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Arnold Schwarzenegger's autobiography: the most unpleasant celebrity memoir ever Arnold Schwarzenegger's autobiography: the most unpleasant celebrity memoir ever
(35 minutes later)
Oho! What gift is this from the celebrity gods, floating down on to the Lost in Showbiz desk? Why, it's Arnold Schwarzenegger's 650-page autobiography, Total Recall – My Unbelievably True Life Story. While LiS is dismayed to lose its long-running bet that the title would be I Told You I'd Be Back – And I Am!, the subtitle does provide consolations with its pleasing similarity to Gary Shteyngart's tale of a plucky immigrant in America, Super Sad True Love Story, but Arnified. Thank you, celebrity gods! Tools down, everyone – it's a Lost in Showbiz book group special.
/>The first thing to say is that this is not a celebrity autobiography. Trust me, I have a degree in celebrity autobiographies from TMZ.com University, and this is not a contribution to that noble genre. No, what Arnie (anyone who suffered the film Junior has earned the right to such familiarity) has done is write a political autobiography, which is a very different beast. A celebrity autobiography drips with gossip and humility, with the subject detailing at length their failings only then to end on a note of happy redemption and rehab, with positivity about the future
/>A political autobiography is generally a cut-and-paste job from old newspaper articles detailing what the politician was doing on this date or that, while the subject constantly tells the reader how he was in the right about certain decisions and everyone else in the wrong, and it all ends somewhat elegiacally with the politician now out of office. That, to no one's gratitude, is precisely what Arnie has produced, with his exhortations about how Predator 2 would have been a success if only the director had listened to him, and other important issues. He then is forced to end his "immigrant made great" saga on the somewhat less than triumphal note of his wife leaving him after he boffed the maid and fathered her child. Living the American dream!
/>Sure, there might be more references in Arnie's book to calf-sculpting exercises, "hot affairs" and Planet Hollywood than you probably get in, say, Robert Caro's The Passage of Power, the much-lauded recent biography of Lyndon Johnson (although maybe not that many more than in Bill Clinton's My Life). But ultimately, this is very much a political as opposed to celebrity autobiography, which is an interesting choice from a man who is one of the most iconic actors of the modern era and was one of the worst state governors in history.
/>But despite his adherence to the more self-validating form, Arnie cannot help but come across as a reassuringly repulsive individual. Even aside from his constant cataloguing of his financial earnings and his unGuardian politics ("Taking the [Watergate scandal] out of the equation, I admired Richard Nixon and thought he was a terrific president"), it's the way this condom stuffed with walnuts (copyright: Clive James) just radiates with self-love and a near sociopathic lack of interest in others that really sticks in the mind.
/>Let us return to the aforementioned boffing and flip to the index. But there, just beneath "Back-end, Arnold's, 362-63, 374" is not, as one might expect, "Baena, Mildred", the name of the mother of his non-Kennedy child, but Ban Ki-moon and Antonio Banderas. Instead, Mildred is dispatchfully dealt with as barely a sidenote in the final chapter: "Mildred had been working in our household for five years and all of a sudden we were alone in the guest house. When Mildred gave birth the following August, she named the baby August." As narrative ellipses go, it's not quite up there with "Reader, I married him", but it nips at Charlotte Bronte's heels.
/>There is a similarly intriguing literary gap in what Schwarzenegger refers to as "allegations of bad behaviour on my part", specifically, the LA Times' 2003 article headlined, "Women say Schwarzenegger Groped, Humiliated Them". Arnie's explanation is that while "none of the groping accusations are true" he had "behaved badly sometimes" and he makes a vague reference to "rowdy sets". Ditto his "hot affair" with Brigitte Nielsen while he and Maria Shriver were about to get engaged. Arnie reassures readers that the fling "underlined what I already knew: that I wanted Maria to be my wife". Whether the affair made Shriver feel the same way is not elucidated.
/>Nothing brings our Arnold more pleasure than himself, especially when he says "outrageous things". One of these outrageous things is when he meets Shriver's parents, and, by way of introduction, Arnie says to the rather wonderful Sargent Shriver and Eunice Kennedy Shriver: "Your daughter has a great ass." (Kennedy Shriver, possibly not understanding Arnie's accent, replies: "That's very nice.")
/>Incidentally, this book contains the following sentences: "I became the proud owner of the world's first civilian Humvee"; and "The idea of buying a Boeing 747 snuck up on us slowly." It also contains the creepiest family photo I think I have ever seen featuring Arnie and his two young sons using a public urinal while Arnie stares intently at his sons' urination activity. Who would take such a photo? And why would you put it in a book? Yet more unanswered questions with which we'll all have to live.
/>From David Niven to Danniella Westbrook, from Nina Simone
/>to Nikki Sixx: when it comes to
/>celebrity autobiographies LiS has
/>read them all. But never have we
/>finished one disliking the author as much as we ended up disliking Schwarzenegger. So congratulations, Arnie! You win the laurel of LiS's
/>most unpleasant, creepiest celebrity autobiography ever! 		Oho! What gift is this from the celebrity gods, floating down on to the Lost in Showbiz desk? Why, it's Arnold Schwarzenegger's 650-page autobiography, Total Recall – My Unbelievably True Life Story. While LiS is dismayed to lose its long-running bet that the title would be I Told You I'd Be Back – And I Am!, the subtitle does provide consolations with its pleasing similarity to Gary Shteyngart's tale of a plucky immigrant in America, Super Sad True Love Story, but Arnified. Thank you, celebrity gods! Tools down, everyone – it's a Lost in Showbiz book group special.
The first thing to say is that this is not a celebrity autobiography. Trust me, I have a degree in celebrity autobiographies from TMZ.com University, and this is not a contribution to that noble genre. No, what Arnie (anyone who suffered the film Junior has earned the right to such familiarity) has done is write a political autobiography, which is a very different beast. A celebrity autobiography drips with gossip and humility, with the subject detailing at length their failings only then to end on a note of happy redemption and rehab, with positivity about the future
A political autobiography is generally a cut-and-paste job from old newspaper articles detailing what the politician was doing on this date or that, while the subject constantly tells the reader how he was in the right about certain decisions and everyone else in the wrong, and it all ends somewhat elegiacally with the politician now out of office. That, to no one's gratitude, is precisely what Arnie has produced, with his exhortations about how Predator 2 would have been a success if only the director had listened to him, and other important issues. He then is forced to end his "immigrant made great" saga on the somewhat less than triumphal note of his wife leaving him after he boffed the maid and fathered her child. Living the American dream!
Sure, there might be more references in Arnie's book to calf-sculpting exercises, "hot affairs" and Planet Hollywood than you probably get in, say, Robert Caro's The Passage of Power, the much-lauded recent biography of Lyndon Johnson (although maybe not that many more than in Bill Clinton's My Life). But ultimately, this is very much a political as opposed to celebrity autobiography, which is an interesting choice from a man who is one of the most iconic actors of the modern era and was one of the worst state governors in history.
But despite his adherence to the more self-validating form, Arnie cannot help but come across as a reassuringly repulsive individual. Even aside from his constant cataloguing of his financial earnings and his unGuardian politics ("Taking the [Watergate scandal] out of the equation, I admired Richard Nixon and thought he was a terrific president"), it's the way this condom stuffed with walnuts (copyright: Clive James) just radiates with self-love and a near sociopathic lack of interest in others that really sticks in the mind.
Let us return to the aforementioned boffing and flip to the index. But there, just beneath "Back-end, Arnold's, 362-63, 374" is not, as one might expect, "Baena, Mildred", the name of the mother of his non-Kennedy child, but Ban Ki-moon and Antonio Banderas. Instead, Mildred is dispatchfully dealt with as barely a sidenote in the final chapter: "Mildred had been working in our household for five years and all of a sudden we were alone in the guest house. When Mildred gave birth the following August, she named the baby August." As narrative ellipses go, it's not quite up there with "Reader, I married him", but it nips at Charlotte Bronte's heels.
There is a similarly intriguing literary gap in what Schwarzenegger refers to as "allegations of bad behaviour on my part", specifically, the LA Times' 2003 article headlined, "Women say Schwarzenegger Groped, Humiliated Them". Arnie's explanation is that while "none of the groping accusations are true" he had "behaved badly sometimes" and he makes a vague reference to "rowdy sets". Ditto his "hot affair" with Brigitte Nielsen while he and Maria Shriver were about to get engaged. Arnie reassures readers that the fling "underlined what I already knew: that I wanted Maria to be my wife". Whether the affair made Shriver feel the same way is not elucidated.
Nothing brings our Arnold more pleasure than himself, especially when he says "outrageous things". One of these outrageous things is when he meets Shriver's parents, and, by way of introduction, Arnie says to the rather wonderful Sargent Shriver and Eunice Kennedy Shriver: "Your daughter has a great ass." (Kennedy Shriver, possibly not understanding Arnie's accent, replies: "That's very nice.")
Incidentally, this book contains the following sentences: "I became the proud owner of the world's first civilian Humvee"; and "The idea of buying a Boeing 747 snuck up on us slowly." It also contains the creepiest family photo I think I have ever seen featuring Arnie and his two young sons using a public urinal while Arnie stares intently at his sons' urination activity. Who would take such a photo? And why would you put it in a book? Yet more unanswered questions with which we'll all have to live.
From David Niven to Danniella Westbrook, from Nina Simone to Nikki Sixx: when it comes to celebrity autobiographies LiS has read them all. But never have we finished one disliking the author as much as we ended up disliking Schwarzenegger. So congratulations, Arnie! You win the laurel of LiS's most unpleasant, creepiest celebrity autobiography ever!