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PRODUCT DESCRIPTION
Make Love the Bruce Campbell Way (Hardcover)
by Bruce Campbell (Author)
1ST EDITION! COLLECTORS ITEM.
Book Description
What you're reading right now is known as the “flap copy.” This is where the 72,444 words of my latest book, Make Love the Bruce Campbell Way, are cooked down to fit in a 3 ½-by-9 ½-inch column. But how does one do that with a fictional story about a B movie actor’s disastrous attempt to finally star in a big-budget Hollywood movie? Do you tantalize readers with snappy zingers like the one in chapter six where Biff the Wonder Boy says, “You may be bred in ol’ Kentucky, but you're only a crumb up here”? Or do you reveal pivotal plot points like the one at the end of the book where the little girl on crutches points an accusing finger and shouts, “The killer is Mr. Potter!”
I have too much respect for you as an attention-deficient consumer to attempt such an obvious ruse. But let’s not play games here. You’ve already picked up the book, so you either:
A. Know who I am
B. Like the cool smoking jacket I’m wearing on the cover
C. Have just discovered that the bookstore restroom is out of toilet paper
Is this a relationship book? Well, if by “relationship book” you mean that the characters in it have relationships or are related to someone, then yes, absolutely. Will you learn how to pick up chicks? Good heavens, I can only hope so, though for best results in that department you should both read this book and be Brad Pitt.
Is it a sequel to my autobiography, If Chins Could Kill: Confessions of a B Movie Actor? Sadly, no, which made it much harder to write. According to my publisher, I haven't “done” enough since 2001 to warrant another memoir.
Is it an “autobiographical novel”? Yes. I'm the lead character in the story and I'm a real person and everything in the book actually happened, except for all the stuff that didn’t.
Mostly, the action revolves around my preparations for a pivotal role in director Mike Nichols’s A-list relationship film Let's Make Love!, starring Richard Gere, Renée Zellweger, and Christopher Plummer. This is the kind of break most actors can only dream of. But my Homeric attempt to break through the glass ceiling of B-grade genre fare is hampered by a vengeful studio executive and a production that becomes infected by something called the “B movie virus,” symptoms of which include excessive use of cheesy special effects, slapstick, and projectile vomiting.
When someone fingers me as the guy responsible for the virus, thus ruining my good standing in the entertainment industry (hey, I said it was fiction, okay?), I become a fugitive racing against the clock, an innocent patsy battling the shadowy forces of the studio system to clear my name, save my career, and destroy the Death Star. In a jaw-dropping twist worthy of Hitchcock (page 274), you'll gasp as I turn the tables on Hollywood and attempt to salvage my reputation in a town where you’re only as good as your last remake.
From a violent fistfight with a Buddhist to a life-altering stint in federal prison, this novel has it all. If you like John Grisham, Tom Clancy, or one too many run-on sentences, you'll absolutely love Make Love the Bruce Campbell Way. And if the 72,444 words are too time-consuming, there are lots and lots of cool graphics.
Regards,
Bruce “Don't Call Me Ash” Campbell
~
Bruce Campbell's first book, If Chins Could Kill, was a major sleeper hit
and became a New York Times and national bestseller. His immense energy and
sharp wit are in evidence again in Make Love the Bruce Campbell Way, a novel that will
have readers laughing out loud.
* Hardcover: 320 pages
* Publisher: Thomas Dunne Books; 1st edition (May 26, 2005)
* Language: English
* ISBN-10: 0312312601
* ASIN: B0013LTEZM
* Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 6.2 x 1.4 inches
Satire and sharp one-liners are the engines powering low-budget movie hero Campbell's (If Chins Could Kill) first autobiographical novel, a funny, breezy, high-camp affair. After dispensing B-movie witticisms on romance and navigating love scenes, Sci-Fi channel schlock film actor "Bruce Campbell" is unexpectedly offered the A-list role of a "wise-cracking doorman" and "emotional lynchpin" in the new Mike Nichols romantic comedy Let's Make Love, starring Richard Gere and Renee Zellweger. After getting fully immersed in calamitous role research at the Waldorf-Astoria, Campbell postures (and annoys) his way through the first read-through with indifferent cast members, runs lines with a timid Gere, crassly advises Zellweger on how to accentuate her bust line, dishes ex-husbands with Liz Taylor and berates the film's director of photography, Oscar-winning Vilmos Zsigmond (whose name Campbell spells Sigmund). After a Secret Service ambush and more movie set mayhem, Campbell's A-List luck finally runs out. But not even a bumbling S.W.A.T. team can stop this determined day player from getting his due. Campbell knows of what he writes, and this endless barrage of extreme silliness obviously spoofs (and quite possibly mirrors) a frenzied acting career made up of equal parts exasperation and hilarity.
About the Author
Bruce Campbell is the ultimate "B" actor with an ever growing fanbase. His films in the "Evil Dead" series are cult favorites and his TV roles spark the same enthusiasm. He lives in Oregon.
If Chins Could Kill: Confessions of a B Movie Actor (HARDCOVER)
by Bruce Campbell (Author)
1ST EDITION! COLLECTORS ITEM.
Book Description
If Chins Could Kill is a delightfully irreverent, yet oddly touching epic of ambition and disappointment, fame and anonymity, and lots of fake blood. Told in Bruces wry, sarcastic voice, it is a Hollywood from the bleacher seats look at his experiences in film and TV and at his status as a cult horror and sci-fi movie god. This man with the face of a matinee idol and the heart of a Stooge first attracted what has grown into an enormous cult following as the star of Sam Raimis legendary Evil Dead trilogy of thriller-comedies. With tireless good humor and biting wit, Bruce acted, produced, and directed his way through a bakers dozen of B horror films and space operas before finally enjoying mainstream stardom on prime-time TV. Deeply earnest and fiercely funny, this book tells the story of an unlikely star who continues to lead a unique double life as cult movie icon and regular Joe.
About the Author
Bruce Campbell is the ultimate "B" actor with an ever growing fanbase. His films in the "Evil Dead" series are cult favorites and his TV roles spark the same enthusiasm. He lives in Oregon.
Though it offers few revelations about the details of Campbell's personal life, this entertaining and witty Hollywood memoir combines his life story with how-to guidance on making independent films and becoming a pop culture cult hero. Campbell began working in show business as a teenager, and in high school became friends with future director Sam Raimi, with whom he eventually co-produced the 1982 cult horror hit Evil Dead, in which Campbell starred. Despite his wry, modest sense of humor Campbell recognizes the peculiar place that Evil Dead holds in contemporary culture he sincerely conveys the enormous commitment and work that went into making and marketing the movie. By the time he describes the film's premiere, Campbell's sense of triumph is palpable: we share his excitement when the film makes back its money and by 2000 becomes number three on the all-time video charts after Lady and the Tramp and Titanic. When Campbell isn't starring in new films like Evil Dead II and Moontrap, he is desperately often hilariously looking for investors for his new projects. His subtitle aside, Campbell's career has gone mainstream: he has appeared in Homicide and Ellen, is a regular on Hercules and Xena, and has started directing as well. (June)Forecast: While a boon to film cultists and to Campbell's many fans, this book also has enough insights and smarts to appeal to readers with a serious interest in popular culture. A planned author tour and national print advertising will help it capitalize on Campbell's cult following.
This engaging memoir offers much more than the standard, glamorous "and then I did..." show business autobiography. In an informal and entertaining style, Campbell describes his suburban childhood in 1950s Detroit, his introduction to acting at 13 via a summer stock production of The King and I, his involvement in theatrics and an 8mm movie production in high school, a semester-long foray into higher education, and his adult career as an actor. A large portion of the work is devoted to his friendship and working relationship with director Sam Raimi, who was a high school classmate and whose successful film Evil Dead brought them both to public attention. The book offers insights into the world of independent filmmaking and the life of a "B" actor, but most importantly it succeeds as an evocative memoir that allows the reader to know Campbell.
Campbell, famed and in some quarters beloved star of Sam Raimi's ridiculously scary/scarily ridiculous horror flicks (Evil Dead, Evil Dead II, Armies of Darkness) since their high-school days, has a rapier wit that he plies handily against the weird little world in which he toils. He notes, for example, how much thriller-comedies like Raimi's resemble such syndicated-TV sword-sandals-biceps-boobs-'n'-magic fests as Xena and Hercules, in both of which he just happens to have recurring roles. Exceptionally literate yet conversational, wide-ranging but never wandering, and copiously, gleefully illustrated, Campbell's self-life is, as he says, "not about an actor's 'meteoric' rise or 'tragic' fall" but is "dedicated to the players on the second string, the 'B' people," with whom he cheerfully identifies. Light reading it may be, but it contains much important lifestyle information, such as how to deal with a cracked block in a 1976 Opal Isuzu, and the merits of using a brush to paint a car with house paint. The true Hollywood and behind-the-scenes-with-Xena-and-Gaby stuff is just so much whipped cream on the sundae.
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