For many decades, Marion Davies's story has been a source of fascination to the public. From her humble days in Brooklyn to her rise to fame alongside press baron William Randolph Hearst, her story seems like a modern fairy tale. Gossip columnists and fan magazines have tried to capture her unique story for over one hundred years, and biopics and documentaries have tried to incorporate her story into countless screenplays. Amid the interest, the real Marion Davies has been largely hidden. Due to her wariness of strangers and the press, she shied away from interviews and trusted very few with the details of her own unusual life story. Through Gabrielle's archival research, and letters, notes, tapes, and interviews of Davies with family and friends, a woman emerges of enormous strength and resolve.
An entertaining, first-rate biography that necessarily serves, like it or not, as a corrective to Hollywood myth ... Gabrielle...spent nine years digging through archives and interviewing anyone she could find who knew Davies ... Among the delights of Gabrielle’s book are its forays into very old-school slang ... Despite the evident breadth and depth of Gabrielle’s research, her many insights, and her obvious affection for Davies, the woman herself remains at a bit of a remove—a vivid presence seen and felt, but not quite grasped. One problem is that, as a stutterer, she was a reluctant interviewee ... Davies the performer is an easier get.
Sparkling ... Gabrielle’s narrative is a breezy, colorful saga of Old Hollywood, full of showbiz picaresque, glamorous parties at Hearst’s San Simeon castle, and a touching romance between two flawed, magnetic personalities. Film buffs will want to check this one out.
