Still Here: The Madcap, Nervy, Singular Life of Elaine Stritch

The ebullient, troubled life of a Broadway legend who became a heroine to a younger generationStill Here is the first full telling of Elaine Stritch’s life. Rollicking but intimate, it tracks one of Broadway’s great personalities from her upbringing in Detroit during the Great Depression to her fateful move to New York City, where she studied alongside Marlon Brando, Bea Arthur, and Harry Belafonte. We accompany Elaine through her jagged rise to fame, to Hollywood and London, and across her later years, when she enjoyed a stunning renaissance, punctuated by a turn on the popular television show 30 Rock. We explore the influential—and often fraught—collaborations she developed with Noël Coward, Tennessee Williams, and above all Stephen Sondheim, as well as her courageous yet flawed attempts to control a serious drinking problem. And we see the entertainer triumphing over personal turmoil with the development of her Tony Award–winning one-woman show, Elaine Stritch at Liberty, which established her as an emblem of spiky independence and Manhattan life for an entirely new generation of admirers. In Still Here, Alexandra Jacobs conveys the full force of Stritch’s sardonic wit and brassy charm while acknowledging her many dark complexities. Following years of meticulous research and interviews, this is a portrait of a powerful, vulnerable, honest, and humorous figure who continues to reverberate in the public consciousness.
Review
“One of the more surreal, gratifying, and wonderful experiences of my career was when Elaine Stritch played my mother on 30 Rock. An acting lesson, a therapy session, a chance to know the great La Stritch. This book is your chance.” ―Alec Baldwin “Elaine Stritch brought a raw truth to musical theater that had rarely been seen before or since. Her whole self―warts, drinks, and all. In this biography, Alexandra Jacobs shows Stritch’s every pore, and we are all better for it.” ― Sarah Silverman I laughed. I cried. Alexandra Jacobs lovingly pulls back the curtain on "Stritchy," a sacred cow of American showbiz, revealing her to beas talented, reckless, flawed and fabulous as I always hoped she was.― Simon Doonan , author of Drag and Wacky Chicks “Alexandra Jacobs’s Still Here is a delicious, page-turning, and meticulous romp through the distinctive life of a feminist icon. The talented, urbane, smoking-and-drinking queen of Broadway’s tough dames lived a life of accomplishment, boldly frank opinions, and just as bold-faced names that defined the Great White Way (and Hollywood) of recent yore. Elaine Stritch balanced theatrical perfectionism, glamorous Manhattan evenings, and behavioral brinksmanship with the never-quite-dismissed lessons of her Catholic background in the Midwest. I learned as much as I was entertained and left smitten: my idea of a pretty terrific book.” ―Sheila Weller , New York Times –bestselling author of Girls Like Us: Carole King, Joni Mitchell, Carly Simon―and the Journey of a Generation and Carrie Fisher: A Life On The Edge
About the Author
Alexandra Jacobs is a longtime features writer, cultural critic, and editor who has worked at The New York Times since 2010. She has contributed to many other publications, including The New Yorker , The New York Observer , and Entertainment Weekly.