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The Herald Scotland
20-07-2025
- Entertainment
- The Herald Scotland
Fame, food, music, sex and sport: Best 10 memoirs to read this summer
Electric Spark: The Enigma of Muriel Spark, Frances Wilson, Bloomsbury, £25 Muriel Spark, that most mercurial of Scottish writers never made it easy for her biographers (she had her own official biography delayed by seven years and then dismissed the result as a 'hatchet job'). At the same time, though, her story is not short of incident. An unhappy marriage to a man prone to violent outbursts (it was when he tried to shoot her that she fled with their son), the abandonment of said son, a breakdown, a religious conversion; she made sure there was plenty of material. Wilson makes the most of it. British actor and comedian Peter Sellers (Image: free) The Life and Death of Peter Sellers, Roger Lewis, Riverrun, £30 After the huge success of Roger Lewis's incredibly moreish Erotic Vagrancy, his joint memoir of Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, it's no surprise that his 2004 memoir of Peter Sellers should be spruced up and put once more out into the world. If I didn't enjoy it quite as much as Erotic Vagrancy that's mostly because I've never really warmed to Sellers the performer or the man (the latter would be hard, to be fair, given the way he treated his wives and, well, pretty much everyone else). But Lewis gives both the career and the life his full attention here. And he is a sharp, often waspish guide: 'Because she was unobtainable, [Sophia] Loren stayed Seller's ideal woman,' he writes at one point. 'Even from beyond the grave, he was faithful to her memory and inspiration. Interviewed through a ouija board by a psychic named Micki Dahne, he said, 'Sophia was my ultimate woman.'' And it's probably worth it alone for the addition of Lewis's droll account of the filming of the big screen version of this book. Naked Portrait: A Memoir of My Father Lucian Freud (Image: Picador) Naked Portrait: A Memoir of My Father Lucian Freud, Rosie Boyt, Picador, £12.99 And talking of sacred monsters … Novelist Rosie Boyt's memoir of her dad and one of England's greatest painters of the postwar 20th century (he's jostling for the title with Bacon, I reckon) is a revealing take on the artist and the man. The word 'shocking' was used again and again in reviews of the book. Boyt, now 66, looks back on their relationship and her own life as a young woman in 1980s London. As you would expect she has the fiction writer's eye for detail. The Impossible Man: Roger Penrose and the Cost of Genius, Patchen Barss, Atlantic, £12.99, August 28 To get a measure of Patchen Barss's biography of the Nobel Prize-winning mathematician and physicist Roger Penrose (now coming out in paperback) you just need to read the prologue which begins with an account of Penrose heating up a cup of coffee in the microwave in 2008 and then proceeds to give us a brief history of the 13.7 billion years since the birth of the universe. This account of one of the greatest cosmologists of the 20th century takes on both the science and the man. Del Amitiri (Image: free) The Tremolo Diaries, New Modern, £22, out August 28 This summer is a good one for music memoirs from ageing pop stars. As well as The Absence, Budgie's account of his life in Siouxsie and the Banshees there's also Kevin Rowland's self-flagellating memoir about his time in Dexys Midnight Runners (Bless Me Father, Ebury Spotlight, £25). But if you can wait until the end of August it's worth considering The Tremolo Diaries. At first glance it might not seem promising - a tour diary of Justin Currie's band Del Amitri as they schlep around America alongside Semisonic and Barenaked Ladies, and then around the UK and Europe in support of Simple Minds (who come out of this account very well, it has to be said). But there's much more to this than an ageing musician's grumbling about bad hotels and bad food. Because in these pages Currie is coming to terms with his own Parkinson's diagnosis - what he calls the Ghastly Affliction; his tremor, meanwhile, is named Gavin - while also dealing with the fact that the love of his life is now in a care home. And yet for all the pain and fear and heartache in these pages, it's also full of life and joy and copious swearing. I laughed out loud more than once. Currie is realistic about his condition but not maudlin about it and he has retained his very Scottish ability to be entertainingly angry at things that annoy him. The result is a thrill of a book and a great marker for new music publisher New Modern. Oh, and if BBC Scotland ever wants to make a programme that people might actually want to watch, just send Justin and a camera crew around the art galleries of Europe. His art criticism here is by turns caustic and funny. He has all the potential to be TV's new Sister Wendy. Read more Tart: Misadventures of an Anonymous Chef, Slutty Cheff, Bloomsbury, £16.99 Sex and food. Food and sex. This pseudonymous account of life in London restaurants is greedy for both. I could have done with less sex myself, but maybe that's because I'm an ageing parent these days. Ah, but the food. Our author writes about it with such glee and detail you are salivating as you read. And she brings a real energy to writing about life in kitchens (you can tell Anthony Bourdain is one of her heroes). She's also very good at nailing the misogyny, misery and pleasure of a chef's life. Namaste Motherf*ckers, Cally Beaton, Headline, £22, July 31 Language Timothy. Sorry. Language, Cally. Comedian and podcaster Cally Beaton's new book is a mash-up of memoir and manifesto aimed at offering a map to midlife female reinvention. As someone who went from being a studio exec to appearing on Live at the Apollo, she has some experience to share on the matter. Can you be funny about failure? Turns out you can. And the menopause and misogyny and the Hoffman Process (for those of you desperate to Google something). Mike Tyson (Image: Getty Images) Baddest Man: The Making of Mike Tyson, Mark Kriegal, Ebury Spotlight, £25 Granted, it's perfectly possible that the idea of spending a few hundred pages in the company of the heavyweight boxer and, lest we forget, convicted rapist, Mike Tyson may not be to your taste. Tyson's story is a brutal one, in terms of what was inflicted on him and what he inflicted on others (and sometimes himself). And yet he is still here and he's now a cannabis mogul. Kriegal's book tackles it all. How to Lose Your Mother: A Daughter's Memoir, Molly Jong-Fast, Picador, £16.99 Vanity Fair writer Molly Jong-Fast looks back on her turbulent, sometimes chaotic, relationship with her mother, Erica Jong, novelist, feminist and author of the notorious Fear of Flying, from childhood to Jong's descent into dementia. Expect anger, love and grief. Nouvelle Femmes, Ericka Knudson, Chronicle, £26 Film historian Ericka Knudson's new book has the rather clunky subtitle 'Modern Women of the French New Wave and Their Enduring Contribution to Cinema'. But that can't be said of its subjects, actresses Anna Karina, Jeanne Moreau, Jean Seberg, Brigitte Bardot and filmmaker Agnes Varda. Just those names conjure up images of the Left Bank, coffee and croissants, and striped sailor shirts. Actually, you don't have to imagine them. This book enhances Knudson's text with photographs, film posters and neat design.
The Irish Sun
03-06-2025
- Entertainment
- The Irish Sun
Sexy BBC drama star in the frame to play Elizabeth Taylor in blockbuster TV show about movie icon
RISING Brit star Marisa Abela is in the frame to play Elizabeth Taylor in a blockbuster TV drama charting the movie legend's sensational life. The actress won a Bafta for playing sexy financier Yasmin Kara-Hanani in three series of the BBC's bonking-and-banking drama Industry. 4 Marisa Abela is in the frame to play Elizabeth Taylor in a blockbuster TV drama charting the movie legend's sensational life Credit: Getty 4 Screen siren Liz Taylor is rumoured to have once had a threesome with President John F Kennedy and actor Robert Stack Credit: Getty 4 Marisa won a Bafta for playing sexy financier Yasmin Kara-Hanani in BBC drama Industry Credit: Getty An insider said: 'Bosses of the adaptation want someone who can capture the essence of the single-minded woman that married seven times and was said to have had a voracious sexual appetite. 'It's very early days for the project but the producers want to assemble formidable British talent with the aim of making this a blockbuster series.' Former EastEnders boss Dominic Treadwell-Collins is developing the drama — called Read More on TV The scripts are being written by Times columnist Caitlin Moran, a superfan who once said of her idol: 'She ate up life like a sexy glutton.' It is based on the book Erotic Vagrancy, written by Roger Lewis, about Liz's passionate love affair with husband The London-born star of Cleopatra and Giant, who died in 2011 aged 79, was said to have had sexual needs as famous as her husband's. Legend has it that she once had a threesome with President John F Kennedy and actor Robert Stack. Most read in News TV Producers Happy Prince made the racy adaptation of The company is part of ITV Studios, which means the drama could end up airing on ITV. Seven divorces, health drama & a public affair - Elizabeth Taylor's controversial life revealed as doc shares her side But it may end up in a bidding war among streamers with a hunger for quality British drama. 4 Marisa as Amy Winehouse opposite Jack O'Connell as Blake Fielder-Civil in Back to Black Credit: PA
The Guardian
02-04-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Mr Burton review – the teacher who inspired and encouraged screen legend Richard Burton
The career of Richard Burton seemed mythic at the time, and more so in retrospect. In Pedro Almodóvar's latest movie The Room Next Door, Julianne Moore's character is even shown reading Erotic Vagrancy, Roger Lewis's account of Burton's then-adulterous relationship with Elizabeth Taylor in the early 60s, the title taken from Pope John XXIII's extraordinary denunciation: 'You will finish in an erotic vagrancy, without end or without a safe port.' In fact, the nearest thing Burton ever had to a safe port was his inspirational English teacher Philip Burton in Port Talbot, south Wales, whose own frustrated dreams of the theatre were poured into the bright young miner's son Richard Jenkins, coaching him in acting and even making him his legal ward and getting him to change his surname to Burton to facilitate the teacher's sponsorship of his Oxford scholarship. It's the subject of this heartfelt, vigorously acted, enjoyable, if slightly naive movie from screenwriters Tom Bullough and Josh Hyams, and director Marc Evans. Toby Jones stars as the spaniel-eyed Mr Burton and Harry Lawtey is Richard, a lanky, needy kid morphing into that insufferably haughty and sonorous prince of the English stage. It tells a uniquely painful and dysfunctional story, and does its best to show how Burton's pride always coexisted with shame and self-hate, and culminated with him playing Hal in Henry IV Part 2 at Stratford with Mr Burton in the audience, the pair effectively enacting their own version of the Hal/Falstaff betrayal scene. The film also takes up the disputed claim that Richard's boozy and negligent dad only relinquished legal guardianship to Mr Burton in return for the teacher's cash payment of £50, the equivalent of £1,300 today. That may or may not be true, but it is certainly consistent with something deeply uncomfortable in the whole affair – this is no simple feelgood story. Even Billy Elliot's dad didn't actually give up his parental rights. Lawtey makes for a livewire Richard, living with his sister Cis (Aimee-Ffion Edwards) and her glowering husband Elfed (Aneurin Barnard) because there's no room with his drunk dad Dic Jenkins (Steffan Rhodri) down the road. When he does well in Mr Burton's English class and at his drama club, he moves in to Mr Burton's house, where the film imagines a landlady called Ma Smith (Lesley Manville), perhaps to provide a chaperoning presence in the story. The drama here is absolutely clear that there was nothing predatory in the older man's intentions, despite an ugly homophobic jibe from Dic Jenkins once he'd got that fabled £50 in his hand. But certainly Richard himself is resentful and confused and there is an excruciatingly embarrassing encounter between the two in Mr Burton's bedroom with both in their pyjamas. Does the film bowdlerise the teacher's complicated, hidden emotional life? Perhaps, yes. There is no evidence of abuse, but no one is under any illusions about what others were insinuating. Jones certainly shows Mr Burton's sad and dignified loneliness. Mr Burton is in UK and Irish cinemas from 4 April.
Telegraph
24-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
David and Victoria Beckham ‘inspired' BBC's new Agatha Christie series
Victoria and David Beckham provided the inspiration for the BBC's latest Agatha Christie adaptation, its makers have said. Towards Zero features a famous sportsman and his wife, whose marriage has come under the microscope during a sensational divorce case in which he confesses to an affair. The makers of the BBC One series said they had drawn parallels between the fictional couple and the Beckhams. 'We were in development at the time the David Beckham documentary came out, and we did a lot of talking about that,' said Rebecca Durbin, the drama's producer, citing 'the excitement, the celebrity, the craziness' that surrounds the Beckhams. The drama's director, Sam Yates, joked that using the Beckhams as inspiration was 'incredibly lowbrow'. The Beckhams have denied rumours over the years of a pending divorce and remain happily married. In the Netflix documentary, they make oblique reference to claims that David had an affair with his personal assistant Rebecca Loos while he was playing for Real Madrid. Towards Zero is based on Christie's 1944 murder mystery. It stars Oliver Jackson-Cohen as tennis star Nevile Strange, Mimi Keene as his new wife, Kay, and Ella Lily Hyland as his ex-wife, Audrey. The trio are drawn into uneasy proximity during a stay at the home of Nevile's aunt, Lady Tressilian, who is played by Angelica Huston. Durbin said that the adaptation would put the sex into Christie. 'We talked a lot about sexy Christie,' she said at the drama's launch. 'The situations are so modern. 'Lucy Worsley [in her biography of Christie] talks a little bit about Agatha and her modern attitudes towards sex and female desire, and that was something we took into account.' The cast was also asked to read Erotic Vagrancy, Roger Lewis's book about the passionate affair between Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, as additional preparation. James Prichard, the author's great-grandson and chief executive of her estate, said: 'These are modern shows. They're grown-up shows. I think it's an incredibly powerful moment. And on that basis, I am comfortable with it. It's fairly in-your-face but… it's a crucial part of the show.' Mr Prichard also told the Daily Mail that he was relaxed about characters using the f-word, which did not happen in Christie's books. 'I think probably the modern world has moved beyond really minding massively,' he said. He said of his great-grandmother: 'She certainly wouldn't have used the f-word. I can be pretty sure of that. But it's a generational thing, isn't it? We're doing adaptations in 2025, not in 1925.' Towards Zero is one of Christie's lesser-known works but she considered it to be one of her best. In a letter to a Japanese fan, she included it in a list of the 10 best mysteries she had written. It has been adapted for television by Rachel Bennette. The murder happens late in the book and the three-part drama follows suit, with no murder in the first episode. Yates said: 'It's a who's-going-to-do-it that becomes a whodunit.' Huston said: 'When I was first offered the part of Lady Tressilian, I was delighted at the prospect that my British television debut would be in an Agatha Christie production. She is, after all, the Queen of Crime.' Her English accent is impeccable, and Yates revealed that the Oscar-winning actress can also do an excellent Northern accent honed through watching Coronation Street, one of her favourite shows.
