ENTERTAINMENT REALM

I Don’t Know What You Know Me From: Confessions of a Co-Star by Judy Greer. Publisher: Doubleday (April 8, 2014). Memoir. Hardcover. 256 pages. ISBN13: 9780385537889.

“I can’t afford a full-time assistant or organize my life, I don’t have a chef cooking for me and my family, I barely have time to work out or walk my dog (OK, fine, I do have a dog walker, I mean, I’m not going to shortchange my dog Buckley, come on).”

Part one growing up in suburbs outside of Detroit not terribly noteworthy. Part two, where Judy Greer begins to discuss her Hollywood life gets only slightly more appealing. She writes without a clear voice. The tone’s neither funny nor serious. And it’s not well-written or edited. Funny actors and comedians aren’t’ necessarily funny storytellers or have real-life amusing anecdotes or interesting lives off-screen. People expect it and it’s not the case 75 percent of the time. That’s why many people are drawn to acting so that they can become another person or express themselves in another way.

What I learned:

M. Night Shyamalan was the first director to call Greer and offer her a film (The Village). She dully proceeds to describe her three month shoot on location. Bottom line: it’s a job.

She did a short-lived series called Miss Guided. I thought it had a cute premise and seemed promising. Don’t think it got picked up past one season, per most network series I like. Ashton Kutcher was a producer. After filming the pilot he asked her what she would do if ABC picked up the series. He asked her what she wanted to do if the series were to become a success. She told him she wanted to buy her dad a Harley Davidson motorcycle. Ashton told her that if the series was picked up by ABC, he’s buy her dad one. When ABC picked it up for seven episodes, true to his word, Ashton did just that. What a generous, sweet guy.

In the chapter titled “Celebrities I’ve Peed Next To,” Greer only mentions Jennifer Lopez, Debra Messing and Heidi Klum and she was doing films with two of them so how could she avoid peeing next to them at some point?

Her publicist/agents/ manager told her to tweet/ Facebook/ instagram (message: don’t trust celebrity tweets) “I become temporarily obsessed with watching my number of Twitter followers grow, with who is following who, who posts what, how many followers he/ she has, especially in comparison to me. It’s kind of a ridiculous time suck isn’t it?” She SO doesn’t understand Twitter and social media.

RATING: **/ 5

–review by Amy Steele

FTC Disclosure: I received this book for review from Net Galley.