James Stewart

by Donald Dewey (Author)

• Used

  Hardcover
  1997

  $3.44

  An actor remembered for portraying relatively sympathetic and unassuming characters, James Stewart, in many ways, revolutionized the art form. The actor's seemingly easy charm belied great depth and complexity. Donald Dewey's study reveals both the man and the screen legend. With the co-operation of Stewart's family, this book provides an insight into the turmoil of the actor's private life and behind the earnest and endearing Capraesque image so often accepted as the Stewart identity. Dewey draws upon new and private insights into Stewart's personal life and professional career gathered from nearly 200 interviews with childhood neighbours, fellow workers, stage designers, old loves from Hollywood, airmen who flew with him during World War II, as well as close and estranged family members and friends. Donald Dewey is the author of Reasonable Doubts , which won the Nelson Agren Prize for Fiction, and also a biography of Marcello Mastroianni.

• Used

  Paperback
  1997

  $3.44

  In this penetrating and riveting biography of one of Hollywood's most beloved screen icons, Donald Dewey probes beneath Jimmy Stewart, the conservative image and ideal, to reveal James Stewart, the actor and the man.
  Through hundreds of interviews and in-depth analysis of his seventy-five films, the author assesses how the Hollywood man-about-town of the 1930's and 40's - Stewart's lovers included Ginger Roberts, Olivia de Havilland and Marlene Dietrich - became the epitome of American family values who remained married for forty-five years; and how the studio-bred, effervescent star of It's a Wonderful Life developed into the brilliant actor whose performances in films such as Vertigo and Shenandoah exposed a vulnerability unseen in his personal relationships. With many insights into the turmoil of his private life, the artistry behind his cinematic craft and his heroic military record in the Secon World War, Dewey gives us much more than a legend to love.