Christopher Plummer (1929–2021)

I'm surprised by how much I enjoyed Christopher Plummer's memoirs. Plummer comes across as an irresponsible, self-centred, heavy-drinking womanizer, though, to his credit, he readily admits this. If you can get past this and are not offended by the bawdier passages, he has many wonderful stories to tell about his decades in theatre, film and television. Though most people know of him through The Sound of Music, that work seems to be among the least of his accomplishments.

Canadians especially show more will like Plummer's stories about his childhood in Quebec, his involvement with the Stratford Festival during its early years, and his observations on the relationships between French and English Canadians. It helps if you understand French, as there are French phrases sprinkled throughout the text.

Plummer's true love is the theatre, and in between the hilarious behind-the-scenes stories, he shows his appreciation and understanding of the works themselves. He quotes extensively from the texts and gives his views on how they should be interpreted. Plummer also name-drops at an incredible per-page rate, and he has great stories about many actors that you may know from old movies and TV shows but who also got their start on the stage. For example, William Shatner (Captain Kirk) was once his understudy at Stratford.

I wouldn't recommend this book to everyone. With 648 densely-packed pages, it's a long read, and Plummer spends a lot of time on details that might not be of wide interest. However, if you love theatre or old movies, you will find this book highly entertaining. show less

Finally finished it, only seven months after I began it. True, there were several weeks through the summer I did not touch it. Once I got into the rhythm of the book, it went better. I realized it made for good bedtime reading. I don't mean that it is so boring it put me to sleep! The book is a compilation of vignettes throughout Plummer's life. It's easy to read a few pages and stop: perfect for calming down my mind at the end of the day in preparation for sleep. With a novel, you want to show more know what happens next; this was more like short stories, but rarely heart-racing, keep-you-awake stuff.

I admit to likely the final third of the book best; probably because the stories are shorter, and they are about people or projects that I have heard of (more than the first two-thirds). The style is also less garrulous in the latter part.

Overall, I think Plummer has written about the stage and its players (and film) more than his life per se. He is arrogant and a rogue, yes, but he acknowledges that about himself, even if he does not apologize for it. I took the "name-dropping" not so much as a "I'm so great because I've worked with all these great people" but as a record of what the acting world is/was like throughout his life. As a historical record, I think his memoir has value. It records a lifestyle that no longer exists, of people who will now not be forgotten.

His love of Shakespeare comes across throughout the book; especially his admiration of The Tempest, having read the book during the season he played Prospero at Stratford in Ontario made the experience of seeing him on stage and reading the book that much more meaningful. show less

Christopher Plummer has got away with a lot in his long life. Part of this must be due to sheer luck. Given his appetite for alcohol, food, and women, all of which appears to be meticulously detailed in this autobiography, it's a miracle he's in the good shape he's in, or indeed, alive at all, given more than one close call (also carefully related). Another thing that gets him off is his extreme good looks. People are always more willing to forgive handsome and charming people. The third show more thing that excuses this over-the-top catalogue of questionable doings is Plummer's own self-deprecation. Sure, he tells tales, but mostly on himself.

Plummer is a smart man. He knows, more than most people, that it takes a dollop of healthy self-regard to survive in the theatre, movies and television, and there's absolutely no doubt that he has that in spades. However, he also knows that no one succeeds in acting purely through one's own doing. In fact, sometimes one succeeds in spite of oneself. (Apt title, Christopher!) Thus, Plummer is careful to give credit to those who gave him breaks, who performed brilliantly alongside him, who loved him and put up with him. The story of his Tony nomination for Iago in Othello is buried by his account of daughter Amanda's Plummer's Tony-win for Agnes of God in the very same year. (And he cheerfully admits that he was "a lousy father" to his only child.)

There's a lot to forgive in this book: the rather precious sprinkling of French throughout (yes, he grew up in Montreal, but really), the number of times he describes friendships in terms of being "inseparable", the often purple prose, the vague and often downright inaccurate references to actual historical events. Did he even have an editor? However, the anecdotes are amusing, his life story is fascinating, and if you check the list of his accomplishments, he's left out a great deal. All delivered with devilish charm.

Finally, given his long life and the huge range of his acting, we can certainly forgive the name-dropping. That's no doubt why we picked up the book in the first place. show less

This is a richly entertaining and splendidly written autobiography by a master at both acting and writing. Portions of it read like great poetry, yet there’s earthiness and plenty of dish, too. By all means, listen to Plummer’s reading of the audiobook if you can. His voice and narration are magical complements to the beautiful text.