Peerless

A proud Armenian who claimed a distant link to nobility born in what was then part of czarist Russia Rouben Mamoulian (1897-1987) was one of the most astonishing and confounding figures in American film and theater directing the original stage productions of <i>Porgy and Bess</i> <i>Carousel</i> and <i>Oklahoma!</i> as well as films including <i>Love Me Tonight</i> <i>Queen Christina</i> <i>City Streets</i> and <i>Silk Stockings</i>. He was famously fired from the film version of <i>Porgy and Bess</i> in a dispute over publicity and quit <i>Cleopatra</i> after arguments over a single scene. Mamoulian's mercurial confidence and autocratic tendencies were among the reasons he had a reputation for being uncompromising. This frustrating mix of genius and stubbornness of critical successes and financial flops has proven challenging for biographers. <br> <br> Kurt Jensen's magisterial volume extensively researched and filled with trenchant observations brings to life this charming flawed and fascinating man-and demonstrates how the wellspring of his art contained the seeds of his own destruction. Drawing upon Mamoulian's unfinished memoir and voluminous diaries as well as interviews with the director's surviving collaborators Jensen delivers fresh and informative insider stories from seminal productions. Meanwhile he explores Mamoulian's aesthetic principles and strategies as manifested in lighting choreography and sound design. A tour de force <i>Peerless</i> offers readers a multifaceted in-depth look at an idiosyncratic genius.