Big Red: A Novel Starring Rita Hayworth and Orson Welles
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- $14.99
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- $14.99
Publisher Description
Apple Books • Best Books of the Month
A Publishers Weekly Summer Reads Selection
Narrated by a starry-eyed lesbian, Big Red reimagines the tragic career of Rita Hayworth and her indomitable husband, Orson Welles.
Since he first appeared on the American literary scene, Jerome Charyn has dazzled readers with his “blunt, brilliantly crafted prose” (Washington Post). Yet Charyn, a beloved comedic novelist, also possesses an extraordinary knowledge of Golden Age Hollywood, having taught film history both in the United States and France.
With Big Red, Charyn reimagines the life of one of America’s most enduring icons, “Gilda” herself, Rita Hayworth, whose fiery red tresses and hypnotic dancing graced the silver screen over sixty times in her nearly forty-year career. The quintessential movie star of the 1940s, Hayworth has long been objectified as a sex symbol, pin-up girl, and so-called Love Goddess. Here Charyn, channeling the ghosts of a buried past, finally lifts the veils that have long enshrouded Hayworth, evoking her emotional complexity—her passions, her pain, and her inner turmoil.
Charyn’s reimagining of Hayworth’s story begins in 1943, in a roomette at the Hollywood Hotel, where narrator Rusty Redburn—an impetuous, second-string gossip columnist from Kalamazoo, Michigan—bides her time between working as a gofer in the publicity offices of Columbia Pictures, volunteering at an indie movie house, and pursuing dalliances with young women on the Sunset Strip. Called upon by the manipulative Columbia movie mogul Harry “The Janitor” Cohn to spy on Hayworth—then, the Dream Factory’s most alluring “dame,” and Cohn’s biggest movie star—Rusty becomes Rita’s confidante, accompanying her on a series of madcap adventures with her indomitable husband, the “boy genius” Orson Welles.
But Rusty, an outlaw who can see beyond the prejudices of Hollywood’s male-dominated hierarchy, quickly becomes disgusted with the way actresses, and particularly Rita, are exploited by men. As she struggles to balance the dangerous politics of Tinseltown with her desire to protect Rita from ruffians and journalists alike, Rusty has her own encounters—some sweet, some bruising—with characters real and imagined, from Julie Tanaka, an interned Japanese-American friend, to superstars like Clark Gable and Tallulah Bankhead, as well as notorious Hollywood gossip columnist Louella Parsons.
Reanimating such classic films as Gilda and The Lady from Shanghai, Big Red is a bittersweet paean to Hollywood’s Golden Age, a tender yet honest portrait of a time before blockbusters and film franchises—one that promises to consume both Hollywood cinephiles and neophytes alike. Lauded for his “polymorphous imagination” (Jonathan Lethem), Charyn once again has created one of the most inventive novels in recent American literature.
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
If you love stories about Hollywood’s golden age, you’ll be swept up by this dazzling fictionalized account of a doomed Tinseltown marriage. Noted film historian Jerome Charyn spotlights the short but passionate union of director Orson Welles and actress Rita Hayworth, aka Big Red, through the eyes of an empathetic narrator named Rusty Redburn, a street-smart office worker hired by Hayworth’s studio to keep an eye on the star. Charyn’s obvious affection for his subjects lends humanity and depth to the depictions of personal drama, like the fallout from Hayworth’s childhood abuse and the pain caused by Welles’ massive ego and wandering eye. As captivating as its namesake and chock full of bold-faced names, Big Red is an unforgettable portrait of American film royalty.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Charyn (The Perilous Adventures of the Cowboy King) plausibly recreates another chapter in American history in this affecting and searing portrait of Silver Screen superstars Rita Hayworth and Orson Welles. Rusty Redburn, "an actress who couldn't act, a dancer who couldn't dance, a singer who couldn't sing," struggles to make ends meet in Los Angeles. She takes a job in the publicity department of Columbia Pictures, tasked with digging up dirt on directors and actors, including those employed by the studio. Her adeptness in the role leads studio head Harry Cohn to plant her in the household of Hayworth and Welles to spy on them while working as their secretary. Redburn finds the assignment challenging, especially after she becomes aware of the shy, insecure personality Hayworth's assured exterior conceals. She sympathizes more and more with her quarry as she learns of Hayworth's past as a victim of abuse by Hayworth's own father and of her desire to improve herself intellectually to be a better match for Welles. Charyn offers rapid-fire dialogue and slapstick action ("So it's a bit of blackmail," Orson says at one point, "lunging" at an adversary though he "wasn't much of a gladiator with his big flat feet") along with affecting character development. It's a rewarding paean to some of cinema's greats.