Purchase

Amazon

Barnes & Noble

Books-A-Million

Indie BookShop

Ripped Bodice

Add to Wish List

Also by Mark A. Vieira:

The Making Of "Some Like It Hot", October 2009
Hardcover

Also by Tony Curtis:

The Making Of "Some Like It Hot", October 2009
Hardcover
American Prince, October 2008
Hardcover

THE MAKING OF "SOME LIKE IT HOT"
By: Mark A. Vieira, Tony Curtis

My Memories Of Marilyn Monroe And The Classic American Movie

Wiley
October 2009
On Sale: September 28, 2009
240 pages
ISBN: 0470537213
EAN: 9780470537213
Hardcover
Add to Wish List

Non-Fiction | Non-Fiction Memoir

When Hollywood legend Tony Curtis meets his fans, they always ask about his 1959 comedy Some Like It Hot. Luckily for them—and for us—Tony has stories to share. In his new book, The Making of Some Like It Hot, he shares all of them.

Some Like It Hot is a beloved part of our culture, voted the "Funniest Film of All Time" by the American Film Institute, but Tony is the first to tell the complete, uncensored story of its making, a behind-the-scenes saga of intrigue, humor, and romance. A noted artist and raconteur, Tony paints word portraits of the geniuses who made the film: director Billy Wilder and his cowriter I. A. L. Diamond; actor Jack Lemmon; and sex icon Marilyn Monroe. In his engaging style, Tony tells of Wilder and Diamond's unique writing routine; Wilder's surprising first choice for Tony's costar; and Wilder's daring decision to add violence to farce.

Tony describes the challenges he faced as the "best-looking kid in Hollywood" suddenly forced to dress as a woman: meeting the limitations of a constricting costume; learning the "moves" from a female impersonator; adapting his walk and the pitch of his voice; facing people's reactions (or worse, the lack of them); working in tandem with the hilarious Lemmon; and following Wilder's precise but often impersonal direction.

Here, too, are Tony's previously unpublished recollections of his bittersweet relationship with Marilyn. He tells in vivid, compelling detail how America's most celebrated sex symbol came to work on this unlikely project; how he had met the young unknown years earlier on a studio street; about their puppy love, her meteoric rise to fame, and the resentment he saw in her colleagues; how her perfectionism nearly drove him crazy; and how her strange behavior nearly shut down the film. Disclosed for the first time are details of the affair that took place during the filming at the Hotel del Coronado and the effect it had on Tony, on the production, and on Marilyn's husband, the playwright Arthur Miller. In 1958, America read about a fistfight on the set. Now, for the first time, Tony tells what caused it—and what followed it.

Packed with scores of rarely seen black-and-white photos and eight pages of color photos that reveal how the movie would have looked in Technicolor, The Making of Some Like It Hot is the ideal way to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of this landmark film.

Media Buzz

On Point - October 4, 2010