Declare Books As Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life
Original Title: | Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life |
ISBN: | 1416553649 (ISBN13: 9781416553649) |
Edition Language: | English |
Characters: | Steve Martin |
Literary Awards: | Grammy Award Nominee for Best Spoken Word Album (2009) |
Steve Martin
Hardcover | Pages: 207 pages Rating: 3.87 | 79460 Users | 5048 Reviews
Be Specific About Appertaining To Books Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life
Title | : | Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life |
Author | : | Steve Martin |
Book Format | : | Hardcover |
Book Edition | : | Anniversary Edition |
Pages | : | Pages: 207 pages |
Published | : | February 29th 2008 by Scribner Book Company (first published November 20th 2007) |
Categories | : | Nonfiction. Biography. Autobiography. Memoir. Humor. Comedy |
Interpretation Supposing Books Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life
In the midseventies, Steve Martin exploded onto the comedy scene. By 1978 he was the biggest concert draw in the history of stand-up. In 1981 he quit forever. This book is, in his own words, the story of "why I did stand-up and why I walked away." Emmy and Grammy Award winner, author of the acclaimed New York Times bestsellers Shopgirl and The Pleasure of My Company, and a regular contributor to The New Yorker, Martin has always been a writer. His memoir of his years in stand-up is candid, spectacularly amusing, and beautifully written. At age ten Martin started his career at Disneyland, selling guidebooks in the newly opened theme park. In the decade that followed, he worked in the Disney magic shop and the Bird Cage Theatre at Knott's Berry Farm, performing his first magic/comedy act a dozen times a week. The story of these years, during which he practiced and honed his craft, is moving and revelatory. The dedication to excellence and innovation is formed at an astonishingly early age and never wavers or wanes. Martin illuminates the sacrifice, discipline, and originality that made him an icon and informs his work to this day. To be this good, to perform so frequently, was isolating and lonely. It took Martin decades to reconnect with his parents and sister, and he tells that story with great tenderness. Martin also paints a portrait of his times-the era of free love and protests against the war in Vietnam, the heady irreverence of The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour in the late sixties, and the transformative new voice of Saturday Night Live in the seventies. Throughout the text, Martin has placed photographs, many never seen before. Born Standing Up is a superb testament to the sheer tenacity, focus, and daring of one of the greatest and most iconoclastic comedians of all time.Rating Appertaining To Books Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life
Ratings: 3.87 From 79460 Users | 5048 ReviewsJudge Appertaining To Books Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life
Is it an endorsement to say that this is the most unfunny comedy memoir Ive ever read? In my (otherwise glowing) review for Amy Poehlers Yes Please, I wrote about how the book is not really about comedy, in that Poehler never spent much time getting into the nitty-gritty of how she plans her characters, and all the work that goes into each one. This seems to be a common theme in the comedy memoirs Ive read so far everyone seems reluctant to discuss the work that goes into being funny, or toI was upraised when I saw Caros review of this book and I definitely wanted to read a book written by a comic, who was with bunny ears, (a true witty playboy (ups, sorry, playgirl) bunny:D) My experience with memoirs is 50/50 (as before this one I read only 2, one was really good and heartbreaking (The Diary of a Young Girl) and the other was awful and heartpuking (Scar Tissue). Im happy to say that this book belongs to really good and heartbreaking. "Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life" is a flow
I loved this book so much because it was everything I subconsciously wanted it to be and nothing that I expected it to be. I thought it would be mostly about Martin's career as a primarily comedic actor and it basically ends at the onset of his film career. I thought it would be hilarious and filled with jokes and I think I actually laughed out loud about five times. And a part of me harbored some sort of belief that every person who saw Steve Martin do stand up comedy must have known they were
I count my idols on one hand. When I was 18 I took a cross country road trip with my father during which we listened to Martin's LET'S GET SMALL on repeat for the entire length of New Mexico. The trip confirmed a few beliefs, yes my father was the greatest man on the planet, and yes Steve Martin was a close second. Martin's stand-up has still never been rivaled, a perfect blend of absurd with a straight face, as if his goal was to make the joke fly over the audience's heads. Many times there
This is a very enjoyable read. I like Steve Martin's writing, especially his novels Shopgirl and The Pleasure of My Company, and this memoir is a good behind-the-scenes look at how he came to craft his hyper-silly comedy routine of the 1960s and '70s. I was interested to learn how much philosophy Steve had studied and how he evolved his brand of comedy. Rather than cue the audience for a punchline, he got rid of the punchline altogether and went on with another bit, waiting for the audience to
"I was born a poor black child," I shouted repeatedly as a very little boy on our family trip down South. I'd heard Steve Martin say it in a movie that I didn't understand, but I did understand that it was an absurd thing to say, and that was enough for me! It was too much for my super white New England parents on that trip down through the Carolinas, Georgia, etc.At that young age and for years after, Martin's humor resinated with me and I never fully grasped why until reading his autobio, Born
A short memoir written and read by Steve Martin with a surprisingly flat affect, this is his truth about how and why and he began and ended his stand up career. Honest and surprisingly touching in parts, this is mainly his chronological rise to fame in a time when comedy and those producing it were regarded differently. Unique, philosophical, creative, and funny, Steve Martin has always been my number one choice for fantasy BFF. 3.5 stars
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