You think the lukewarm coffee at your office is bad? Consider a perk that Nancy Balbirer received as a young actor, as described in her new Take Your Shirt Off and Cry: A Memoir of Near-Fame Experiences (Bloomsbury, 256 pp., $16, paperback), a review of which will appear soon:
“Shortly after I turned twenty-eight, I was cast in an off-Broadway production of the Molière play The Ridiculous Précieuses, at the Kauffman Theatre. The production was bankrolled by our leading lady, who happened to be an heiress of one of our country’s great, philanthropic robber baron families. She had Philip Morris as a backer, so in addition to our Equity minimum salaries, the cast were offered as many packs of cigarettes as we could smoke a day. Undeterred by the homicidal innuendo, we all graciously accepted the producers’ largesse.”
Oooh, this memoir sounds fun. I like reading about people’s jobs, especially if they’re things I could never / would never do (like the gymnast one). Looking forward to your review.
Comment by sarahsk — May 20, 2009 @ 5:53 pm |
Parts of the book really are fun, though it’s uneven. It’s also got a lot on California🙂, where the author lived for years, including a description of what it was like to audition for Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David in the old days of Seinfeld.
Comment by 1minutebookreviewswordpresscom — May 20, 2009 @ 7:50 pm |