Marlon Brando found many rabbit holes...

Marlon Brando was, end of story, the finest actor in film history. And yet, his life and career were a series of rabbit holes.

Marlon was born in Omaha Nebraska in 1924. His mum smoked, wore trousers and drove cars. She was also an alcoholic. Marlon, in later life said of her "The anguish that her drinking produced was that she preferred getting drunk to caring for us."

First rabbit hole for Marlon. Down this rabbit hole Marlon found a sensitivity to the failings of others and expressed it. He was expelled from Libertyville High School after riding a motorcycle through the corridors.

Acting was fun for Marlon but he was far from the lazy slob he is often thought to be. An example of his thinking comes from an acting class with Stella Adler. She told the class to be chickens. Then she said a nuclear bomb was about to fall, the chickens went headless crazy, apart from Marlon who just sat down. When asked why he replied "I'm a chicken...what do I know about bombs?"

Another clue to his acting style lies in his habit of, after the director called 'Action!", chatting to one or two of the crew about whatever came into his head and then, when he felt relaxed and natural in conversation, out come the scripted lines.

The cue cards? Yes, he did use them, why? He would read a script but not set it in stone in is head, he would learn it to the point of needing a prompt, hence the cue cards, he felt his delivery would then be more natural.

This ability to be faithful to the script whilst also being natural is best seen here, a clip from 'A Streetcar Named Desire' all good but look at 3.09 whe he sees a fleck floating in the air and pinches between finger and thumb and then the 'Got That' nod.  Here it is...

That moment, for me, is Marlon Brando in a millisecond. Two minds working together, the acting mind and the real mind.

To unravel the rabbit holes in Marlon's life I read Susan L Mizruchi's stunning book 'Brando's Smile' and if you like rabbit holes you need this book about Marlon

Another rabbit hole soon....

Guy Burgess found rabbit holes inside rabbit holes...

To be a spy is to live two lives at once without allowing one to impinge on the other, a daunting task for anyone.

Guy Burgess was already living two different lives at once before he became a spy and was always happy for one to impinge on the other, indeed he enjoyed doing so and watching the results.

Born in 1911 to a wealthy upper-middle class English family Guy was schooled at Eton, the Royal Naval College Dartmouth and Trinity College, Cambridge. Such a background brings to mind a well mannered individual, respectful of his heritage and all it stood for.

Not so Guy. Flamboyantly gay from an early age Guy had been described, by the time he arrived at  Cambridge as grubby and  untidy and exceeded himself whilst at Trinity, being described there as 'a selfish lout' and 'dirty'. Guy was never much bothered with others opinions as he espoused his new left wing opinions with breath full of the garlic cloves he habitually chewed.

Dissolute and promiscous Guy was also precociously clever Guy. Though failing to leave Cambridge with the expected double first he was able to network and this, along with his leftwing views, led to his being talent-spotted by the already KGB agent Kim Philby who recommended him to his handler, Arnold Deutsch who, very perceptively, saw great potential in Guy's "inclinations of an adventurer" as a new recruit to the group who became 'The Cambridge Five'.

Guy's only concession  to his life as a spy was to renounce his left wing views. He remained as contrary as ever through subsequent jobs at the BBC, where he was described as '"a snob and a slob..." The rabbit hole was open and Guy dived in.

His contrariness continued as he joined the Foreign Office and provided so much information to the Soviets that they thought it was to good to be true and that nobody as badly behaved and unkempt could possibly keep his job and he could, therefore, be a double agent.

Guy's fortune ran out and he and fellow spy Donald Maclean fled to Russia in 1951.

The rabbit hole now took on a darker hue as Guy pined for that part of British life he enjoyed as much as he rejected the system that had provided it. He wrestled, once again, with living two lives side by side and died of acute liver failure in 1963 aged just 53

His ashes are interred in a quiet churchyard in rural England, far from the now long gone Soviet Union.

Two recent biographies shed light on the strange and divided life/lives of Guy Burgess.

Just take the ISBN's 9781473627383 and 9781849549134 to your local bookshop for the full engrossing story.

Another rabbit hole soon...

Philip K Dick's rabbit hole got made into movies...

The recent extension to the Blade Runner film story has also stirred interest in the author of the book it is based on, "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" published in 1968, written by Philip K Dick.

Born in 1928 in Chicago Philip was one of twins, his sister Jane died aged six weeks. Brought up by his mother Philip developed an interest in science fiction and began writing stories, the first was  published in 1951 and from then on he devoted his life to writing. Alongside science fiction he also wrote mainstream literary novels with no success.

At university study of philosophy gave Philip a life-long interest in what is 'real' and this increasingly dominated both his psyche and his writing.

By 1971 he had developed a serious amphetamine habit and the rabbit hole began to open in front of him. His increasingly erratic behaviour was reverse-mirrored in the increasingly focussed subjects of his writing. Notions of reality, confused ideas of consciousness and alienation mixed with a cocktail of drugs resulted in psychosis, hallucinations and breakdowns.

It also resulted in some of the most original and challenging works of science fiction. His ideas and novels were made into films, 'Blade Runner', 'Total Recall' and 'A Scanner Darkly' being the most notable.

His health suffered from the drug use and Philip K Dick died in 1982. He was buried alongside his sister. At the time of her death his name had also been inscribed on the tombstone, the dates of birth and death were left blank, awaiting his arrival.

Emmanuel Carrère's biography 'I Am Alive and You are Dead: A Journey Inside the Mind of Philip K. Dick' is now available again, take the ISBN 9780747579717 to your local bookshop for a trip into a fascinating mind.

There is also an equally intriguing audio-only interview he gave in 1979 here

Another rabbit hole soon.

Bobby Fischer fell down a rabbit hole...move by move

Like many people I learned, at an early age, how to move chess pieces around the board, take the occasional piece and left it that.

A selected few, Bobby among them, took it to new heights. Bobby went down the rabbit hole.

An early prodigy he first lit up the chess world aged thirteen with his defeat of Donald Byrne..often called the best ever game of chess...here it is...good luck..I got lost at around move 5...Fischer vs Byrne

Born in 1943 Bobby found his first chess set at a candy store aged six. He understood chess in a way most others never do.

His deep understanding of the game and a willingness to break the rules led to an early rise through the chess ranks.

Along with this came a habit of making demands and laying down conditions before agreeing to enter a tournament.

Then came the Cold War clash in Rekyavik, in 1972 against Boris Spassky. It was presented as a Cold War showdown.  Bobby played it tricky, played mind games as well as chess. His head is working ten times around here...

He won. Then went down a 20 year rabbit hole. He emerged in 1992.

Then went down another rabbit hole. Big time...the trip did not turn out well...

The Rekyavik story is best told in this book by David Edmonds and David Eidinow ISBN 9780571214129...take it down your local bookshop, in stock in mine...

For a fascinating further read on Bobby down the rabbit hole The Atlantic, as so often, comes up trumps....or should that be checkmate...here it is..

Another rabbit hole soon...

David Litvinoff fell down a 1960's rabbit hole

The 1960's were a mixed bag. If you lived in London it was all about mixing. If you lived elsewhere it was just the 1950's with a new number in it.

Which is why the story of David Litvinoff is so fascinating. He mixed, he mixed up people as well, then went down a rabbit hole.

1960's aristocratic socialite Suna Portman summed David up best and her words are the key to Litvinoff...'He seemed to know all of us rather better than we knew him,’ very wise words.

Born in Whitechapel, London, in 1928 to a Jewish family of Russian origin  David was into his twenties when he began frequenting the new jazz clubs in the west end of London. This is where the rabbit hole formed.

At this time the first seeds of the 'swinging sixties' were being sown as an unholy alliance took form in a reverse polarity. East End villains took to the West End more than before and found themselves accepted rather than shunned. A mutual admiration society flourished which reached it's hieght when the Kray twins moved uptown and mingled.

David was, in many cases the key, he flitted, he flirted, he told those he flitted and flirted with all they needed to know and nothing about David except that he was the key to the mystery. So secretive was he that very few photographs of him exist, which is why there are none in this post.

David mixed with Lucien Freud, George Melly and other Soho regulars, back in the East End it was the Krays again, both sides looked to David for introductions to the other and he kept the balance.

David's highest high came when he was a 'dialogue coach and technical director' on the ultimate British film describing the 1960's, Nicholas Roeg's 1968 'Performance' starring Mick Jagger.

Now David was walking a tightrope in the darkness of a rabbit hole.

On one side the socially powerful, on the other the violently powerful. A dangerous tightrope.

David jumped off the tightrope and into a new rabbit hole when he moved to Wales in 1968 then Australia then, in 1972, back again to the UK to Davington Priory in Faversham, Kent, a big house owned by his old friend Christopher Gibbs.

David died in April 1975 from an overdose of sleeping pills.

Author Keiron Pim has, with diligent and dogged research, managed to find enough about the mercurial, secretive David Litvinoff to write a fascinating biography of a lost character of the 1960's of who Iain Sinclair said it was 'hard to find hard to find anyone who remembered Litvinoff as the cost of joining that club was "burn-out, premature senility or suicide."

 Bravo Keiron for a great read...as usual take the ISBN 9780099584445 to your local bookshop for a great read...in stock at my local bookshop!

Another rabbit hole soon...

Sonny Liston's life was one long rabbit hole

If there is one thing most of us know it is the date of our birth.

Sonny Liston was never sure of his and there is no record of it. Arkansas, the state he was born in, did not consider birth records worth making mandatory until 1965 and Sonny was never sure of his.

A childhood of which he said '"The only thing my old man ever gave me was a beating" mixed with his illiteracy led to a life on the streets and crime. Sonny got busted but didn't moan about prison, at least it gave him three meals a day he later mused.

The prison athletic coach suggested Sonny should try boxing to keep his fists away from the law. Sonny was a natural, as an amateur he beat 1952 Olympic Heavyweight Champion Ed Sanders. A professional contract followed and Sonny allegedly said on signing  "Whatever you tell me to do, I'll do"

Sadly for Sonny the men who fronted the money were from the shadier corners of an already gloomy  boxing world and Sonny worked as an enforcer as well as a boxer. Though he rose through the pro rankings earning himself a formidable reputation Sonny could never quite escape the rabbit hole the gangsters had dug for him.

His serious countenance was mistaken for surliness so Sonny lived up to the 'surly' tag,  in interviews he was often monosyllabic and soon became a figure of hate.

 This was magnified when he beat popular Floyd Patterson to become world champion in 1962. Then came the two still controversial fights in 1964 with Cassius Clay/Muhammad Ali. Sonny was accused of throwing one and surrendering the other to the new champ.

The rabbit hole now fully opened and Sonny spent the rest of his career trying to find his way out. He fought often and won often but never became a serious challenger.

Sonny was found dead in his Las Vegas home on December 30th 1970, heroin and marijuana were found near the body. Heart failure and lung congestion were the official causes of death but foul play has long been suspected which, judging by the title of his deeply researched and grippingly told book on Sonny's life, is also author Shaun Assaels considered opinion.

For a trip down boxings deepest rabbit hole take the ISBN 9781509814831 to your local bookshop. As usual it's in stock at mine...

Another rabbit hole soon.

Laurel Canyon was one big rabbit warren...

Laurel Canyon, Los Angeles. The 1960's.

Think music then and you are also thinking Laurel Canyon. The Byrds, The Doors, Flying Burrito Brothers, Crosby Stills Nash and Young, Mamas & Papas, Frank Zappa, Buffalo Springfield, Canned Heat, Carole King, Joni Mitchell, The Monkees...and more.

For them Laurel Canyon was a playground. But, did they ever wonder about that big building on Lookout Mountain?

Dave McGowan did, he wrote a book about it and the Laurel Canyon scene, in his hands, is riddled with rabbit holes, it is a warren.

The title sort of gives it away so there's no spoiler in telling you that Dave reckoned that the whole Laurel Canyon scene was a false flag operation dedicated to undermining the anti Vietnam war movement. His argument gains traction when he points out the anti war movement began on university campuses, not among the hippy movement. He adds grit to the mix as he notes that the young men of draft age who were in these bands were never drafted and many of them had fathers in shady corners of the armed forces.

Lookout Mountain? Oh, that was only a self-contained film studio set up in total secrecy by the US government to further the propaganda arm of the cold war, how the rabbit holes spread.

In the beautifully titled 'Weird Scenes Inside the Canyon : Laurel Canyon, Covert Ops & The Dark Heart of the Hippie Dream' Dave takes us into the warren of rabbit holes he found and it is pure escapist fun to tag along and join the dots with him.

As usual take the ISBN, 9781909394124, to your local bookshop, it's in mine.....

OK....if you really don't have the cash for the book the first drafts as published online are now hosted by the authors daughter Alissa (Dave passed away in 2015) and can be read on her site Center for an Informed America

Many of Dave's other rabbit holes are also on the site, have fun but don't fall down too many:)

A new rabbit hole soon..