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Mohrbooks Literary Agency
Sebastian Ritscher
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CAN I GO NOW?

Brian Kellow

The Life of Sue Mengers, Hollywood's First Superagent

A lively and colorful biography of Hollywood’s first superagent—one of the most outrageous showbiz characters of the 1960s and 1970s whose clients included Barbra Streisand, Ryan O’Neal, Faye Dunaway, Michael Caine, and Candice Bergen.
Before Sue Mengers hit the scene in the mid-1960s, talent agents remained quietly in the background. But staying in the background was not possible for Mengers. Irrepressible and loaded with chutzpah, she became a driving force of Creative Management Associates (which later became ICM) handling the era’s preeminent stars.

A true original with a gift for making the biggest stars in Hollywood listen to hard truths about their careers and personal lives, Mengers became a force to be reckoned with. Her salesmanship never stopped. In 1979, she was on a plane that was commandeered by a hijacker, who wanted Charlton Heston to deliver a message on television. Mengers was incensed, wondering why the hijacker wanted Heston, when she could get him Barbra Streisand.

Acclaimed biographer Brian Kellow spins an irresistible tale, exhaustively researched and filled with anecdotes about and interviews with more than two hundred show-business luminaries. A riveting biography of a powerful woman that charts show business as it evolved from New York City in the 1950s through Hollywood in the early 1980s, Can I Go Now? will mesmerize anyone who loves cinema’s most fruitful period.

Brian Kellow is the author of Pauline Kael: A Life in the Dark, which was a 2011 New York Times Notable Book of the Year and also appeared on the Best of the Year lists of Entertainment Weekly, The New Yorker and the Chicago Tribune. He is also the author of Ethel Merman: A Life, The Bennetts: An Acting Family, and the coauthor of Can’t Help Singing: The Life of Eileen Farrell. He is the features editor of Opera News. Kellow lives in New York City.
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Book

Published 2015-09-08 by Viking

Book

Published 2015-09-08 by Viking

Comments

To call Sue Mengers a “character” is an understatement, unless the word is written in all-caps, followed by an exclamation point and modified by an expletive. And based on Brian Kellow’s assessment in his thoroughly researched “Can I Go Now? ,” even that description may be playing down her personality a bit... Read more...

Kellow, an admirer of Mengers’ spunk and achievements, serves her well in this deft, entertaining biography. Read more...

Brian Kellow’s CAN I GO NOW? is #10 on the New York Times Monthly Bestseller list for the month of September!

On 9/3, VARIETY.COM interviewed Brian about the book. Read more...

The new biography “Can I Go Now? The Life of Sue Mengers, Hollywood’s First Superagent” (Viking) by Brian Kellow, is a perfect encapsulation of Mengers, one of the most powerful agents in Tinseltown history. Read more...

Brian Kellow delivers a deliciously dishy book that is a rich dessert of Hollywood hi-jinxes, clear and cold facts and a bon-bon of life in the fast lane.

Delicious dish... Kellow is the first to pull back the caftan, to consider what really made Mengers Mengers... Read more...

Kellow give[s] Mengers the place in Hollywood history that she deserves. Read more...

...compulsively readable... “Can I Go Now?” shows us how the agent’s fierce belief in her clients altered their careers... (and) how quickly a movie career can explode or go off track. Read more...