Cara's Reviews > Miss May Does Not Exist: The Life and Work of Elaine May, Hollywood’s Hidden Genius

Though I’ve not had the pleasure to experience all of Elaine May’s oeuvre, I have experience enough of her brilliance to be fully “in” on reading a biography, especially knowing how she was not at all available or willing to participate in this writing of her story. I loved the author’s stalker-esque confessional in the introduction. It’s a wild start to telling the story of one wild woman storytelling genius of the early days of the Cold War (Nichols/May) into New Hollywood era and decades beyond.
Reading about her chaotic and harrowing (abusive and neglected) childhood, but one full of not just dangerous but colorful, damaged (and damaging) family members and other unsavory characters who not just informed her ways of navigating her personal life but also of her masterful storytelling, acting performance, staging and filmmaking. Becoming a mother so young and then a step mother to multiple children while singularly forging her talents in male dominated Hollywood (with many friends and supportive creative partners who withstood her quirks and hard driving work ethic because of her prolific and manifesting genius) was in and of itself so mind blowing to read. Even without Elaine’s voice in this book, Carrie Courogen does a solid job of integrating many sources into a very compelling narrative. It was hard to put this book down! I am even more admiring of Ms. May and can’t wait to watch the rest of these movies and rewatch and listen to Nichols and May. (Heaven Can Wait and Tootsie two of my all time favorite movies and loved learning she had much to do with the extraordinary screenplays of these two films).