Publisher's Weekly Review
New York Times editor Jacobs explores the life of colorful and brash actor Elaine Stritch (1925--2014) in this celebratory biography. Stritch was born in Detroit, Mich., into a middle-class Catholic family and moved to New York City in 1943 "in pursuit of fun, music, nightclubs, and theater." So began a legendary, boozy career that would include roles on Broadway (in Noël Coward's Sail Away and Stephen Sondheim's Company, among many others), in films (Woody Allen's September and Small Time Crooks), and on television (most notably in Tina Fey's 30 Rock). Jacobs moves meticulously through Stritch's decades on the stage, from her audition for the road company of Oklahoma! shortly after her arrival in New York, to such achievements as her 2002 Tony Award--winning one-woman show At Liberty. The author covers Stritch's complicated relationships with men (including her sex-deprived marriage to actor John Bay), her loneliness, and her struggles with alcoholism. She captures Stritch's big personality through amusing stories, including the time Stritch smuggled her dog into England in a bag. Jacobs ends by praising Stritch for her "wit, resilience, unusual forthrightness, and courage." This book, lush with detail and heavy on Broadway history, will appeal to Stritch fans and theater geeks everywhere. (Oct.)
Kirkus Review
New York Times features writer and cultural critic Jacobs makes her book debut with a biography of the glamorous, outspoken entertainer Elaine Stritch (1925-2014).Stritch's career spanned nearly seven decades, ending in an acclaimed one-woman show that earned her the Tony Award she had long coveted. As an actress and singer, she had middling success, usually hired for a part when a bigger name was unavailable, or when a show went on national tour, or for summer stock. Often, she lost out to Angela Lansbury, who won many of the roles Stritch wanted: as Auntie Mame, for example, which made Lansbury "a definitive star of the musical theater," and as Madame Rose in Gypsy. "I'm sick of Angela Lansbury," Stritch once remarked. "I'm sick of people doing parts that I should be doing." In 1961, her performance in Noel Coward's Sail Away won accolades: She turned the play "into a one-woman show," one critic wrote. "Let's keep the busy Miss Stritch busier." But there were problems in keeping her busy: a reputation for "being tiresome, over-full of suggestions and not knowing a word" of her lines, as Coward noted; and, increasingly, alcoholism. "They all love Elaine," Lee Israel discovered when she worked on a feature story about Stritch. "But along the way lots of people have ceased to trust her," Israel wrote. "She drinks, they say." Stritch defended drinking as "a wonderful thing for social communication," but theater critic John Lahr saw a deep vulnerability. She was "the most panic-struck person I ever knew," he observed, "a hysteric, and completely terrified." In an engaging, thoroughly researched narrative, Jacobs chronicles Stritch's career, boosted by working with Stephen Sondheim and Woody Allen; her half-hearted attempts to get on the wagon; her friendships, romances, and marriage; kleptomania and refusal to pay restaurant tabs; and brazen money-grubbing. Put up at a Florida hotel for an event, for example, she brought her entire winter wardrobe for dry-cleaning "at the production's expense."A sharply drawn portrait of an ambitious, fierce, and complicated woman. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
Elaine Stritch's lifelong friendship with gossip columnist Liz Smith helped boost her early image in the 1940s and '50s as a leggy, not-quite-ingénue who could drink anyone under the table. But the Stritch presented here is a study in contrasts: she came off as a brassy freewheeler, but she was naïve enough to think Rock Hudson had a crush on her; she was a self-described strong woman, yet the women's movement didn't dent her staunch apoliticality. Several themes repeat: her haphazard Catholicism, her reliance on alcohol to perform both on stage and in life, and a need for approval that got her labelled difficult and demanding. And she was difficult: she hogged the spotlight while she lamented her low billing. But even in her biggest flops, critics loved her. This was the key to her long-lasting appeal: she had an uncanny ability to play to an audience. This dishy biography will be a ride for the theatrically inclined as Stritch's 70-year career crosses those of Marlon Brando, Ethel Merman, Noël Coward, Angela Lansbury, Bea Arthur, and, of course, Hal Prince and Stephen Sondheim.--Susan Maguire Copyright 2010 Booklist
