Flash--The Making of Weegee the Famous

March 19, 2018
New York magazine senior editor Bonanos (Instant: The Story of Polaroid) constructs an energetic and informative biography of photographer Arthur Fellig (1899–1968), better known as Weegee, whose crime scene photos captured the grit and grime of New York City in the 1940s. The book traces Weegee’s career from his early years as a “squeegee boy” at the New York Times, where his chief responsibility was drying prints, to his darkroom work at Acme Newspictures, where it is rumored that one of his colleagues gave him the name Weegee, and finally to his rise as the photographer of “crashes, crimes scenes, arrests, and fires.” Bonanos details how Weegee created his fame using a combination of talent and relentless self-promotion (he was known to introduce himself as “the world’s greatest living photographer”), but the book’s most revealing sections are actually about the dramatic waning of his fame toward the end of his career, as he started to take gag pictures for curious business ventures, including a line of greeting cards and posters for dorm rooms. Bonano’s revelatory portrait of “Weegee the Famous” will interest general readers, as well as those with a special interest in photojournalism. 65 b&w photos.

Starred review from May 1, 2018
A fine-grained close-up of the lensman who lit up New York City, both low-life and high-.If there was ever a caricature of the old-time newspaper photographer, it is Weegee, born Usher--later Americanized to Arthur--Fellig (1899-1968). A stocky Gotham type down to the rumpled suit and ever present 5-cent stogie, he was the man on the scene with the Speed Graphic and the flaming bulb, throwing harsh noirish light on fires, wrecks, and any number of mob hits. Unlike most caricatures, his work has survived. His pictures of dead gangsters, necking teenagers in movie theaters, kids sleeping on fire escapes, a slovenly woman sneering at fashionable operagoers, distraught victims of a tenement fire, or an impossibly crowded Coney Island are indelible images of American life both before and after World War II. In this continually fascinating biography, New York magazine city editor Bonanos (Instant: The Story of Polaroid, 2012, etc.) presents Weegee as a skilled craftsman who learned that you had to "get punch in your pictures" to beat the competition; that meant angle, framing, and environment. A corpse on the sidewalk was just a fact; getting a city mailbox in the foreground--urging "Mail Early for Delivery Before Christmas"--created a story. Voyeurism was both Weegee's motivation and subject; he found as much drama in a sudden reaction shot--as in his picture of schoolchildren who have just witnessed a murder--as the event itself. The author makes a strong case for Weegee's continued relevance: "Things that seemed slight when they were made do not always turn out that way in the long run when thinking people who sweat the details are the ones making them. Weegee was one of those people, and he did just that."In this deeply researched (though lightly worn) and compelling portrait, Bonanos captures all sides of an artist in spite of himself.

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Starred review from June 1, 2018
Was Weegee, Arthur Fellig's professional moniker, a phonetic variation on Ouija in recognition of his seemingly psychic ability to anticipate crimes or disasters, the subjects that made him famous as one of the first and certainly most tenacious on-the-spot news photographers? Or was it a taunting variation on squeegee, a knock on this poor Jewish immigrant's humble start working in New York City newspaper darkrooms? This axis between high and low defines Weegee and his work, which ranges from masterfully composed, adeptly flash-illuminated images of the underside of city life, to goofily distorted images and crass girlie shots. The cut and strut of Bonanos' vivid prose captures the rough-and-tumble of mid-twentieth-century New York, while vital details gleaned from his extensive research enliven the portrait of the notoriously rumpled, monomaniacal, audacious, relentlessly self-promoting, and truly revolutionary photographer. Bonanos (Instant: The Story of Polaroid, 2012) offers intriguing insights into the scrappy ingenuity and artistic sixth sense that enabled Weegee to so indelibly document gangland murders, catastrophic fires, and car crashes with wit and compassion. My idea was to make the camera human, Weegee declared. As Bonanos tracks Weegee to Hollywood and back, and defines his key place in the history of photography, he makes the man behind the camera fully human in his moxie, foolishness, and dark incandescence.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)

Starred review from May 15, 2018

In this superb biography, New York magazine city editor Bonanos (Instant: The Story of Polaroid) charts the life of Arthur Felig, aka Weegee (1899-1968), from his impoverished childhood in Ukraine to his remarkable work in New York City. A self-made man and a fine artist whose original approach to photography endures, Weegee was a geeky raconteur with a camera who liked to stalk the gritty streets of New York at all hours of the night to take crime-scene photos and other sensational, often shocking images. He elevated street photography into an art form and respected the humanity of his subjects, often capturing those on the fringes of society. Bonanos has meticulously researched every aspect of Weegee's life, filling this fascinating and lively account with amusing and touching anecdotes and photographs carefully selected to illustrate Weegee's work and life. VERDICT Lovers of photography and/or New York City will appreciate this highly recommended biography of a man who not only became part of Gotham itself but also helped to shape its character and history. [See Prepub Alert, 10/4/17; "Editors' Spring Picks," LJ 2/1/18.]--Raymond Bial, First Light Photography, Urbana, IL

Copyright 2018 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

May 15, 2018

Famed for his gritty, sometimes lurid shots, particularly of midcentury New York, Arthur Fellig, aka Weegee (from the Ouji board), is here tracked from young, self-taught immigrant to flashbulb-bright celebrity by Bonanos, a senior editor at New York magazine.

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.