num_pages: 240
description: Henry Alford was a well-adjusted, critically acclaimed author living quietly in New York City.Then he decided to become an actor.Thus begins Alford's hilarious romp through the uncanny world of the struggling actor, with its horrible headshots, gleefully sadistic acting teachers, and mutilated Shakespeare. Alford is rejected by directors, ignored by casting people, and educated in the finer points of Shakespearean thespianism at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in England, where he fails to convince the Queen to attend his final performance. Along the way, he auditions for the role of Wilbur the Pig in Charlotte's Web , triumphs as an extra in Godzilla , and takes his sixty-nine-year-old bird-watching, chain-smoking mother to improvisational-comedy camp. Original, absurd, and written with true comic grace, Big Kiss captures in a new and unforgettable way the experience of being a performer.
language: English
title: Big Kiss: One Actor's Desperate Attempt to Claw His Way to the Middle
titlecomplete: Big Kiss: One Actor's Desperate Attempt to Claw His Way to the Middle
genres: Nonfiction, Humor, Biography
ratings_count: 55
awards: awardedAt: 978336000000
name: Thurber Prize
category: American Humor
publisher: Broadway