Encyclopedia of Hollywood Film Actors, Vol. 1: From the Silent Era to 1965

Rating:
Summary: Best of All!
Review: Barry Monush's "Encyclopedia of Hollywood Film Actors" is the best volume of its type. Other guides to performers tend either to be mean spirited or incomplete. This book is witty, informative and comprehensive. Each entry has some unusual or fascinating fact. This book has more complete credits information than most reference works, but this one is also fun to read. All the stars who became famous before 1965, including many of today's great stars, are here. Actors who came to prominence 1965->present will be covered in Vol. 2. The rare "headshot" photos alone are worth the price of purchase. If you know anyone who enjoys movies, they'll love this amazing book!

Rating:
Summary: Best of All!
Review: Barry Monush's "Encyclopedia of Hollywood Film Actors" is the best volume of its type. Other guides to performers tend either to be mean spirited or incomplete. This book is witty, informative and comprehensive. Each entry has some unusual or fascinating fact. This book has more complete credits information than most reference works, but this one is also fun to read. All the stars who became famous before 1965, including many of today's great stars, are here. Actors who came to prominence 1965->present will be covered in Vol. 2. The rare "headshot" photos alone are worth the price of purchase. If you know anyone who enjoys movies, they'll love this amazing book!

Rating:
Summary: The Best So Far
Review: This is the best comprehensive directory of Hollywood stars and featured players yet. What's so nice about the Monush are the head shots accompanying every entry. And they are good head shots indeed. When I mentioned to a friend that a film we just saw was narrated by Michael Hordern, I got a blank response. So, I opened the Monush to Hordern's entry and...instant recognition!

Monush is opinionated but never mean-spirited or pretentious (like David Thomson in his mis-titled "Biographical Dictionary"). And the entries aren't as dry as those of Katz's Filmgoer's Encyclopedia. (In fairness, Katz tries to cover all aspects of cinema, which makes his a nice companion to the Monush.)

I do have a problem about the editing which has, alas, caused me to deduct a star. There are typos/mispellings, which sometimes are pretty comical, like this one, from Alan Ladd's bio: "He became a diving champion while a teen, then a lifeguard, before singing a contract with Universal in 1932." (Note to publisher: spellcheck can't replace a good proofreader.) Also, there are factual errors. For example, Nina Foch's entry states that she played the secretary to a "suicidal [sic] businessman" in Executive Suite. This is incorrect. (The businessman died of a heart attack, the daughter was suicidal.) I know this sounds like carping, but these errors popped up after just the first brief scanning, and I wasn't looking for nits to pick. This is unfortunate, because Monush tries to make a story, instead of just a blurb, out each entry.

As long as you don't use this volume to settle trivia bets, and you want an armchair reference to find out who the names in the credit rolls are, this Encyclopedia is, well, encyclopaedic.

After Monush completes Volume II, covering post-1995, I'd love to see him tackle the character actors that we all know by face, but almost never by name. I'm sure many have stories just as fascinating and noteworthy as the stars (like John Ford's regulars), and I'd love to read about them from someone as good as Monush.