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Tomorrow is the day readers!  Do you have your drink umbrellas ready?  Ashley and I do, even if she hasn’t finished Emily Henry’s Beach Read quite yet.  She’s got plenty of time, and you may too!  Whether you finish the book or not, you can SIGN UP HERE to join the book club discussion tomorrow, Friday, June 18th at 7:30pm Central Time.  We are looking forward to looking into several romance tropes, writers’ block, and family drama with you all!

Dear readers, I must give credit where credit is due this week.  Thanks to Madame Fifi for her amazing high school French class, and the delightful French club!  The people gathered in these two gems within the hot mess of high school were some of the best, including Ashley, and one special frequent Virtual Book Club attendee, and a darling friend who introduced me to the joy that is Eddie Izzard.  Yes darlings, I was in high school when I first saw the stand up of Eddie Izzard and I was gloriously hooked by Glorious.  The humor was different from what I’d been exposed to by American sitcoms, I was following the French which made me feel smart, and I was super confused by this dude with eyeliner, fantastic heels, and painted nails.  Then I learned he was a transvestite executive and had no idea how that was supposed to explain anything, but it didn’t matter because it was fantastic.  Years later, another French lover, frequent Virtual Book Club attendee, and friend of the blog gifted me Dressed to Kill, which I still own and cherish.  So, when Ashley told me Eddie Izzard wrote a memoir, and it was available, we both checked it out so fast and added it to the June plans because HAPPY PRIDE Y’ALL! Then I found out the proper pronouns for Eddie Izzard are she/her/hers and SO much more about her life, which is the real reason we’re here.  

Believe Me: A Memoir of Love, Death, and Jazz Chickens is a real, vulnerable look into Eddie Izzard’s life and is such a great read.  Written with more candor than his stand up, Izzard explains her upbringing, family life, when she knew she was different, and how her career has progressed.  I learned so much about British boarding schools, the BP corporation, and the comedy scene in London – all things I didn’t really want to know about, but Izzard made it interesting and easy to connect with because her perseverance, style, and openness welcomed the reader right into the story.  I knew nothing of her background before reading this memoir, and I’m so glad to have learned the story of one of my favorite comédiennes.

My favorite part about Believe Me is that this performer / actor / writer now feels like a real, dimensional person to me.  I realize she always was, but just with any celebrity memoir, my vision of Izzard is dramatically different now.  She resonates with me in a new way, and not just because she describes herself as “a lazy but driven person. When motivated, I will move heaven and earth to get something done. When not motivated, I’ll sit in bed and watch black-and-white movies and eat breakfast cereal.”  Swap out some minor details and SO. MUCH. SAME.   

Izzard’s laissez-faire attitude comes out in Believe Me in a way that just doesn’t work for her stage performances.  There are so many tidbits of how she explored her “girl mode” and “boy mode” as she puts it.  How she experimented with women’s clothing for her male body when the opportunity presented itself (more or less), started exploring the plethora of options for women, and then got help defining her style based on her body from a close, long-time friend.  Oh readers, should we all be so lucky to find our people who help us look our best! 

“In different societies we create our own rules about clothing and makeup and ornamentation. I’ve just come to the conclusion that all women should wear whatever they want to wear and that all men should wear whatever they want to wear.”

And I couldn’t agree more.  She uses her clothing and makeup as a means of expressing herself, and I do the same, as I’d venture most people, regardless of gender, do.  Sometimes that expression is a need for comfort, other times beauty, and sometimes armor, but it’s still all an expression.  

I give this amazing memoir a solid 4 stars, and readers, I’m interested in anything Izzard wants to write in the future.  I want to watch more of her comedy specials, and to rewatch old loves (does anyone need a flag or perhaps tea and cake?), and I want to watch her films too, but especially the Emmy nominated documentary Believe: The Eddie Izzard Story.  I’ve only seen a few of her acting credits, but Izzard is a versatile performer and artist with great skill and I’m here for it!

~Nikki

I went into the reading of this memoir knowing of Eddie Izzard’s standup comedy and a more vague notion that she had also been in some films. I decided to do basic internet research and realized, while looking at her IMDB page, that she has sixty-nine acting credits listed including television, film, and even voice work for animated films. Did I remember that she acted in both Ocean’s Twelve and Ocean’s Thirteen? Nope. Am I amused and amazed by her admitting that Dame Judi Dench sends her a banana instead of flowers before comedy shows? One Thousand Percent Yes. They have acted together on Victoria & Abdul and Six Minutes to Midnight, and you can sense Izzard’s awe and respect for her fellow actress in the way she writes about their relationship. I would feel remiss if I didn’t mention that Izzard voices Lord Voldemort in The Lego Batman Movie and Sir Miles Axelrod, the antagonist in Cars 2, among a plethora of other acting roles. Additionally, it was clear in the way she talked about touring in the book that she loves to travel and meet the whole of humanity. From where I’m sitting, there’s not a much better way to accomplish that than filming on location. This book also brought me into the world of street performing in a way I never realized it could be made into a viable living (she never mentions needing to have a second type of career besides other performances), and the bit of dabbling in stage productions that Izzard both managed and acted in.

Believe Me: A Memoir of Love, Death, and Jazz Chickens had me learning not only about Izzard’s life, but the long grueling process that many actors and performers have to go through to realize their dream of doing what they love. She embodies the statement, direct from the book: “Don’t get somewhere as fast as possible. Get somewhere as good as possible.” And maybe everyone could learn a little bit about life and commitment to craft, and as Izzard states, about the stamina it takes to get through the boring parts of life to the action bits. Stamina is a big part of her repertoire, especially now, as she’s becoming even more well-known for running marathons of marathons for charity. In the book, she recalled the experience of running 27 marathons in 27 days in South Africa to raise money for the UK Sport Relief charity in honor of Nelson Mandela and the 27 years he spent in prison. Most recently, according to Izzard’s website, she ran 31 marathons over the course of January 2021, called it: A Run for Hope, Make Humanity Great Again, which was done in response to the pandemic-that-shall-not-be-named.  I would highly suggest that you watch the 7 minute video about that virtual adventure. And, spoiler alert, she actually completed 32 marathons in 31 days while doing interviews and having discussions with people from all over the world, losing toenails, and raised over £250M for charities that help Make Humanity Great. 

Other things I loved learning about Izzard: She overcame a fear of flying by learning how to pilot airplanes. She won her first two Emmys while filming on location in the Austrian Alps and Matt LeBlanc ‘awarded’ them to her in a ceremony/party once the awards arrived on set for All the Queen’s Men. [Nikki here: She wanted to attend the ceremony – the director said no.] Izzard does comedy shows in English, French, German, and is learning Spanish, and intends on learning Russian and Arabic, all with the help of her brother Mark.  When this memoir was published in 2017, Izzard was 55 years old, and if in 2021 she can run 32 marathons in 31 days just days before turning 59 I can only expect more amazing things in the next decades from this powerhouse of a person. Her final lines echo the entire thread of her philosophy and action on life and I will share it here: “Because believe me when I say—we can all do more than we think we can do. All I did was apply that to myself. And if you believe in humanity, please do this, too.” A satisfying end to a 4 star read in honor of Pride Month.

~Ashley

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