Sean Gursky reviewed Burn It Down by Maureen Ryan
Review of 'Burn It Down' on 'Goodreads'
4 stars
Tony Soprano behaving badly, that's creativity. A woman using her sexuality on her own terms? Disgusting.
Maureen Ryan has delivered a powerful book. Each chapter dove into another form of the unpleasant Hollywood underbelly and kept going.
Another brief but memorable phrase: "Vengeance is a lazy form of grief".
Ryan has such elegance to her writing and ability to go into difficult and sensitive subjects that my simple review won't do it justice.
Ryan explores the trauma and suffering of sexual assault victims, actors who were given inconsequential roles due to the color of their skin, the difficulties of being a female in a male workplace and how this infection in Hollywood can continue to fester because it "gets results".
I read this book as the WGA strike was underway and SAG-AFTRA was considering striking and seeing Ryan's prediction about the union tensions was fascinating as it unfolded in realtime. …
Tony Soprano behaving badly, that's creativity. A woman using her sexuality on her own terms? Disgusting.
Maureen Ryan has delivered a powerful book. Each chapter dove into another form of the unpleasant Hollywood underbelly and kept going.
Another brief but memorable phrase: "Vengeance is a lazy form of grief".
Ryan has such elegance to her writing and ability to go into difficult and sensitive subjects that my simple review won't do it justice.
Ryan explores the trauma and suffering of sexual assault victims, actors who were given inconsequential roles due to the color of their skin, the difficulties of being a female in a male workplace and how this infection in Hollywood can continue to fester because it "gets results".
I read this book as the WGA strike was underway and SAG-AFTRA was considering striking and seeing Ryan's prediction about the union tensions was fascinating as it unfolded in realtime.
If you destroy yourself in an effort to get accountability, what did you really get? If you do that, they win.
This was a heavy book to get through. There is no levity. Each chapter is an undertaking as no TV show, movie or professional is safe from having their skeletons examined and discussed. To Ryan's credit there is a sliver of hope offered, but it will take work by those who are reluctant to enforce it.
