I love everything about Beatrice Williams-Rude's memoir except
its title, "Misadventures of a Would-Be Muse." (Xlibris)
There's nothing "would-be" about Ms. Williams-Rude's career
as an actress, copy editor, columnist and assistant to the
late great playwright Dale Wasserman ("Man of La Mancha" and
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest") - or, for that matter, her
highly-entertaining book. Ms. Williams-Rude writes movingly
and at times lyrically about some of the "Who's Who" of
theater and TV as well as her own heart-warming personal
journey.
And parts of the it are also downright funny. In working
with Dale Wasserman, she writes "Dale's habit had been to
ask me to do something, give me carte blanche then
micro-manage me while telling me not to bother him with
details!"
Ms. Williams-Rude also writes candidly about her late
husband, brilliant New York Post TV critic Bob Williams who
was a giant on the paper when I worked there myself the
first time in the 1970's. Bob Williams really set the gold
standard for electronic media criticism. "Bob drank daily
and constantly," she writes. "I didn't understand until
recently that it was his coping mechanism, what allowed this
basically shy, desperately insecure would-be recluse to
function in his profession..."
Like her columns and reviews the writing in this book often
sings as much as the shows she was in as an actress. My
only criticism is the book doesn't have an index, something
Ms. Williams-Rude may add in subsequent editions.