Whether you love, hate or tolerate the movies of Charles Band, there’s no denying the man has no shortage of terrific offscreen stories to share. Otherwise, his autobiography, Confessions of a Puppetmaster, would not exist — or at least not be a must-purchase.
Subtitled A Hollywood Memoir of Ghouls, Guts, and Gonzo Filmmaking and written with three-time Emmy nominee Adam Felber, the book opens with a line all but scientifically calculated to hook and retain: “Unaware of just how insane things had gotten outside her door, Barbie took a shower.” Move over, “Call me Ishmael”!
Having played a pioneering part in sell-through VHS, video stores, license-based video games, the special-features market and, the name “Harry Potter” and toilet-based advertising campaigns, Band takes the reader on the near-Gumpian journey that is his life thus far — a merry-go-round of risk that has earned him as many fortunes as he’s lost, not to mention wives. You’ll learn about him being babysat by Marilyn Monroe, his affair with the very married Demi Moore, his battles with Klaus Kinski and Gary Busey, and his recalibration with director David DeCoteau after finding his erotic flicks “too damn gay!” (Hilariously, DeCoteau prefers to call them “tighty whitey frighties.”)
He may be the only person to go on record as having nice things to say about Helen Hunt. Outside of his actors, cameos include Liberace, Michael Jackson, John Carpenter, Barbra Streisand and “ancient Japanese horse piss.”
While not quite up there with the autobios of Roger Corman and William Castle (to name two filmmakers as beholden to ballyhoo), Band’s collected Confessions make for a delightful afternoon. While he and/or Felber show too much distrust of the reader (“We’ll get to that,” “More on that in a moment,” et al.), the book flies at 288 pages. I would welcome triple that, easily. —Rod Lott