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Ghost Light: A Memoir | 
 enlarge | Author: Frank Rich
Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks
Category: Book
List Price: $14.95
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Avg. Customer Rating:  19 reviews
Sales Rank: 298697
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 352
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 7.9 x 4.9 x 0.7
ISBN: 0375758240
Dewey Decimal Number: 792.092
EAN: 9780375758249
ASIN: 0375758240
Publication Date: October 9, 2001
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Amazon.com Review
When Frank Rich was an anxious, unhappy kid marooned in the suburbs of Washington, D.C., the fact his parents were divorced was discussed "only in the whisper that Grandma Ross used when talking about being Jewish or having cancer." Like so many others who feel painfully different, Frank found refuge in the theater, particularly the classic musicals of Broadway's golden age. After an enchanted trip to see Bells Are Ringing in 1956 when he was 7, Rich writes, "I was now destined to trace my childhood almost exclusively through an accelerating progression of plays, good and bad, that would captivate and kidnap me." Many of the tickets came from his stepfather, who was sometimes generous and fun but often frighteningly abusive. Once again, the theater helped him cope: when Frank saw Gypsy, its portrait of troubled family relations "made me feel less lonely." Similarly, when chronicling his attendance at such legendary shows as Bye Bye Birdie, Fiddler on the Roof, and A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, among many others, Rich concentrates on his responses rather than the productions themselves. What interests him most here is the theater's power to shape lives. Paying tribute to the men who both shared and cultivated his passion for the theater, Rich draws touching portraits of Scott Kirkpatrick, manager of Washington's National Theatre, who hired young Frank as a ticket taker, and of Clayton Coots, a company manager who befriended him. Those who admired (or excoriated) Rich's work as drama critic for The New York Times will find Ghost Light an intriguing look at the personal history that lies behind his critical judgments. --Wendy Smith
Product Description
There is a superstition that if an emptied theater is ever left completely dark, a ghost will take up residence. To prevent this, a single "ghost light" is left burning at center stage after the audience and all of the actors and musicians have gone home. Frank Rich's eloquent and moving boyhood memoir reveals how theater itself became a ghost light and a beacon of security for a child finding his way in a tumultuous world.
Rich grew up in the small-townish Washington, D.C., of the 1950s and early '60s, a place where conformity seemed the key to happiness for a young boy who always felt different. When Rich was seven years old, his parents separated--at a time when divorce was still tantamount to scandal--and thereafter he and his younger sister were labeled "children from a broken home." Bouncing from school to school and increasingly lonely, Rich became terrified of the dark and the uncertainty of his future. But there was one thing in his life that made him sublimely happy: the Broadway theater.
Rich's parents were avid theatergoers, and in happier times they would listen to the brand-new recordings of South Pacific, Damn Yankees, and The Pajama Game over and over in their living room. When his mother's remarriage brought about turbulent changes, Rich took refuge in these same records, re-creating the shows in his imagination, scene by scene. He started collecting Playbills, studied fanatically the theater listings in The New York Times and Variety, and cut out ads to create his own miniature marquees. He never imagined that one day he would be the Times's chief theater critic.
Eventually Rich found a second home at Wash-ington's National Theatre, where as a teenager he was a ticket-taker and was introduced not only to the backstage magic he had dreamed of for so long but to a real-life cast of charismatic and eccentric players who would become his mentors and friends. With humor and eloquence, Rich tells the triumphant story of how the aspirations of a stagestruck young boy became a lifeline, propelling him toward the itinerant family of theater, whose romantic denizens welcomed him into the colorful fringes of Broadway during its last glamorous era.
Every once in a while, a grand spectacle comes along that introduces its audiences to characters and scenes that will resound in their memories long after the curtain has gone down. Ghost Light, Frank Rich's beautifully crafted childhood memoir, is just such an event.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 14 more reviews...
 A good read October 1, 2008
A very interesting read from someone who hates Andrew Lloyd Webber musicals- apart from Cats. I look forward to finishing this book soon.
This author was given a lot of freedom August 29, 2007
I can't believe how much time this author spent unsupervised in NYC. Memoir? seems a bit far fetched to me.
rich memories May 19, 2007
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Ghost Light by Frank Rich; Random House, 2001. New York.
Frank Rich's memoir, Ghost Light, embodies the feelings of hopelessness and struggle one undergoes in childhood; Rich writes about these feelings with a wisdom that could have been gained only by experience. The author begins the novel with his early childhood, which rivaled "Leave it to Beaver" in the perfection and blissful ignorance in which he and his younger sister came to perceive as "normal." Somerset, Maryland was a typical 1950's suburban neighborhood, where new parents came to raise their families with high hopes of a new life filled with prosperity and contentment. While given all the props and the perfect setting to carry out a happy family life, Frank's parents "dropped in and out of the role of parents at whim, like novice actors improvising from a script still in rough draft." His parents did share an intense love of music however, and often incorporated it into the lives of Frank and his sister, Polly. He grew up listening to the captivating and consuming music of shows like South Pacific and The Pajama Game. Thus began his love of the shows on Broadway, and the escape they brought him later in life.
All too soon, Frank's fairytale childhood comes crashing to an end when his parents introduce a new word into his vocabulary, one that had never been spoken about in a voice louder than a whisper in his sheltered neighborhood, and one that had been as shunned and feared as the plague all around the country: Divorce. In a new apartment, new neighborhood, and new school the young Frank realizes a new terror, insomnia. In the dark of his room, while all is quiet, Frank has no choice but to think about the gaping hole in his heart which family used to fill. These restless nights lead to an insatiable rage that fills him until he erupts in a fury of destruction and tantrums. Frank soon learns to internalize his feelings for the sake of his desolate and distant mother. Eventually Frank's mother finds a new man, Joel. His step-father is unlike any person Frank or Polly has ever met, he is loud, obnoxious, and demands the best of everyone. His own two children, John and Sue, are already familiar with the way Joel behaves when he doesn't get his way, but the first time Frank is hit for disobeying an order, he is shocked and dismayed that his mother married this monster. Along with the bad, Joel brings a great deal of good to Frank's life. He opens up a whole new world for Frank, taking spontaneous trips to town or overseas, demanding the best in restaurants, and most importantly, giving him the opportunity to go to the shows on Broadway and off, which later become Frank's life.
Rich documents his life and his growing passion for theater, his only distraction in a house where he is never certain of safety. He narrates his own story as his new family moves to Washington, as he meets his first girlfriend, and is accepted into college. All the while theater keeps him going, he collects Playbills, listens to every musical record he can get his hands on, and gets a job in the local theater as an usher.
This book personifies the feelings of anguish and hopelessness that everyone has felt at one point or another in their life and gives character to the universal joy of theater. I found this book to be unique in the blatant and honest portrayal of a child dealing with divorce and a violent stepfather in a time when things like that were not talked about publicly. Rich tells the story of an escape in theater that saved his sanity and preserved his faith in humankind.
 Life begins in the theatre May 6, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This is a beautifully written, sensitive memoir of a painful childhood and coming of age. Anyone who has ever listened to the original cast album of a Broadway show and been transported in their mind to a theatre will find a kindred spirit in Frank Rich. Rich grew up in a home which had an abundance of material goods but also contained an abundance of pain. His love of the theatre and some lovely people he met along the way helped him to endure until he went away to college and his adult life.
Mr. Rich was for many years the very astute theatre critic for the New York Times. He now writes incisive OpEd pieces for the Times. This memoir is very courageous in light of the private pain that it reveals which helped to mold this public man.
Saving Mr. Rich June 1, 2006
3 out of 4 found this review helpful
Ghost Light is a compelling memoir about the life of Frank Rich, the acclaimed theater critic for the New York Times and long time theater lover. The memoir commences when Frank is ten years old; he is living in Somerset, a model neighborhood. Frank's parents get a divorce and in this 1950s setting, divorce was something that was simply not acceptable. Throughout Frank's entire life, his parent's divorce affected him in so many ways. Frank was forced to move away with his mother and sister, Polly, away from Somerset, the one thing in his life that seemed regular at that time. Frank, his mother, and sister are constantly moving until his mother gets remarried to a man named Joel. Frank, Polly, Frank's mother, and Joel all settle down together in Washington, D.C. In the end, Joel proves to be abusive both physically and mentally. He beats Frank constantly and makes his mother cry every night. Although Frank does not realize this at the time, Joel turns out to be a very important person of Frank's life. Joel was a lawyer with many connections, especially with airlines. These connections allowed Frank and his family to travel all around the world, something that they would not have been able to do if Joel had not come into his life: "Each time Gypsy reached Tulsa's song, I tried to fill in more details in the story it told. What did the dance look like? How old was Tulsa? What did Louise and June look like? Did he ever get his nightclub act?" (110). Frank's writing through out the entire book continues with this curious attitude. Frank is constantly questioning the shows and aspects of his life around him. From all of his `curiousness' he is able to find more meaning both in the shows and in his life. Ghost Light is an accurate account of how a young boy's life was saved by the theater.
Through all of the harsh changes in Frank's life, he always has a home at the theater. The theater became an obsession for Frank even before his parent's divorce. His father used to bring home records to Broadway shows, and Frank would sit and listen to them for hours, memorizing every lyric, imagining what the show would look like in real life. As Frank became older, the theater became a way for Frank to escape from the everyday traumas of growing up in a "broken home". As Frank's life gets more distressing, he relies further on the theater as his haven. Frank went into every little detail about countless shows, from Gypsy to The Music Man to Mr. President. Frank went into detail about many shows that I have not seen because they are no longer running and I thought that it was really interesting to compare the theater of today to the theater of the 1950s and 60s. As Frank grows as a person, his knowledge in theater also grows; he starts collecting Playbills to both shows that he has seen and others that he hasn't seen that were discarded in the trash. Frank starts reading Variety, a popular magazine filled with reviews of all of the current Broadway shows; he is able to get a lot of information about the shows from this magazine. Frank also reads the scripts of many of the shows. Following the theater so closely helps Frank have something concrete in his life since everything else seems to be changing so much.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book. At times, it was a bit slow to read, and some parts were more graphic than I would have liked, but every time I picked it up, I got lost in the story. This book is a very intriguing account of a young boy's life in the 1950s which was very interesting to see what it was like, since I am a child of the next generation. Ghost Light taught me many new things about the theater that I had not known before. As a lover of theater myself, it was really wonderful to follow the theater in such an intricate way. I felt myself growing as a person while Frank did just the same. I would recommend Ghost Light to anyone who enjoys the theater thoroughly and would like to see it from someone else's eyes.
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