Page 16 - Abacoa Community News - April '21

Page 16, Abacoa
Book Review
Even This I Get To Experience
By Nils A. Shapiro
The Remarkably Candid,
Fascinating,
Sel f-Reveal ing
Autobiography
By Showbiz Genius
Norman Lear
If you watched the recent
Golden Globe Awards
ceremony, you know that
one of the well-deserved
highlights was the beautiful,
brilliant and moving acceptance speech by 99-year- to the winds, bare all, and express his
old entertainment industry legend Norman Lear when
he received the Carol Burnett Award for outstanding
contributions to television.
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appreciate the full creative talent and top four and another with five of
wisdom of this extraordinary man by the top nine; hosted Saturday Night
experiencing the autobiography that Live; wrote, directed, produced,
Lear began when he turned 90 and executive-produced, or financed
published two years later, in 2014. more than a dozen major films; before
This 438-page volume is stunning in normalization, led an entourage of
so many ways: as a record of enough Hollywood writers and producers
achievements to have filled half a on a three-week tour of China;
dozen lives; as proof of the prodigious founded several cause-oriented
memory he clearly possessed even national organizations, including the
then, at that age, recalling details 300,000-member liberal advocacy
from childhood to every business deal group People For the American Way;
... and, perhaps most impressive of all, was told by The New York Times that
his obvious decision to throw caution I changed the face of television; was
labeled ‘No. 1 enemy of the American
opinions about everyone in his life, from family’ by Jerry Falwell; was warned
his parents and other family members to by Pat Robertson that my arms were
his three wives, six children, the many ‘too short to box with God’; made it
famous TV and movie performers and onto Richard Nixon ‘Enemies List’;
executives he has worked with – and, was presented with the National
unsparingly, himself. Medal of Arts by President Clinton;
The result is a book that is both purchased an original copy of the
deeply thoughtful and hugely entertaining. Declaration of Independence and toured it for ten years in
To get an idea of who Norman Lear is – and why he has all fifty states; was ranked by Entertainment Weekly 40th
been named both a Kennedy Center Honoree and received among the ‘100 Greatest Entertainers of the Century’ (29
the Golden Globe Award, among many other career tributes places ahead of the Sex Pistols); ran the Olympic Torch in
– here is an excerpt from the book’s preface: the 2002 Winter Olympics; blew a fortune in a series of bad
“In my 90-plus years I’ve lived a multitude of lives. businesses; and reached a point where I was advised that we
There was that early life with my parents and relatives; might even have to sell our home.
a life as a kid with my blood buddies Herbie Lerner and “Having heard that we’d fallen into such dire straits, my
the Schwarz twins; a life in high school zeroing in on the son-in-law phoned me from New York and asked how I
humor in our existence; a life in college cut short by World was feeling. My answer was, ‘Terrible, of course,’ but then
War II; a life as a crew member in a B-17 bomber flying 52 I added, ‘but I must be crazy, Jon, because despite all that’s
missions over Europe; a life in the world of entertainment, happened, I keep hearing this inner voice saying, ‘Even this
with sub-lives in television, radio, movies, and music; a life I get to experience.’”
as a political activist; a life in philanthropy; a late-starting Even with all of that, Lear left out in that passage another
life as a spiritual seeker; three lives as a husband, six as a very important achievement, which in the telling includes
father (with my youngest born 48 years after my eldest), and a very funny – but profound – message. In 1983, he gets
four as a grandfather. advance notice that the Television Academy is going to
“In the course of all these lives, I had a front-row establish a Hall of Fame, and that he will be among the first
seat at the birth of television; wrote, produced, created or six to be inducted, along with Milton Berle, Lucille Ball,
developed more than a hundred shows; had nine on the
air at the same time; finished one season with three of the Book Review on page 17
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