A Star Is Found

A Star Is Found
Janet Hirshenson and Jane Jenkins with Rachel Kranz
Harcourt
ISBN: 0-15-101234-2
Non-Fiction, Entertainment
Reviewed by Dave Thompson

As partners in one of Hollywood’s premier casting companies- named, with cunning serendipity, THE Casting Company, Janet Hirshenson and Jane Jenkins have been responsible for lining up the lead roles in a slew of movie blockbusters. From Backdraft to Harry Potter, from Ferris Bueller to the next James Bond, their job has been to not only identify, but then obtain the actors who will bring each role to life or not, in the case of the title role in Beetlejuice; as they unfold the tale of how reluctant Michael Keaton (or anybody else, for that matter) was to take that part, one wonders why anybody could even dream of wanting their job.
Engagingly written and well-paced, A Star Is Found could be compared to a long, and very orderly conversation between two friends which, of course, is what it is. Each picks up a topic and runs with it, then hands it over to the other for their own take on the proceedings, in a book that sheds some fascinating light on a side of the movie trade that few outsiders have ever even considered.

There are few conflicts in the tales they tell, but the two perspectives can be enlightening nevertheless, particularly when discussing their personal reasons for choosing so-and-so to play such-and-such a role. And the names they drop as the process unfolds are phenomenal Julia Roberts, Tom Cruise, Winona Ryder, John Cusack, Leonardo Di Caprio, Brendan Fraser and Meg Ryan all have Hirshenson and Jenkins to thank for some role or another, and the fact that many of those roles turned out to be at least pivotal, if not altogether transforming, is simply the icing on the cake.
Things do occasionally get a little self-congratulatory, and it’s clear that neither author believes in false modesty. But, there again, who even knew that their profession existed before sitting down to read this book? If they can’t trumpet their achievements, who can?