siria's review
3.0
A memoir covering the life and career of Alec Guinness up until roughly about 1980. If you have an interest in what it was like to be a jobbing actor in mid-century Britain, or in reading anecdotes about various different actors and directors—some still well-known today, others largely forgotten—this I think might be an engaging read for you. Guinness writes with great fluidity and meanders amiably from one topic to the next, eschewing chronological order, and my sense was that he must have been a great dinner party guest. There's too much performative humility in Blessings in Disguise, though, and too many other things (hints of a certain kind of very English snobbery, racism, misogyny) for me to think I would have liked the man had I ever met him.
nealalex's review against another edition
4.0
A Radio 4 portrait of Alec Guinness claimed that he used to humiliate his wife in front of house guests, and that he opened a celebratory bottle of champagne after his mother’s funeral. So I was surprised by how much time I had for him by the end of this book. Not least because of his navy service in WWII: getting a landing craft across the Atlantic in winter, never mind taking it - and its successor after being shipwrecked in a storm - through two years of combat.
Although not always sympathetic – he admits a fondness for the ‘bitchy remark’ – he does makes himself the butt of several stories. Like the theatre director telling him he was no actor and to get off the f-ing stage, or, when out to see a play, proud of his new officer’s uniform, being handed a ticket by a lady who thought was a commissionaire.
This makes some trumpet-blowing acceptable. Like an argument which Peggy Ashcroft had about him with a director of a production of The Seagull. She’d commented on how Guinness made the audience believe he was pulling on a real rope when just miming. The director pooh-poohed, saying that of course there was a real rope. There wasn’t.
It’s hard to disagree with him about acting. Here he’s sympathizing with Alan Bennett’s hatred of ‘great acting’. “I know what he meant: the self-importance, the authoritative central stage position, the meaningless pregnant pause, the beautiful gesture which is quite out of character, the vocal pyrotechnics, the suppression of fellow actors into dummies who just feed, and the jealousy of areas where the light is brightest, above all the whiff of, ‘You have come to see me act, not to watch a play.’”
In 1955, arriving jetlagged in LA for his first Hollywood film, he couldn’t get a restaurant table till a young actor took pity on him and invited him to join his group. In the car park, the young actor couldn’t resist pointing out his new gift-wrapped sports car. “In a voice I could hardly recognise as my own” Guinness prophesied that he would die within four weeks if he drove it. Which he did: James Dean, of course.
Although not always sympathetic – he admits a fondness for the ‘bitchy remark’ – he does makes himself the butt of several stories. Like the theatre director telling him he was no actor and to get off the f-ing stage, or, when out to see a play, proud of his new officer’s uniform, being handed a ticket by a lady who thought was a commissionaire.
This makes some trumpet-blowing acceptable. Like an argument which Peggy Ashcroft had about him with a director of a production of The Seagull. She’d commented on how Guinness made the audience believe he was pulling on a real rope when just miming. The director pooh-poohed, saying that of course there was a real rope. There wasn’t.
It’s hard to disagree with him about acting. Here he’s sympathizing with Alan Bennett’s hatred of ‘great acting’. “I know what he meant: the self-importance, the authoritative central stage position, the meaningless pregnant pause, the beautiful gesture which is quite out of character, the vocal pyrotechnics, the suppression of fellow actors into dummies who just feed, and the jealousy of areas where the light is brightest, above all the whiff of, ‘You have come to see me act, not to watch a play.’”
In 1955, arriving jetlagged in LA for his first Hollywood film, he couldn’t get a restaurant table till a young actor took pity on him and invited him to join his group. In the car park, the young actor couldn’t resist pointing out his new gift-wrapped sports car. “In a voice I could hardly recognise as my own” Guinness prophesied that he would die within four weeks if he drove it. Which he did: James Dean, of course.
fallchicken's review
3.0
A fun, easy read. The first bits, starting his career, were especially interesting. The end seemed to turn into too much name-dropping.
csd17's review against another edition
4.0
Guinness is a skilled writer. He weaves his tales and vignettes of "the great dead" simply, in an unpretentious tone and then, when you're not expecting it, slips in a wry, comical but wisely accurate observation that makes you pause and reflect and/or laugh.
His preface was particularly clever and enlightening, as was his lengthy chapter on his religious journey and his time in the Navy during WWII.
I found myself looking for events, moments, coincidences, that were the blessings in disguise referenced in the title. As I came to the end of the book I realized that it wasn't the moments that he was highlighting. It was the people that were the blessings in disguise. So, perhaps, it is with us.
His preface was particularly clever and enlightening, as was his lengthy chapter on his religious journey and his time in the Navy during WWII.
I found myself looking for events, moments, coincidences, that were the blessings in disguise referenced in the title. As I came to the end of the book I realized that it wasn't the moments that he was highlighting. It was the people that were the blessings in disguise. So, perhaps, it is with us.
kienie's review against another edition
3.0
Well, this only took forever. I liked the individual stories, but they seemed like the sort to be shared with friends over dinner, not to be put in a book. Oh, they're well written, but there is a certain distance. I have no knowledge of most of the people and many of the plays he names, and while I can google everyone, it seemed futile after a point. This is someone's well written and casually interesting diary. But I wasn't really sucked in into their world. It remained a mystery to me.
smcleish's review against another edition
4.0
Originally published on my blog here in September 2000.
All too often actors' anecdotes amount to "You should have seen me in (whatever). I was wonderful." Alec Guinness, however, carries the opposite approach to such an extreme in his memoirs that you wonder how he ever became a success. His humility sometimes comes over as a little affected, but does at least leave room for him to write positively about many of his colleagues, legends of the twentieth century theatre and film.
Rather than opting for a straightforwardly chronological approach, Blessings in Disguise is organised in a thematic manner. Most of the "themes" are accounts of his relationships with particular people, such as Ralph Richardson, though one of the longest sections is about the way in which his religious convictions evolved until he was received into the Catholic church.
My major criticism of Blessings in Disguise as a memoir of Alec Guinness is that it concentrates on his stage acting to the almost total exclusion of his film roles. Given that vastly more people have seen just one of the films in which he appeared (Star Wars) than will ever have seen him on stage, and given the esteem in which his film acting is held, this is to be regretted. To take the example just cited, Star Wars is mentioned only once in the book, in the context of an imaginary interview in which Alec Guinness says that it effectively means he could be reasonably comfortable for the rest of his life. Interesting issues such as what he thought of George Lucas - and even more with reference to other films, what he thought of David Lean, with whom he famously fell out - are ignored.
On the whole, I enjoyed the anecdotes (though the early sections are a bit difficult to get through), but would have preferred a more balanced account of the life and personality of one of the twentieth century's greatest actors.
All too often actors' anecdotes amount to "You should have seen me in (whatever). I was wonderful." Alec Guinness, however, carries the opposite approach to such an extreme in his memoirs that you wonder how he ever became a success. His humility sometimes comes over as a little affected, but does at least leave room for him to write positively about many of his colleagues, legends of the twentieth century theatre and film.
Rather than opting for a straightforwardly chronological approach, Blessings in Disguise is organised in a thematic manner. Most of the "themes" are accounts of his relationships with particular people, such as Ralph Richardson, though one of the longest sections is about the way in which his religious convictions evolved until he was received into the Catholic church.
My major criticism of Blessings in Disguise as a memoir of Alec Guinness is that it concentrates on his stage acting to the almost total exclusion of his film roles. Given that vastly more people have seen just one of the films in which he appeared (Star Wars) than will ever have seen him on stage, and given the esteem in which his film acting is held, this is to be regretted. To take the example just cited, Star Wars is mentioned only once in the book, in the context of an imaginary interview in which Alec Guinness says that it effectively means he could be reasonably comfortable for the rest of his life. Interesting issues such as what he thought of George Lucas - and even more with reference to other films, what he thought of David Lean, with whom he famously fell out - are ignored.
On the whole, I enjoyed the anecdotes (though the early sections are a bit difficult to get through), but would have preferred a more balanced account of the life and personality of one of the twentieth century's greatest actors.
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