A dissection of film theaters which are compared to airport
terminals, general disillusionment with movie-going and how
the magic is gone, musings on pop culture and lack thereof,
the disappearance of our pop culture traditions that spawned
a generation of well cultured masses. All in one-hundred and thirty pages?
How is that accomplished? In one utterly engrossing passage,
Dougherty riffs on how directing and making a film, which
was once such a demanding task, is now reduced to a mere
mundane ability thanks to technology. Author Dougherty makes
two things clear during this novel; that Joi was both an
actress with great potential who never reached the upper
echelons of Hollywood royalty she had the potential to reach
due to circumstances that were both beyond her control and
due to her own behavior, and she was very beautiful.
Dougherty's
descriptions of Lansing are often immensely detailed and
describe her often with a sense of fawning that just seeps
from the pages. The descriptions make it clear Lansing was
gorgeous, with "rounded face and blonde hair not yet
platinum" which is the description of her before she broke
in to the business. He describes her as a pure beauty even
during her childhood; and it's not hard to learn why when
looking at her pictures. Lansing is the archetype for the
Hollywood starlet later to be embodied through kitschy
figurines, the beautiful body, "bullet bra", and gorgeous
face, to which Dougherty speaks only well even when pointing
out her negatives (Dougherty expresses utter anger at the
prospect of Lansing's romantic involvement with Frank
Sinatra and the possibility that she was just another of his
many conquests). |
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"Powerful
tools have been placed
in the hands of people with absolutely nothing to say."
[Page 94] |
The fact
that Dougherty is willing to commit a book to a very obscure
relatively unknown to the masses actress speaks only well to his
boldness and daring efforts to challenge himself. Even approaching
this obscure actress is something Dougherty uses as a positive, yet
again describing Lansing's lack of success as a positive that kept
her from being doomed to the same fates as Monroe, and Mansfield--or
as he describes it-- the "Blonde Curse". In one brutally sharp
biting quip he declares "She wasn't so much of an actor as more a
re-actor". Dougherty's extremely heartfelt and often inviting prose
make "Comfort and Joi" a truly rare Hollywood satire that is both
amusing and informative offering a new perspective on microscopic
elements of film. He even makes light of his infatuation with this
unknown bit actor noting that his obsession with her was unexpected
declaring--in the best line of the book--"Obsessions sneak up on you
like snowdrifts". In one passage, Dougherty examines the importance
of extras within a film in a sort of "Rosencratz and Guildestein are
Dead" scenario, posing the theory that perhaps each of them have
their own stories, it's maybe a hypotheses to either illuminate the
mind by offering a sense of optimism, or an attempt to give further
importance to a bit part of Lansing's in "Singin' in the Rain".
Dougherty
even makes the gross--albeit presumptuous praise--only a true
admirer could make, to describe Lansing with lines such as "She
couldn't ruin a movie, she could only improve it, by smiling and
leaning over". It's the reflection upon the author showing that not
only is he seeking to teach us about this obscure actress, but
express his love for her to us. Though the narrative describes
Lansing as a pure fighter, and survivor of the curse of the blondes,
he never shies away from admitting to the reader that she had had
work on her appearance to improve her looks which she assumed was
the ultimate confliction against her lack of truly defining roles
possibly unaware that her beauty and sheer presence was the reason
for her inability to be seen as anything else but a dumb ditzy
blonde. Lansing who died at only 44 from breast cancer, was an
actress who appeared as an extra performed in bit parts, performing
in her own show, and eventually acted in very low budget pictures,
but Dougherty examines each and every bit of that work, which he
admits is challenging. Yet, somehow he's up for the challenge. His
friends Mark and David question why her? Why not someone like
Marilyn Monroe or Jayne Mansfield, but he refuses because we know
everything about them. What do you, I, we know about Joi Lansing?
| With often
imaginative scenarios he ponders on for pages, Dougherty's character
brings himself closer to Lansing in his
mind thinking about her with her friends and meeting at dinners, and
it makes for a sense of intimacy the character
shares with the audience. At a tight 129 pages, Dougherty gives us
an engrossing story with writing that is both pleasant
and breezy. Dougherty's writing sucks you in and brings you to this
time, and his prose is often so elegant yet sharp as a
blade with lines so hard hitting it's just so entertaining, such as
his one description alluding jokingly that perhaps
homosexual men were the perfect plan for man who make heterosexual
men look like the rough draft, perfect men so
well done that it would only take the same sex to satisfy them. It's
just sharp lines like that that often made me break in to
laughter. Though, one real caveat with "Comfort and Joi" is that
Dougherty often meanders when he attempts to
reminisce. As warm and pleasant as it may have been to recollect
walking through his grandmother's home and
describing every single detail of her making him his daily tuna fish
sandwich--it doesn't exactly translate well on the page
as engrossing material. But much of that hardly diminishes what the
content has to offer. |
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After I
had finished the book, something that felt all too short, I realized
that the novel is less about an obscure actress,
and more the requiem for pop culture (which becomes apparent in page
94, where Dougherty really provides heavy
analyses, and interesting insight with immense zeal). It's a man who
is in love with an obscure starlet, but, the starlet is in
the end a microcosm of something far more vast. Dougherty riffs on
pop culture throughout the book displaying gripes on
constantly changing symbols and the fading of old culture that will
be deemed irrelevant in the years to come. To some it
may look like a baby boomer refusing to accept change, but in
reality it's expressing sadness for symbols that culture was
built on, symbols that created this vacuous pop era, yet it's just
being given the boot. Deemed irrelevant. By profiling this
actress in this love letter, he's more profiling the pop culture of
a simpler time that will come to obscurity. He gives us a
view in to this pop culture world, because as he says "If he
doesn't, who will?" With "Comfort and Joi", Dougherty gives
a bit actor her spotlight, and it's one of the best books I've read
in years. If you consider yourself a
remotely educated film buff, you'll read it too.
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