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Fallen Idols: A Century of Screen Sex Scandals
It’s a scandal! How often we use that phrase and what a catalogue of sins it covers. That’s what this book is all about. It is literally a catalogue of sins – committed by some of the most celebrated names on the planet.Within these covers are startling stories of scandals during a century when screen idols seemed to vie with each other in outraging public decency. It was an age when fan fever was at its height and an endless supply of shocking revelations emerged to fuel the frenzy.Because of the perpetrators’ superstar status, the shame of exposure was often heightened, not only wrecking reputations but often harming careers and, at least, ensuring very public humiliation.The lessons learned from these cases of celebrity scandal (though often, it seems, not by the celebrities themselves) is that the bigger the star, the harder the fall … and that deceit and intrigue so often turn hard-won fame into instant infamy.
- GenresBiography
176 pages, Kindle Edition
Published November 30, 2018
5 people are currently reading
9 people want to read
About the author
Nigel Blundell
85 books20 followersNigel Blundell is a journalist who has worked in Australia, the United States and Britain. He spent 25 years in Fleet Street before becoming an author and contributor to national newspapers. He has written more than 40 books, including best-sellers on crime and royalty. He co-wrote the Top Ten exposé Fall of the House of Windsor, which first revealed the so-called ‘Squidgygate’ tape and the infidelity of both Princess Diana and Prince Charles. His other factual subjects have included military history, celebrity scandals, and ghosts and the paranormal.
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
April 28, 2019
All too often, celebrities are put on pedestals only to fall when scandal strikes. In Fallen Idols, Nigel Blundell takes readers on a trip down memory lane, recalling infamous events in the lives of select notables that occurred within the last century.
After giving a brief rundown on infamous events tied to 21 various celebrities (including Clara Bow, Richard Pryor, and Rob Lowe) in the introduction, the book focuses its fourteen fairly short chapters on the following people:
Charlie Chaplin
Fatty Arbuckle
Jean Harlow
Errol Flynn
Grace Kelly
Lana Turner
Marilyn Monroe
Jayne Mansfield
Elvis Presley
Roman Polanski
Joan Crawford
Rock Hudson
Jim Bakker & Jimmy Swaggart
Woody Allen
Years ago, I spent a lot of time reading biographies about movie stars from the Golden Age of Hollywood. It seemed like such a glamorous time, and I was completely enchanted by the idea of it, so I read about as many of the old movie stars as I could. As a result, I was already familiar with many of the stories told in this book. It was interesting to read about them again, particularly when I'd forgotten certain details or didn't know how that person's story ended.
I particularly enjoyed the photographs. I had never seen most of them before, so I spent a lot of time examining them.
Final Thoughts
Little surprised me concerning the selected stories, but my familiarity with them didn't lessen my interest in the book. The photographs ended up being the main attraction for me as a result, and I was pleased to see a nice amount of them in each chapter.
Given the subject matter, this book may not appeal to everyone. People who enjoy this type of book will likely find it an entertaining read, however.
I received an advance reading copy of this book courtesy of Pen & Sword History.
After giving a brief rundown on infamous events tied to 21 various celebrities (including Clara Bow, Richard Pryor, and Rob Lowe) in the introduction, the book focuses its fourteen fairly short chapters on the following people:
Charlie Chaplin
Fatty Arbuckle
Jean Harlow
Errol Flynn
Grace Kelly
Lana Turner
Marilyn Monroe
Jayne Mansfield
Elvis Presley
Roman Polanski
Joan Crawford
Rock Hudson
Jim Bakker & Jimmy Swaggart
Woody Allen
Years ago, I spent a lot of time reading biographies about movie stars from the Golden Age of Hollywood. It seemed like such a glamorous time, and I was completely enchanted by the idea of it, so I read about as many of the old movie stars as I could. As a result, I was already familiar with many of the stories told in this book. It was interesting to read about them again, particularly when I'd forgotten certain details or didn't know how that person's story ended.
I particularly enjoyed the photographs. I had never seen most of them before, so I spent a lot of time examining them.
Final Thoughts
Little surprised me concerning the selected stories, but my familiarity with them didn't lessen my interest in the book. The photographs ended up being the main attraction for me as a result, and I was pleased to see a nice amount of them in each chapter.
Given the subject matter, this book may not appeal to everyone. People who enjoy this type of book will likely find it an entertaining read, however.
I received an advance reading copy of this book courtesy of Pen & Sword History.
June 23, 2024
Mostly Just Sad
Picked up this book on the sale shelf not sure what to expect. Yes there were some scintillating details about big stars but 3 accounts of male stars having flings with underage girls made my stomach turn - awful if true. It makes a person realize that we are lucky to have our regular lives. For example a megastar like Elvis had unlimited weath, fame, adoration of fans, yet his last few years he was, by all accounts, miserable. I didn't anticipate being repulsed and thankful for my plain life when I began reading this book. Actually sombering.
Picked up this book on the sale shelf not sure what to expect. Yes there were some scintillating details about big stars but 3 accounts of male stars having flings with underage girls made my stomach turn - awful if true. It makes a person realize that we are lucky to have our regular lives. For example a megastar like Elvis had unlimited weath, fame, adoration of fans, yet his last few years he was, by all accounts, miserable. I didn't anticipate being repulsed and thankful for my plain life when I began reading this book. Actually sombering.
February 16, 2019
Thanks to Rosie and the whole team at Pen & Sword for providing me a paperback copy of this book that I freely chose to review.
A while back I read and reviewed a book in the same series ‘Images of the Past’, called The British Seaside, and I enjoyed the combination of the wonderful images and the informative and humorous text, fairly light on reading but high on entertainment value. In this case, the same is true, even with the serious subject and the unavoidable reflections on how times don’t seem to have changed so much, although know we get to hear about many of the details that in the past would have remained hidden from the general public.
I’ve always been fascinated by the history of cinema, and Hollywood, from its beginnings to now, although times have changed somewhat, and tinsel town is not what used to be (if it ever was). I have watched documentaries and read magazines about the industry, particularly about the era of the big studios, when everything seemed more glamourous and shiny than our everyday lives.
This book looks, mostly at past scandals, from the early history of Hollywood to some more recent ones, but does not include the XXI century, and although some of us, who grew up watching reruns of classics, will remember many of these stars (and some have become icons, like James Dean or Marilyn Monroe), to the youngest generation most of them will sound like ancient history. Only Roman Polanski, Woody Allen, and the TV preachers are still alive, and although their controversy remains alive, it seems to have been dwarfed by most recent scandals.
This is not an in-depth study of any of the cases, but rather a quick survey with a few details of the biographies and circumstances of some of the stars, whose lives became as well-known and exposed to the public attention as that of their characters. Despite that, although I thought I was familiar with the majority of the actors and actresses the book talks about, I discovered I didn’t know many of the details, perhaps because they were not discussed at the time or have been revealed later, and many of the pictures where totally new to me (and I thoroughly enjoyed them, especially those showing the stars when they were young). I am sure, though, that experts or true fans of these actors and actresses will not learn anything new, but I enjoyed the combination of text and pictures (and I particularly relished the introduction, which offers interesting insights into the effects of some of these scandals, like the Hays Code, that went beyond the content of the movies and affected the personal lives of the stars as well), that makes it ideal as a present for people of a certain age who enjoy celebrity magazines of the time, and also for the younger generation who might not have been exposed to these stories and the old-fashioned notion of celebrity and stardom.
It is impossible to read this book without comparing many of these scandals to some of the recent ones. The big studios spent a lot of money on lawyers, on keeping the press at bay, and of course, power has always talked. Thankfully, some of the things that were considered normal practice at the time have now become unacceptable and are the subject of legal procedures.
To give you a better idea of the content, there are fourteen chapters, each focused on one of these stars: Charlie Chaplin, Fatty Arbuckle, Jean Harlow, Errol Flynn, Grace Kelly, Lana Turner, Marilyn Monroe, Jayne Mansfield, Elvis Presley, Roman Polanski, Joan Crawford, Rock Hudson, Jim Bakker & Jimmy Swaggart, and Woody Allen.
I thought I’d share a couple of the quotes I’ve highlighted, so you get some idea of what to expect. Here, referring to James Dean:
“The star of East of Eden and Rebel without a Cause was bisexual and had affairs with actresses Pier Angeli and Ursula Andrews but when asked if he was gay his reply was: “Well, I’m certainly not going to go through life with one hand tied behind my back!” (Blundell, 2018, p. 8).
In the chapter about the TV preachers Jim Bakker and Jimmy Swaggart (a fascinating phenomenon that seems pretty unique to the USA), it explains that Swaggart confessed and apologised to his congregation and the viewers of his TV channel the first time he was caught with a prostitute. But the second time, he truly spoke his mind:
“This time, rather confessing to his congregation, Swaggart brazened it out with the rebuff: ‘The Lord told me it’s flat none of your business’ (Blundell, 2018, 143).
In sum, this is a fun book for people who love anecdotes and to peep into the lives of the Hollywood famous, especially those from the era of the Hollywood big studios. If you want a brazen and amusing book, with its dark moments and plenty of pictures to get the conversation going, or are looking for a present for somebody who loves movie memorabilia, I recommend it.
Blundelll, N. (2018). Images of the Past. Fallen Idols. A Century of Screen Sex Scandals. Barnsley, UK: Pen & Sword.
A while back I read and reviewed a book in the same series ‘Images of the Past’, called The British Seaside, and I enjoyed the combination of the wonderful images and the informative and humorous text, fairly light on reading but high on entertainment value. In this case, the same is true, even with the serious subject and the unavoidable reflections on how times don’t seem to have changed so much, although know we get to hear about many of the details that in the past would have remained hidden from the general public.
I’ve always been fascinated by the history of cinema, and Hollywood, from its beginnings to now, although times have changed somewhat, and tinsel town is not what used to be (if it ever was). I have watched documentaries and read magazines about the industry, particularly about the era of the big studios, when everything seemed more glamourous and shiny than our everyday lives.
This book looks, mostly at past scandals, from the early history of Hollywood to some more recent ones, but does not include the XXI century, and although some of us, who grew up watching reruns of classics, will remember many of these stars (and some have become icons, like James Dean or Marilyn Monroe), to the youngest generation most of them will sound like ancient history. Only Roman Polanski, Woody Allen, and the TV preachers are still alive, and although their controversy remains alive, it seems to have been dwarfed by most recent scandals.
This is not an in-depth study of any of the cases, but rather a quick survey with a few details of the biographies and circumstances of some of the stars, whose lives became as well-known and exposed to the public attention as that of their characters. Despite that, although I thought I was familiar with the majority of the actors and actresses the book talks about, I discovered I didn’t know many of the details, perhaps because they were not discussed at the time or have been revealed later, and many of the pictures where totally new to me (and I thoroughly enjoyed them, especially those showing the stars when they were young). I am sure, though, that experts or true fans of these actors and actresses will not learn anything new, but I enjoyed the combination of text and pictures (and I particularly relished the introduction, which offers interesting insights into the effects of some of these scandals, like the Hays Code, that went beyond the content of the movies and affected the personal lives of the stars as well), that makes it ideal as a present for people of a certain age who enjoy celebrity magazines of the time, and also for the younger generation who might not have been exposed to these stories and the old-fashioned notion of celebrity and stardom.
It is impossible to read this book without comparing many of these scandals to some of the recent ones. The big studios spent a lot of money on lawyers, on keeping the press at bay, and of course, power has always talked. Thankfully, some of the things that were considered normal practice at the time have now become unacceptable and are the subject of legal procedures.
To give you a better idea of the content, there are fourteen chapters, each focused on one of these stars: Charlie Chaplin, Fatty Arbuckle, Jean Harlow, Errol Flynn, Grace Kelly, Lana Turner, Marilyn Monroe, Jayne Mansfield, Elvis Presley, Roman Polanski, Joan Crawford, Rock Hudson, Jim Bakker & Jimmy Swaggart, and Woody Allen.
I thought I’d share a couple of the quotes I’ve highlighted, so you get some idea of what to expect. Here, referring to James Dean:
“The star of East of Eden and Rebel without a Cause was bisexual and had affairs with actresses Pier Angeli and Ursula Andrews but when asked if he was gay his reply was: “Well, I’m certainly not going to go through life with one hand tied behind my back!” (Blundell, 2018, p. 8).
In the chapter about the TV preachers Jim Bakker and Jimmy Swaggart (a fascinating phenomenon that seems pretty unique to the USA), it explains that Swaggart confessed and apologised to his congregation and the viewers of his TV channel the first time he was caught with a prostitute. But the second time, he truly spoke his mind:
“This time, rather confessing to his congregation, Swaggart brazened it out with the rebuff: ‘The Lord told me it’s flat none of your business’ (Blundell, 2018, 143).
In sum, this is a fun book for people who love anecdotes and to peep into the lives of the Hollywood famous, especially those from the era of the Hollywood big studios. If you want a brazen and amusing book, with its dark moments and plenty of pictures to get the conversation going, or are looking for a present for somebody who loves movie memorabilia, I recommend it.
Blundelll, N. (2018). Images of the Past. Fallen Idols. A Century of Screen Sex Scandals. Barnsley, UK: Pen & Sword.
September 13, 2020
Fascinating look at Hollywood stars and their aberrant behavior. This book is absolutely packed with scandal. A second volume would be easy to put together with the wealth of current actors and actresses and the fact that virtually everything they do is reported in some fashion or another. Most of the stories involved actors that lived before my birth and they were interesting short articles. Halfway through the book I came upon more recent stars who I had some familiarity with and these I relished. Lots of pictures to assist your imagination. My only wish is that more information had been added to each individual story. There were parts of the book, for instance with Joan Crawford, that I was aware of far more info than was given.
February 27, 2019
A combination of images and concise biographies of the names 'idols'. Most of the stories are fairly well known, and this book covers events right up until 2018 in the case of Woody Allen and Roman Polanski, but it's an easy way to get up to scratch on the scandals of Hollywood, and film trivia.
December 10, 2020
Factual
I wasn’t expecting most of the things I read in this book, especially some of the anecdotal presentations about well known, and well loved figures, like Bing Crosby. The introduction is as interesting as the rest of the book.
This isn’t a salacious or titillating tell all, but a well documented any thoughtful record of people who could not handle the vast successes achieved. These are stories of people who disregarded and disrespected the rights of others as they pillaged their way through life, leaving helpless children and hapless victims behind to face lives of shames and abuse.
I see the common threads of success taking all the forbidden fruit
they wanted then succumbing to their well deserved demise at young ages and destroyed legacies.
It’s a good book to study the causes of their highly dysfunctional behavior and secret lives. Almost all of them were from poor or broken families and child abuse was common to many of them.
I liked th this book and have no reservation in telling anyone that I read and enjoyed learning more about the duplicity and sickness of people who gained great notoriety and wealth but with that they exposed the darkest and ugliest side of humanity.
The author played it straight and was fair, always offering the whole truth without equivocation or bias.
I wasn’t expecting most of the things I read in this book, especially some of the anecdotal presentations about well known, and well loved figures, like Bing Crosby. The introduction is as interesting as the rest of the book.
This isn’t a salacious or titillating tell all, but a well documented any thoughtful record of people who could not handle the vast successes achieved. These are stories of people who disregarded and disrespected the rights of others as they pillaged their way through life, leaving helpless children and hapless victims behind to face lives of shames and abuse.
I see the common threads of success taking all the forbidden fruit
they wanted then succumbing to their well deserved demise at young ages and destroyed legacies.
It’s a good book to study the causes of their highly dysfunctional behavior and secret lives. Almost all of them were from poor or broken families and child abuse was common to many of them.
I liked th this book and have no reservation in telling anyone that I read and enjoyed learning more about the duplicity and sickness of people who gained great notoriety and wealth but with that they exposed the darkest and ugliest side of humanity.
The author played it straight and was fair, always offering the whole truth without equivocation or bias.
June 7, 2021
Well it's a book so it counts in my reading challenge. It's a piece of nonsense that manages to say absolutely nothing new about any of these so called scandals. The author has contempt for the people he writes about . I'm thinking it's probably because they got to live large and do what they wanted and all he got to do was produce this crappy book. Avoid like the plague.
January 17, 2021
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I love books like this one!!
I love the scandal, gossip and intrigue from the times gone by regarding some of the most famous and popular people of their eras. Some of the actions not only being scandalous at that time, they would still be right up there with some of the most awful acts of the 21st Century too.
I knew a fair bit about the celebrities features but there were a few entries that were eye openers and it really is remarkable how a lot of them did manage to get away with their scandals without much damage to their careers – nit sure the same would happen today especially with the #MeToo movement!
It is 5 stars from me for this one, I find books like this really addictive and I read this one in pretty much one sitting – it was a great book to read and I loved being able to read more about the different scandals these Hollywood greats were involved in – very highly recommended!
I love books like this one!!
I love the scandal, gossip and intrigue from the times gone by regarding some of the most famous and popular people of their eras. Some of the actions not only being scandalous at that time, they would still be right up there with some of the most awful acts of the 21st Century too.
I knew a fair bit about the celebrities features but there were a few entries that were eye openers and it really is remarkable how a lot of them did manage to get away with their scandals without much damage to their careers – nit sure the same would happen today especially with the #MeToo movement!
It is 5 stars from me for this one, I find books like this really addictive and I read this one in pretty much one sitting – it was a great book to read and I loved being able to read more about the different scandals these Hollywood greats were involved in – very highly recommended!
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews