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Rating: 
Summary: Read Paul Mazurky's Book Instead
Review: After hearing Rafkin on the Howard Stern Show I expected much more from this book. He was very funny and forthcoming in his interview with Stern, but it seemed like every interesting anecdote from the book was mentioned in the interview in full detail. He also jumps around too much - the way he goes back and forth in time is very confusing, even irritating. Overall, I would have to say that there was a lot of potential and very little is delivered.
Rating:
Summary: A bit disappointing...
Review: After hearing Rafkin on the Howard Stern Show I expected much more from this book. He was very funny and forthcoming in his interview with Stern, but it seemed like every interesting anecdote from the book was mentioned in the interview in full detail. He also jumps around too much - the way he goes back and forth in time is very confusing, even irritating. Overall, I would have to say that there was a lot of potential and very little is delivered.
Rating: 
Summary: This book comes up short on "Tales"
Review: I heard about this book on the Howard Stern show, and Alan Rafkin's candidness made me want to read the book. While there are some entertaining anecdotes, overall it's a collection of "he's nice/she's not" stories, pieced together with tales of his personal life. He's an interesting person, but I wish he would pick one subject and stick with it; Celebrity gossip or his three marriages.
Rating: 
Summary: Alan Rafkin's a Stud!
Review: I read Alan Rafkin's book after hearing his hilarious interview on the Howard Stern Show. Alan has lead a fascinating life that makes for great reading. The only other title that I've found as entertaining is Getting To Howard: The Odyssey of an Obsessed Howard Stern Fan by Dan Wagner. Too bad Alan never made it with Barbara Eden. Now that would've made one heck of a chapter! Oofah!
Rating:
Summary: This book comes up short on "Tales"
Review: Rafkin has the ability and experience to write a totally interesting and DETAILED book about the shows and stars he has directed, as well as the producers. We get a few sprinkled examples of stars who are "professional", trouble, or drug users, but little else. Specific anectdotes about the stars and shows he has been associated with could probably flow from this man without end. However, he offers teasers [of already well known anectdotes], personal philosophical observations, and too few first hand accounts about some stars and shows, and leaves one wanting. Rafkin does give some details regarding revenge in tinsel town, and it would appear this is why he soooooo stingy in details about the dozens of stars, producers, and shows he has been associated with. While Rafkin claims that he practically lived with these stars and shows while directing, his book offers few intimate details of the good, the bad, and the ugly, and I suspect that he is withholding much about powerful stars and producers. I should hope that Rafkin will really spill the beans when he decides he is truly out of the business. It is worth reading only because it is as close as we might presently get past the facade of our TV set.
Rating:
Summary: Read Paul Mazurky's Book Instead
Review: Some of the other reviews posted very deftly critiqued the weaknesses of this book. I felt it was just poorly written and very much a first draft filled with surface anecdotes. Here is someone who had this amazing vantage point and the information he chooses to share with us seemed downright silly.Whatever...it did have its good parts. But few. I must tell you though...the feeling I walked away with after reading this book was pity. I felt sorry for him. He has almost no close interpersonal relationships with other human beings. Yes, he got to be present at the dawn of the TV sitcom era and contribute to it, but at the price of maturing developmentally as a human being. Decades of a workaholic pace has left him with a killer reel and many award statuettes but no intimate connections with people. The Mazursky book (Show Me The Magic) is warm, introspective, captivating, and revealing and offers much insight into Hollywood and the directorial process.
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