Sunday March 19, 2006
Fun days with dad
Review by MARSHA MAUNG
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By Billy Crystal
Publisher: Warner Books, 182 pages
(ISBN: 0-446-57867-3)
THIS has got to be one of the funniest books I’ve read since Anthony Bourdain’s Kitchen Confidential. While there are people who try to be funny and people who try VERY hard to be funny, Billy Crystal is just ... born funny.
700 Sundays is not, strictly speaking, a biography. The author wrote it in loving memory of his father, hence, the title which is derived from the approximate number of days he got to spend with his father (usually Sundays) when he wasn’t working. Well, 700 days is too short a time for a boy to get to spend with his father.
Jack Crystal, who held two jobs trying to feed the family, died unexpectedly of heart attack in a bowling alley when Billy Crystal was just 15. The point and place of death left the boy in a very “angry” state, which he refers to as “the otherness”. Not here, not there but “The Otherness’. It was a state of denial, refusal, pain, anger and acceptance.
Billy Crystal has this energetic, charismatic and magnetic force aura that pulls you to him, and there’s no doubt that on stage, he shines brighter than the spotlights. That's on stage; a book is a whole new universe. Can he deliver his comedic one-liners without visual and auditory aid?
The doubts were there but they dissipated after the first chapter. After leafing through the final page, I couldn't help wondering?. “Why on earth did it take him THIS long to come up with a book like this?” The man who conquered the big screen, small screen and the theatres is now conquering bookstores worldwide, too, with this definite winner.
In 700 Sundays, Billy Crystal also writes about his other heroes. His mother, Janice, who had a big smile, big heart and big character; who took on the weight of sending her three boys to college after her husband's death. His brothers, Joel and Rip, who were his brothers, friends and heroes. His influential Uncle Milt, who introduced jazz to Billy when he was little. (Jazz continues to play an important role in Crystal's life.) His Aunt Sheila, who had to deal with a gay daughter and attend her first lesbian wedding.
And, of course, being such an influential star, he also tells us about the first time comedy entered his life and refused to leave. He remembers, the first time he watched a stand-up comedian perform, how he loved laughing and how wonderful it made him feel. He was mesmerised and he knew, right there and then, that he wanted to make people laugh.
Young Billy memorised the entire act, went home and replicated it (with some re-characterisations) in front of his family. Pow! Stand-up comedy just hit home and he became the Billy Crystal we know today.
The book also has a chapter about his struggle with his hormones and a very graphic depiction of his first off-the-bench moment in a basketball game.
To enjoy 700 Sundays, you have to imagine that the man himself is there in front of you, doing his solo act. This is a gem, for keeps. It will touch you and make you laugh – a tough act for any author. Hats off to Billy Crystal for doing both in one book.
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