book is nicely illustrated, including a short gallery of Louise Brooks' best portraits. This is a fascinating biography of a natural actress who had a loathing for the profession; a woman who could be a good friend and equally suddenly turn against them. This is a book that should not be missed even if someone does not have an interest in silent films.

In this fascinating book, Barry Paris paints a portrait of a remarkable woman, warts and all. Unlike many of the many biographies which only serve to inflate a stars already massive ego, this gives you the full story of one of the silent screens most interesting stars - and one whose fame was sadly short lived. Louise Brooks never followed the Hollywood rules, but in doing so ensured that her name would be remembered for more than just her acting. Barry Paris presents her story in a way which makes you want to read on, just to see what Louise does next! If you buy just one book this year, make it this...

The Barry Paris biography of Louise Brooks is a harrowing, riveting and brilliant recollection of an obscure but genius silent film star. The wit, venom and power of Louise Brooks as an author, actor, and person are brought to light in this accessible and entertaining book. It is the bible for all fans of Louise Brooks and should be required reading for anyone with an interest in Hollywood, silent film, dance, and the fine art of celebrity. If you have half a brain and can get one eye open, this is the book for you.

Louise Brooks was never as famous in her day as other female actors like Colleen Moore and Clara Bow, and in fact most people were more familiar with her face than with her films, but she just had that special something that enabled her to stand the test of time, not only as a cult figure (as when she had a revival in the Fifties and again in the Eighties) but also as a very talented actor in her own right, cult figure or not. And today a lot of female actors who were very famous in her era, like Colleen Moore and the Talmadge sisters, are all but forgotten, while Louise lives on. Mr. Paris, in telling the story of Louise's life, explains just what about her has made her live on long after many other performers of her era have been forgotten by time and the average person off the street. I also particularly liked the chapter "Sound and Fury," with a lot of in-depth information on the coming of sound, and just how many people really were affected by the transition from silent to noise, not just the actors. Title-card writers and musicians were some of the other people in the business affected by it; their jobs were more or less made obsolete altogether.

This was not a woman who was interested in making friends and influencing people, and was quite capable of venomously turning on friends and even relatives to whom she'd formerly felt very close and affectionate. You didn't want to get on her bad side. She also had always wanted to be known as a professional dancer, not an actor, and when she had been dragged into motion pictures, she made what many people would consider some foolish decisions, decisions that sometimes cost her important roles that might have advanced her career. Indeed, some of the decisions she made, seemingly based on wanting to get even with the powers that be, put some serious nails in the coffin of her career, though she also made some incredibly risky decisions that in the long run landed her her cult status and lasting appeal (making the three movies abroad for G.W. Pabst, movies which initially bombed and were devastatingly reviewed). Because she refused to play nice and brown-nose the powers that be, she never amounted to much in the talking pictures she made in the Thirties, but her life after she quit motion pictures was just as fascinating. And isn't it preferable to be remembered best for the top-quality pictures you made as opposed to being remembered as and made fun of for having continued to act in increasingly bad movies after you've already become a has-been who won't get the message and retire gracefully?

This is, without a doubt, the best biography I have ever read. I agree with the other reviewers that a big reason for that accolade is the fact that Mr. Paris writes about Louise Brooks as a person and not as a "movie star". In fact, my favorite portion of the book is the section on her life after Hollywood and prior to her writing career. Paris writes an incisive psychological portrait of a complex woman. And the last lines of the book, taken from one of Louise's letters, still haunt me--the perfect ending. Buy it, read it and treasure it.

What a brick of a book! Isn't it curious that a silent movie star who only made a couple of films of which only a couple are worth the mention gets a 500+ page biography when many more prolific actors don't get one at all? But Ms. Brooks was not just an actress or dancing performer, she was that oh-so-rare thing in entertainment, she was a personality (and also a "character"). Her trademark bob became a cultural icon and at least one film made history as one of the best - if not THE best - silent of all times: Pandora's Box - to the importance of which Louise Brooks was a vital ingredient. Still, success ultimately eluded her, mostly due to her own vitriolic temperament and unpredictability. Neither in the US nor in Europe, where she made her best films, could she reap the fruits of her efforts. Nor could she, after leaving the movie biz behind for good, come back as a dancer, declaring in a very somber mood to a close relative shortly before her death in 1985: "How I have existed fills me with horror. For I have failed in everything (...). And I do not excuse myself with the usual escape of "not trying". I tried with all my heart."
Barry Paris' assessment of this glorious and dark lady is a model example of biographing. Never lurid or slanderous, as is so common in celebrity biographies these days, he verifies almost every one of his quotes with the original source. However, despite his obvious adoration for the subject of his research, he doesn't stumble into the trap of unduly polishing Ms. Brooks life either and relates her rather deft and frequent sexual episodes with historical precision. Sex, in fact, was one of the major forces - positively and negatively - in her life according to herself. Coming from Kansas, deeply bible-belted, she was like many Americans caught in the dichotomy of puritan restraint and the contrecoup of extreme license in matters bodily (and alcoholically!).
After reading "A Biography" one has the impression of having met Ms. Brooks in person - experiencing her erotic attraction as well as her volatile personality, but also her erudition. A woman who fit neither social nor male expectations of a striking beauty, a fact which might ultimately have been the stumbling block of her life. Paris has exhausted all available sources, turned every stone and read every letter surviving from Louise Brooks (and there apparently were a lot as she was an expansive epistolarian, especially late in life when sickness and wariness of the world prevented her from leaving her small and spartan apartment in Rochester) presenting all of it in a light language that pulls the reader along even through barrages of names, places and events (and possibly a slight tendency to digress here and there, though always cought in time) giving not only an intimate portrait of the greatest of the "lost" silent stars, but also a thorough picture of her times.
What Ms. Brooks saw in some of her contemporaries (C. Chaplin and G. W. Pabst among them) she failed to see in herself: "To be a great person is the final work of art" And she did, indeed, succeed in that.

Louise Brooks was a remarkable woman in many ways and this excellent biography depicts her entire story in a way that lets us truly get to know this fascinating and original individual. Louise was far more than just a pretty face. She had talent oozing from literally every pore of her body. I have caught the bug and am now a devoted Brooks fan for life, and finding this book by fellow Pittsburgher Barry Paris has enriched my knowledge of Louise for which I will be forever grateful. Thank you Barry, this is wonderful research you've done for us here, and all fans of Louise Brooks owe you a standing ovation!

There aren't many biographies on Louise that I could find outside of this book and Louise's own autobiography of sorts, titled "Lulu in Hollywood", but there isn't room for many more as this thorough study covers everything one would wish to know about Louise Brooks and her fascinating life onscreen and off.

Tired of the typical spoiled starlet of yesteryear? Think all old-time actors were all the same? Boy are you wrong, and this book will prove it to you! This is one woman who breaks down all conventions and shatters all illusions. Louise Brooks was a true original in every sense of the word!

Have a look and you too will fall in love with Louise Brooks.

This is what a biography should be: insightful, understanding, offering a measured & complex view of its beloved subject. And what a subject Barry Paris has in Louise Brooks! Her beauty, her intelligence, her compelling charisma all shine in these pages, giving us a multi-faceted view of this ravishing star. For someone who had never heard of Louise Brooks, this biography will send him or her in eager pursuit of her all-too-few films & her own writing -- and both are of the very highest standard.

It's clear that Brooks never did anything without wanting to give her all, to make true art out of it, a work of beauty & meaning that would stand the test of time. And the same could be said of this superb biography. While Paris clearly adores Brooks (and with good reason), he never succumbs to blind hagiography. Nor does he stumble in the opposite direction of pathography. His purpose is to explore the life of a fascinating woman, and to present it to the reader as thoroughly & lucidly as possible. He succeeds on every level. Louise Brooks emerges from these pages as both a flesh & blood woman, and as the dazzling, mysterious icon she became to countless admirers.

In short, the best book on Louise Brooks you'll ever find, most highly recommended!

Barry Paris's bio is a wonderful read and in my opinion did more for the recent increase of interest in Brooks than anything other book.

At the time of it's publishing in the mid 90's the internet was a mere flicker of info, photos bios and trivia about obscure stars like Louise Brooks were very hard to come by. After this book was published, I was one of several people who started fledgling web sites in Brooks' honour. While I gave up, one of those websites carried on to become the Louise Brooks Society, the definitive website on her life. Paris' book is essential reading for anyone who is facinated by this beautiful starlet.

Superb biography of a simply fascinating personality. Here was a women who literally and figuratively had everything: stunning beauty; talent; training; desire; intelligence; in the right place at the right time, and knew the right people, to achieve both stage and screen immortality and who, multiple times--not just once -- multiple times, snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. What a story!