Synopses & Reviews
Mary Louise Wilson became a star at age sixty with her smash one-woman play Full Gallop portraying legendary Vogue editor Diana Vreeland. But before and since, her life and her career--including the Tony Award for her portrayal of Big Edie in Grey Gardens--have been enviably celebrated and varied.
Review
"Thank you MLW for writing this book, if only to confirm for me hi diddly de de the actor's life for me--a life as full of heartache, waiting, and disappointment as it is, for us all, an absolute delight. Learning that it would be the same for the great Mary Louise Wilson is a relief. And for those not in show biz...get ready to read some truth!" Melissa Leo, Academy Award-winning actor
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"Mary Louise Wilson's writing is like her acting--deft, droll, and full of surprises. Her book is a riot of characters met and characters played, of dreams dashed and dreams fulfilled--a funny, frank, and savvy chronicle of a wonderful life, in the theatre and beyond." David Hyde Pierce, Tony and Emmy Award-winning actor
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"A fascinating read from one of our greatest comic actresses." Bernadette Peters, Tony Award-winning actor
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"Mary Louise Wilson's should be a required read for all actors, no matter what stage of their career they are in. It's a masterpiece of hilarity and deadpan honesty, and a master class in acting. There is much to learn from her bible of theatrical experiences, from to writing her passion piece . Mary Louise Wilson equals GENIUS." Kristin Chenoweth, Tony and Emmy Award-winning actor
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"I LOVED this book! It is utterly honest and Mary Louise Wilson's spunky and irascible and gorgeous spirit just shines through. I think she's just great and so is the book. It's fascinating and insightful and authentic up the wazoo. I'm sure DV would approve." Alan Cumming, actor and New York Times bestselling author of Not My Father's Son: A Memoir
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"Mary Louise Wilson's memoir boasts the same tart wit, rim-shot timing, and scrupulous honesty as her memorable gallery of performance. In a book that belongs on the same shelf as Moss Hart's and William Goldman's , she offers a clear-eyed but heart-felt paean to a life spent in service of the theater. Her star shines every bit as brightly on the page as it does the stage." Doug Wright, Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright
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"Show-business memoirs are not a rare breed. What sets Wilson's apart is her unique voice--bone-dry, hilarious, literate--and sharp-eyed gaze at the working life of a character actor...I'm stunned by the finished book." Chronogram
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"MY FIRST HUNDRED YEARS IN SHOW BUSINESS is a sharp and brazenly authentic meditation on the elusiveness of fame and the determination one needs to "just charge ahead" amidst the uncertainty of making it in show business." Broadwayworld.com
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"Wilson's frank and fascinating story of perseverance will encourage aspiring actors and entertain theater buffs." Shelf Awareness
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"Here it is, the dishiest, funniest, chattiest, and most soul-baring theater book of the year. Tony winner Mary Louise Wilson -- forever dubbed "the best thing in it" in review after review -- captures her life and career in this delightful memoir. Pick it up and its slim nature (less than 200 pages) might disappoint. But then you start to read it and realize, "Oh, she only put in the good stuff!"" The Huffington Post
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"The book brims with anecdotes about working with such legendary figures as Bert Lahr, Judy Holliday, Eva LeGallienne and Lotte Lenya, as well as backstage types including, most memorably, an enormous wardrobe mistress...There are plenty of laughs -- after all, her first theater job was to play the Second Dead Lady in a revival of "Our Town" -- but there is plenty of candor, too." Nola.com
Review
"She spent most of her first hundred years in show business as an underestimated comedian, but as she embarks on the next hundred, she feels she's finally hit her stride." TheaterMania.com
Synopsis
The unabashedly funny and forthright memoir by the Tony Award winner for Grey Gardens, detailing the singular life and career of one of our most admired and acclaimed stage actors
About the Author
Mary Louise Wilson has acted on and off Broadway and in films and TV for nearly fifty years. Roles include Vera Joseph in 4000 Miles at Lincoln Center (Obie Award), Big Edie in Grey Gardens (Tony Award), Fraulein Schneider in Cabaret (Tony nomination), and Diana Vreeland in Full Gallop (Drama Desk Award). Her writing has appeared in the New Yorker and The New York Times and she teaches acting at Tulane. She lives in upstate New York.