From Steve Martin to Kevin Hart.
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We've rounded up unmissable memoirs from some of the world's comedy greats, many of who aren't afraid to dive into how their careers started, and to get raw about the highs and lows of their lives. From Steve Martin 's unmatched rise to fame in the late '60s and early '70s to Kevin Hart's persistence as a touring comedian, these memoirs speak of unprecedented success. If you're ready for a book that will make you laugh while providing introspection and inspiration, add these 10 memoirs and biographies to your reading list.
Kevin Hart 's comedy career truly went stratospheric, but as he details in his memoir, success wasn't instantaneous. In I Can't Make This Up: Life Lessons, Hart reflects on his early life, his first marriage, and the sacrifices he made in order to pursue a career as a stand-up comedian. He may be a major movie star now, but he relentlessly toured his comedy routine all over the United States for years before he broke into acting. Inspirational, hilarious, and completely candid.
With Only Murders in the Building , Steve Martin has found himself in the zeitgeist once again, but it's far from the only time he's been there. The accomplished comedian, actor, author, screenwriter, and musician has had an incomparable career spanning six decades.
Born Standing Up is an intimate portrait of Martin's comedy career, from his childhood, which involved working at Disneyland, to his decision to quit stand-up despite being ridiculously successful. If you've ever wondered how Martin came to prominence, Born Standing Up is the book for you.
Leslie Jones is an undisputed queen of comedy, having been a regular Saturday Night Live cast member from 2014 to 2019. Hosting stints on Supermarket Sweep and The Daily Show, and acting roles in movies like the 2016 all-female Ghostbusters remake, cemented her status as one of the funniest comedians of the 21st century.
In Leslie F*cking Jones, the eponymous author revisits her childhood, her introduction to the entertainment industry, and the challenges she faced as a Black woman in the comedy space. Not to be missed.
Mel Brooks' impact on the world of comedy can't be overstated. Long-awaited memoir All About Me!: My Remarkable Life in Show Business was nominated for a Goodreads Choice Award and documents Brooks' amazing career.
The book covers everything from his youth in Brooklyn during the Great Depression to the Broadway projects, TV series, and movies that proved he was an unrivaled talent. The recipient of a plethora of awards, from a Kennedy Center Honor to a BAFTA Fellowship, Brooks' memoir is a hilarious reflection on an impeccable career.
Whether she's talking about the poverty she experienced as a child or her difficult marriage, Tiffany Haddish manages to be endlessly endearing and genuinely funny.
The Last Black Unicorn tells Haddish's extraordinary story, revealing how she discovered her love of comedy and the steps she took to build an incredible career. Haddish also addresses the hurdles she faced when she started finding success, and the way that impacted the close relationships in her life. Haddish will have you laughing from the first page.
Ali Wong struck a chord with audiences thanks to her brutally personal comedy and ability to make fun of the lowest moments of her life. Dear Girls is a collection of letters to her daughters, exploring everything from her marriage to the failed romantic relationships of her youth. Rather than shying away from the more uncomfortable moments, Wong leans into the awkwardness of life, resonating with readers and audience members alike.
Basically, regardless of whether you've enjoyed Wong's work onstage or onscreen, you'll devour Dear Girls.
Rebel Wilson made headlines with her memoir Rebel Rising because she wasn't afraid to discuss the worst moments in her career, along with personal details she hadn't shared before. From her alleged experience working with Sacha Baron Cohen to the difficulties she faced with her fertility, Wilson's decision to be so honest with her fans hasn't gone unnoticed. The Pitch Perfect star took to her teenage diaries to find inspiration for her memoir, and she overcame a sense of shyness to open up in such a public way.
Jimmy O. Yang came to prominence in his scene-stealing roles on HBO's Silicon Valley and the hit movie Crazy Rich Asians. But the comedian's path to fame was far from easy, and neither was the road to becoming an American citizen, either.
Having moved to Los Angeles from Hong Kong as a teenager, Yang had a deportation scare during a trip to Mexico before becoming an American citizen in his twenties. After defying his parents' wishes to pursue a sensible career, Yang followed his dream of being a stand-up comedian, and it certainly paid off.
Praised by Hollywood superstars like Reese Witherspoon and Gwyneth Paltrow, Celeste Barber's book is the perfect introduction to one of Instagram's funniest influencers. Known for recreating famous people's Instagram pictures with extreme realism, Barber's brand of comedy has always felt unique.
Instead of trying to portray a perfect social media image, Barber has no qualms looking less than graceful online, which is completely refreshing. Challenge Accepted!: 253 Steps to Becoming an Anti-It Girl is the perfect comedy memoir, and might even inspire your internet activity.
Tig Notaro went viral after revealing her cancer diagnosis onstage during a comedy routine, which was subsequently nominated for a Grammy. Notaro's candor about a sequence of devastating events that had led to the moment rightly garnered her a passionate fan base.
Since then, she's appeared in films like Instant Family and Army of the Dead and co-created One Mississippi , a TV series based on her life.
In I'm Just a Person, Notaro opens up about her life, including all of the difficult and challenging moments that inspired her heartbreaking yet hilarious stand-up routine.
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HONOLULU — Wallace “Wally” Amos, the creator of the cookie empire that took his name and made it famous and who went on to become a children’s literacy advocate, has died. He was 88.
Amos created the Famous Amos cookie empire and eventually lost ownership of the company — as well as the rights to use the catchy Amos name. In his later years, he became a proprietor of a cookie shop called Chip & Cookie in Hawaii, where he moved in 1977.
He died Tuesday at his home in Honolulu, with his wife, Carol, at his side, his children said. He died from complications with dementia, they said.
“With his Panama hat, kazoo, and boundless optimism, Famous Amos was a great American success story, and a source of Black pride,” said a statement from his children, Sarah, Michael, Gregory and Shawn Amos.
He was married six times to five women, son Shawn said, explaining that he and Carol had split up, reacquainted and then remarried.
“He loved love,” Sarah Amos said.
They said their dad “inspired a generation of entrepreneurs when he founded the world’s first cookie store” on Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles in 1975.
He had been stationed in Hawaii with the Air Force, and Famous Amos gave him the means to later make it his home.
Sarah Amos, who was born in Hawaii, remembers her dad flying back and forth to the U.S. mainland and taking business calls at 4 a.m.
“It’s hard to run a business and to work with people on the mainland when you’re in Hawaii,” she said. “But he made the sacrifice.”
While Wally Amos was a great promotor, he struggled as a businessperson and eventually lost control of the company. He walked away from it because he didn’t want to just be its face, Sarah Amos said.
Later losing the business and the right to use his name was deeply painful and personal, Shawn Amos said: “The remainder of his life and the remainder of his professional pursuits were attempts to get him to, you know, reclaim that space.”
Wally Amos was also co-founder of Uncle Wally’s Muffin Co., whose products are found in stores nationwide. But Amos said the fame never really mattered much to him.
“Being famous is highly overrated anyway,” Amos told The Associated Press in 2007.
His muffin company, based in Shirley, N.Y., was originally founded as Uncle Noname Cookie Co. in 1992, a few years after Amos lost Famous Amos, which still widely uses his name on its products.
Amos had said the Famous Amos cookies sold today are unlike his cookies, which had lots of chocolate, real butter and pure vanilla extract.
“You can’t compare a machine-made cookie with handmade cookie,” he told the AP. “It’s like comparing a Rolls Royce with a Volkswagen.”
Uncle Noname, however, foundered because of debt and problems with its contracted manufacturers.
The company filed for bankruptcy in 1996, abandoned cookies and went into muffins at the suggestion of Amos’ business partner, Lou Avignone.
Inside his now-shuttered Hawaii cookie shop, he sold bite-sized cookies similar to the ones he first sold at the Famous Amos Hollywood store.
Amos also was active in promoting reading. His shop, for example, had a reading room with dozens of donated books, and Amos usually spent Saturdays sitting on a rocking chair, wearing a watermelon hat, reading to children.
Sarah Amos recalled him reading to children at Hanahauʻoli School and continuing to do so even after she graduated from the small elementary school.
The former high school dropout penned eight books, served as spokesperson for Literacy Volunteers of America for 24 years and gave motivational talks to corporations, universities and other groups.
Amos earned numerous honors for his volunteerism, including the Literacy Award presented by President George H.W. Bush in 1991.
“Your greatest contribution to your country is not your signature straw hat in the Smithsonian, but the people you have inspired to learn to read,” Bush said.
In one of his books, “Man With No Name: Turn Lemons Into Lemonade,” Amos explained how he lost Famous Amos even before it was sold for $63 million to a Taiwanese company in 1991. Despite robust sales, by 1985, the business was losing money, so Amos brought in outside investors.
“The new owners gobbled up more of my share until all of a sudden, I found I had lost all ownership in the company I founded,” Amos wrote. Before long, the company had changed ownership four times.
Sarah Amos said that after parting ways with Famous Amos, he stopped baking for about two years. After rediscovering a love of baking, he launched the Hawaii business, Chip & Cookie, in 1991.
Born in Tallahassee, Florida, Amos moved to New York City at age 12 because of his parents’ divorce. He lived with an aunt, Della Bryant, who taught him how to make chocolate chip cookies.
He later dropped out of high school to join the Air Force before working as a mailroom clerk at the William Morris Agency, where he became a talent agent, working with The Supremes, Simon & Garfunkel and Marvin Gaye before borrowing $25,000 to launch his cookie business.
He was the first Black agent in the business, Shawn Amos, said.
Shawn and Sarah said that after becoming parents themselves, they realized how meaningful the chocolate chip cookie is to their family.
“The first time we made cookies with our kids, it sort of sunk in, this is actually a family thing,” Shawn said. “It’s a gift he gave us. It’s part of our heritage.”
Early on Friday morning, a 31-year-old female trainee doctor retired to sleep in a seminar hall after a gruelling day at one of India’s oldest hospitals.
It was the last time she was seen alive.
The next morning, her colleagues discovered her half-naked body on the podium, bearing extensive injuries. Police later arrested a hospital volunteer worker in connection with what they say is a case of rape and murder at Kolkata’s 138-year-old RG Kar Medical College.
Tens of thousands of women in Kolkata and across West Bengal state are expected to participate in a 'Reclaim the Night' march at midnight on Wednesday, demanding the "independence to live in freedom and without fear". The march takes place just before India's Independence Day on Thursday. Outraged doctors have struck work both in the city and across India, demanding a strict federal law to protect them.
The tragic incident has again cast a spotlight on the violence against doctors and nurses in the country. Reports of doctors, regardless of gender, being assaulted by patients and their relatives have gained widespread attention. Women - who make up nearly 30% of India’s doctors and 80% of the nursing staff - are more vulnerable than their male colleagues.
The crime in the Kolkata hospital last week exposed the alarming security risks faced by the medical staff in many of India's state-run health facilities.
At RG Kar Hospital, which sees over 3,500 patients daily, the overworked trainee doctors - some working up to 36 hours straight - had no designated rest rooms, forcing them to seek rest in a third-floor seminar room.
Reports indicate that the arrested suspect, a volunteer worker with a troubled past, had unrestricted access to the ward and was captured on CCTV. Police allege that no background checks were conducted on the volunteer.
"The hospital has always been our first home; we only go home to rest. We never imagined it could be this unsafe. Now, after this incident, we're terrified," says Madhuparna Nandi, a junior doctor at Kolkata’s 76-year-old National Medical College.
Dr Nandi’s own journey highlights how female doctors in India's government hospitals have become resigned to working in conditions that compromise their security.
At her hospital, where she is a resident in gynaecology and obstetrics, there are no designated rest rooms and separate toilets for female doctors.
“I use the patients’ or the nurses' toilets if they allow me. When I work late, I sometimes sleep in an empty patient bed in the ward or in a cramped waiting room with a bed and basin,” Dr Nandi told me.
She says she feels insecure even in the room where she rests after 24-hour shifts that start with outpatient duty and continue through ward rounds and maternity rooms.
One night in 2021, during the peak of the Covid pandemic, some men barged into her room and woke her by touching her, demanding, “Get up, get up. See our patient.”
“I was completely shaken by the incident. But we never imagined it would come to a point where a doctor could be raped and murdered in the hospital,” Dr Nandi says.
What happened on Friday was not an isolated incident. The most shocking case remains that of Aruna Shanbaug , a nurse at a prominent Mumbai hospital, who was left in a persistent vegetative state after being raped and strangled by a ward attendant in 1973. She died in 2015, after 42 years of severe brain damage and paralysis. More recently, in Kerala, Vandana Das, a 23-year-old medical intern, was fatally stabbed with surgical scissors by a drunken patient last year.
In overcrowded government hospitals with unrestricted access, doctors often face mob fury from patients' relatives after a death or over demands for immediate treatment. Kamna Kakkar, an anaesthetist, remembers a harrowing incident during a night shift in an intensive care unit (ICU) during the pandemic in 2021 at her hospital in Haryana in northern India.
“I was the lone doctor in the ICU when three men, flaunting a politician’s name, forced their way in, demanding a much in-demand controlled drug. I gave in to protect myself, knowing the safety of my patients was at stake," Dr Kakkar told me.
Namrata Mitra, a Kolkata-based pathologist who studied at the RG Kar Medical College, says her doctor father would often accompany her to work because she felt unsafe.
“During my on-call duty, I took my father with me. Everyone laughed, but I had to sleep in a room tucked away in a long, dark corridor with a locked iron gate that only the nurse could open if a patient arrived,” Dr Mitra wrote in a Facebook post over the weekend.
“I’m not ashamed to admit I was scared. What if someone from the ward - an attendant, or even a patient - tried something? I took advantage of the fact that my father was a doctor, but not everyone has that privilege.”
When she was working in a public health centre in a district in West Bengal, Dr Mitra spent nights in a dilapidated one-storey building that served as the doctor’s hostel.
“From dusk, a group of boys would gather around the house, making lewd comments as we went in and out for emergencies. They would ask us to check their blood pressure as an excuse to touch us and they would peek through the broken bathroom windows,” she wrote.
Years later, during an emergency shift at a government hospital, “a group of drunk men passed by me, creating a ruckus, and one of them even groped me”, Dr Mitra said. “When I tried to complain, I found the police officers dozing off with their guns in hand.”
Things have worsened over the years, says Saraswati Datta Bodhak, a pharmacologist at a government hospital in West Bengal's Bankura district. "Both my daughters are young doctors and they tell me that hospital campuses in the state are overrun by anti-social elements, drunks and touts," she says. Dr Bodhak recalls seeing a man with a gun roaming around a top government hospital in Kolkata during a visit.
India lacks a stringent federal law to protect healthcare workers. Although 25 states have some laws to prevent violence against them, convictions are “almost non-existent”, RV Asokan, president of the Indian Medical Association (IMA), an organisation of doctors, told me. A 2015 survey by IMA found that 75% of doctors in India have faced some form of violence at work. “Security in hospitals is almost absent,” he says. “One reason is that nobody thinks of hospitals as conflict zones.”
Some states like Haryana have deployed private bouncers to strengthen security at government hospitals. In 2022, the federal government asked the states to deploy trained security forces for sensitive hospitals, install CCTV cameras, set up quick reaction teams, restrict entry to "undesirable individuals" and file complaints against offenders. Nothing much has happened, clearly.
Even the protesting doctors don't seem to be very hopeful. “Nothing will change... The expectation will be that doctors should work round the clock and endure abuse as a norm,” says Dr Mitra. It is a disheartening thought.
India's covid doctors demand action after attacks.
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Oprah Winfrey (1954 - ) American TV presenter, actress, entrepreneur. Indira Gandhi (1917 - 1984) Prime Minister of India 1966 - 1977. Eva Peron (1919 - 1952) First Lady of Argentina 1946 - 1952. Benazir Bhutto (1953 - 2007) Prime Minister of Pakistan 1993 - 1996. George Orwell (1903 - 1950) British author.
See why leading organizations rely on MasterClass for learning & development. Biographies are how we learn information about another human being's life. Whether you want to start writing a biography about a famous person, historical figure, or an influential family member, it's important to know all the elements that make a biography worth ...
Conduct relevant interviews. Whenever possible, seek firsthand accounts from those who knew or interacted with the subject. Conduct interviews with family members, friends, colleagues, or experts in the field. Their insights and anecdotes can provide a deeper understanding of the person's character and experiences.
Let's break down the process step by step. 1. Choose Your Subject. Decide who you want to write about. It could be a well-known celebrity, a historical figure, or someone close to you. In addition to figuring out who you're writing about, this is also the step where you figure out why you want to write about them.
1. Research is key: Writing a biography requires extensive research to ensure that you have a thorough understanding of the person's life and achievements. 2. Choose your sources carefully: Make sure to use reputable sources when conducting your research, such as books, articles, and interviews with people who knew the person. 3.
8. Send a copy to your subject. Consider sending a copy of your manuscript to the person whose life you wrote about in your book. The copy may serve as a thank-you gift, but also, if you intend to publish your work, you will need them to approve, as well as fact check, everything you put into the story.
Steps to Write a Famous Person's Biography. Here are the simple steps to write a biography: 1. Choose A Famous Person. First, pick a famous person you like.
To write a biography essay, authors thoroughly research their famous people, organize the information chronologically or thematically, and present a detailed, engaging narrative that highlights the person's key living events, achievements, and impacts (Maurois & Roberts, 2014).
1. Go for a chronological structure. Start chronologically from the subject's birth to their death or later life. Use the timeline of the person's life to structure the biography. Start with birth and childhood. Then, go into young adulthood and adulthood.
A good writing routine can make the process smoother and more enjoyable. Choose a Writing Space: Find a quiet, comfortable place free of distractions. Set a Time: Write at the same time each day to build a habit. Prepare Mentally: Take a few minutes before writing to clear your mind and focus on the task ahead.
A biography is an account of someone's life written by someone else.While there is a genre known as a fictional biography, for the most part, biographies are, by definition, nonfiction. Generally speaking, biographies provide an account of the subject's life from the earliest days of childhood to the present day or, if the subject is deceased, their death.
Wondering how to write a biography? We've constructed a simple step-by-step process for writing biographies. Use our tips & tricks to help you get started! ... Celebrities and famous figures are universally viewed as interesting and will have a wider audience.If you choose to write about a famous person, make sure your biography stands out in ...
12. The Lost City of Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon by David Grann. Another mysterious explorer takes center stage in this gripping 2009 biography. Grann tells the story of Percy Fawcett, the archaeologist who vanished in the Amazon along with his son in 1925, supposedly in search of an ancient lost city.
Rosa Parks (civil rights) Samuel Morse (inventor) Sandra Day O'Connor (political leader) Stephen Hawking (scientist) Susan B. Anthony (famous women) Thomas Edison (inventor) W.E.B. Dubois (civil rights) Wright Brothers (inventors) Winston Churchill (political leader)
1. The first step to writing a biography is to choose a person you are interested in. Write the book because the story matters to you and the thought of telling it excites you, not because you care about becoming rich as a result. You'll be working on this book for one or more years, so it has to matter. A lot.
Download Article. 1. Mention the person's name, birth date, and place of birth. Start by including key biographical details like the person's full name and their birth date. You can also provide the person's place of birth, especially if it will give readers context for the rest of the biography.
In this video, I'll show you how to write a biography. Whether you're a beginner or a pro, I'll show you how to write a biography that will capture your audi...
Including Basic Details. Date and place of birth and death. Family information. Lifetime accomplishments. Major events of life. Effects/impact on society, historical significance. While this information is necessary to your project, these dry facts, on their own, don't really make a very good biography.
3. Write an introduction. Start your introduction by using an attention grabbing statement or startling fact to draw the reader's attention. Also be sure to include significant information about this person in the introduction, so that a reader who doesn't know who this person is can have a bit more information.
Unsure of what to include in a biography? Whether about yourself or someone else, write one easily with these key parts of a biography.
Writing a famous person biography sample doesn't have to be hard. With tools like Affpilot AI's Biography Writer, you can create well-structured and engaging biographies effortlessly.
Expert Tips for Writing. When crafting a compelling biography essay, consider these expert tips to make your writing stand out: 1. Start with a captivating introduction that sets the tone for the rest of the essay. 2. Research thoroughly to gather accurate information and interesting anecdotes about the subject. 3.
Some people call this massive bestseller a memoir, but the way Becoming spans Michelle Obama's life easily qualifies it as an autobiography—one of the best autobiographies you'll ever read ...
The worksheet includes four biographies of famous people (Thomas Edison, Ada Lovelace, Elvis Presley, Leonardo da Vinci) with gaps to fill in correct past simple forms. My suggestion is to divide ss into small groups or pairs and give each a different biography. Ss first choose correct past forms and then retell the biography skipping the name ...
Many who resort to crime ultimately can't read or write. Being famous is highly—very, very, very highly—overrated. ... The Biography.com staff is a team of people-obsessed and news-hungry ...
We rounded up 10 of the funniest memoirs and biographies by the world's best comedians, from Steve Martin to Leslie Jones to Ali Wong. If you love a good laugh, add these to your reading list.
Sarah Amos said that after parting ways with Famous Amos, he stopped baking for about two years. After rediscovering a love of baking, he launched the Hawaii business, Chip & Cookie, in 1991.
Early on Friday morning, a 31-year-old female trainee doctor retired to sleep in a seminar hall after a gruelling day at one of India's oldest hospitals. It was the last time she was seen alive ...
AI Is Coming for India's Famous Tech Hub. Country's outsourcing companies have added urgency to shift to higher-end services. By . Megha Mandavia. Aug. 6, 2024 11:00 pm ET. Share. Resize.