Blowing the Bloody Doors Off

Imagine spending seven satisfying hours with English actor Michael Caine while he tells you all about his life. This audiobook offers just such an experience, and the time flies. Caine is warm, conversational, funny, serious, and wise, and listeners will enjoy every anecdote and word of advice. With a cast of celebrity friends, colleagues, and cherished family members, Caine recounts his childhood, WWII years, many part-time jobs, and long-in-coming "overnight" success. He offers humorous, candid opinions on his career, including his films, plays, and costars. While the audiobook seems like a master class in acting, Caine turns his best-learned lessons into excellent rules to adopt whatever one's career choice: Arrive on time and prepared; be ready for luck; and when you fail, learn from it. Enjoyable listening. S.J.H. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award � AudioFile 2018, Portland, Maine

October 15, 2018
Oscar-winning British actor Caine (What’s It All About?) mines his long career for entertaining anecdotes and life lessons in this genial memoir, taking readers from his childhood in a London slum to his years as a struggling unknown—one studio canceled his contract because an executive thought he looked gay—to major roles in hits such as Alfie, Sleuth, and Batman Begins. Much of the book is blithe showbiz picaresque, stocked with A-listers including John Wayne and Beyoncé and full of filmmaking pratfalls. (“The bees were shitting on us,” he writes of a scene in The Swarm, which he cheerfully allows may be “the worst movie ever made.”) From these vignettes, Caine distills advice on topics including acting mechanics (“Stand straight and you look younger; round your shoulders for instant aging”) and success strategies (“You are always auditioning”), and delivers generic pep talks (“Any time you learn from a failure, it’s a success”). His pensées gain resonance from deeply felt passages on the grueling rejection and insecurity of an actor’s life, the sting of being typecast as an “ignorant cockney bastard,” and the immersion in craft and preparation that overcome obstacles. Caine’s writing—funny, warm, down-to-earth—will captivate fans and casual readers alike.

March 1, 2019

In this entertaining memoir, Academy Award winner Caine looks back at his long and illustrious career and offers candid advice to aspiring actors. Caine, who began appearing in film in 1956, attributes his success to a mixture of hard work, determination, and sheer luck. It took him eight years of appearing in uncredited and bit parts before he gained notice in Zulu (1964). He reflects that his career was filled with doubt and ups and downs. The high and low points are sprinkled throughout the "life lessons" he shares here. He offers practical advice on acting techniques, as well as developing good habits such as being on time, learning your lines, and acting with civility toward everyone on the set. He shares many colorful stories about such fellow legends as Elizabeth Taylor, Laurence Olivier, Jack Nicholson, and many others. He also discusses the other loves in his life: his wife, Shakira; children; and grandchildren and his love of gardening. Caine's narration is friendly and engaging, like listening to an old friend. VERDICT A valuable resource for students as well as an entertaining addition to Caine's previous autobiographies What's It All About? and The Elephant to Hollywood.--Phillip Oliver, formerly with Univ. of North Alabama, Florence

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