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A review by jlmb
My First Five Husbands... And the Ones Who Got Away by Rue McClanahan
3.0
Fun, light-hearted, easy read. It's always interesting reading the memoir of a working actor - that is, not a huge star but rather an actor who manages to make their living acting without ever blowing up into a huge star. If you look at her IMDB page, it's astounding how many things she was in over the years. I only knew her from The Golden Girls & Maude. I also recall seeing her as a guest star on shows like Love Boat. She worked steadily though, for 50 years. Dinner theater, off Broadway, Broadway, commercials, voice overs, cartoons, tv shows, game shows, tv movies, independent movies, Hollywood movies - Rue did it all.
The other thing she did a lot was make bad choices in her personal life. She is aware of it thanks to therapy, but still, she made some doozies. Married 6 times! 3 she stayed friendly with and 3 were total jerks. (Fun fact - her second husband dropped out of society and became one of the Merry Pranksters) Her first husband seems like a textbook case of sociopathy. Her third husband is almost as bad, with his emotional abuse escalating to physical abuse. Rue doesn't go into great detail, the memoir stays fairly surface and light. Financially she also made many poor choices. Wow, that house in Encino she dumped a million into the renovation! She should have bought a nice two bedroom condo in Beverly Hills or Bel Air.
I liked that she was an animal person, rescuing dogs & cats off the street and joining PETA. She also kept friends for years and had a good relationship with her family.
The other thing she did a lot was make bad choices in her personal life. She is aware of it thanks to therapy, but still, she made some doozies. Married 6 times! 3 she stayed friendly with and 3 were total jerks. (Fun fact - her second husband dropped out of society and became one of the Merry Pranksters) Her first husband seems like a textbook case of sociopathy. Her third husband is almost as bad, with his emotional abuse escalating to physical abuse. Rue doesn't go into great detail, the memoir stays fairly surface and light. Financially she also made many poor choices. Wow, that house in Encino she dumped a million into the renovation! She should have bought a nice two bedroom condo in Beverly Hills or Bel Air.
I liked that she was an animal person, rescuing dogs & cats off the street and joining PETA. She also kept friends for years and had a good relationship with her family.