Haywire

Rating:
Summary: haywire
Review: A good,useful guide to the era Brooke lived in. I received a clean copy promptly and uneventfully.

Rating:
Summary: Touching
Review: I read HAYWIRE when it first was published, and I have continued to think of its sad story throughout all of the years that have followed.

I found this work by Brooke Hayward to be a courageous report of the events which tore apart her family. She was the daughter of producer Leland Hayward and actress Margaret Sullavan, whose first husband was Henry Fonda. Fonda's children from his next marriage were among the Hayward children's best friends. This was the cast which peopled Brooke Hayward's childhood.

After Sullavan's death, Leland married Pamela Churchill, whose first husband was the son of former English Prime Minister Winston Churchill. The Hayward family's problems trascended Pamela, but Brooke's portrayal of her is as a classic wicked stepmother, a thesis since confirmed by subsequent biographies of Pamela.

Since the author here came from a famous family, and since many of the events experienced by her family were extraordinary, HAYWIRE makes for fascinating reading. Brooke Hayward writes a heartbreaking story with style and dignity.

Rating:
Summary: Wistfully Narrative
Review: Just before I began this review, I was listening to Ravel's "Pavane For a Dead Infanta", which is the classical piece played at Bridget Hayward's funeral in the Autumn of 1960. Her older sister's narrative of the triumphs and tragedies of her family has the beautiful solemnity of "Pavane" itself.It's like a flower that blooms, grows, and dies far too quickly, somehow never quite fulfilling its true potential, like her younger sister. The Haywards' story is a typical Hollywood-style tragedy. But I felt intrigued by the detailed descriptions of the people and places Brooke Hayward knew, enthralled by the descriptions of the stylishness of her step-mother, Pamela, who later became the U.S. Ambassador to France, the heartiness, of her Grandfather who spent hours creating a beautful display quilt for his two granddaughters when they were children, the lonliness her father, Leland Hayward still felt years after being abandoned by his mother, and his unfortunate continuation of that cycle of behavior, of Margaret Sullavan's domineering spirit, of the failure of Bridget and Bill to live up to parental expectations, and of young, ill-fated Bridget's accute case of Middle Child Syndrome. Somehow, I didn't feel altogether surprised by her early death. Along the way, Brooke expresses concern for those who cared for and about her family when she was growing up, and gives a facinating study of life in Old Hollywood and Broadway in their Golden Ages. As Henry Fonda was one of Margaret Sullavan's ex-husbands, and the Fonda children and Hayward children were very close, I've often wondered if actress Bridget Fonda was named for Bridget Hayward. Brooke Hayward is someone who has come through a lot in her life, and one can only hope that she and her brother have found some peace after all the unhappiness they suffered.

Rating:
Summary: haywire
Review: Just before I began this review, I was listening to Ravel's "Pavane For a Dead Infanta", which is the classical piece played at Bridget Hayward's funeral in the Autumn of 1960. Her older sister's narrative of the triumphs and tragedies of her family has the beautiful solemnity of "Pavane" itself.It's like a flower that blooms, grows, and dies far too quickly, somehow never quite fulfilling its true potential, like her younger sister. The Haywards' story is a typical Hollywood-style tragedy. But I felt intrigued by the detailed descriptions of the people and places Brooke Hayward knew, enthralled by the descriptions of the stylishness of her step-mother, Pamela, who later became the U.S. Ambassador to France, the heartiness, of her Grandfather who spent hours creating a beautful display quilt for his two granddaughters when they were children, the lonliness her father, Leland Hayward still felt years after being abandoned by his mother, and his unfortunate continuation of that cycle of behavior, of Margaret Sullavan's domineering spirit, of the failure of Bridget and Bill to live up to parental expectations, and of young, ill-fated Bridget's accute case of Middle Child Syndrome. Somehow, I didn't feel altogether surprised by her early death. Along the way, Brooke expresses concern for those who cared for and about her family when she was growing up, and gives a facinating study of life in Old Hollywood and Broadway in their Golden Ages. As Henry Fonda was one of Margaret Sullavan's ex-husbands, and the Fonda children and Hayward children were very close, I've often wondered if actress Bridget Fonda was named for Bridget Hayward. Brooke Hayward is someone who has come through a lot in her life, and one can only hope that she and her brother have found some peace after all the unhappiness they suffered.