Overview

Lenny Bruce was a controversial standup comedian of the 1950's and 60's who became a martyr to First Amendment rights when he satired the hypocrisy and deception of political and religious leaders. Those leaders used the law in an attempt to harrass him into silence. Even though Bruce used no more adult language than other comics of his time, his lower court convictions for obscenitywere all judged unconstitional and overtrned in higher courts, making those milestone cases for defense of First Amendment rights and providing the freedom of expression today's entertainers enjoy. Bruce was immortalized in Tom O'Horgan's 1960's musical ""Lenny"" and Bob Fosse's 1970's movie ""Lenny"" starring Dustin Hoffman in the title role. Of the subsequent books about Lenny Bruce, William Karl Thomas' memoir of his ten year collaboration with Bruce is the only one by someone who knew him personally and professionally. Other books and documentaries about Bruce sometimes quote Thomas or use his photos and film footage, but Thomas' details the people and processes that inspired Bruce's classic routines with first person presence and poignancy. As the Manchester Guardian rview of this book says, ''Thomas can write...he superbly evokes the seedy atmosphere of the cheap Hollywood clubs and coffeehouses...his work sometimes reads like a Bogart script.'' Thomas' subsequent more than a dozen books chronicle most of the twentieth century in which he participated as a military correspoodent in Korea's combat zone, a photogapher of Hollywood's elite, a screnwriter and comedy writer with Lenny Bruce and others, a cinematographer of feature and documentary productions, and a book author Kirkus praises for ""his historically astute depiction of the country and era. He aptly conveys the heights and depths of human capability."" Click on his highighted name to see his author's page with descriptions and excerpts of all his books. This book is not a biography of Lenny Bruce, but a very intimate and revealing memoir of Bruce and his only writing collaborator.

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9781627680035

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William Karl Thomas was born 1/25/33 in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi, a small Gulf Coast town in which Tennessee Williams lived and wrote about in his works. In 1951 Thomas married his former high school teacher and was divorced after a four year childless marriage. His checkered background includes being a cocktail pianist in New Orleans French Quarter, serving a year of combat in the Air Force during the Korean War, being a photographer, a journalist, a feature/documentary cinematographer, a screen writer, an industrial film producer, a public relations executive, and a book author. He has worked for and with such notables as Frank Sinatra, the Rat Pack, Lenny Bruce, Shecky Green, Sally Marr, Frank Ray Perelli, Dale Ireland, Basil Bradbury, and others with whom he signed confidentiality agreements. In the course of various assignments, Thomas has lived or worked in Oxford England, Paris France, Japan, Korea, Jamaica, Mexico, Canada, and most of the United States. Thomas' books include a memoir of his ten year collaboration with the most controversial comedian of the twentieth century titled ""Lenny Bruce: The Making of a Prophet."" His memoir of his childhood in a Gulf Coast town where Hurricane Katrine made landfall in 2005, is titled ""The Genteel Poor."" His novel based on his wartime experiences in Korea is titled ""The Josan And The Jee."" His novel, ""Cleo,"" is based on his media experiences in Los Angeles during the turbulent civil rights era of the 1950's and 1960's. His anthology of twelve short stories titled ""Hollywood Tales From The Outer Fringe"" reveals the relationship that arise between 'A' list celebrities and the armies of little people who work for them. His latest, ""A Place For Us,"" is the biography of a charismatic woman and her inspiring life as a polio survivor. His latest novel, ""The Piano Man,"" is about a colorful collection of hedonists in New Orleans French Quarter during the 1950. His upcoming science fiction trilogy, Immortal, involves three alien archeologists a millennium in the future who try how and why humans self destructed themselves and their planet, in the process reviewing the evolution of humanity and the turn points of human civilization. William Karl Thomas currently lives in Tucson, Arizona, where he occasionally teaches writing and film production at a local community college, and continues work on a variety of book, film, and media projects.

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