Guy Williams: The Man Behind the Mask
by Antoinette Girgenti Lane
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Book Summary Information
Author: Antoinette Girgenti LaneEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2005-04-01
ISBN: 159393016X
Number of pages: 528
Publisher: BearManor Media
Book Reviews of Guy Williams: The Man Behind the Mask
Book Review: When Zorro Owned a Flying Saucer
Summary: 5 Stars
How many icons of early television can claim to have not one, but two cult classics to call their own?
As Disney's "Zorro", Guy Williams sold a lot of plastic, chaulk-tipped swords in his career. Guy was most proud of his role of Zorro, but not so much as the famous space patriarch he portrayed as Professor John Robinson in the '60s cult classic, and more popular, and more lasting "Lost in Space".
We get a good idea of the character of the man in this well-researched, mainly well-written, and sizable book. The strength of this book is that it is written by someone who was a huge fan of Guy Williams. The main weakness of this book is that a very interesting story gets over-taken by an almost gushy, fawning eagerness to stick to the highs of this complicated character. The point being that the author often resorts to giving the lows in this very real life the same weight as the highs.
Guy Williams was a complicated man, who was thoughtful enough to know it. He disliked the phoniness of Hollywood, but was rather inclined to be "over-whelmed" by "the business", even though he was smart enough to succeed - when he wanted to. The problem for Guy was that he couldn't get out of the way of idea of Guy Williams.
This is plainly obvious in his distain for playing second fiddle to a robot and "Dr. Smith". Guy felt betrayed (and justifiably so), by what Irin Allen had promised would be a serious portrayal of the challenges a family faced in space, and a show that deteriorated to pure '60s camp.
To his credit Guy compensated for these faults by making sure that his children got the best preparation for a life that Guy himself found difficult to handle. He was married to a beautiful woman who stood by Guy, even when Guy periodically retreated from his responsibilities as a married man, father and faithful husband to Argentina - a country that eagerly catered to Guy's belief that his finest role was that as "Zorro", a role that he only played for two seasons.
Even as the effects of aging turned swash-buckeling into parody, Guy pressed on, giving one show after another, until even his greatest fans started to fall away.
The author, Antoinette Girgenti Lane, explores all of this in a faithful, yet sometimes pollyannish way, while giving welcome details such as the floor plan of Guy's appartment in Argentina. Surprisingly, hardly anyone knows that for a man so beloved, Guy died alone in his Buenos Aires apartment, his body not discovered until days later.
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