Rating: 
Summary: great dish
Review: i came to the film late in my life, only last year, but the wait was worth it. all about eve made me mourn for a forgotten art form in cinema: sophisticated dialogue that packs an urbane wallop. the author matches the film with his passion and enthusiasm. great dish, great writing, great anecdotes. there should be another oscar category for books about hollywood. i nominate this gem; i only wish i could get my hands on mankiewicz's screenplay--perhaps a canny publisher will read this and take heed.
Rating:
Summary: "Sam Staggs...he knows all about it"
Review: I had such an incredibly good time reading this book that I am almost sad I can't go back, erase everything I've read from my mind and start again. From the author's hilarious and brief phone conversation with Celeste Holm near the start, all the way through his interview with 'real Eve' Martina Lawrence, Mr. Staggs has created the ultimate and perfect companion to ALL ABOUT EVE. If you love the film or Hollywood and Broadway (Staggs delves into the creation of APPLAUSE, the musical based on the same material), you will relish what this book has to offer. Top notch.
Rating: 
Summary: All About Staggs
Review: If properly edited, the book would have been half the size....just tell us how the movie was made, what Bette Davis, Celeste Holm, George Sanders were like while filming the movie...just tell us who got fired or hired from the production and why..just tell us all about eve, not all about the author. It is obvious that the author loves this movie. Many of his sentences begin with the same tone and wording from the movie script. Though the books starts off well, and keeps us in suspense about Mary Orr and what has happened to her, and who Eve really was or is, Staggs cannot but help himself in seeing something in the movie which really isn't there....namely the gay aspect. He is blatantly wrong. He does not seem to have a clue or has bothered to study social behaviour of the 1940' 50's. So what if Eve was wearing a trench coat with a hat? So what if Margo says "That evening we sent for Eve's pitiful belongings?" etc. The author wants to see an issue there which does not exist.....too bad...could have been a great book about a great movie.
Rating: 
Summary: An entertaining read
Review: If you love the film "All About Eve" or about the making of classic Hollywood films in general, you will probably love this book. 350 pages on "All About Eve"? Yes, and not a bit boring, I might add. There are tantalizing bits of information here about the stars of the film (Bette Davis and Celeste Holm disliked each other immensely and Marilyn Monroe was so nervous in her scenes with Davis that she would become physically sick afterwards) as well as behind the scenes stories of how the film came to be and the woman who was the inspiration for the character of Eve. Sidebars give other interesting info (such as the salaries of the actors). A glossary includes definitions of real names that are dropped in the dialogue of the film (I always wanted to know who "Mrs. Fiske" was, now I know). The only drawback is the author's habit of reading too much into symbolism that, more than likely, was never there in the first place. Also, a neverending gushing for the line "You can put this award where your heart ought to be" (it is obvious that this is the author's favorite line, he mentions it in almost every chapter). But these minor faults can be overlooked. The book is highly entertaining and film buffs will enjoy it.
Rating:
Summary: More of All About Eve
Review: If you want more of All About Eve that goes beyond just watching it again, this is the book for you. This isn't any kind of scholarly analysis, nor is it a work of pure gossip. It's an intelligent and informed discussion of how this brilliant film came to be. It's purely shocking how every single part could have gone to several others, fascinating and sometimes sad to read how these great actors interacted with each other. Staggs also includes discussion of the short story on which the film was based, and discussion of the reality on which that story was based. I enjoyed knowing that all the more since I wasn't really familiar with Broadway Theater of the time or its great stars. We also learn that there was a sequel short story More About Eve. My only disappointment with All About All About Eve was that the author didn't see fit to include the short story, or its follow-up in the book, nor even to explain why he didn't. That would have been very interesting reading.
Rating:
Summary: More of All About Eve
Review: If you want more of All About Eve that goes beyond just watching it again, this is the book for you. This isn't any kind of scholarly analysis, nor is it a work of pure gossip. It's an intelligent and informed discussion of how this brilliant film came to be. It's purely shocking how every single part could have gone to several others, fascinating and sometimes sad to read how these great actors interacted with each other. Staggs also includes discussion of the short story on which the film was based, and discussion of the reality on which that story was based. I enjoyed knowing that all the more since I wasn't really familiar with Broadway Theater of the time or its great stars. We also learn that there was a sequel short story More About Eve. My only disappointment with All About All About Eve was that the author didn't see fit to include the short story, or its follow-up in the book, nor even to explain why he didn't. That would have been very interesting reading.
Rating: 
Summary: Not quite a mass of fire and music, but a good read.
Review: In All About All About Eve, Sam Staggs tells of the birth, life and legend of one of the greatest films ever made (and certainly the best screenplay--in English at least). We get good looks at the personalities and paranoia of Joseph Mankiewicz, Bette Davis, Celeste Holm, Marilyn Monroe, George Sanders and Mrs. Sanders a.k.a. Zsa Zsa Gabor who turns out to be more hot-headed than Bette or a truckload of paprika.
Staggs' detailing of the process of the film is quite interesting and often bitchy fun. He gives the same treatment to the 1970 musical play "Applause" which is based on AAE. His analysis of the script, costumes, music and production design are also interesting. Where the book breaks down is in his pseudo-scholarly explanation of the subtexts, the films latent lesbian strain and its "camp" and ongoing appeal to gay men. These subtexts cannot be denied, but Staggs stretches credulity in some of his attempts to justify them. More knowledge of the practicalities of film making and the director's methods would have kept Staggs out of this trap. For example, photographing Randy Stuart in profile was probably dictated by her use of a candlestick phone rather than the need to show her as an incomplete woman. Many of Staggs’ painstakingly complied coincidences and connections will illicit an "oh brother" from some readers.
A close reading can be used to justify just about anything. On page 311 Staggs describes the meeting between Lauren Bacall and Joe Mankiewicz during her run in Applause. Staggs concludes his report with the sentence "Or was he just being kind?" By this Staggs must be implying that there had been a love affair between Bacall and Mankiewicz in the Forties or Fifties. Why else would he quote Steven Sondheim's song "Losing my Mind" about a long ago passion that never came to full fruition? Of course the author means no such thing, but I can read it that way if I want to.
All About All About Eve makes a cozy companion to the film and can help you draw more meaning, appreciation and pleasure from the masterpiece...
Rating:
Summary: A great book on Hollywood that reads like a novel.
Review: Juicy, irresistible reading. A great story about one of the great movies that's also the story of Hollywood in microcosm. It's packed with larger-than-life characters like Bette Davis, George Sanders, Darryl Zanuck, and of course Marilyn Monroe, and plenty of lesser-known but no less fascinating figures, like Elizabeth Bergner, the real-life Margo Channing upon whom the original story was based. It's also an intriguing mystery (was there a real Eve and who was she?)with an intriguing, satisfying wrapup--and with an ironic twist at the end. And the author tells his story in a unique, dramatic way, in the form of a novel, and weaves actual quotes in a way that you'll find hard to believe--but they're all documented. Amazing. All in all, one of the best and most enjoyable Hollywood books I've ever read. It would make a great movie.
Rating:
Summary: Marilyn is star ! -Marilyn Monroe(Garry Hixon)
Review: Marilyn shines in this one, she outdoes everybody, even upstaging Bette Davis, there all betting on how many men go into marilyns hotel room, a pretty good book, Marilyn has so many! Reminds me of todays stars and how they envy the public, no privacy, no anonymity, they can't go back and be a waitress, etc. I think Morisa Tomei and Drew Barrymore would be a good bet to write a new version about 2002-they could call it, Cinderella 2:Dreams come true- the most self-centered movie made in modern times about some obviously new Marilyn Monroe. Who she is in this century is obviously anonimous, and a local, which so quite obviously infuriates Hollywood even more. This book is a crack up, If you buy it, pass on the word that everyone in this book is jealous of Marilyn Monroe- except of course Marilyn...
Rating:
Summary: Way too much about All About Eve
Review: One of the best films about Hollywood (okay, okay, it takes place in the theater, but look between the lines, people) gets the overblown treatment in this tell-all book. For every piece of very interesting information (Bankhead vs. Davis, Davis vs. Holmes, director vs. studio), there are pages and pages of information which, while key to the making of "AAE", read like the resumes of people who died two decades ago. Still, "All About 'All About Eve'" still manages to pull out a few surprises. If you are a hopeless Margo Channing fan, buy and enjoy. Otherwise, visit your the local library and skim through the pages.
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