Customer Reviews

The Women of Warner Brothers: The Lives and Careers of 15 Leading Ladies with Filmographies for Each (Performing Arts)

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The book is well-written and well-researched. It presents entertaining chapters on 15 leading WB actresses from the 30s and 40s. I learned about stars I was previously not familiar with like Nancy Coleman. The book presents interesting information not previously published about many of these stars. I would have liked to see the chapters on each actress be somewhat longer. Some of the more interesting aspects of the actresses' lives could have been more fully developed, especially their private lives as opposed to their film careers. Instead, "snippets" are presented in some cases. I would have liked to see more about the lives of the stars in their later years. However, I understand that the publisher limited the length of the book.

It's hard to take too seriously a book of this title that includes Nancy Coleman but not the actress whose early '30s work for Warners (Three on a Match, Strange Love of Molly Louvain, etc.) is among that studio's best, Ann Dvorak. Clearly an effort by the author to remind us of the existence of these talented, spirited stars at a time when cultural memory threatens to forget them, The Women of Warner Brothers covers the 1930s and '40s and includes such well-known stars as Olivia de Havilland and Ann Sheridan, along with lesser lights such as Glenda Farrell and Andrea King.

The writing is workmanlike, if sometimes too casual in the manner of movie zines (starting a sentence with "Oh yeah" may not endear the author to all of his readers). There's nothing particularly new here, but the book is useful as a one-stop source for longer profiles of its subjects and their films than can be found elsewhere (excluding stars like Bette Davis whose careers have been written up in exhaustive detail). And the lack of Dvorak is at least partially compensated for by the inclusion of such vanishing worthies as Joan Leslie, Andrea King, Eleanor Parker, and Alexis Smith. Fans of these actresses will find this a diverting read.

The title is intriguing and even more intriguing is that there are some ladies that are rarely written about. Those ladies include Eleanor Parker, Alexis Smith, Andrea King, Nancy Coleman, Priscilla Lane, Glenda Farrell and Joan Leslie. But this is an expensive book that lacks good pictures of the ladies and almost nothing new about the ones that have previously been written about. The Warners ladies missing include Patricia Neal, Ruth Roman, Janis Paige, Faye Emerson, Dorothy Malone, Virginia Mayo and a whole lot more.

Each lady is given one picture (in some cases not even a good picture) with the exception of Ann Sheridan, who rates three photos. The stories of their careers rarely flesh out their lives away from the camera. There is very little about them after their film careers ended. I never got a feel for what each lady was really like other than "she worked with (so and so) and liked (so and so) and her favorite movie was (so and so)", etc.

The filmography for each lady includes a little bit of TV work. It would seem that if the author is going to name TV credits, then why not all the work the lady has done, not just a scattering of titles. It's interesting that Andrea King is included when she only was at the WB studio for 18 months and others who worked for the Warner Brothers for many years are left out.

This book is lacking in so many areas--a major disappointment. There is no in-depth story of any of these fifteen WB ladies. I guess it's better than nothing, but not nearly as good as it could have been.

Daniel Bubbeo has written an entertaining and informative look at the classic actresses who made Warner Brothers. Bubbeo has an easy prose that invties the reader to learn about this wonderful time in cinema history. This is an invaluable book for anyone interested in classic films as well as the history of the Warner Bros. Studio.