Man on the Flying Trapeze: The Life and Times of W. C. Fields

Man on the Flying Trapeze is the first biography in decades -- and the only accurate one -- of the beloved cinematic curmudgeon and inimitable comic genius W. C. Fields. Simon Louvish brilliantly sifts through evidence of Fields's own self-creation to illuminate the vaudeville world from which Fields sprang and his struggles with studios and censors to make his hilarious films-in the process confirming suspicions (yes, he did drink) and confounding them (he doted on his grandchildren). "One of the best movie biographies to come along in quite some time. . . . A] book to cherish."--Film Review " Man on the Flying Trapeze] nicely regales us with many vaudevillian stories. . . . Louvish does a heroic job."--Katharine Whittemore, New York Times Book Review "A rapturous, giddy, and irrepressible book. . . . Let us be clear: this is a delight, a marvel of research . . . and a superb argument for the case that William Claude Dukenfield was, and is, the greatest comic the movies have given us."--David Thomson "At last 'the Great Man' (as Fields called himself, accurately) has a great biography."--Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

Binding Type: Paperback
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Published: 03/17/1999
ISBN: 9780393318401
Pages: 564
Weight: 1.72lbs
Size: 9.23h x 6.15w x 1.36d

Review Citations: New York Times 03/14/1999 pg. 36