Cecil B. DeMille is Hollywood’s most enduring legend, remembered, and often reviled, for his grandiose biblical sagas, such as Samson and Delilah and his 1956 version of The Ten Commandments, with its cast of tens of thousands before computer graphics made the modern epic mundane. Many judged DeMille a dinosaur both for his movies and his ultraconservative politics. But in his vision of the Bible as an American frontier narrative he recast this old trend in American culture as a cinematic precursor of the “neoconservatism” of our own times.

The paradox of DeMille goes deeper, as despite his fame, most of his seventy ?lms, of which ?fty were silent pictures, remain unknown even to avid ?lm fans, though his ?rst 1923 version of The Ten Commandments and his 1927 tale of Jesus Christ, King of Kings, linger in the imagination. A founder-pioneer of Hollywood as an industry, DeMille was an unsung auteur, a master of increasingly bizarre narratives, with tales of adultery and divorce, hedonism and sin, in an age in which modernity, the consumer society, and the pursuit of money made America a battle?eld of clashing values and temptations.

Simon Louvish tells the tale of Cecil B. DeMille through his work: a major reexamination of Hollywood’s most monumental founder. Savant or sinner, artist or hack, defender of freedom or a hypocritical opportunist who embraced the golden calf of sheer commercialism, DeMille is a pervasive puzzle---a mirror of the larger puzzle and contradictions of America itself.

 

Praise for Simon Louvish

 

“Louvish is a biographer who leaves few stones unturned.”---Los Angeles Times on Mae West

 

“Meticulously researched.” ---USA Today on Mae West

 

“Louvish’s painstakingly researched and shrewd biography tells all about Mae---body, libido, and, perhaps most surprisingly and fascinatingly, mind.”--The Atlantic on Mae West

 

 “Louvish is at his best in discussing how Laurel and Hardy, unlike most of the great silent-?lm comedians, had no trouble making the transition to sound.”---The New York Times on Stan and Ollie

 

“Thanks to a lively, affectionate writer, we can glimpse the great clowns at work.”

---The Dallas Morning News on Stan and Ollie

 

“Louvish’s wide-eyed love for his subjects’ simple, forthright, and hardworking desire to please will bring down the house.”---Kirkus Reviews (starred review) on Stan and Ollie

 

 “Mr. Louvish has written a well-researched and playful version of this hysterical history.”---Orlando Sentinel on Monkey Business

 

“Louvish is a . . . committed researcher.” ---The New York Times Book Review on Monkey Business

 

“Told with tremendous style and sparkle, Louvish’s composite portrait of the Marx Brothers offers an indispensable overview of the actors’ saga.”---Publishers Weekly on Monkey Business

 

Simon Louvish has written eleven works of ?ction and ?ve previous movie biographies of Hollywood’s classic stars: Mae West, W. C. Fields, Laurel and Hardy, the Marx Brothers, and Mack Sennett. He lives in London, England, but wanders as far a?eld as China and California on occasion.

Imprint: Thomas Dunne Books
Distributor: MPS
Publication Date: 03-04-2008
Pages: 528
Measurements: 9.25in X 6.13in X 1.75in