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High Society: The Life of Grace Kelly
by
Donald Spoto
Drawing on his unprecedented access to Grace Kelly, bestselling biographer Donald Spoto at last offers an intimate, honest, and authoritative portrait of one of Hollywood’s legendary actresses.
In just seven years–from 1950 through 1956–Grace Kelly embarked on a whirlwind career that included roles in eleven movies. From the principled Amy Fowler Kane in High Noon to the th...more
In just seven years–from 1950 through 1956–Grace Kelly embarked on a whirlwind career that included roles in eleven movies. From the principled Amy Fowler Kane in High Noon to the th...more
Hardcover, 352 pages
Published
November 3rd 2009
by Harmony
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This may seem like a weird choice if you don't know me well and know why I was reading it. I can't really get into why I was reading it in this space, but whatever. I read it. It happened.
For those not familiar with Donald Spoto, he is one of the authoritative Golden Age of Hollywood writers. He wrote the seminal books on Alfred Hitchcock The Art of Alfred Hitchcock and The Dark Side of Genius: The Life of Alfred Hitchcock. It was while writing The Art of Alfred Hitchcock that he becam...more
For those not familiar with Donald Spoto, he is one of the authoritative Golden Age of Hollywood writers. He wrote the seminal books on Alfred Hitchcock The Art of Alfred Hitchcock and The Dark Side of Genius: The Life of Alfred Hitchcock. It was while writing The Art of Alfred Hitchcock that he becam...more
Obviously one must hold regard for Grace Kelly to read this book.
Since one of my life questions to myself when a social, character building decision needs to be made Is..."What would Grace Kelly do?"
Readers will enjoy this book because it does not dwell on her flawless delicate looks. You learn she wore glasses, paid for her own education even though she was a blue blood in real life. Grace always worked, followed social decorum with a flair of being a rebel, and wa...more
Since one of my life questions to myself when a social, character building decision needs to be made Is..."What would Grace Kelly do?"
Readers will enjoy this book because it does not dwell on her flawless delicate looks. You learn she wore glasses, paid for her own education even though she was a blue blood in real life. Grace always worked, followed social decorum with a flair of being a rebel, and wa...more
This book focused too much on GK’s movie career, delving into the 11 movies she starred in before taking on the title of Her Serene Highness the Princess of Monaco. Although I found Spoto’s writing style interesting, the move details seemed a little incongruent with the rest of the book. I just picked this book up while browsing library shelves, but I would have preferred something that elaborated more upon her life after her marriage to Prince Rainer, i.e., the challenges of taking on a new c...more
This is a serious book--a tad too serious for me. To truly appreciate it you should be very familiar with Kelly's work and even have given it a bit of analysis. The author had extraordinary access to Kelly, her friends and Hitchcock (about whom he has written several books). Having marveled at her in The Country Girl, I recognized her talent. I didn't realize how devoted she was to her craft or how incredibly hard she worked. Studio system notwithstanding, she had the spunk to control her o...more
The Hollywood story of great actresses coming from humble beginnings is so ingrained that the first surprise this book offered was that Grace was born to a wealthy family. Her father was opposed to her career choice and was constantly critical of her achievements. She was allowed to move to NY to attend the American Academy of Dramatic Arts as long as she lived in a monitored building filled with other daughters of wealthy families.
The book spends a lot of time on her movies, the...more
The book spends a lot of time on her movies, the...more
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I've never read a biography of a celebrity before, and I can't say that I love this genre. I do really enjoy Grace Kelly's movies and that whole era in Hollywood so I did find reading about all that, and her personal life as well, pretty interesting. I did not find it at all well written; perhaps that's normal in this genre. But it seemed a real stretch that he was basing the book on just a few conversations and meetings he had with Grace. He seemed to rely heavily on a lot of uninteresting ...more
First and foremost, I learned that my son Andy pays attention. We watched three Grace Kelly movies, at my request, one night while he was home for Thanksgiving. He bought me this book for Christmas.
A notable quote by the author: "From such casual, spontaneous decisions does one's destiny take shape, and what seems but a confluence of distractions alters the course of life."
Grace Kelly led a very down-to-earth existence, even though her life appeared to be magically be...more
A notable quote by the author: "From such casual, spontaneous decisions does one's destiny take shape, and what seems but a confluence of distractions alters the course of life."
Grace Kelly led a very down-to-earth existence, even though her life appeared to be magically be...more
An interesting and well-done biography. I consider this one definitive, since Spoto is the only biographer who interviewed Grace personally (and many times, over many years). He is very respectful without glossing over the truth. Granted there aren't too many salacious bits in Grace Kelly's life, so that wasn't all that difficult. Anyway, it was fun for me to read about how Grace felt toward her craft, her fame, and her role as a princess. The only negative comment I have about the book is that ...more
I love to read works of fiction for many reasons but at the top of that list of reasons is to witness the art of creating characters and plots from an author's imagination to the written page. I've realized as I've gotten older that just as remarkable is the well-written biography that scans a REAL lifetime, beginning to end--REAL character, REAL journey, REAL growth. Grace Kelly is one of my all-time favorite actresses and it was interesting to read how very different she is as a real live ch...more
This is the second book I have read about Her Serene Highness Princess Grace Kelly Grimaldi. Unfortunately, this book was more serious than I anticipated. For some reason, the author vowed to not publish the book until 25 years after her death. I wasn't quite sure why he vowed this since there was no "Eureka!!" moment, but alas. The book chronicles Grace's rise and short career as a Hollywood Best Actress. There were a few funny tidbits about Grace that I never knew such as she ha...more
Until the last part I found this book terribly dull. The author goes over each movie she made giving the full details. I was a lot more interested in Grace Kelly's life that the entire storyline of the old movies. He did give us insight into her life after marrying her 'Prince Charming'.
If you would rather read about a movie than see it go ahead and read the entire book! But if you were a young child when the papers were full of her storybook marriage like I was I suggest you ski...more
If you would rather read about a movie than see it go ahead and read the entire book! But if you were a young child when the papers were full of her storybook marriage like I was I suggest you ski...more
I thought the author was too attached to the subject at hand. He clearly doesn't want to tarnish the idea of Grace Kelly and although he tries to bring her down to earth as a hard working actress, he never really removes her from the pedestal that everyone around her places her on.
It was kind of a boring read and there wasn't that much new. Most of the book was filled with extreme detail of the films she was in. If I want to know about Grace Kelly's films, I will watch them.
...more
It was kind of a boring read and there wasn't that much new. Most of the book was filled with extreme detail of the films she was in. If I want to know about Grace Kelly's films, I will watch them.
...more
Alice
rated it
This book’s fatal flaw has to be Donald Spoto’s endless page time devoted to critiquing Grace’s movies and her parts in them. For someone who had the amount of access he did to the woman herself and a number of the people she was close with it appears to me that he squandered those valuable opportunities.
So many times through out this book I found myself wondering whether I was reading a biography about Grace Kelly or if I had inadvertently bought a book that wanted to talk in great...more
So many times through out this book I found myself wondering whether I was reading a biography about Grace Kelly or if I had inadvertently bought a book that wanted to talk in great...more
I'm a huge Grace Kelly fan and have read more books on her life than I'd care to admit...this one focuses mostly on her acting career, with a short overview of her life as Princess of Monaco. What sets this apart from other books about her is that it tastefully dispels (rather than fuels) rumors that she was a husband-stealing nymphomaniac during the time of her brief film career. Spoto is really skilled at painting a respectful portrait of her life, though the story of Grace Kelly's time on e...more
I bought this book when I was in London, after having visited an exposition on Grace Kelly. My mom thought I would like it, even though I wasn't familiar with the woman before. My mom was right. I very quickly fell in love with Grace Kelly. They also showed some movie material of Grace's at the exposition which convinced me to buy this book.
I liked the book, although I understand why some people have problems with it. The writer of this book, Donald Spoto, is exceptionally positive a...more
I liked the book, although I understand why some people have problems with it. The writer of this book, Donald Spoto, is exceptionally positive a...more
I thought it was an interesting book. I have always loved the movie "To Catch a Thief" and have seen a few other movies of Grace Kelly's. Her rather fairy-tale life after Hollywood was intriguing and I wondered how much of what was written in the press about her was true. While Donald Spoto clearly favors Grace, he seems to be fairly honest in his treatment of her life and love affairs, always a hot topic for the press. This book deals with her early years and her acting career. H...more
This biography was infinitely better than the first I read (True Grace, by Wendy Leigh). The book is well-written, giving insight into both the events of Grace Kelly's life and her personality and character. Spoto gives a forthright account of her life, relying on excellent sources, and doesn't go diving for scandal or make accusations or conjectures based on sources of questionable credibility (as Leigh does). Two things detracted from the quality of this biography: (1) the author clearly has a...more
Oh what an interesting, classy lady! And a lot tougher than people give her credit for. I now want to go back and watch everything she did in the few years she worked. Especially "The Country Girl" which she won an Academy Award for. I was also impressed by the author who actually knew her and stayed true to his promise of waiting 25 years after she was gone to publish this. Fascinating!
Grace Kelly's life was certainly more interesting than this biography. The author concentrates heavily on all of her movie roles--which was kind of interesting, but mostly tedious after awhile. And the account of her life as Princess of Monaco was rushed--like it was an afterthought to her film career. In the right writer's hands, a bio of Grace Kelly could probably be really good. At the very least, it encouraged me to watch several of her films--Rear Window is maybe one of the best movies ever...more
This book was lacking a real focus on Grace! For my taste, it had WAY too much detail on the plots of the movies or plays she was involved with, the other actors, the directors, etc. I was left wanting to learn more about Grace herself. And, it felt like Donald Spoto was infatuated with her and constantly projecting feelings onto her. At times he seemed to feel the need to defend her. Overall, not a good read.
Well written book about Grace Kelly. Goes into detail about her childhood in Philadelphia, how her father never thought she was anything extraordinary (!), and despite her love of acting, how she disliked being in the Hollywood spotlight. Grace always handled herself with, well, Grace, and was nothing short of a true lady.
The author draws on interviews he conducted with Grace, as well as previously unrevealed interviews and correspondence with many of her friends and colleagues, to present an affectionate biography of Grace Kelly. He traces her life from her childhood in the wealthy suburbs of Philadelphia, as a model and theatre actress, her life as a Hollywood film star, her marriage to a Prince, and her untimely death in Monaco. The reader is given an especially interesting look at Hollywood during the 1950's....more
Short book, heavy on Grace's movie years and very light on her married years. As a tell all, not so much but she certainly had a lot of boyfriends before becoming Princess Grace. It is clear that she thought she would continue making films after having children but the Prince was definitely not. Guess who won.
This was my 2nd beach read which was chosen for my Aug book club. I thoroughly enjoyed learning more about Grace Kelly; I now want to get to the library to pick up some of her movies! Her connection to Philadelphia and how much Philadelphians are linked to the theatre/movies was very interesting as well.
It was a good account of Grace Kelly, and I thoroughly enjoyed all of the smaller tidbits of information about other famous Hollywood types of that time period. That being said, it was clear that this was penned by an author who has spent most of his time chronicling the lives of celebrities, and at times the side notes and vignettes were distracting from the central story, that of Princess Grace. Overall, I enjoyed the book, but view it just as a jumping-off point for learning more about the Pr...more
This book was mainly about Grace's life as a working actress. While her life as the Serene Highness of Monaco has certainly been the greater focus of other books, I enjoyed reading this book, especially about her fairly extensive work in television, which seems to be lesser known than her movies.
Interesting bio about Grace Kelly, sort of blandly told, but factual. Interesting insight on moviemaking with Alfred Hitchcock "HItch",her love affair with Oleg Cassini, friendships with Josephine Baker and Jackie Kennedy and retirement from movie making to become Princess of Monaco.
from my bn.com review:
Before Grace Kelly married a prince, she was a princess in America. She was a beloved actress who was known for her poise, professionalism, beauty, and talent. This biography, which was the result of intimate conversations between the author and Grace Kelly, tells with great detail the acting career of the future Princess of Monaco. My only complaint is that there is not more told about her life after her marriage, but I would recommend this biography to any fil...more
Before Grace Kelly married a prince, she was a princess in America. She was a beloved actress who was known for her poise, professionalism, beauty, and talent. This biography, which was the result of intimate conversations between the author and Grace Kelly, tells with great detail the acting career of the future Princess of Monaco. My only complaint is that there is not more told about her life after her marriage, but I would recommend this biography to any fil...more
This was pretty good for a biography. Normally I heard biography and immediately zoned out. I could have cared less for them. Then I read this. This book totally changed my opinion. I think I’m a little more open to biographies now because I read this interesting, eye catching book. I could kind of relate to Grace Kelly a little bit. Maybe I liked it because she was an actress and I want to be an actress. Maybe I found the book really inspirational. I don’t know what it was that made me like thi...more
The author promised Grace Kelly he would not write this book until twenty five years after her death. But I'm darned if I can figure out what great secret he was holding back. I think she was a lovely person and he is respectful. But somehow I think there was more going on there.
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A prolific and respected biographer and theologian, Donald Spoto is the author of twenty published books, among them bestselling biographies of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Alfred Hitchcock, Tennessee Williams, and Ingrid Bergman. His books have been translated into more than twenty languages. Donald Spoto earned his Ph.D. in theology at Fordham University. After years as a theology professor, he t...more
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