Charmed Lives

Fülszöveg

Surrounded by the rich, the famous and the
beautiful, Alexander Korda lived a life other
men only dream about. Churchill (who secretly
wrote film scripts for him), H. G. Wells, Lord
Beaverbrook and Robert Sherwood were among
his lifelong friends; Olivier, Laugh ton, Ralph
Richardson, Dietrich, Vivien Leigh and Merle
Oberon (whom he married) among those he
brought to stardom. As he rose to power, wealth
and fame to become Sir Alexander Korda, one
of the most legendary and flamboyant of all
film tycoons—making and losing fortunes,
engaging in vast and costly enterprises,
charming all around him and living in bound-
less luxury—his two brothers, often unwillingly
and quarrelsomely accepting his dominant role,
rose with him: Zoltan, mercurial and eccentric,
a director of genius whose The Four Feathers
and Cry the Beloved Country are film classics;
and Vincent, whom Alex shanghaied from a
career as a painter to be the artistic director of
his new motion picture... Tovább

Fülszöveg

Surrounded by the rich, the famous and the
beautiful, Alexander Korda lived a life other
men only dream about. Churchill (who secretly
wrote film scripts for him), H. G. Wells, Lord
Beaverbrook and Robert Sherwood were among
his lifelong friends; Olivier, Laugh ton, Ralph
Richardson, Dietrich, Vivien Leigh and Merle
Oberon (whom he married) among those he
brought to stardom. As he rose to power, wealth
and fame to become Sir Alexander Korda, one
of the most legendary and flamboyant of all
film tycoons—making and losing fortunes,
engaging in vast and costly enterprises,
charming all around him and living in bound-
less luxury—his two brothers, often unwillingly
and quarrelsomely accepting his dominant role,
rose with him: Zoltan, mercurial and eccentric,
a director of genius whose The Four Feathers
and Cry the Beloved Country are film classics;
and Vincent, whom Alex shanghaied from a
career as a painter to be the artistic director of
his new motion picture empire.
And while Charmed Lives is "a family
romance/' it is Alex who stands at the center
of it, as he did in his lifetime. It was Alex who
led the brothers from a remote Hungarian
peasant village into the early silent-film world
of Budapest, Vienna, Berlin and Paris, and to
the great studios of Hollywood and London as
talking pictures swept the globe. And it is
Alex's story, a story more poignant than those
around him could have guessed or his most
gifted screenwriters could have imagined, that
dominated all their lives. For Alex, along with
an incredible flair for success, had an equally
powerful impulse toward destruction. In the
end, it was this impulse that prevailed.
(continued on back flap)
(continued from front flap)
Sir Alexander Korda's nephew, Michael
Korda, writes with fascination, nostalgia and
total recall about the enchanted, giant figures
of his childhood, and with increasing appre-
hension and, finally, detached sadness, of his
struggle to break loose from the Kordas and
lead a life of his own—a struggle made more
poignant by the darkness of Alexander Korda's
final days and by a love story both bizarre
and complex.
Charmed Lives will take its place beside
Moss Hart's Act One as one of the great show
business stories of all time.
About the Author
Michael Korda is the best-selling author of
Male Chauvinism!, Power! and Success! He
was born in London in 1933, and educated in
Beverly Hills, New York City, Switzerland and
England, where he was graduated from Mag-
dalen College, Oxford, after serving in the
Royal Air Force. For many years Mr. Korda
has written for the New York Times, Vogue,
New York magazine and Glamour. He is the
editor-in-chief of Simon & Schuster. Mr. Korda
is married and lives in New York City. Vissza