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Lisa Baumgardner Falour reviews Liz Renay's MY FACE FOR THE WORLD TO SEE |
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"The room swam crazily as I downed another glass of cheap champagne. The lights blurred and the music sounded strangely loud in my ears. 'I'd better watch it,' I thought. 'I'm getting high again.' I smiled up into the eyes of the John at my table. He was waving a twenty-dollar bill in my face. 'See this, honey? I got lotsa these, just waiting for a pretty baby like you--understand?'" "'All right, tough guy--kill me. what are you waiting for?' Cappy pulled out a knife and started for me. He expected me to back away. I stood my ground..." "Soon opening night rolled around. I dressed in my most outstanding gown and hired a limousine to take me there for appearance's sake, purposely arriving thirty minutes late to make an entrance." "What met my eyes astounded me. It was a sight I'll never forget. There were society matrons, Park Avenue dowagers, and phony counts with phony monocles--all rubbing elbows with the toughest mob of underworld characters I ever saw. The society element sipped champagne delicately and oohed and aahed over (my) paintings, while the mobsters wandered uncomfortably around like rhinos in china closets, afraid they might break something." What sounds like a mix between Mickey Spillane and the Happy Hooker are actual scenes from the almost-Silver-Screen-Superstar, bigger-than-life misadventures of blonde bombshell Liz Renay, whose gutsy antics scorch the pages of her autobiography, My Face for the World to See, a Bantam paperback released in the early seventies, guaranteed to stay glued wide open in your sweaty hands 'til you've gulped down the last meaty line. Renay, winner of a Marilyn Monroe look-alike contest, Mafia moll, artist, stripper, multi-wed near-movie-star and devoted mother of two, gets showered with furs, homes and limos by rich and powerful men from all walks, some who rip her off, others who tangle her in gangland slayings, leading eventually to her extended incarceration at Terminal Island. What led me to read this particular literary gem was a visit to Tom Hosier's MODERN CORRESPONDENCE headquarters at the end of the Hudson-Harlem-New Haven Conrail line, one night last winter. He lent me her book and I finished it in the time it took to ride the train back to Manhattan. I was sorry when it ended. Renay bounces from one wacky situation to another with both the wide-eyed and straightforward innocence of the little Arizona ragamuffin she was and the slicing sarcasm of a hard-boiled gun moll-turned-sensitive scholar she later became. This broad fairly ricochets between roles of slut seductress to gentle humanitarian, thinking up essays on God and crusading for prison reform. She was a veritable Angel of Mercy behind bars, and campaigned vigorously through TV talk shows and public appearances upon her release. Most interesting to me are her delightful anti-Kennedy statements, her flair for hot action-adventure reporting, and her presentation of often sleazy misdoings through outrageously rose-tinted lenses, as if to say, "Sure I've done some wild things, but I had my reasons." Apparently she did, and still does. No apologies, either. No regrets, for certain. I admire the hell out of Liz Renay, because she never settled for half-way. I'm twenty-one and moved to The Big City from some pretty humble origins. Not to say my experiences thus far have come close to Lizzie's, but let's just say a young blonde girlie, naive to the ways of the grown-up nasty world gets a lot of opportunities to misbehave, and books like this one keep me from fits of total depression and disillusionment, 'cause they remind me how essential courage and a sense of humor are as safeguards to sanity. This book has something for almost everyone--to borrow a trite old phrase--and borders on bizarre, for sure. Apparently hard-to-find, too, so snatch it up if it happens to show it's face (for the world to see). |
©1977 LISA BAUMGARDNER FALOUR |
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