I Must Confess - Softcover

Smith, Rupert

3.39

23 ratings by Goodreads

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1573442895 ISBN 13: 9781573442893

Publisher: Cleis Press, 2007

View all copies of this ISBN edition:

A stinging satire of tell-all showbiz memoirs starring a self-deluded gay icon who has managed to ride every pop culture trend of the last forty years. Marc LeJeune has had a remarkable career in the entertainment business. Despite the carping of critics, cruel twists of fate, and the treachery of former friends who were blind to his exceptional dramatic and musical talents, he has remained true to his unique artistic vision. From his early days as the face of Swinging London, to the late 1960s avant garde theater scene, through the sexually liberated cinema of the 1970s, to his current status as a much-loved household name and TV favorite, he tells all in this, his own astonishing story. Through this fabulous parody of the showbiz confession, Rupert Smith has created a witty and scathing satire of popular culture and entertainment over the last forty years. Marc LeJeune is a brilliant comic creation, inspired by Smith’s many years of interviewing celebrities for Time Out and writing about showbiz in The Guardian (U.K.).

"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.

About the Author:

Rupert Smith was born in Washington DC in 1960, and grew up in Surrey. He has lived in London since 1978. After graduating with a BA in English, he continued his studies at the University of London and in 1986 completed his PhD in theatre history. He is the author of many novels, under his own name and as James Lear and Rupert James. As a journalist, he has contributed to The Guardian, The Independent on Sunday, The Times, The Los Angeles Times, Radio Times, Time Out, and Gay Times.

Review:

"Make no mistake, Rupert Smith's novel is fiction, but it's peppered with real people and events, which invites readers to moisten their lips, arch their eyebrows and wonder, `who is he really talking about?' It's all great fun. Circulate liberally among bitter queens and gossip mavens." -- Echo Magazine

"One of the funniest and most ambitious novels I have read in ages.... Rupert Smith offers us nothing less than a comic history of popular culture. His eye and ear are acute, his parodies lethally accurate." -- Jonathan Coe author of The Closed Circle

"Readers of AfterElton.com know that we have a thing for celebrity memoirs, even when they are poorly written and self-serving. As a literary genre, celebrity memoirs invite parody, and many writers simply can not resist. At their best, celebrity memoir parodies are delightful camp, as was the case with Little Me (1961), written by none other than literature's clown price of camp Patrick Dennis (Auntie Mame).

In 1998, gay English author Rupert Smith took his turn at the bat when he wrote I Must Confess: Celebrity Tells All. Though that first British edition is sadly out of print, I Must Confess has now been reissued by America's own Cleis Press (256 pages).

Like Dennis's Belle Poitrine, Smith's Marc LeJeune (born Mark Young) is a one-man microcosm of pop culture, having experienced the full gamut of English celebrity life from "swinging London" in the sixties to New York "erotic cinema" in the seventies and British TV stardom in the 1980's and 1990's. Though Smith gave his fictional Marc LeJeune a more graphic sex life (gay or otherwise) than Dennis dared to give Little Me's Belle Poitrine, I Must Confess lacks the charming series of staged photos that Dennis used to illustrate Belle's life story.

On the other hand, I Must Confess benefits from Smith's intimate knowledge of English pop culture and the role that gay people (in or out of the closet) play in it. All in all, I Must Confess: Celebrity Tells All is a wonderful read, one that is funny, sexy and - yes - campy." -- Jesse Monteagudo--AfterElton.com April 2008

"This mockumentary tale of the rise and fall and rise of a fabulous English celeb delivers great lines and quite a few giggles..." -- Jonathan Riggs--Instinct Magazine March 2008

"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.