Detailed item info | Synopsis | In 1970, acclaimed director Elia Kazan agreed to be interviewed by filmmaker Jeff Young for this book, under the condition that Young would not publish it until Kazan wrote his autobiography (which was not released until 1988). Based on interviews over an 18-month period, the book collects Kazan's thoughts on his membership in the Communist party, his feelings about the blacklist, and his testimony before the House Un-American Activities Committee in 1952, when he gave the committee names of former Party members, many of whose careers were subsequently destroyed.
| | Details | | Editor: | Jeff Young |
| | Size | | Length: | 368 pages | | Height: | 9.5 in. | | Width: | 6.3 in. | | Thickness: | 1.2 in. | | Weight: | 24.0 oz. |
| | Publisher's Note | In 1971, young filmmaker Jeff Young sat down with his favorite director, the legendary Elia Kazan, to discuss making movies. Over several years and hundreds of one-on-one interview hours later, Kazan revealed to Young his methodology for dealing with the problems and issues in each of his films and his experiences working with such actors, producers, and writers as James Dean, Marlon Brando, Tennessee Williams, Vivien Leigh, John Steinbeck, and many others. He also spoke about his experience as a witness before the House Un-American Activities Committee.
Young conveys the essence of these interviews in his fascinating book published coincidentally in the same year that Kazan was given a special Academy Award honoring his lifetime achievement. The book features a summary of each film plot and a discussion of 18 of the director's films in his own words, concluding with the author's own commentary on Kazan's final film, THE LAST TYCOON.
In this collection of interviews, renowned Academy Award -winning director Elia Kazan ("On the Waterfront, East of Eden, Gentleman's Agreement, Splendor in the Grass, Baby Doll, The Last Tycoon, A Face in the Crowd", and others) reveals with brutal honesty the joys and complications of production and his unique insights on acting, directing, and producing. 90 photos. Index.
| | Industry reviews | "Young is not much of a writer; his introductory chapter manages to be at once puffy and flat. But he is a knowing interviewer with independent opinions that incite Kazan to justify his movies...."
Goodman
"[A] valuable piece of film history."
Tharsing
"[I]t is hard not to warm to Kazan, or at least to the Kazan presented in the pages of Jeff Young’s book-length interview, which is to say, the version of himself that he has chosen to present because the author or editor or compiler--whatever--is frank about the collaborative nature of the enterprise that Kazan apparently reviewed and approved. The voice that was so beguiling in the director’s extraordinary, doorstop-sized 1988 autobiography is back again for an encore. He comes off like a character out of Damon Runyon. He is blunt and candid. His language is earthy."
Los Angeles Times (12/09/1999)
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