So I got around to reading Hollywood by Bukowski. It was a very interesting read, seeing how the making of Barfly came about with all the ups and downs and all the producer assholes that had to be dealt with along the way. It’s very lucky that it ended up being made at all. One of the characters in the book, a Frenchman invested in the screenplay, was a riot! All the names were of course changed, and the movie was renamed The Dance of Jim Beam. I found it interesting that it was shot in the building Bukowski and the woman the movie is about (his first love) actually lived in together over thirty years prior! That’s both eery and surreal, eery because it didn’t end well for her due to her severe alcoholism.
All and all, I was hoping that the book would be funnier and more entertaining, but it was still a good read with lots of interesting insight into both Bukowski and the world of Hollywood (a much different book than the one I read before it: To Have or to Be? by Erich Fromm). I much preferred Barfly, though, what a fabulous movie.
On my way home on Thursday night, I stopped by the grocery store near my place here in Tokyo, and in the alcohol aisle (alcohol is sold in supermarkets and convenience stores here), I saw a bottle of Jim Beam whiskey. I bought it, a bottle of Coke Zero, and when I got home, mixed them into a cup and finished off the book. Then I watched Eraserhead for the first time because, in the novel, Chinaski (Bukowski’s name for himself in his books) tells a guy interviewing him for a magazine that it’s his favourite movie. Watching it, I completely understood why.
My rating: 4/5 stars
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