Biography

CATS ON A CHANDELIER, a bio of Andrew Lloyd Webber by Michael Coveney: Genre: Biography; Availability: Published in the UK in 9/99 by Hutchinson London; Rating: NA; Review: NA

A PARCEL ARRIVED SAFELY TIED WITH A STRING, by Michael Crawford: Genre: Autobiography; Availability: In print as of September, in the UK. Preorder at Amazon.com; go to the British server once you follow this link, search for "Michael Crawford," and scroll down. An audiobook version is also to be released.; Rating:; Review: If I had a half-mask icon, I'd give this book 3.5. Crawford's autobiography is intimate (to a shocking degree), funny, honest, and generally well-detailed. My gripe: the book seems to have been written by an amateur author and a very weak editor. "Parcel" lacks a sense of theme, of messages learned in Michael's career; it is inconsistent in perspective (is it a purely professional auotiobiography or a personal one? Michael likes to have it both ways); the style is awkward, an obvious translation of Michael's spoken story-telling style; and the book overall requires better organization than it has. The cumulative years of Michael's professional life seem rushed in comparison to the endless recountings of his childhood. This reader at least would've liked to have seen a lot more about "Phantom" than we get (thanks to the space devoted to endless childhood or early career history), and about the years afterward--which are totally absent, as if "EFX," his concert series, his recording career, and the Phantom movie debate all had never happened.

PHANTOM: MICHAEL CRAWFORD UNMASKED, by Anthony Hayward.: Genre: Biography; Availability: OP, ER; Rating:; Review: Hayward's biography is worth the cost of printing only as an accumulation of many newspaper articles and interviews with Michael Crawford. Where Hayward attempts to introduce new facts about Michael, he falls short; unable to interview the star himself, it would seem, or to interview anyone presently close to Michael, Hayward results to muck-raking based on the word of limo drivers and failed actors who knew Michael early in his career. Even with that, we may note smugly, Hayward can't dig up any really shocking dirt. This book is nothing for Crawford fans to lose sleep over.

HAROLD PRINCE AND THE AMERICAN MUSICAL THEATER, by Foster Hirsch: Genre: General History, biography, theatre; Availability: IP; Rating: NA; Review: NA

HAROLD PRINCE: FROM PAJAMA GAME TO PHANTOM OF THE OPERA AND BEYOND, by Carol Ilson.: Genre: General History, biography, theatre; Availability: IP; Rating: NA; Review: NA

ANDREW LLOYD WEBBER, by Gerald McKnight.: Genre: Biography; Availability: Unknown. Released in 1984, St. Martin's Press.; Rating: NA; Review: NA

FANFARE: ANDREW LLOYD WEBBER UNAUTHORIZED, by Jonathan Mantle.: Genre: Biography; Availability: OP; Rating:; Review: Mantle's writing is less than captivating and his take on the subject reveals nothing new. He does deal more with the biography of Sarah Brightman than do most writers, but it's more for possible sex appeal than for true scholarly interest. Mantle seems obsessed with the "dirty" details of ALW's life-he even gushes to the reader about allegedly seeing Sarah Brightman's photograph smiling back at him above a toilet in ALW's New York apartment. Do we need to know this? I don't think so.

CONTRADICTIONS: NOTES ON TWENTY SIX YEARS IN THE THEATER, by Hal Prince.: Genre: General History, biography, theatre; Availability: Probably OP, published in 1974, pre-POTO; Rating: NA; Review: NA

THE MUSICALS OF ANDREW LLOYD WEBBER, by Keith Richmond.: Genre: Biography; Availability: IP, try ordering it from your bookstore. Published by Virgin, ISBN is 1-85227-557-X.; Rating:; Review: The Musicals of ALW gave me little new information about ALW musicals. The photographs in the book are, however, superb and often ones I'd not seen before. For that alone, I'd buy it.

ANDREW LLOYD WEBBER: HIS LIFE AND WORKS, by Michael Walsh.: Genre: Biography; Availability: IP, try ordering it from your bookstore.UPDATED, 1998 version out now!; Rating:; Review: For ALW fans, Walsh's book has deservedly become a classic. The depth of research and detail is amazing; open up this monstrous book and just look at the point size-this is not a "big pictures, no text" coffee table book. The critic Walsh examines each of ALW's musicals from an educated musical perspective, and confronts dead-on many of the charges ALW-haters hurl at the composer. If you want to know anything about Andrew Lloyd Webber up until post-Aspects, you'll find it here. The new version is updated through Whistle Down the Wind.