George Cukor: A Double Life (Paperback)

Patrick McGilligan (author)

£20.99

Paperback 416 Pages / Published: 22/03/2013

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Synopsis

One of the highest-paid studio contract directors of his time, George Cukor was nominated five times for an Academy Award as Best Director. In publicity and mystique he was dubbed the \u201cwomen\u2019s director\u201d for guiding the most sensitive leading ladies to immortal performances, including Greta Garbo, Ingrid Bergman, Judy Garland, and-in ten films, among them The Philadelphia Story and Adam\u2019s Rib-his lifelong friend and collaborator Katharine Hepburn. But behind the \u201cwomen\u2019s director\u201d label lurked the open secret that set Cukor apart from a generally macho fraternity of directors: he was a homosexual, a rarity among the top echelon. Patrick McGilligan\u2019s biography reveals how Cukor persevered within a system fraught with bigotry while becoming one of Hollywood\u2019s consummate filmmakers.

Publisher: University of Minnesota Press
ISBN: 9780816680382
Number of pages: 416
Weight: 522 g
Dimensions: 216 x 140 x 30 mm

MEDIA REVIEWS

"That rarity of rarities among Hollywood biographies: a full-bodied study of a man and his metier, equally insightful about the life and the art." -Andrew Sarris, The New York Times

"Full of information about every aspect of Cukor's career and refreshingly candid about his sexuality, McGilligan's book throws some much-needed light on Gay Hollywood in the heyday of the studios." -The Advocate

"This funny and surprising book, with its vigorous portrait of Hollywood's most glamorous age, is an exemplary critical biography and an important film book. It propels Patrick McGilligan into the front ranks of film biographers." -The Washington Post Book World

"McGilligan's biography is the defense that Cukor could never bring himself to write. Much more than just a posthumous `outing,' it gives Cukor his full due as a director of both style and wit, whose long career is all the more impressive given the double life he was forced to live." -Los Angeles Times Book Review