Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
A one sided story, 1 Aug 2001
By A Customer
Whether or not it was just to make a quick buck I don't know, but Bob Zmuda's perspective on Andy Kaufman's life has a feel of something hastily thrown together. A lot of Bob's musings appear to be those of a lesser man trying desperately to cash in on his departed "friends" renaissance. He credits himself as the creator of many of their stunts and virtually claims that without him Andy would have been nothing. There are also large sections where Zmuda attempts do demystify Andy through the use of supermarket-magazine psychology... However, the book is informative and allows Andy fans a greater insight into his history, psyche and life in general...
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
A funny and insightful look into the head of a comic genius, 7 Sep 1999
By A Customer
This book defied categorization. It's certainly a fascinating and very funny read, but I can't say for sure if it's a biography of Andy Kaufman or Bob Zmuda's autobiography. In the end it doesn't matter -- the book is terrific reading. Co-author Matthew Scott Hansen takes a series of hysterical and hard-to-believe anecdotes and constructs a completely entertaining and sometimes moving narrative about two intertwined show-biz lives. If your only exposure to Kaufman was his goofy-sweet character on Taxi, you're in for a surprise, maybe an outright shock -- and that, apparently, is just the way Andy would have wanted it. Kaufman was a great many things other than a quirky sitcom character. In fact, although Taxi gave Kaufman a chance to reach his biggest audience, his work on the sitcom might have been the thing he enjoyed least. Zmuda delights in telling the tale of how he and Andy experimented with comedy in ways no one else ever had. They pulled off some brilliant practical jokes, wrote television shows that were years ahead of their time, and probably made more people uncomfortable than they made laugh -- and that may have been the point. A masterful comic writer himself, Hansen takes Zmuda's tales and deftly weaves them into a book that will make you laugh a lot more than it makes you uncomfortable. Read this and just try to imagine spending a day with Mr. X. I dare you.
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5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
or Bob Zmuda Revealed perhaps, 9 Nov 2001
By A Customer
Why is it that American biographies are always about the writer rather than the subject? Kaufman has gone off to Hollywood to become a star, but the reader learns how miserable Zmuda is in New York. Zmuda explains in detail the inspiration that led him to walk out on his job tossing burgers. Zmuda is having a bad time while his best friend is in the Philippines seeking spiritual healing for terminal cancer. As Andy Kaufman's friend and writer, Bob Zmuda is most definitely an authority. Obviously his position as writer provides insight into the inspiration behind Kaufman's pranks and sketches. Furthermore, Zmuda recounts his experiences in an anecdotal, amusing and frank way. His experiences as the employee of the anonymous screenwriter Mr X are one of the highlights of this book, and he links this well with Kaufman's Tony Clifton character. The way Zmuda fuels the reader into moral outrage over a real life event before revealing it was all a carefully orchestrated prank is masterfully reminiscent of Kaufman. This kind of biography has the advantage over a 'fan' biography in that Zmuda doesn't gloss over negative character traits: that Kaufman was a hopeless womaniser and could also be extremely selfish. (Neither does Zmuda hold back on his own character deficiencies - this is a very honest book.) However, a 'career' biographer would have added a depth of research and detachment that this biography doesn't provide.
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