Woody Allen's "Mere Anarchy": a book review

Woody Allen's Mere Anarchy is his first new literary work in many years.

In addition to churning out roughly a movie a year for 40 years, director Woody Allen has also worked as a stand-up comedian, actor for hire, playwright, and author. In fact, he has written three bestselling collections of humor, Getting Even, Without Feathers and Side Effects, collecting his various short stories, essays, and plays, along with absurd lists and guides.

One of the great thrift-store finds of my life was a Book of the Month Club paperback containing all three of these books (unabridged!) in one easily-portable volume. This is a book I've taken with me on long trips many, many times. You can dip into it just about anywhere and find something entertaining, ranging from exercises in pure silliness, like Allen's highly unlikely "Slang Origins," to truly well-written fiction. In fact, I'd count "The Shallowest Man" and "The Kugelmass Episode" among the better short stories I've ever seen by anyone, anywhere.

Mere Anarchy (2007) is Allen's first collection of prose in decades, and reading it is like attending a concert by a '70s hitmaker who wants to try out some new material after a long absence from touring. Allen has given up on the plays, essays, and guides this time, so Mere Anarchy only contains short (often very short) stories -- 18 altogether, ten of which originally appeared in The New Yorker and eight of which are new to this edition.

For the most part, the eight new stories are fairly weak -- contrived, unfunny, and somehow both overwritten and undercooked -- and Allen's editor has done him no favors by running all of them in a row at the beginning of the book. For that reason, Mere Anarchy gets off to a very slow and bumpy start, and I would not blame readers for abandoning it and moving on to something else.

Allen's writing style tends to include a lot of eccentric vocabulary choices, semi-obscure cultural references, and Yiddishims, and in these early tales he tends to let his "quirks" overwhelm the weak plots. For readers unfamiliar with Allen's prose, Mere Anarchy sometimes verges on unreadable. His decision to give seemingly every character a wacky name might also grate on readers' nerves.

About the only new story that rates with Allen's best is "Glory Hallelujah, Sold!" about a prayers-for-cash scam. The nadir of this part of the book, for me at least, was "Sam, You Made the Pants Too Fragrant," an extended riff on the idea of "enhanced" clothing that stretches a lame premise far beyond its breaking point.

The good news is that the ten New Yorker stories are, on average, much stronger and funnier, so the back half of the book is a much smoother ride. Here, you'll find "Thus Ate Zarathustra," a rumination on food and philosophy that could easily have found a place in one of Allen's three classics, as well as highly amusing takes on physics ("Strung Out"), home repair ("On a Bad Day You Can See Forever"), and overly chatty dentists ("Pinchuk's Law").

The New Yorker selections aren't perfect, though. Some critics fawned over "Surprise Rocks Disney Trial," a story in which Mickey Mouse gives very un-Disney-like testimony at the trial of Michael Eisner, but for me this was a missed opportunity. Allen thinks it's funny simply that a cartoon character is talking in a very businesslike way about sex and money and is casually referring to other cartoon characters as he does so, but to really make a piece like this work you have to truly understand the characters and their careers. Specificity is what makes or breaks a pop culture spoof.

For an example of how to do this kind of thing correctly, try to find "Some Famous Couples Discuss Their Divorces" by Delia Ephron in her 1986 book, Funny Sauce. That contains brief monologues by several cartoon characters, including Mickey & Minnie (along with Popeye & Olive Oyl and Archie & Veronica), and it's funny, daring, and insightful in ways that Allen's story just isn't.

Misogyny is also a problem for Allen. I'd be curious to hear a woman's perspective on Mere Anarchy. Females do not come off terribly well in Allen's stories. In fact, they generally fall into one of two categories: curvaceous young sex kittens and nagging old harpies who spend their husbands' money too freely. If you don't have a Y chromosome, you're pretty much either a bimbo or a crone in this book, with very little middle ground.

Given Allen's advancing age and infamous sexual history, his numerous leering descriptions of attractive young women, at least two of whom are complimented on their "protoplasm," might make some readers uncomfortable. He kind of comes off as an old lech now and again.

Amazingly, you can read a lengthy excerpt of this book for free on Google Books!

"Mr. Strangelove: A Biography of Peter Sellers" - A book review

Ed Sikov finds the man behind the characters in his Peter Sellers biography, Mr. Strangelove.

 
The last time we spoke about books, it was to discuss David Michaelis' gargantuan biography of Peanuts cartoonist Charles Schulz. That book must have gotten me on a "biography" kick because I followed it up with Mr. Strangelove, Ed Sikov's look at the life story of British comedian and actor Peter Sellers. 

Sellers first came to prominence as a cast member of an anarchic BBC radio program called The Goon Show in the 1950s before achieving international success as a motion picture star in the 1960s through his appearances in such films as Lolita, Dr. Strangelove and The Pink Panther. That last film provided him with his best-known role, that of bumbling Inspector Clouseau, whom he portrayed in a series of highly profitable sequels for pretty much the rest of his life. 

Sellers' weak heart, combined with a lifestyle of heavy drinking and drugging, led to his death at the age of 54 in 1980, not long after his triumphant Oscar-nominated performance in Hal Ashby's Being There, a personal project Sellers had been trying to get off the ground for about a decade.

It would be tempting to write a truly scathing, damning book about Peter Sellers. He had so many serious character flaws that it's almost impossible to tabulate them all. Spoiled rotten by his controlling and manipulative mother, Peg (who emerges as the second-most astounding character in Sikov's book), Peter Sellers grew up to be a temperamental and immature child-man, infamous for his tantrums and wild mood swings, marked by swift and terrible changes of heart. 

Married four times (with no success), Sellers was an alternately neglectful and abusive father to his three (possibly four) children. Materialistic and greedy to an absurd extent, Sellers used his movie money to buy cars, houses, and gadgets he simply didn't need and took roles in some truly godawful films strictly for the cash, despite the damage it was doing to his career. Sellers could be a terror during the production of a film, slowing down filming with his erratic behavior and having various cast and crew members fired for no good reason. Ed Sikov does not shy away from detailing all of Sellers' faults in this book.

However, the minor miracle of Mr. Strangelove is that the reader does not emerge from the book hating its subject. Sikov writes with genuine affection about Sellers' best screen work, and he makes the reader want to track down these films and watch them again. (I'm particularly keen to revisit A Shot in the Dark and The Party as well as Being There.) 

It helps that the interview subjects, i.e. Peter's friends, relatives, and coworkers, generally seemed to have liked the man despite his many, many flaws. Even after decades of inexcusable behavior (and, believe me, there's a ton of it in this book), very few of the people close to Peter Sellers seem to hold a grudge against him. They all recognize his talent, and they often speak fondly of the humor, charm, and generosity he displayed during his more-lucid moments. Instead of waiting for Sellers to get his much-deserved comeuppance, the reader will instead be rooting for the man to get his act together. (Spoiler: he never does.)

I guess since I read the Schulz book and the Sellers book back-to-back, there's a temptation to compare the two. There are several parallels between the lives of Schulz and Sellers. Both were stereotypical "mama's boys" whose relationships with their mothers defined their adult lives. Both fought in World War II, though Schulz with much more distinction than Sellers. Both had troubled and argumentative marriages that ended in divorce. Both were in the business of making people laugh but were surprisingly complex and moody men in their private lives. And both were gawky and unattractive as youths, but became rather dapper and distinguished (and, thus, more attractive to women) in middle-age. 

The two books are not much alike, though. Schulz and Peanuts is a much heavier read and offers plenty of food for thought on the nature of art and the relationship between an artist and his work. Mr. Strangelove is more of a page-turner, a well-written book with lots of splashy incidents about the life of an eccentric and well-known man. I recommend them both.

But I think I'm done with biographies for a while. One of the supporting characters in Mr. Strangelove is the American writer Terry Southern (who coauthored the screenplay for Dr. Strangelove), and I think it is high time I explored Southern's novels.

Before I go, I really must share with you this clip. Half of it was filmed during the making of Strangelove and half... well, wasn't. Either way, it includes a dazzling display of Peter Sellers' talent for regional accents. Enjoy.

Schulz and Peanuts: a book review

A familiar zig-zag pattern appears on the cover of Schulz and Peanuts.

 

"Cartooning will destroy you. It will break your heart."

- Charles Schulz 

   

Charles M. Schulz's Peanuts is, essentially, The Beatles of comic strips. If you're into newspaper comics (or cartoons in general), you probably enjoy Peanuts, while if you're into classic 1960s rock (or popular music in general), you more than likely enjoy The Beatles. Schulz did not invent the comic strip, as The Beatles did not invent rock & roll, but they both redefined their respective media and broadened people's expectations of what could be done within them. In so doing, Peanuts attained unprecedented commercial success (as did The Beatles) and influenced generations of other writers and artists (as did The Beatles). And both have remained popular over the decades, appealing both to the widest-possible mainstream audience and over-analytical connoisseurs alike.

(Side note: If Peanuts is the Beatles of comic strips, does that make Garfield the Rolling Stones of comic strips? Hmmmm.)

David Michaelis' massive biography of the late Mr. Schulz, Schulz and Peanuts: A Biography, is a fascinating book which provides valuable insight both into the strip and the man who created it. The title has the billing right: this is a book about Schulz first and Peanuts second. Michaelis assumes, probably correctly, that anyone willing to tackle a 672-page book about Charles Schulz is already very familiar with Peanuts and its various characters, relationships, recurring storylines, and running jokes. If you can't tell Charlie Brown from Linus or Snoopy from Spike, Schulz and Peanuts is not the book for you. Maybe some other writer will have to write the definitive book about the internal history of Peanuts. Michaelis' book is much more about the strip's external life, i.e. the real-life inspirations behind the strip (Schulz's own life and his relationships with others) and its growth as a pop culture and merchandising phenomenon.

When Schulz and Peanuts came out back in 2007, the standard line from critics and reporters -- who were looking to quickly pigeonhole Michaelis' book -- was that it exposed the hidden dark side of Charles M. Schulz. To that, I would say Schulz's dark side was "hiding" in plain sight for 50 years, as his strip frequently dealt with frustration, disappointment, fear, depression, and cruelty. Even the sentimental and reassuring TV special A Charlie Brown Christmas features moments of angst, despair, and emotional brutality. In short, Schulz put his dark side on display for the entire world to see.

Michaelis presents Schulz as neither a hero nor a villain, but as a surprisingly complex human being. The life of Charles Schulz is neither a comedy nor a tragedy. It's not quite a Horatio Alger story, an allegory, an epic saga, or a cautionary example either. The cartoonist's life, therefore, did not follow any of the standard templates for a biography. I think critics painted this book as a "dark" expose because that makes for a better story. Michaelis does explore some of Schulz's various character flaws, such as his emotional withdrawal from his first wife Joyce, but I never for a moment felt that Michaelis was trying to make Schulz into an "unforgivable" monster. Instead, the author remains sensitive and sympathetic throughout the entire book -- sympathetic both to Schulz and to the people around him.

Schulz and Peanuts: A Biography is probably of interest mainly to comics junkies in general and Peanuts fans in particular, but I would recommend it to anyone who is interested in the creative process or in exploring the relationship between Art and Life. And if you just like funny cartoons, Michaelis generously includes many, many examples of Peanuts strips from all the different eras of Schulz's career. If anything, this book made me eager to explore those strips again.