Front and Center

John Houseman is one of the most most extraordinary talents of the American theater, a distinguished television and motion picture producer and a brilliant writer. Run-Through, the first volume of his memoirs, was widely acclaimed as one of the most entertaining and informative books written on the contemporary American theater.

Now, in Front and Center, Houseman continues the story of his fascinating life, beginning with his wartime work on the innovative and controversial "Voice of America," a remarkable experiment in persuasion marked by bitter quarrels and ideological battles, and his friendships with such diverse personalities as Robert Sherwood, James Warburg and Joseph Barnes. He goes on to chronicle his career in Hollywood in the forties, when he produced, among others, The Blue Dahlia. and Letter from an Unknown Woman; his return to Broadway and production of Lute Song and the world premiere of Bertolt Brecht's Galileo. which starred Charles Laughton. He recalls his associations with Ray Chandler, Nicholas Ray and Joan Fontaine; his experiences during the Red Scare and blacklists of the fifties; his daring film of Julius Caesar starring Marlon Brando, John Gielgud, Louis Calhern and James Mason; and Lust for Life, in which Kirk Douglas played Van Gogh...

Here is a unique and fascinating look at life in Hollywood and the theater, related by a gifted man who writes about himself with wit, astonishing candor, a piercing eye for the ridiculous in himself and others, and a total recall that makes his memoirs remarkably true-to-life.