Tag: Celebrity Biography

The Flame Of Resistance – Damien Lewis (2022)

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Damien Lewis is the celebrated author, documentary film-maker and historian who is most famous for writing a number of best-selling non-fiction books (as well as a couple of fictional thrillers) about the SAS.  I haven’t read any of his books prior to this and it was his subject matter here which got me interested- the extraordinary performer Josephine Baker.  This book is titled “Agent Josephine” in the US and I wonder why the UK has gone with this less satisfactory title- I hope it wasn’t a commercial decision in case it put off what is probably a large male readership for this author’s work.  In both editions the same subtitle adds a little more information – “American Beauty. French Hero. British Spy.”

Josephine Baker (1906-75) is a twentieth century great.  Born in St. Louis, Missouri where her talent for performing helped her escape a life of poverty.  Her career limited by racism she moved to France where she became a sensation, her vibrancy, often risqué costumes, dancing and singing talent as well as her beauty led to her becoming one of the most famous and most photographed women in 1920s/30s Europe.  Her love for her adopted homeland and its acceptance of her was compromised by the rise of the Nazis and the fall of France.

After World War II Josephine was awarded, amongst other acknowledgements, the Legion D’Honneur, France’s highest service medal.  In succeeding years it has gradually been publicly recognised that hers was a vital role in supporting the Allies through Secret Service work.  On researching her life the author has uncovered just how important this work was, how long she managed to escape enemy attention and how team, partnered and solo missions had a significant impact on events of the war years.

Before war broke out her pilot’s licence saw her flying in aid and support and when Paris fell she refused to perform in Nazi occupied France but demand for her unique brand of morale boosting celebrity elsewhere enabled her to smuggle intelligence, information and documents within the trappings of costumes, music scores etc.  In the early years she was often accompanied by her menagerie of adored animals which added more chaos to her travels and actually helped her to carry out intelligence undertakings in plain sight.

Damien Lewis does well to bring the story alive of this extraordinary woman and her colleagues but even so, the secret nature of this work suggests that perhaps there is much more that she achieved which will never be uncovered.  His focus is very much on her war work and I think I do need to read a general biography to flesh out her many other achievements and to provide a greater context for these activities.  Recognition of just how unique this woman was, as a performer, as a member of the Resistance and as a British spy has begun to build up slowly over the decades.  In 2021 she became the 6th woman and 4th person of colour accepted for interment in the crypt of the Pantheon, alongside French greats such as Marie Curie, Alexandre Dumas and Victor Hugo.  I’m not convinced that she has gained the level of recognition her achievements demanded in her homeland and in the UK but hopefully this book will shine a light on this woman whose glamorous depiction of celebrity masked sheer bravery, determination and adherence to her beliefs.  Hers is a tale of extraordinary missions, invisible ink, microdots, secreted documents alongside her desire for peace and uncompromising insistence on equality.  This is a trail-blazer whose story demands to be known.

The Flame Of Resistance was published in the UK in 2022 by Quercus.

An Iron Girl In A Velvet Glove- Triona Holden (2021)

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Back in the late 1980s/early 90s I lived in Crouch End in North London where close by a recording studio used by Dave Stewart and Annie Lennox of the Eurythmics was a café called Josie’s. The first time I went in there it was like being in some parallel universe.  Around the café were photos of big stars from two or three decades before with a glamorous blonde woman, not unlike Diana Dors, often photographed in sparkly gowns and leotards.  This lady was obviously the same lady who was now making our coffee.  From the magnitude of the people she was photographed with and the lengthy span when these photos would have been taken this was someone who I clearly should have known, but I didn’t.

Finding out some information nowadays would involve ten seconds on Google but things were different then.  I felt I couldn’t just ask her.  I eventually discovered that this was Joan Rhodes, a long lasting star of variety and the early years of tv, famed as a strongwoman and for tearing up telephone directories and now the subject of Triona Holden’s book published by The History Press, which seems a fitting publishing house for this unique talent who was very much of her time but whose attitudes and qualities will still very much resonate today. 

Joan Rhodes (1921-2010) went down a storm on variety bills, bending nails and steel bars with her bare hands, lifting weights and members of the audience, tearing up phone books, being a one-woman tug of war team and once, famously, tripping and dropping comedian Bob Hope.  Looking very much a showgirl and not overly muscular she was billed as “The Strongest Woman In The World” and “The Mighty Mannequin.” She toured the world, performed for royalty, appeared on the “Ed Sullivan Show” in the USA and latterly ran a café in Crouch End where I encountered her.

The author befriended Joan in 2003.  By then retired and living in the garden flat she occupied for decades in Belsize Park she didn’t let that many people into her close circle but was a fiercely loyal long-time friend to luminaries such as Quentin Crisp, artist Dame Laura Knight, Marlene Dietrich and Larry Grayson.  She had an extraordinary tale to tell, was ripped off through attempting to self-publish an autobiography and so it was left to her old friend to tell this story eleven years after Joan’s death at the age of 89.

It’s a fascinating glimpse into the recent past, where things seem familiar and yet so far removed from today.  Joan did love to tell stories and had amassed large amounts of memorabilia and written accounts of events in her life and yet the author still discovered things she had chosen to hide.  Born into poverty, abandoned by her mother as a toddler, Joan credited the rage this caused within her to be the motivation for her feats of strength.  A street performer who worked her way up the variety ladder into becoming a highly recognised performer much feted by the popular press who loved to print stories about her. 

All this made me feel that I wished I had spoken more to her when I visited the café.  The author does a very good job of putting Joan Rhodes into context for a modern audience, even for those who might not now know what a telephone directory was! The book was inspired partly by the interest of the young production crew of BBC TV’s “The Repair Shop” where the author had one of Joan’s stage outfits she had inherited restored.  This felt both a nostalgic and empowering tale of a very special woman, who lived life on her terms, who used a unique physical talent extraordinarily and who also possessed great warmth, determination and resilience.

“An Iron Girl In A Velvet Glove – The Life Of Joan Rhodes” by Triona Holden was published in 2021 by The History Press.

And Away…- Bob Mortimer (2021)

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Although I’ve really enjoyed a healthy amount of the work of Bob Mortimer over the years I probably wouldn’t have bothered with this best-selling autobiography if it had not been for his appearances on BBC TV’s “Would I Lie To You”.  I came to this series quite late and have been watching catch-up earlier editions almost daily throughout this summer, and one thing I’ve learnt, is that if Bob Mortimer is a guest you are in for a treat.  His anecdotes on incidents of his life (not always true as that is the nature of the game but usually so) made me want to find out more.

Some of these anecdotes make it to the book and are very representative of the life of Bob Mortimer.  Born in Middlesbrough in 1959 we get a childhood shadowed by the early loss of his dad, his eventual decision to become a solicitor until an invitation to see a comedy show at a South London pub introduced him to Vic Reeves and in the fullness of time led him to being one half (although he wouldn’t credit himself with an equal fraction) of one of the best-loved comedy duos of our time.

I think those “WILTY” guest spots where Bob allows himself to shine through and his downbeat fishing shows with Paul Whitehouse were significant in the germination of this book but central to it is his 2015 quadruple heart-bypass and recovery.  Alongside this narrative thread which continues for most of the book is the chronological tale of Bob’s life.

The latent hypochondriac in me found the health stuff unsettling and I might not have chosen to read this had I known it was so central but we know that this has a happy ending and the Bob who recovers is a person more at ease with himself.  For much it is a tale of chronic shyness, of not fitting in, of undervaluing achievements (Who knew that his acting in the BBCTV reboot of “Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased) caused him such anxieties?) and yet coming much closer to calm, even a wisdom in his present life (well a wisdom that gets him to share; “As you age do not fear the elasticated waistband; it can be a good friend”).

His acknowledgement of the importance of comedy partner Jim Moir (Vic Reeves) is also central and it is here that the laugh out loud moments (not as many as I was expecting) tended to come.  There’s a good balance of the career and personal life which is something I always appreciate in a biography.

I really enjoyed spending time with Bob Mortimer and despite his self-effacing nature I felt he shared so well and I got a good understanding of him professionally and as a person.  You don’t get that in many celebrity autobiographies.  I’m delighted this book has been such a success.

And Away was published in 2021 by Simon & Schuster.  The paperback edition is now available.

Possessed: The Life Of Joan Crawford – Donald Spoto (Hutchinson 2011)

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Donald Spoto is a prolific American biographer who has written many Hollywood themed works, but also on the Royal Family and religious figures.  His first book, on Hitchcock, came out in 1976.  He is now in his eighties and living with his husband in Denmark.  There have only been a couple of works published since this biography, which is informed by his many years of experience of writing about the film industry.

Joan Crawford, known in her heyday as “The Movie Queen” has been much written about but views on her life and work took a different direction when disgruntled daughter Christina wrote “Mommie Dearest” (1978) which gained additional notoriety with the 1981 movie adaptation with such a sublimely over the top performance by Faye Dunaway (which she feels damaged her career) that it assured its place as one of the all-time cult films.

All this has not been good for Joan Crawford’s reputation.  It’s not been helped that her most remembered film now is the atypical Grand Guignol melodrama of “Whatever Happened To Baby Jane?” (1962) which pitched her against Bette Davis as battling siblings and which was not representative of her long career and prolific output.  Also, it was not helped by the only film roles available to her after this being mainly campy, low-budget efforts and not helped either by Shaun Considine’s 1989 “Bette & Joan: The Divine Feud” which looked at the relationship between the two stars in an unflattering light (incidentally one of my favourite biographies of all time).

Spoto believes we have it wrong.  He feels much of “Mommie Dearest” was invented and goes to some lengths to disprove the notorious “wire coat hanger” incident and believes there wasn’t much rivalry between Crawford and Davis.  Such perceptions have clouded Spoto’s subject who he believes is one of Hollywood’s most talented actresses (she was certainly one of the most popular). He states:

“She was a recognizably human and passionate woman who entertained millions; she made egregious mistakes and learnt from them; and she always had a legion of friends and countless admirers.”

Spoto’s own aim in this work is to play down the sensational aspects and highlight the career, focusing in on the films (70 of her 87 films still exist in some form).

Part of Joan Crawford’s long-lasting success was in her talent for reinvention as well as that, in a time of aloof glamour, (such as Garbo and Dietrich) she represented the accessible and hard-working, acknowledging the poverty she had escaped from and was in touch with her fans.  She did this by communicating with them to an extent which borders on the unique.  Spoto wrote to her when he was 11 and got a reply.  I have, in my possession, a letter from 1964 thanking a fan for a Christmas card.  This was a conscious move which assured her longevity and support, even at times when she was labelled “box office poison” by movie magazines.  She always befriended crew and had high expectations of the productions she worked on and yet the reputation we have been left of her was that she was a nightmare to work with.

I think probably the truth, as much as we’ll ever know it now that few from that time are still around is somewhere between Spoto’s underplaying and Christina’s monstrous recreation.  I did enjoy reading about her films in Spoto’s accounts but his wish to sweep the bitching under the carpet can trip him up.  He says no actors ever refused to work with her but had earlier stated that Spencer Tracy turned down the opportunity to work with her a second time.  The filming of the western “Johnny Guitar” (1954) is the stuff of movie legend with sparks blazing between Crawford and co-star Mercedes McCambridge.  Spoto is keen to acknowledge alcoholic McCambridge’s bad behaviour and tends to let Crawford off the hook slightly, despite her shredding her co-star’s costumes and prompting the director to say about her; “As a human being, Miss Crawford is a very great actress.”

I don’t want to come across as if I’m disappointed by Spoto’s measured appraisal of her career.  I’m fascinated by Crawford as an actress and disappointed that the number of films that still get shown and/or are readily available feels limited compared to other less significant actresses of her era.  I do think she was very much of her time and the type of material chosen for her has not dated so well.  She was a terrific movie star whose lasting popularity in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s show she was sublimely good at what she did and I welcomed Donald Spoto’s rebalancing of her life and career.  I suspect, however, that I’m more likely to return to Shaun Considine’s gleeful mauling as my definitive work.

Possessed: The Life Of Joan Crawford was published in 2011 by Hutchinson.

Let’s Do It – Jasper Rees (2020)

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Here’s a big book, the authorised biography of Victoria Wood that I’ve only just got round to despite it being one of my books I’d wished I’d read in 2020 (still only up to 70% of this list).  I think I’ve been a little nervous of this really hoping that Rees gets the balance right between the career and public persona and the very different private person and juggling also the humour of her work and zest for life with the inevitable sadness at reading of a life which ended too soon.

I don’t know of the author, but as a journalist, he seemed to have a professional but not close relationship with Victoria Wood in her latter years.  I was heartened by this book appearing on a number of Best Book Of The Year lists and one description of it was that it was “impeccable”.  It certainly is thorough.  This is the definitive biography of Victoria Wood, no one else need bother.  Rees has had access to all the right people and material and herein is included really all we would need to know.

He does indicate at the start that Victoria Wood was collecting material for a memoir, making audio tapes which he had access to.  It would have been fascinating to see how such a private person would have approached such a publication but it is unlikely that it would have been as thorough and probing as this biography.

It was so important to me that Rees got this right as Victoria Wood (1953-2016) is, in my opinion, the greatest British comedian.  I don’t think a single day goes by without at least one of her lines coming into my head.  Whilst reading this book I dug out a DVD of her award-winning “As Seen On TV” and was staggered to see how many of these were almost low-key asides in their original setting rather than fanfared jokes; often said by characters who were not central in the sketch.  This shows how good her writing was on every level.  And, despite this genius, not everything she did hit home, the same viewing showed that some of the early songs at piano have not dated well and yet, for many years, this was her bread and butter and the first flush of fame came when she performed comedy songs on 70’s TV talent show “New Faces” and topical songs on “That’s Life”.

As a shy, private person it must have been difficult for Victoria as fans felt that they had such a personal bond with her.  She tried to keep a brave face on in public but people could find her prickly and taciturn away from the limelight and even when in it.  I lived in Highgate when she did, would often see her around and was one time rendered speechless by her when teaching as she appeared in my classroom on a school visit for prospective parents (both of her children attended the Primary School I worked at).  This was a school which had more than its fair share of notable parents but this was the first time I felt myself floundering in presence of celebrity.  With someone as good as she was at analysing speech I felt my words being analysed as I spoke to the class, when, in reality, even if she was listening, she was just a mum looking around.

Rees gets this private/public person split very well.  She was demanding to work for, rewriting and striving for perfection and insisting on actors being word-perfect and not deviating from her script.  She was driven, as indeed she had to be, at the time there was no woman writing comedy in this way, there was much resistance to female led female written comedy on British television (“As Seen On TV” predated the first French & Saunders TV series by three years).  She was a pioneer, who achieved so many firsts in her career.  Jasper Rees is also strong in celebrating this, it made me want to go back and experience her work again, always a good marker for a biography.  What I don’t think I need to do is read any more about her life as it is all here- the years of struggling after the New Faces appearance, her marriage, the children, divorce and final illness set alongside the comedy magic she produced. This book deserves my five star rating.

Let’s Do It: Authorised Biography Of Victoria Wood was published by Trapeze in hardback in 2020 and paperback in 2021. Since then Jasper Rees has put together a collection of unseen sketches, songs and other memorabilia in his November 2021 publication “Victoria Wood Unseen On TV” which I am adding to my To Be Read list.

The Real Diana Dors – Anna Cale (2021)

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Diana Dors (1931-84) was a British National Treasure.  It’s close to forty years from her death and still new material is being published about her, this time by film and TV writer Anna Cale.  The author seeks to re-evaluate the career of Diana Dors through her performances rather than the gossip and scandal which surrounded her throughout her professional career.

It could be said that Diana was the first British “celebrity” with the trappings with which we associate that word today.  She was certainly aware of the power of the press and played up to their interest but before we discount her as a 1950’s Gemma Collins we have to consider the range and scope of her work and the affection the British public had for her.  The notion of celebrity both made her and overshadowed her (there were so many stories made up about the extent of her wealth that tax departments hounded her).  Her Hollywood career was pretty much scuppered by what could have been a publicity stunt gone wrong and at the time she was known as much for being “the girl in the mink bikini” (it was actually rabbit); “Britain’s Marilyn Monroe” (a comparison she hated) and for Sunday newspaper “exclusives” on her love life as for her many TV and film appearances.   

An all-rounder, Diana would embark on variety tours, released records and was a regular talk show guest (and host) and game show regular when the film roles dried up.  A whole generation rediscovered her by her upstaging of Adam Ant in his “Prince Charming” video but whether the public loved her from the film “Yield Into Night” (1956) which established serious acting credentials; her 70’s hit sit-com “Queenie’s Castle”; the TV adaptation of “Just William” or in one of my favourite roles of hers as Mrs Wickens in “The Amazing Mr Blunden”(1972) she always made an impression.

mrblunden4
Wickens!!! Diana with David Lodge

Cale is very factual and does not hang around for too much analysis (she does get fired up by Diana and husband Alan Lake’s need to do low-budget sex comedy films in the late 1970’s as that was all the British film industry could really offer at that time).  I would have liked a little more of the author’s voice and opinions in this re-evaluation as to be honest, there wasn’t much in this book that I hadn’t read before.  I think I favour a trashier publication from 1987 “Diana Dors: Only A Whisper Away” by Joan Flory and Damien Walne where the whole dichotomy of celebrity/actor is conveyed better.  That is a book I have read a couple of times and really enjoyed.  I was expecting more from Cale’s book with its greater hindsight expecting it to be the definitive word on the life and career of Diana Dors.

It wasn’t.  I’ve also read at least a couple of her autobiographical works and remember them being quite candid showing that Dors was not reluctant in keeping the scandalous side of her alive, knowing that this was what the public wanted and that it would sell books.  Amazon suggests three titles I haven’t read David Bret’s “A Hurricane In Mink” (2010): Niemah Ash’s “Connecting Dors” written in conjunction with Diana and Alan Lake’s late son, Jason (2012) and “The Shocking Truth” by Harry Harrison (2020) which shows that the interest in reading about her is without doubt still there.  I think Cale’s book may be the most restrained of these but that might not be what those wishing to find out more about this marvellous woman would want.

The Real Diana Dors was published in hardback by Pen and Sword in July 2021.

Le Freak- Nile Rodgers (2011)

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I don’t know why it has taken me ten years to read a book which seems so suited to me.  Subtitled “An Upside Down Story Of Family, Disco and Destiny” and written by a true original, gentleman and legend in the popular music industry this is a fascinating insight into Nile Rodgers and his Chic organisation.

I particularly favour music autobiographies when you really feel like you get to know the subject, where there is no holding back and when there is a good balance between the personal and professional life. This book has these elements just right.

I thought I knew a fair bit about Nile Rodgers.  In interviews he is a great raconteur and so stories like the conception of Chic’s biggest song “Le Freak” linked to an attempt to get into Studio 54 to see Grace Jones are very familiar but there was a lot I didn’t know.  This is where the family aspect comes in.  The suave appearance of himself and musical partner Bernard Edwards always gave off well-heeled vibes of the black urban professional making a name within the sophisticated world of disco culture of the late 70’s, Nile, however, was pretty much a street kid.  Born to a mother who was 13 years old when she got pregnant he was moved around for relatives to care for him and then back to mum.  By the age of 6 he was skipping school and travelling to forbidden areas of cities to spend his day in the cinema and before he was much older than that he was following family members’ proclivities in prodigious drug taking and alcoholism.

He was largely a functioning addict so it didn’t really hold back his multi-million selling career with Chic and production duties for Sister Sledge and Diana Ross and when disco succumbed to the racist, homophobic backlash of the Disco Sucks movement as a producer for David Bowie, Duran Duran, Madonna, Grace Jones and countless more.

The extent of his addictions, his attempts at sobriety and his response to the tragic death of Bernard Edwards in Japan in 1996 when Chic were firmly on the comeback trail are handled very effectively and poignantly.

We end in 2011 with a cancer diagnosis which we know he survives as 10 years on he is still very much with us and still a musical force to be reckoned with (especially as a live festival act).  I’m looking forward to a second volume to bring the Nile Rodgers story up to date.

Le Freak was published in 2011.  I read the Sphere paperback edition.

No Shame – Tom Allen (2020)

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One of the titles I focused on in my What I Should Have Read in 2020 post, I have now got round to it and it certainly met my expectations.

I’ve always been very impressed by Tom Allen.  A couple of years back he performed locally at what we thought was an absolute bargain price compared to many comedians who show up at our local theatre.  Having really enjoyed the show my partner posted positive comments on social media whilst sat in the pub afterwards.  By the time we got home he’d had a personal message from Tom thanking him for coming and for saying he’d enjoyed it- how nice was that!

Since then Tom has become a more regular face on TV.  I particularly enjoy him on “Bake Off’s Extra Slice” and “Bake Off: The Professionals”.  Over the Christmas period there was a new Channel 4 show “Tom Allen Goes To Town”, was one of three comedians locked overnight in Hamleys and co-presented a festive Bake Off. 

He has written a memoir which is of a much higher quality than many celebrity biographies.  The reason for this is partly his natural wit and aptitude at handling his material but also the focus he places on shame, which does influence his stand-up work and has had a significant effect on his life and mental health.  This gives his writing a sense of purpose and development.

Like Will Young in his “To Be A Gay Man” also published in 2020 much of this shame is linked to sexuality but it is also about the fear of standing out. His upbringing in Bromley, South East London where nobody seems to want to stand out holds an influence here, but, as so often happens, not wanting to stand out is what causes him to stand out.  His well-spoken, clear diction is at odds with his family and his neighbourhood, nobody seems to know where that has come from; as a teenager he dresses as a Victorian dandy and there is a wonderful story as to how he opts to deal with homophobic name-calling by doing something theatrical for a PTA event at school in Year 8 which he hopes will make him seem more cool but chooses an Alan Bennett monologue as famously performed by Julie Walters playing an actress on a porn set which becomes even more inappropriate when he does it in a ballgown.

Tom is so good at recreating these “shameful” moments of his life that you laugh with him, never at him.  If you have seen his stand-up routine some of the material will be familiar, for example, his childhood experiences at Bromley Leisure Centre was a highly memorable part of the stand-up show I’ve seen performed but it is great to have it again here and the familiarity had me laughing in anticipation as much as at the events.

This is thoroughly entertaining with serious points to make.  Tom is a product of an educational system tainted by Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative Government Section 28 ruling and as a youth grappling with sexuality his sense of being an outsider was reinforced directly because of this.  It takes years for Tom to begin to accept himself and this growth is catalogued in a well-written, funny, significant text.

No Shame was published in 2020 in hardback in the UK by Hodder Studio.

Hungry – Grace Dent (Mudlark 2020) – A Real Life Review

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I know who Grace Dent is.  I occasionally read her restaurant reviews in The Guardian and in other publications over the years and she generally makes me laugh.  I know her as a talking head on nostalgia programmes reminiscing about a biscuit or forgotten gem of Children’s TV. I don’t know much more than that about her but my interest was certainly piqued by the arrival of this work.  Subtitled “A memoir of wanting more”, when I finished it I was the one who was certainly wanting more.

Grace won me over from the Epigraph which conveys the wisdom of Coronation Street’s Ena Sharples circa 1965; “When I was a little lass, the world was half a dozen streets, an’ a bit of waste land, an’ the rest was all talk.”  Grace’s all talk is an upbringing in Carlisle and the importance food played in her working class Cumbrian home runs throughout as she develops a palate from the tinned Fray Bentos pie to unimaginably posh food at top London restaurants.  As Grace moves into a world of journalism, London magazines, working with Piers Morgan (life’s not always a bowl of cherries, I suppose) she remains the girl who swung around lampposts waiting to be called in for her tea.

Her relationship with family is beautifully conveyed, especially her parents and particularly her Dad as he begins to slip away from them with dementia which as the book moves towards the present day has a potent pull on Grace’s priorities. 

It is full of superb observations on life and the recalling of the 80’s and 90’s is palpable.  I relished her reflections, such as the most significant person in eighties Cumbria being the woman who worked in the big Asda in Carlisle with the price reduction gun.  I like a memoir where the writer carries you along establishing points of common contact and yet telling their own story and I think Grace Dent does this brilliantly here. 

I haven’t enjoyed a food-based memoir as much since Nigel Slater’s “Toast” (2003) and like that book it is the people fuelled by the food who really are memorable.

Hungry was published by Mudlark on 29th October 2020.  Many thanks to the publishers and Netgalley for the review copy.

To Be A Gay Man – Will Young (2020) – A Real Life Review

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I am a big Will Young fan.  A quick scan down my 100 Essential CD lists would illustrate this with his “From Now On” at #52, “Friday’s Child at #54 and “The Hits” compilation at #58.  He is somebody who I have written about a lot and who over the last 18 years has established himself as a significant national figure and especially within the cultural history of British LGBTQ+ issues.  This book is an inevitable choice for me to want to read soon after publication.

Some may be surprised by Will’s unflinchingly honest, forthright tone in this book but those of us who have listened to the “Homosapiens” podcast which he started with friend Chris Sweeney (I’ve gone through every edition with Will and Chris, the current series sees Will on sabbatical with Alan Cummings now alongside Chris) will be aware that the issues raised in this book are of great importance to the author.

Will has been upfront in the past about mental health issues and here deals with the notion of “gay shame” which for most of his life has overwhelmed him, threatening his ability to function.  Will very impressively explains the ways this becomes internalised, often at a very young age, in LGBTQ+ individuals and offers his strategies he has over time employed to help.

I did start off being slightly puzzled as to the extent of Will’s agonies over gay shame.  I am older than him and closer to the time when being gay was still considered a crime in the UK and grew up in a time when the only visible people who may have felt like I did (although this was never acknowledged by them at the time) were the camp comedians such as Kenneth Williams, John Inman, Larry Grayson and Frankie Howerd, none of whom were especially good candidates for the title of role model.  This history of LGBTQ+ culture is very well accounted for in Paul Flynn’s 2017 “Good As You”, my review of which can be read here.

In fact, it was really only when Russell Davies’ “Queer As Folk” was aired and Brian Dowling winning “Big Brother” and Will himself conquering the first season of “Pop Idol” that gay men could recognise something of themselves being portrayed.  Although Will seemed at the time an ideal, positive role model he was still grappling with the issues and shame of being gay which had been projected upon him by society and as a visible representation of a gay man he suffered considerable shocking homophobia from members of the public and in the media.  Will is right to air these here including the DJ Chris Moyles, the Mail Newspaper and correct once again to revisit the Mail’s hateful inclusion of an article on the death of the Boyzone singer Stephen Gately which is the reason why I will never pick up a copy of that newspaper again.  Incidentally, those most likely to suffer homophobia are young straight men who often in the form of “banter” have to face more putdowns and questioning of their sexuality than their gay male counterparts.

As well as being an honest and sensitive work this is extremely thought-provoking.  It made me wish I was part of an LGBTQ+ book group (or in fact any book group could valuably discuss this) to further explore the issues raised as it would be fascinating to hear others’ perspectives in the safe environment that such a group should provide. I may not have agreed with everything Will raises here but there is no doubt how his personal issues regarding being a gay man have caused a considerable struggle and his willingness to air these issues to help others is to be highly commended.

To Be A Gay Man was published in September 2020 by Virgin Books.