Close to being the last word of the golden age of the flicks. All the stars are here and more, but it is the author's perspective that makes this so interesting and captivating. Hollywood's power lay in its ability to create potent images that defined a nation's awareness of itself. But often the creators were unaware of how well they succeeded. The author here gives us the dream machine's layers of power, warts and all, and we are subsequently overwhelmed by this business that could produce assembly-line fantasies at such a frenetic pace. Of course, there is plenty of good gossip about the stars and shakers. Those who can never get enough of the vulgar, crass, vicious, larger-than-life people who too often made up the celluloid empire, who eat up scandal and outrageous idiocy, will have a field day. There's union organizing and union busting, gangsters and nearly illiterate moguls of immense clout, lackeys and press-agent madness in this engrossing survey. Some heroes emerge and there are surprises galore: What did Schoenberg, Stravinsky, Brecht, Fitzgerald, Faulkner, Dorothy Parker and Ronald Reagan have in common? Tinseltown, of course. Movie mavens will love this. Even the familiar stories delight on the retelling. Can there be someone who knows zilch about Hollywood's golden age? Well, here's the perfect remedy for such a lamentable deficiency. What's more, it's intelligent, superbly written and thoroughly enjoyable