Vicky Loebel’s Choose Your Own “Neil Patrick Harris: Choose Your Own Autobiography” Review
I’m going to diverge from not posting 1920s stuff in order to post an actual review of Neil Patrick Harris: Choose Your Own Autobiography.
I have an unusual (fannish) relationship with NPH. I’d never heard of him as Doogie Howser. I had no interest in How I Met Your Mother. And I never watched the Tony Awards, which always go to a bunch of revivals, Disney monstrosities, and sappy adaptations of the minor works of major poets, and why doesn’t anybody write amazing and interesting songs like “I got the horse right here” or “Johanna” anymore?
So, as I was saying, the first time I saw Neil Patrick Harris to remember him was when my son made me watch Doctor Horrible’s Sing-Along-Blog which was a little too camp for my taste despite the fact I already knew and liked Felicia Day, from The Guild, and Nathan Fillion from everything.
My son LOVED Dr. Horrible, and over the next couple of weeks proceeded to play the show over and over, and three things began to sink into my skull.
Despite the cheese factor, the songs are very well written with interesting lyrics
Damn, that Neil Patrick Harris guy can sing
Zack actually gets the best song on “Commentary” but we’ll leave that for another blog.
In olden days, that would have been that, but in this glorious age, I was able to ask myself the musical question, “Is this three-named celebrity in anything else?” Ten YouTube-Tony-Award-watching minutes later, I had my answer, and I was blown away. Because, damn, revisit #2 above.
This leads us to my review of Neil Patrick Harris Choose Your Own Autobiography, which I highly recommend in the NPH-read audiobook format. You get less choice about whether to achieve stardom or die, but the information’s all there and, as NPH helpfully points out, you don’t have to read. The book rips off a fun format that I (and probably every other reviewer on earth) cannot resist stealing. And so, without more ado, I give you:
Vicky Loebel’s Choose Your Own “Neil Patrick Harris: Choose Your Own Autobiography” Review
It is a warm, sunny afternoon. You are in the kitchen about to clean up yesterday’s dishes (because your housekeeping standards are low) and cook home-made pizza for your son (because food standards are a little higher) when you download the latest audiobook purchase that you made with credits intended to last a year but which actually ran out after three months. The book is Neil Patrick Harris Choose Your Own Autobiography, read by NPH, and you’re excited because, even if the producers of How I Met Your Mother violated every principle of reader—er—viewer trust when they [spoiler alert] laughed, “Hah hah! We take it back!” in the last three minutes of the ninth season, you still think NPH is an astonishingly talented guy. Also, you heard him talk about the book on the Fresh Air podcast and he sounded nice.
To continue with this book, move on to the next paragraph. To learn about the end of How I Met Your Mother, google it. You’ll be busy all day.
You put minced onions and zucchini on the stove to sweat, tap Play on your Audible App, and NPH himself launches into the story of his life. It’s a great story: witty, full of sensible observations, generous recollections, and measured responses to celebrity life. A tale describing one man’s heartwarming determination to be ambitious and kind while remaining firm to his principles, conscious of his good fortune, and devoted to his family. In fact…it’s almost too good to be true.
To take the book at face value and fall platonically in love with NPH, jump to the Conclusion in the last paragraph. For a more cynical response, continue reading.
Your first thought, listening to NPH, is that he’s an amazing guy. Talented, but humble. Sensible about what he wants without an overblown sense of self-importance. And smart. Not only is the man a good writer, he’s clearly very, very smart. And he’s an entertainer. And he likes magic—he’s even gone so far as to place do-it-yourself counting…er…card tricks right in the book! That’s when the first crack appears in your fannish burst of admiration, because you ask, “What sort of autobiography would a really smart guy who was experienced in entertainment and misdirection write about himself?” And the answer’s there staring at you. Exactly this one.
To quell your cynicism and continue reading, skip past the next three paragraphs to Jump 1. To leap to unsubstantiated conclusions and accidentally crush your iPhone, continue reading.
You stir organic tomato paste into the sauce and begin peeling the skin off several sticks of pepperoni. Despite the joy of engaging in this entertaining prep step, you find yourself more and more skeptical about the autobiography. Nobody, you think, can be that talented AND nice. Look at….
You have to stop and ponder because you don’t really know the names of any celebrities except Nathan Fillion, and you’re pretty sure he really is nice. There’s Joss Whedon and, while you don’t know if he’s nice or not, people DO seem to like him. Plus he did a popular film version of Much Ado About Nothing for which he gets a free pass for the rest of his life. You contemplate leaving the sauce to burn and making a list on the internet of people who are talented and whether or not they are reputed to be nice, but this seems like a lot of trouble, and so you simply jump to the conclusion: Neil Patrick Harris is not entirely perfect!
You SLAM your oversized pepperoni-peeling knife on the kitchen table, forgetting in one instant of outrage that that is where you set the iPhone playing the audiobook. You hear a sickening crack (why, oh why hasn’t Apple switched to Sapphire Glass?) and Neil Patrick Harris is silenced…forever.
Jump 1:
Although you realize that NPH’s autobiography is the product of a wickedly self-aware intelligence, you figure “hey, it’s his book; he gets to say what he wants” and go on to enjoy a series of interesting anecdotes mixed with the occasional testimonial from a friend. This continues for a while, until you get to the section on Harold and Kumar, made up of what you guess is supposed to be a funny depiction of predatory male heterosexuality, but which strikes you as simply mean-spirited and gross.
To shrug off the White Castle thing and keep reading, skip the next paragraph to Jump 2. To give up and listen to something completely different, read on.
“I’ve found it!” you cry, picking most of the iPhone glass out of your son’s pepperoni. (Don’t worry – the book automatically synced to the right spot on your iPad.) “NPH’s fatal flaw! Like so many other men, he likes Harold and Kumar! Vowing that this involvement will never get you to watch either that film or anything by the Three Stooges, you slap some pizza crust into the oven and go surf Audible.com for a different book. You and Neil Patrick Harris are over. Unless he reads this and sends you tickets to see him in Hedwig along with a time machine pointing back to last summer.
Jump 2:
“Well,” you tell yourself, “that scene involving words usually reserved for male pornography didn’t work for me, but nobody’s perfect.” You then go on to hear about Doctor Horrible, How I Met Your Mother, award shows, and most endearingly, NPH’s stories of meeting the love of his life (David) and raising twins. All this is told with a warmth, humanity, and respect for both coworkers and his profession that you find pretty much entirely admirable, so that by the time you get to the rather skanky “in the voice of Barney, talking about female conquests” section, you’re able to stick those hard-to-peel pepperoni ends in your ears and forget it.
It’s 2 am. The homemade pizza that you’ve lovingly prepared for your son is ready, four hours after he’s gone to bed. You’ve folded laundry, cleaned the kitchen, tossed in a little Pilates, and dusted shelves and shelves of Playmobile figures your kids won’t let you give away. You’ve also reached the end of the autobiography: a description of NPH’s two-week long 40th birthday party, lovingly planned by his husband and friends, that makes you simultaneously want to kiss your family’s sleeping foreheads and wake them up and kick them. The party story is followed by a final note about kids and family in general that is so well constructed there’s not a dry eye in your head, primarily because there’s no doubt about the author’s sincerity.
Conclusion:
In the end, you don’t know whether Neil Patrick Harris is one of the nicest, most talented people on the face of the earth, or whether he’s hiding mortal flaws behind super-human intelligence. All you know is that the man writes almost as well as he sings.
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Thank you for your delightful and detailed review.