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Penguin Lives
Marlon Brando
When Marlon Brando stunned Broadway in 1948, mumbling and scratching as Stanley Kowalski in Tennessee Williams's A Streetcar Named Desire, he revolutionized American acting in style and sensibility with his raw psychological approach, his improvisational wildness. Patricia Bosworth focuses on Brando's great gifts, describing the gallery of indelible cinematic portraits he created, such as the paraplegic in The Men; the swaggering rebel Johnny in The Wild One; Terry Malloy, the illiterate dockworker who develops a conscience, in Elia Kazan's On the Waterfront (for which Brando won his first Academy Award); Vito Corleone in The Godfather (his second Academy Award); and the despairing expatriate Paul in Last Tango in Paris.
Brando has been called "the greatest actor in the world." Bosworth acknowledges his debt to master teacher Stella Adler and director Elia Kazan, who helped shape Brando as an actor, and she explores his soaring talent, a gift so huge he often didn't know how to control it. But she goes beyond his myth and celebrity to tell the story of his life and to explain Brando's personal torment, portraying the farm boy from Illinois who loved his alcoholic mother more than anyone else and who wanted to use his fame to change the world - and the man who even today remains a mystery.
Brando has been called "the greatest actor in the world." Bosworth acknowledges his debt to master teacher Stella Adler and director Elia Kazan, who helped shape Brando as an actor, and she explores his soaring talent, a gift so huge he often didn't know how to control it. But she goes beyond his myth and celebrity to tell the story of his life and to explain Brando's personal torment, portraying the farm boy from Illinois who loved his alcoholic mother more than anyone else and who wanted to use his fame to change the world - and the man who even today remains a mystery.
240 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2001
32 people are currently reading
248 people want to read
About the author
Patricia Bosworth
14 books51 followersPatricia Bosworth was an American journalist and biographer. She modeled while in college and then became an actress before turning to writing. She chronicled the lives of celebrities in magazines and books. She also wrote about her own privileged family. She was a faculty member of the Graduate School of Journalism at Columbia University.
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Displaying 1 - 25 of 25 reviews
February 27, 2018
Brando, another icon of my youth, but more substantial than James Dean--both great actors. The performance that placed him in my Pantheon was his role as Mark Anthony in Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar", a film of which Mrs. Hawkins, my 12th grade English teacher, a superb motivator, showed our class. Brando made Shakespeare's Caesar so real that he propelled the playwright to the pinnacle of my Pantheon of iconic heroes. Patricia Bosworth demonstrates the effect of Brando's talent and how he accomplished it.
April 2, 2015
This is a concise and very readable biography of Marlon Brando, perfect for those who know little about the great actor's life and with little time to tackle the longer biographies out there. Brando was a seminal figure of the momentous acting revolution of the mid-20th century, and Bosworth gives him his due, and in just over 200 pages. Using a variety of sources close to Brando, Bosworth moves quickly from period to period, mixing anecdote and fact to create a respectful portrait that does not shy away from - or excuse - all of the man's self-destructive excesses. Well worth reading, as long as you don't mind that Bosworth has borrowed heavily (with credit) from Peter Manso's much longer biography on Brando (which is well over 1000 pages, and who has that kind of time unless one is really passionate about the subject …).
February 16, 2014
I really enjoyed this biography that drew on Brando's autobiography and other accounts to chart his life from stage and screen, gigolo to AIM activist, and public figure to recluse. The commentary and analysis of the films has prompted me to revisit or discover many of them. For instance, I have now seen and enjoyed Brando's "Julius Caesar". I liked that is was so close to the Shakespeare original and helped support this book's revelation that Brando began as a very successful stage actor. Thanks to this book I can see that film, a role in which he was encouraged by and trained for by his mother, as a connection back to his stage career.
August 8, 2017
Leer la biografía de una estrella de cine tan legendaria como Brando siempre implica el riesgo de encontrarse con un recorrido por todos los chismes y eventos sensacionales de su vida, como si más que biografía se tratara de una antología de todas las notas de espectáculos que se publicaron sobre su vida y escándalos. Por ello fue una gran sorpresa encontrarme con una biografía que, sin mayores pretensiones, nos da un retrato tan claro y honesto de la persona, más que del personaje. ¡Y vaya que había una persona que describir! El Brando que nos presenta Bosworth es de una gran profundidad, sin que ello signifique una escritura pesada o pretensiones literarias-psicológicas que normalmente no se pueden cumplir. Bosworth se las arregla para llevarnos a través de su infancia y relación con sus padres, especialmente con su madre, que marcaron de manera determinante su personalidad conflictiva, su rebeldía y, sobre todo, su genio, para luego mostrarnos al Brando adulto que ofreció al mundo algunas de las mejores actuaciones de todos los tiempos, al mismo tiempo que lidiaba con una vida conflictiva y llena de dolor y abandono. Me quedo con un buen sabor de boca, y me llevo a un Brando genial, atormentado y, sobre todo, muy humano.
July 14, 2021
Goes into detail about his youth which is good. Mom a drunk, dad mean, some military school. gets into acting, Broadway, movies, becomes famous, gets rich, makes movies, blows through titles, many I had never even heard of, no staying power, why? Film have incomplete scripts? Makes movies just for a payday. Marry, children. Money problems.
October 10, 2020
Though there are many biographies out there about the great actor Marlon Brando, I made a point to read Patricia Bosworth's version in order to hear her particular take on Brando's life and career. I was a fan of Bosworth's Montgomery Clift biography, and was hoping her Brando book would be as good or better. "Marlon Brando" turned out to be good, yet not as good as I thought it would be.
**What did not help, is that this Kindle edition I borrowed from the library had lots of typos. Did not ANYONE proofread the damned thing? For some reason, actor Karl Malden is consistently referred to as "Karl Maiden." After the twenty fifth "Karl Maiden" I thought maybe it WAS Karl Maiden! No, it's not. Other typos are throughout the book as well.
On the positive front, Patricia Bosworth's book contains many fascinating facts and details I never knew about Marlon Brando. I never knew the Brando name began with his father, as his grandfather's last name was the French-sounding "Brandeaux." I never knew how close Brando was with actress Maureen Stapleton, and that he loved playing chess. I was also shocked to discover that Marlon Brando's stage career did NOT end with "Streetcar Named Desire," but with a summer stock production of "Arms and the Man." Who knew?
I also appreciated the author's attempt to paint a picture of who Marlon Brando really was. Patricia Bosworth writes of Brando as a free spirit, child of alcoholic parents, son of a cruel and brutal father, and a sensitive, loving, artistic yet often absent mother. Brando never held back in helping out friends and family with his time, his money. His immense acting talent came naturally to Brando at an early age, nurtured and further developed by the likes of mentors Stella Adler and Elia Kazan. Yet Marlon Brando never pledged his allegiance to acting, the theater, movies. Instead, he looked at acting as a way to make a living, not as a way of life.
Perhaps it was Brando's wandering spirit, his immense curiosity, compassion, and keen powers of observation combined with his great and complex anger and depression over his childhood that led Marlon Brando to avoid commitment to acting, to show business, to women, to any one thing. Brando was an actor who avoided learning his lines, avoided Hollywood publicity, ran in the face of being tied down, or from being told what to do.
Patricia Bosworth states clearly in "Marlon Brando," the actor paid a heavy price for the choices he made, for his fame, for his genius. Brando's difficult childhood forever haunted him. Too often he would use food to digest his pain, his sorrow. Unfortunately, Marlon Brando was the only person who fully understood his own world, his own sense of impulsive behavior, his own sense of morality. As a result, his life consisted of a litany of dysfunctional relationships, custody battles, law suits, and a large litter of children from a number of different women.
As much as I enjoyed "Marlon Brando," I was dismayed that the book was so short. Patricia Bosworth front-loaded her biography with excellent detail from Brando's birth in 1924, up until the early 1960's. From then on, the author skips through a year or two, focuses on an event or a movie, skips another year or two, and so on. Though her chapters outlining Brando's 1970s renaissance with both THE GODFATHER and LAST TANGO IN PARIS are full of depth and detail, her offers up increasingly less detail in each subsequent movie, and year.
I was also put off by the amount of quotations the author used. I could forgive Patricia Bosworth from using material from other Marlon Brando biographies. Yet I was confounded when the author overused quotes from critics, and modern academics like Camille Paglia. I didn't want to read OTHER people's views essays on Marlon Brando, I wanted only to read Patricia Bosworth express HER point of view, her thoughts and opinions.
Perhaps it was an editor/publisher decision, I don't know, yet I felt there were too many things skipped over in Patricia Bosworth's "Marlon Brando" to fully appreciate it as a fully realized biography. I felt a little bit cheated, in a way, as if I would have been better served reading Peter Manso's massive "Brando" biography, or Marlon Brando's autobiography "Songs My Mother Taught Me." Perhaps I will do just that. In the meantime, I am glad I got to read Patricia Bosworth's version of Marlon Brando's life just the same.
**What did not help, is that this Kindle edition I borrowed from the library had lots of typos. Did not ANYONE proofread the damned thing? For some reason, actor Karl Malden is consistently referred to as "Karl Maiden." After the twenty fifth "Karl Maiden" I thought maybe it WAS Karl Maiden! No, it's not. Other typos are throughout the book as well.
On the positive front, Patricia Bosworth's book contains many fascinating facts and details I never knew about Marlon Brando. I never knew the Brando name began with his father, as his grandfather's last name was the French-sounding "Brandeaux." I never knew how close Brando was with actress Maureen Stapleton, and that he loved playing chess. I was also shocked to discover that Marlon Brando's stage career did NOT end with "Streetcar Named Desire," but with a summer stock production of "Arms and the Man." Who knew?
I also appreciated the author's attempt to paint a picture of who Marlon Brando really was. Patricia Bosworth writes of Brando as a free spirit, child of alcoholic parents, son of a cruel and brutal father, and a sensitive, loving, artistic yet often absent mother. Brando never held back in helping out friends and family with his time, his money. His immense acting talent came naturally to Brando at an early age, nurtured and further developed by the likes of mentors Stella Adler and Elia Kazan. Yet Marlon Brando never pledged his allegiance to acting, the theater, movies. Instead, he looked at acting as a way to make a living, not as a way of life.
Perhaps it was Brando's wandering spirit, his immense curiosity, compassion, and keen powers of observation combined with his great and complex anger and depression over his childhood that led Marlon Brando to avoid commitment to acting, to show business, to women, to any one thing. Brando was an actor who avoided learning his lines, avoided Hollywood publicity, ran in the face of being tied down, or from being told what to do.
Patricia Bosworth states clearly in "Marlon Brando," the actor paid a heavy price for the choices he made, for his fame, for his genius. Brando's difficult childhood forever haunted him. Too often he would use food to digest his pain, his sorrow. Unfortunately, Marlon Brando was the only person who fully understood his own world, his own sense of impulsive behavior, his own sense of morality. As a result, his life consisted of a litany of dysfunctional relationships, custody battles, law suits, and a large litter of children from a number of different women.
As much as I enjoyed "Marlon Brando," I was dismayed that the book was so short. Patricia Bosworth front-loaded her biography with excellent detail from Brando's birth in 1924, up until the early 1960's. From then on, the author skips through a year or two, focuses on an event or a movie, skips another year or two, and so on. Though her chapters outlining Brando's 1970s renaissance with both THE GODFATHER and LAST TANGO IN PARIS are full of depth and detail, her offers up increasingly less detail in each subsequent movie, and year.
I was also put off by the amount of quotations the author used. I could forgive Patricia Bosworth from using material from other Marlon Brando biographies. Yet I was confounded when the author overused quotes from critics, and modern academics like Camille Paglia. I didn't want to read OTHER people's views essays on Marlon Brando, I wanted only to read Patricia Bosworth express HER point of view, her thoughts and opinions.
Perhaps it was an editor/publisher decision, I don't know, yet I felt there were too many things skipped over in Patricia Bosworth's "Marlon Brando" to fully appreciate it as a fully realized biography. I felt a little bit cheated, in a way, as if I would have been better served reading Peter Manso's massive "Brando" biography, or Marlon Brando's autobiography "Songs My Mother Taught Me." Perhaps I will do just that. In the meantime, I am glad I got to read Patricia Bosworth's version of Marlon Brando's life just the same.
December 31, 2012
Patricia Bosworth’s "Marlon Brando" is a satisfactory biography of the late actor’s life. While not as revelatory or incisive as her biography of Montgomery Clift, "Marlon Brando" will satisfy those readers looking for a readable overview of the actor’s troubled personal life and remarkable professional career. More often than not Bosworth quotes from other biographers and even Brando’s autobiography perhaps unfairly giving a sense of a “clip job” than a work of original research. But it’s understandably difficult coming up with a new biographical approach for an artist who life was so often and thoroughly dissected by the media. Was Brando a great actor? Most of his contemporaries thought so, though there were a few like Jessica Tandy who took him to task for his lack of discipline. Non-fans may be surprised to find out about Brando's Nebraska upbringing, his walking away from theatre, contempt for Hollywood, and dedication to civil rights. This book was published prior to B’s death in 2004, and it breezes through his post “Last Tango in Paris” years when his work output was scant. With fewer and fewer of Brando’s contemporaries still alive, it’s possible that this will be the final bio on his life. Recommended for those looking for an introduction to Brando.
April 24, 2015
One of my pet peeves is 900-page biography that tell you every time the subject had a bowl of cereal, whether they finished the bowl and whether they rinsed it out or left it in the sink to harden. It is a joy to read biographies that weigh in at less than 200 pages and are written for the reader rather than for future historians. Good quick read about an interesting personality.
October 22, 2010
Marlon Brando was pretty much a good looking jerk who stole a friend's ashes from his (the dead guy) wife. But he was great in the Godfather so it makes everything alright. I enjoyed the book, but it was written with rose colored keys.
February 3, 2012
I like him as an actor. That being said, after reading this book I really didn't like him as a person. I can understand some of his pain but he used it as an excuse for his self-indulgence and snobbery. I hope she wasn't trying to put his life in a positive light because she didn't.
October 16, 2015
This book is very very disappointing! i expected more research from Patricia after i've read her book about Monty Clift...but this Brando' book turned out to be just bits and pieces from Peter Manso' Brando huge biography book..after reading Manso' book i feel this one is just copy and paste job..
July 22, 2007
As with Bobbie Mason's Elvis Presly book in the same series, this biography is fascinating until he becomes a star, and then it bogs down.
November 21, 2014
3 STARS
This is a brief biography on Marlon Brando that touches the main events in his life.
This is a brief biography on Marlon Brando that touches the main events in his life.
December 23, 2017
A fascinating look at one of Hollywood's most famous leading men.
September 27, 2017
Easy, interesting read
October 21, 2018
interesting book about marlon brando not very big but very informative
December 1, 2017
An easy and enjoyable read making me keen to see his major movies again.I knew he had many problems but not the extent of them.Well worth a read to satisfy your curiosity about a true original movie actor,but also how your background sows the seeds to many of the problems you encounter in life - the main reason why I like biographies.All our early years reveal the key to who we were.If only all parents knew the responsibility they have.
July 11, 2022
Excellent book! Perfect if you don’t really know much about Brando. For die-hard Brando fans who have read more of the substantial biographies, such as Brandi’s own autobiography, this book might feel too condensed and repetitive. I’ve been a Brando fan for a long time and hadn’t read a thing on him until now, however, so this book was a nice, quick overall introduction to the legendary actor. I highly recommend it if you need a fast summer read!
March 14, 2019
270 - 2019
August 27, 2021
Edifying.
January 21, 2025
Displays of anger
The two poles of acting and disguise and self revelation
“When you hate like I do you have to suffer pain.”
The two poles of acting and disguise and self revelation
“When you hate like I do you have to suffer pain.”
April 16, 2019
On the one hand, this is the fastest a bio has gotten through the childhood of its subject, which I always bitch about slogging through. But I noticed I was further along faster than I should be. I started to wonder if this whole thing was too breezy given Brando’s more than 50 year career and all his legendarily eccentricity. Having recently read the De Niro bio, this one seemed a little rushed and scant. What is here is interesting so maybe I’m just missing what I feel should be. This is the second book I’ve read on Brando, the first was an account by his friend not a bio but that was a dud. I also thought this was written post his death so it rings real false through no fault of the author. One thing I will fault is the constant typo of Karl Maiden when it should be Karl Malden. This can’t be for real, right? This is the first book I’ve checked out digitally from the library so could someone have changed it? Can anyone shed some light on this?
January 10, 2010
A straight-forward account of the weird, zany life of one of the greatest actors who ever lived
September 16, 2015
Apart from his excellent stage and on-screen acting, I didn't know he was such a perv.
Displaying 1 - 25 of 25 reviews