Claudette Colbert: She Walked in Beauty (Hollywood Legends Series) (Hardcover)

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Editorial Reviews

Product Description

A biography of the award-winning and versatile star of screen, stage, and television

From the Publisher

Claudette Colbert's mixture of beauty, sophistication, wit, and vivacity quickly made her one of the film industry's most famous and highest-paid stars of the 1930s and 1940s. Though she began her career on the New York stage, she was beloved for her roles in such films as Preston Sturges's The Palm Beach Story, Cecil B. DeMille's Cleopatra, and Frank Capra's It Happened One Night, for which she won an Academy Award. She showed remarkable prescience by becoming one of the first Hollywood stars to embrace television, and she also returned to Broadway in her later career.

This is the first major biography of Colbert (1903-1996) published in over twenty years. Bernard F. Dick chronicles Colbert's long career, but also explores her early life in Paris and New York. Along with discussing how she left her mark on Broadway, Hollywood, radio, and television, the book explores Colbert's lifelong interests in painting, fashion design, and commercial art. Using correspondence, interviews, periodicals, film archives, and other research materials, the biography reveals a smart, talented actress who conquered Hollywood and remains one of America's most captivating screen icons.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: University Press of Mississippi (July 31, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1604730870
• ISBN-13: 978-1604730876
• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 6 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #538,678 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars What a disappointment, October 12, 2008

By	Avid Reader "shernscott" (Miramar, FL USA) - See all my reviews

I've waited years for a biography of Claudette Colbert and this book was a major let down. There was very little biographical information in this "biography". It would be better called a filmography. Chapter after chapter of detail about her film & stage roles. Details of the plots, her co-stars, her directors but very few details of her life. You have to stay awake until chapter 15 before you get anything that might be considered biographical.
The book is a bore and a big disappointment.

24 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars ZZZZZZZZZZZ!, October 7, 2008

By	DEAN (PALM SPRINGS, CALIFORNIA) - See all my reviews

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I must admit that I was apprehensive about purchasing this book after reading Bernard F. Dick's rather routine and dry bio of Rosalind Russell. However I figured the likelhood of any future bios about Ms. Colbert would be unlikely and thought I'd give it a chance.

Unfortunately this book suffers from the same faults as Mr. Dick's other bio - boring, boring, boring. Much too much detail on the plot summaries of Ms. Colbert's movies with very little information or insights into the making of the films and Ms. Colbert's feelings and opinions about the films (or anything else for that matter).

Finally, the chapter discussing Ms. Colbert's sexual orientation - homophobically entitled "The Stigma" is just plain offensive. The author should realize it is 2008 not 1958!

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Boring, February 17, 2009

By	Marshell L. Elliott (ohio) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book was not very good. It just did not deal enough with the life of Miss Colbert or behind the scenes of her films. Just did not do her justice. Maybe someone will do a better book.