Anyone Got a Match?

by Max Shulman

Big tobacco meets the boob tube in this incendiary satire from the bestselling author of The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis

Jefferson Tatum is a self-made man. Founder of Tatum Cigarette Company, he wrote the brand's advertising jingle--"Tatums smoke mild like an innocent child"--and has been bringing home big money--and hunting huge bears--ever since. But this year his tobacco sales are down 3 percent thanks to the surgeon general's cancer warnings. To make matters worse, Tatum's forty-three-year-old son, Virgil, shows more interest in presiding over his unaccredited college and its undefeated football team than learning about the family business.

Hoping to kill two birds with one stone, Tatum sets out to reinvigorate his company by transforming Acanthus College into a top-tier research institution. The school's scientists will prove that food is more dangerous than cigarettes, making everyone so anxious they'll start smoking again. But when Tatum hires a New York theater director turned Hollywood bigwig to produce a documentary about the research, nothing goes as planned. Secrets are unearthed, old loves are rekindled, and a TV director with a conscience (will wonders never cease?) threatens to expose the whole scam.

Genres: Fiction, Humor

First published January 1, 1974

Reviews

[Joseph · Rating 5 out of 5]

Max Shulman is out of print, and unknown to most anyone born after, oh, say, 1960, but his writing is brilliant, his humor is biting, his dialogue is on the money. His humor was also timely, which may be a reason that he is not widely read today. We live in a different world from his era, and it's probably hard for a young person today to identify with a character from a Shulman story, and many of Shulman's stories center around young people.
Anyone Got a Match? is a bit different from most other Shulman stories, partly because it centers around middle-aged characters (back when being in one's forties was middle-aged), and yet there is still, I think, probably a "generation gap." American grownups today behave differently from Shulman's grownups, and I'm not sure today's can quite "get it."
Still, this may be a good "starter" book for future Shulman fans. It is fairly recent, and it's about television, and everyone knows about television, right? It's also about cigarettes as a health hazard, and food as a health hazard. What could be more topical today than that? It's also about marriage, which most everyone today has at least heard of.
To enjoy the book, though, I think the reader has to come to terms with the American culture of fifty years ago, which may seem like a neat trick but for some reason folks don't have a problem getting into the scene of Victorian England when reading Charles Dickens. Maybe Shulman needs another hundred years to be rediscovered. Perhaps his era is too distant to identify with and too recent to read with historical perspective.
Perhaps you can be seduced by a bit of dialogue . . .
"I want to talk."
"Good. So do I."
"May I talk first?" asked Ira.
"You always do."
"Tell my why you went to bed with Virgil this afternoon?"
"No."
"Do you deny that you did?"
"No."
"You admit it then?"
"No."
"Would you like to know how I found out?"
"No."
"It's a pretty interesting story. Don't you have any curiousity?"
"No."
"I see . . . . Well, then, to sum up, you won't confirm and you won't deny and you won't give me any information whatsoever?"
"Correct."
Now there's a woman who knows how to fight!

[Ossian · Rating 5 out of 5]

t blows me away that this book seems to have passed largely unnoticed when it came out in the mid-sixties -- the couple of blurbs I found essentially shrugged it off as light situation comedy. In fact, it is a little treasure of a book.

It is tightly plotted, economical, no unnecessary slapstick, the main characters are well-drawn, the Southern flavor is present but not overdone. It is very funny yet nowhere inappropriate, and the plot is not predictable.

Underneath all the fun, though, it is a thoughtful and observant book. When you consider the themes it tackles -- marital problems, the tobacco industry and the processed-food industry, a man selling his creative soul to the corporate Leviathan -- it is remarkable how little of this is dated. It all sounds still very relevant, yet it was written over forty years ago. The main thing that perhaps shows its age is the residue of fundamental decency and normalcy that lies over the characters and story.

Not Dickens, maybe, but a thoroughly enjoyable read.

[Mike · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book while serving in the Army. I am constantly reminded of the story while listening to our Tweeter in Chief's minions trying to put a good face on the Tweeter's comments and actions.

[R.K. Cowles · Rating 4 out of 5]

4 1/2 stars

[Loyd Mcintosh · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found a ratty copy of this book for $1 at a local oddball book store, mainly due to the great art work on the cover. Somehow, someway, I had never heard of Max Shulman - I'm 45 years old - but decided to give it a try and once I started, I just couldn't put this book down. I won't get into the plot and stoylines here, I'll just say that this was very funny, witty, and enjoyable read and a great snapshot of mid 1960s. If you see a copy gathering dust in the corner of a used book store, get it. it'll the best buck you'll spend in a long time!

[Dave Moorman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Funniest Novel Ever.

My parents were somewhat troubled when they caught me reading - and guffawing at - this story. And I have reread it dozens of times since. Even though I know the story by heart, I still giggle at the well-honed humor.

In fact, with each journey through the tale, I discover how well Shulman has crafted each sentence, paragraph, scene, and the whole story. The plot, like a perfect joke, builds to Polly's revelation, with nothing extra and nothing wasted.

This book is a Master Class in writing!

[Joe Slater · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's not often I laugh out loud while reading a book, but this one fit the bill. It reflects a different time period when people sometimes behaved what would be called badly, or better yet, stupidly, and Shulman obviously knew this and exploited it to a very humorous degree. Quite the enjoyable read.

[Dan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sound plotting, a bit of dramatic tension, consistent characterizations -- they have their place, but I like Shulman because he could write inspired nonsense, not because he did some more conventional novels. Especially ones like this, with the action occurring in Hollywood and on a university campus, the two most overused settings in fiction. We're a long way from "The Zebra Derby" in 1946. He still had a sense of humor in the mid-1960s, and I laughed heartily [counts highlighted pages] twice, but I'll stick to his early books.

[Pamela · Rating 2 out of 5]

A little too madcap even for Shulman. And strangely enough, a lot of sermonizing—serious sermonizing. Not what you expect (or want) in a Shulman book.

[Pat · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was written in 1974 and it’s so funny to read about a tobacco company, the FDA, and desegregation from the viewpoint of that era. It was a bargain book to read on Kindle and so worth it!

[William · Rating 3 out of 5]

Funny in parts. A little dated.

[Krisselle Solangon · Rating 5 out of 5]

What I love about Max Shulman is his twist in the twisty
It's a twisty story with uninevitable ending.

[Robert · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is absolutely of it's time, but it is at the same time also timeless - the more things change...

[John Herrick]

Comical read. The book was a 1960s version of Tom Wolfe and Christopher Buckley.