Wired by Bob Woodward
Bob Woodward . Unknown Year . English
This reissue of Bob Woodword&;s classic book about John Belushi&;one of the most interesting performers and personalities in show business history&;&;is told with the same narrative style that Woodward employed so effectively in All the President&;s Men and The Final Days&; (Chicago Tribune). John Belushi was found dead of a drug overdose March 5, 1982, in a seedy hotel bungalow off Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood. Belushi&;s death was the beginning of a trail that led Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward on an investigation that examines the dark side of American show business&;TV, rock and roll, and the movie industry. From on-the-record interviews with 217 people, including Belushi's widow, his former partner Dan Aykroyd, Belushi&;s movie directors including Jack Nicholson and Steven Spielberg, actors Chevy Chase, Robin Williams, and Carrie Fisher, the movie executives, the agents, Belushi&;s drug dealers, and those who live in the show business underground, the author has written a close portrait of a great American comic talent, and of his struggle to succeed and to survive that ended in tragedy. Using diaries, accountants&; records, phone bills, travel records, medical records, and interviews with firsthand witnesses, Woodward has followed Belushi&;s life from childhood in a small town outside Chicago to his meteoric rise to fame. Bob Woodward has written a spellbinding account of rise and fall, a cautionary tale for our times, and a poignant and gentle portrait of a young man who had so much, gave so much, and lost so much.
Categories: Business & Economics
About the Author
Bob Woodward is an associate editor of The Washington Post, where he has worked since 1971. He has shared in two Pulitzer Prizes, first in 1973 for the coverage of the Watergate scandal with Carl Bernstein, and second in 2003 as the lead reporter for coverage of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. He has authored or coauthored 18 books, all of which have been national non-fiction bestsellers. Twelve of those have been #1 national bestsellers. He has written books on eight of the most recent presidents, from Nixon to Obama. Bob Schieffer of CBS News has said, “Woodward has established himself as the best reporter of our time. He may be the best reporter of all time.” In 2014, Robert Gates, former director of the CIA and Secretary of Defense, said that he wished he’d recruited Woodward into the CIA, saying of Woodward, “He has an extraordinary ability to get otherwise responsible adults to spill [their] guts to him...his ability to get people to talk about stuff they shouldn’t be talking about is just extraordinary and may be unique.” Gene Roberts, the former managing editor of The New York Times, has called the Woodward-Bernstein Watergate coverage, “maybe the single greatest reporting effort of all time.” In listing the all-time 100 best non-fiction books, Time Magazine has called All the President’s Men, by Bernstein and Woodward, “Perhaps the most influential piece of journalism in history.” In 2018 David Von Drehle wrote, “What [Theodore] White did for presidential campaigns, Post Associate Editor Bob Woodward has done for multiple West Wing administrations – in addition to the Supreme Court, the Pentagon, the CIA and the Federal Reserve.” Woodward was born March 26, 1943 in Illinois. He graduated from Yale University in 1965 and served five years as a communications officer in the United States Navy before beginning his journalism career at the Montgomery County (Maryland) Sentinel, where he was a reporter for one year before joining the Post. Photos, a Q&A, and additional materials are available at Woodward's website, www.bobwoodward.com.
