Bridgewater Review

Volume 13 | Issue 2 Article 15

Dec-1994 Book Review: Rhinestone Cowboy: An Autobiography, Jack Nicholson: A Life, and Mia and Woody Charles F. Angell Bridgewater State College, [email protected]

Recommended Citation Angell, Charles F. (1994). Book Review: Rhinestone Cowboy: An Autobiography, Jack Nicholson: A Life, and Mia and Woody. Bridgewater Review, 13(2), 28-30. Available at: http://vc.bridgew.edu/br_rev/vol13/iss2/15

This item is available as part of Virtual Commons, the open-access institutional repository of Bridgewater State University, Bridgewater, Massachusetts. ______-----.J _

PARADISE LOST, boy wasn't really any kind of living. It PARADISE REGAINED, AND was merely existing.... On the survival THE HOTEL PARADISO scale, my family was just astep above the animals that we ate to stay alive" (5). The hough eclectic in my reading, bi reader needs no further explanation of ography as a genre doesn't really Campbell's ambition to leave Del ight and Tattract me. However, several lives never return. With the help of a sympa­ of show business celebrities have re­ thetic uncle, he teaches himself guitar. BOOK cently appeared and I decided to see what "Today, they would say I was a child I could learn about them. Do we read prodigy. That word was never used in REVIEW about famous people to see whether Billstown in 1940. They just said things they're just like us only lucky? Do we like, 'That boy can sure playa guitar.'" want confi rmation that they're really dif­ Campbell expresses some obligatory Charles Angell ferent from us? Do we take vicarious nostalgia for his upbringing, saying pleasure in seeing them corrupted by the things like "my dad and his country wis­ money and fame? There but for the grace dom comprise my fondest childhood Rhinestone Cowboy: An Autobiography of God and Michael Eisner go I? Would memories." Such fondness perhaps soft­ by Glen Campbell with Tom Carter celebrity convert me thus? ens his recollection of the frequent beat­ (Villard Books: New York, 1994) Rhinestone Cowboy, Glen Camp­ ings he endured from the paternal font Mia and Woody by Kristi Groteke bell's autobiography, qualifies as a con­ of country wisdom. Punishment in De­ [the Nanny] with Marjorie Rosen (Carroll version narrative. In it Campbell re­ light was physical, prolonged, and pain­ & Graf Publishers, Inc.: New York, 1994) counts his rise from impoverished Ar­ ful. Campbell only ceased fistfighting Jack Nicholson: A Life by kansas roots to magnificent Los Angeles when he realized damage to his hands Patrick McGilligan (W. w. Norton: fruition. In his rise was his fall, but never could end his musical career. New York, 1994) fear, Campbell tells us at the outset, God At age fifteen Campbell leaves school "never left me, even though I might have and departs for Wyoming with his Uncle left him for a time" (xiv). That "for a time" Eugene Campbell where they will play encompasses some serious wom­ roadhouses and honky-tonks until forced anizing and prolonged drug use to retire because the younger Campbell's and drinking. The country boy age bars his presence in such establish­ with his feet in L. A. finally re- ments. Campbell perseveres and gradu­ members that he knew Jesus ally makes his way to Los Angeles where (before he was a star) and be­ his talent and versatility gain him access comes a one woman man. to session musician work and ultimately "God has been merciful to me to television. He fills in with the Beach .... even when I've been mean to Boys and other noted acts of the 1950s ~ myself," Campbell says. "But and '60s. Monetary success attends his ~ of all He's given me, there efforts; he sets out to live the Hollywood ;;;"""j, '"~ is nothing for which I'm style to its fullest. He garnishes his nar­ -..:::.:::,;....-- more thankful than Kim." rative with anecdotes about life in Hol­ Campbell's beginnings were in lywood, adventures on the road, marital Billstown, Arkansas, a town so small that troubles, and personal indulgences that nobody knew where it was. Residents threaten to overwhelm him. "I'm not would tell people they came from De­ making excuses for what I did," he tells light, a larger (pop. 290) town some four us, "but my judgment and values were miles away. Though Campbell tries to tell distorted because of the alcohol and co­ us that as astar he never forgot his roots, caine" (143). he describes a childhood so impoverished Campbell finishes his autobiography no one would ever seek to return. "I'm as, in his words, "the new Glen like a lot of entertainers," Campbell Campbell." He appears regularly on the notes, "especially the ones who sing Christian Broadcast Network and Pat country music or the blues: I grew up Robertson's 700 Club. He claims to pos­ poor. ... The kind of poverty I knew as a sess a ministry in his music which he

28 ------"------performs for God. Given his origins, and thing was sufficiently wrong to require court, misunderstood her, believing that the beginning chapters are the most changing the houselocks and phone she had referred to the violence done the powerful in Campbell's story, who would number. "Whatever secret dramas were women in the tragedy. Quite otherwise, deny him the right to stand before audi­ being played out that winter, Woody still Ms. Farrow explained; she had been ences in Branson, Missouri's "Glen came by to see Mia and the kids regu­ thinking of Hecuba's "struggle to main­ Campbell Goodtime Theatre" and end his larly, so Ifigured they were trying to work tain her moral roots and I felt during this show as he says he always does singing their problems through" (76). But with period of time that that was an issue for 'Amazing Grace.' Ms. Farrow's accusation, made on Au­ me.... I explained to Dr. Schultz what "Someday Kristi," Mia Farrow gust4, 1992, that Mr. Allen had molested the moral dilemma was, and that Hecuba tells her college student nanny, another daughter, the had been unsuccessful "(205). Ms. Far­ "you can write your own book eight year old Dylan, any row casts herself as the desolated Queen about all this" (11). Agraceful of­ . further attempts to work crying" 0 children hear me; it is your fer not to be resisted, Kristi ~• throu·gh the problems mother who calls." Groteke tells what her book's : ceased. In fact, since the Mr. Allen can hardly be cast as atragic dust jacket hypes as "the first molestation occurred on a figure. Ms. Groteke presents Mr. Allen true insider's story" of Ms. day when Ms. Groteke had as a case of life imitating art, and the art Farrow's legal battle with film­ charge of the younger chil­ standing as a record of his life. She yields maker Woody Allen, her lover dren, she, to her dismay, Mr. Allen no sympathy, and truth to tell, for thirteen years, for the cus­ §found herself a player in the he probably deserves none. For Mr. Allen, tody of their biological and ~ drama. Ms. Farrow's children, at Frog Hollow with Ms. Farrow and the adopted children. The facts of 14 Dylan and Satchel, unwilling children, everything's coming up neu­ "all this" concern Mr. Allen's liaison with performers, decide sometime in roses. He tries to depict himself as Soon-yi, Ms. Farrow's adopted daughter, 1993 to change their names. Dylan wrongly and spitefully accused of molest­ and Ms. Farrow's subsequent allegation chooses Eliza "because she was so ing Dylan. But Mr. Allen's affair with that Mr. Allen had molested another charmed by Audrey Hepburn's perfor­ Soon-yi is fact and places him in a role daughter, Dylan, in August 1992. On mance as Eliza Doolittle in the movieMy quite other than the nerdy, neurotic per­ June 7, 1993 a court did in fact award Fair Lady" (216). Satchel, Allen and sona so familiar to us from his films. Mr. Ms. Farrow custody, much to Mr. Allen's Farrow's only biological son, selects Allen's liaison with Soon-yi, rather than bitter and continuing dismay.(He has Harmon, a name he found in his recalling any of his film characters, just recently announced that should he mother's Filofax list of names for new brings to mind his short story, "The not receive legal vindication, he will pro­ adoptions. Ms. Groteke tells us that Mr. Klugelmass Episode," where the narra­ duce a film offering his side of the story.) Allen was furious about the name tor is invited by Klugelmass to enter a Ms. Groteke enters Ms. Farrow's changes, though the childrens' thera­ futuristic contraption that can place him Bridgewater, Connecticut household as pists "felt that these changes might help in the scene of any book he chooses. The a player in Summer Vacation and finds them put the bad times behind them" narrator chooses Madame Bovary, has herselfAlice in Wonderland chronicling (216). Tellingly, Dylan hits upon the an affair with Emma, brings her to Man­ the Brady Bunch. The penumbra of these name of our modern Pygmalion, the hattan, takes her back to Youville, and facts as Ms. Groteke relates them casts woman molded and trained by an older promises to return and liberate her from two self-absorbed celebrities, personally man whom she loves but who can not the boring, provincial town forever. Un­ and professionally united, who attempt and will not marry her. Small wonder fortunately, the machine malfunctions to ruin one another. Mr. Allen was furious at her choice. on the return trip and imbeds the narra­ Satchel, whom Allen had named after In January 1992, while waiting for Mr. tor in a remedial Spanish text. Perhaps Satchel Paige, selects a name which sug­ Allen in his Manhattan apartment, Ms. he came across Cervantes' epigram "Es gests his yearning for the harmony no Farrow discovers compromising photo­ un entreverado loco, lleno de lucidos longer evident in his parents' increas­ graphs of Mr. Allen and Soon-yi, her 21­ intervalos" [He's a muddled fool, full of ingly discordant relationship. year-old adopted daughter. She later tells lucid intervals]. As it happens, this pretty Ms. Groteke that the photos had been left During her court testimony, Ms. Far­ much captures Ms. Groteke's sense of in so conspicuous a place on the fireplace row reveals how she thought of her role him. mantel, that Mr. Allen must have in­ in the drama. She had likened herself to And what of Ms. Groteke? When the tended she find them. One is not inclined Hecuba, Queen of Troy, in Euripides' The trial has ended and Ms. Farrow has been to disbelieve her. Though Ms. Groteke Trojan Women, a comparison she had awarded custody of the children, Ms. isn't told until June 1992 about Mr. apparently first suggested in conversa­ Groteke knows she has to move on. For Allen's affair with his 'daughter,' Ms. Far­ tion with a Dr. Schultz, Dylan's thera­ all her admiration of Ms. Farrow, deep row had told her in January that some- pist. The doctor had, Ms. Farrow told the down Ms. Groteke understands that her

29 ------'------employer has perhaps not been much questions. An epigraph at once illustrates sensibility. They think it's kookie. But it's changed by her experience. "As extraor­ the dilemma and the biographer's solu­ based on breadth. We have an open view dinary as Mia is," observes Ms. Groteke, tion to it, for McGilligan quotes Nich­ of things that comes out of the topogra­ "she seemed to have a need to be less olson as having said in a 1986 interview: phy" (75). Los Angeles released intelligent, less moral, less powerful than "My films are all one long book to me, Nicholson from restraint and constraint, Woody and Woody had a need to make y'know, my secret craft-it's all autobi­ a release his womanizing and drug use her feel that way. In the end these two ography." Accordingly, McGilligan devel­ have made notorious. Yet the release extraordinary people were not immune ops an exhaustive survey of Nicholson's worked side by side with discipline, for to the same power plays that are com­ films and, while we learn a considerable Nicholson is nothing if not mon to so many ordinary couples" (256). amount about the movie indus­ a disciplined performer, Like Alice emerging from Wonderland, try and Nicholson's place in it, meticulously crafting the Ms. Groteke finds her experience Nicholson himself remains elu­ details of his roles. So "curiouser and curiouser." sive, sometimes' the enigmatic when McGilligan com­ In the midst of her custody battle, Ms. smile, sometimes the Joker's ments on Nicholson's re­ Farrow flies to Hollywood to audition for sneer. marks about L. A., saying the female lead in Wolfwhich was to star McGilligan hinges his biogra­ "it was a city of opportu­ Jack Nicholson, himself the subject of a phy on a revelation that Nich­ nity, the place where recent biography by Patrick McGilligan. olson's parents were not John J. § movies were dreamed Nicholson's celebrity dates from 1969's and Ethel May Nicholson as the ac­ ~ up, and where people lLUq.~t\ ~ Easy Rider where Nicholson as George tor himself supposed at least until acted out their Hanson looks at Billy and says "You 1974. His mother was in fact June L·,:.:.----- dreams," he reduces know-this used to be a helluva good Nicholson, John J's and Ethel's the play between person and set­ country. I can't understand what's go­ daughter, who had had an affair with ei­ ting, what D. H. Lawrence called the ing wrong with it." Nicholson travels a ther a dancing instructor named Eddie "spirit of place," to a cliche. Too bad re­ long road between Easy Rider's George King or a dancer named Don Furcillo­ ally, for the facts of Nicholson's life show Hanson and A Few Good Men's Colonel Rose. These doubtful antecedents allow someone fleeing the futility of cliches. Jessup whose take on America may not McGilligan to present Nicholson's films Rather than spend time with the 400 plus be so different but whose tone covers the as attempts by the actor to develop an pages of this 'blockbuster' biography, I distance. Along the way, Nicholson has identity for himself through his charac­ recommend a trip to Blockbuster Video played more than his share of memorable ter parts. We're told thatwhen Nicholson for a copy ofyour favorite Nicholson film. roles: Bobby Dupea, Buddinsky, J. J. learned from his sister Lorraine the facts What do these lives teach us about ce­ Gittes, Randle P. McMurphy, Jack Tor­ of his parentage, he was so stunned by lebrity? The latest Donald Westlake, rance, Garrett Breedlove, Daryl van the news that he became disoriented, Baby, Would I Lie?, set in-of all Horne, Francis Phelan, the Joker, Jimmy telling Mike Nichols - then directing places-Branson, Missouri maybe speaks Hoffa, and my personal favorite, Charlie him in The Fortune - "that he had been for all of us when the narrator says Partanna. He has shared the screen with thrown by a personal revelation." "country-music fans don't envy or be­ a memorable list of actresses, whose McGilligan's readers must remind them­ grudge the material success of the per­ number does not, fortunately perhaps selves to be wary of this tendency to re­ formers, and that's because they don't owing to her circumstances and Wolfs gard Nicholson's film roles as the actor's see the country stars as being brilliant subject matter, include Mia Farrow. attempts to fill some psychological void. or innovative or otherwise exceptional One begins McGilligan's Jack's Life: Thirty-seven years old in 1974, Nicholson people (which they are), but firmly be­ A Biography ofJack Nicholson hoping was well along in his career when he lieve the Willie Nelsons and Roy Clarks to understand how Nicholson came to learned the void existed. are shitkickers just like themselves, who learn his craft and what he has to tell us Like Glen Campbell, Nicholson is happened to hit it lucky, and more power about it. Sad to say, McGilligan disap­ driven by a desire to escape where he to them. It meant anybody could hit it points. Though he exhausts the consid­ knew he was from, the New Jersey shore. lucky, including their own poor sorry erable materials available on Nicholson's "You have no idea what it's like living in selves, so these people...took sweet vi­ career, the subject himself was obviously New Jersey," Nicholson told a reporter, carious pleasure in the overt manifesta­ not a collaborator in the project. "until you move out of it, really. In many tions of their heroes' lush rewards." But Whether Nicholson refused to cooperate ways it is the most futile state in the na­ if 90% of life consists, as Woody Allen or simply lacked time, McGilligan is tion" (71). McGilligan writes that says, in just showing up, don't you bet hampered by having to rely on materials Nicholson "embraced Los Angeles from right now he's yearning for that lost already in the record and by inability to the start" and quotes the actor as having 10%? interview his subject and ask crucial said "people comically impugn the L. A. Charles Angellis Professor ofEnglish.

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