Coronet Books
7 total works
Katharine Hepburn: grande dame of American actresses, fierce individualist, and living legend. Nominated for 12 Academy Awards and winner of four, Hepburn achieved stardom against formidable odds. The woman behind the legend emerges in this sympathetic yet clear-eyed portrait of her exceptional life and loves. Filled with accounts of her relationships with Spencer Tracy, Howard Hughes, and many others, here is the fascinating story of a determined and invincible woman. From her ferociously guarded private life to Broadway's lights and Hollywood's Golden Age, A Remarkable Woman reveals a star whose courage and magnetism knew no bounds. Throughout her life Hepburn spoke her mind, mixing a native Yankee forthrightness with the social conscience she learned from her parents and her own brand of stubbornness. This book is a fascinating look not only at the invincible Katherine Hepburn but at a whole era-the golden age of Hollywood set against the struggles for women's equality and the glittering lights of Broadway.
In this biography, Anne Edwards concentrates on the early years of Ronald Reagan - his childhood poverty, film stardom and his politicization via the Screen Actor's Guild. Reagan grew up in small towns in Illiinois. Known as "Dutch" by his friends, he was athletic and made his reputation locally as a lifeguard, where he was credited with saving 77 lives in a fast-running river. Trying his hand at radio sports reporting revealed a talent which led him to Hollywood and, eventually, a contract with Warner Brothers. Research for this biography involved interviews with over 200 people important in the life of Reagan and access to the Warner Brothers archives, which also provide information on the Hollywood of the period. Anne Edwards is author of "Haunted Summer", which has been filmed, and "Vivien Leigh", and is also biographer of Katherine Hepburn, Judy Garland and Margaret Mitchell.
The life of Princess May of Teck is one of the great Cinderella stories in history. From a family of impoverished nobility, she was chosen by Queen Victoria as the bride for her eldest grandson, the scandalous Duke of Clarence, heir to the throne, who died mysteriously before their marriage. Despite this setback, she became queen, mother of two kings, grandmother of the current queen, and a lasting symbol of the majesty of the British throne. Her pivotal role in the abdication of her eldest son, the Duke of Windsor, is just one of the events that provide the backdrop for both thrilling biography and for narrating the splendors and tragedies of the entire house of Windsor.
Praised as “undoubtedly the best of the many books on Judy Garland” by no less a critic than John Lahr (the son of Bert Lahr, the Cowardly Lion in The Wizard of Oz), Anne Edwards’s biography attempts to present a complete picture of the late actress, and not just the boozing, drug-addicted caricature of a woman that is central to lesser biographies. From Edwards's account we learn, for example, that Garland saw it as her duty to provide for her family financially, a generosity that her mother Ethel exploited with disastrous results. A student of great poets—Shelley, Keats, and Browning in particular—she often tried her own hand at verse; surviving poems are reproduced here. Above all Judy Garland sought to please, whether it was an audience or a studio head, and therein lies her powerful and heartbreaking story.
This is the story of the actress who became a Hollywood legend by winning the coveted role of Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind, and whose circle included both theatrical and political celebrities, from Winston Churchill to Noel Coward, John Gielgud, and Marlon Brando. But behind the dazzling exterior lay the sinister shadow of another Vivien Leigh-a shadow which pursued her throughout her aristocratic upbringing, her frustrating first marriage, her tempestuous romance with Laurence Olivier, and her meteoric rise to stardom. As The New York Times wrote of the hardcover edition, "To read her story is to be inspired with pity and terror."