Louis B. Mayer and Irving Thalberg: The Whole Equation (Jewish Lives)

This amazing book on the lives of Louis B. Mayer and Irving Thalberg is quite intense and goes deeply into MGM from the beginning, but is hard to put down. It shows how complicated their lives were and how their personalities affected their lives and everyone around them.It is not just about L B Mayer and Irving Thalberg, but the many people that you recognize.If you have any interest in Hollywood, don’t miss this great book.

I enjoyed this book because pre-WWII Hollywood history is my favorite film period; so many of the people connected with it are (to me) endlessly fascinating. The Thalberg/Mayer relationship has been well covered by film historians, and Kenneth Turan doesn't add much that's new or that takes a different perspective. But he provides an admirable synthesis of material and has done extensive and thorough research. Pulling together so much complex information is no easy task, nor is presenting it in a balanced, engaging fashion, but for the most part, Turan manages these feats well.I like the fact that he approaches Thalberg's and Mayer's partnership with nuance, resisting and challenging the oft-stated (but too simplistic) binary of "Mayer = business side; Thalberg = creative side." The reality is much more complicated, which we need to understand if we're to gain any real insight into just why the Thalberg/Mayer chemistry was successful (or why it sometimes wasn't). Turan's presentation acknowledges the complexity.I also like the way he contextualizes the personalities and biases of his many primary sources. It's not enough just to write, "So-and-So said X" about Thalberg or Mayer: we need to know So-and-So's stake in the game, their relationship to the main players and to the situation at hand, their possible blind spots or personal motivations, and so on. Turan effectively provides such background.Despite the reams of information and wide-ranging quotations, though, I'm sometimes left feeling as if too much remains unexplained. For instance, although the book is part of Yale UP's "Jewish Lives" series, the treatment of Thalberg's and Mayer's Judaism (and its relevance to their work) seems thin. And despite all I've read over the years, including this analysis, I remain rather vague as to just what, exactly, Thalberg's vaunted "genius" consisted of, beyond a perceptive grasp of story and structure and an endless capacity for detail. I'd love to hear more about, for example, his approaches to narrative and script; I hope Mr. Turan will write further about some of the exciting sources he uncovered, such as the transcripts of Thalberg's story conferences.I'd also love to see more detailed analysis of particular films. I understand that the main focus of the book is biographical, but more critical analysis might further elucidate Thalberg's specific gifts. (And have they -- the gifts and the films -- held up over time? Are they more than just historically interesting today?)The text overall is readable and entertaining, especially for a film buff like me. But there are a few stylistic quirks that become a little intrusive. Turan has a huge amount of information and background to impart, so he sometimes over-packs his sentences with long strings of prepositional phrases, appositives, relative clauses, etc., that can obscure the grammatical subject and verb. I sometimes had to go back and parse the structure before I could follow the meaning. Also, in an understandable effort to avoid constantly repeating people's names, he substitutes epithets like "the executive" or "the writer" or "the star," a practice that sounds a bit amateurish to me.Still, these complaints are quibbles. On the whole, _Louis B. Mayer and Irving Thalberg_ is a fine read. As a critic and historian, Turan is knowledgeable and perceptive and at times wryly funny; he really brings this period and these men and women alive for modern readers.

What an enjoyable double bio! So much entertaining and enlightening info packed into this book. With the author's impressive research and thoughtful storytelling, we're given a wonderful portrait of two Hollywood originals, Louis B Mayer and Irving Thalberg.

Well written account of filmland forefathers by veteran expert