MY REMARKABLE JOURNEY
Larry King
Weinstein Books
Memoir
ISBN: 9781602860865
Larry King is unlike any other journalist in history. He is also unlike any other autobiographer. His stories come one after the other, each funnier or more interesting than the last. I didn’t know he was such a comedian. He saw opportunity around every corner and grabbed the brass ring. He would be the first to admit that he never let go.
King opens his memoir with a hysterical tale about conducting an interview with Osama bin Laden. Imagine! His dream interview would be a scenario where he doesn’t know who he is talking to until the show starts and the mystery guest comes through the door.
In his life thus far, King has sat down with countless celebrities, one of the most memorable being Frank Sinatra, who was famous for not doing interviews. How did this come about? When Jackie Gleason found out that King would just about walk through fire to do an interview with the reclusive Sinatra, Gleason set it up by calling in a favor. King was working for a small AM radio station in Miami that had spent a huge amount of its advertising budget on the hopes that Sinatra would show. Ol’ Blue Eyes arrived at the studio at the last minute, with King on tenterhooks. Not only did he honor his word to Gleason, but he willfully told the story about his son’s abduction, a topic that King was forbidden to bring up.
King’s interview style is so simple that it is sometimes seen as simplistic. Actually, it is totally focused on the guest: “I never learned anything listening to myself talk.” He doesn’t script his interviews or give long lead-ins, and you will never hear him offer his own viewpoints. Rather, he is interested in the opinions and thoughts of his guests, and things he doesn’t know yet.
I can recall vividly seeing O.J. Simpson fleeing Los Angeles in the white Ford Bronco. At the time I was watching “Larry King Live.” King, who stayed on the air for three hours, felt a little unprepared, as this feed was live from LA and he was not. The world watched as the drama unfolded.
Always wanting to be an announcer from his earliest recollections --- having announced a sporting event through a rolled-up program --- King was the color commentator for the Miami Dolphins broadcasts during the early part of their perfect 1971-72 season. He has also met and interviewed many of his heroes, including Leo Durocher, as a young AM radio personality.
Significant to every aspect of King’s life is the death of his father, and the great and consequential loss he felt and the abandonment he lived through. He ascribes many turns in his life as having come from his sense that his father left him when he was a very young boy. We enter his world, career, marriages, family, and finally get some of his closely held opinions.
Through the years, King has interviewed a variety of guests from all walks of life, religious and political viewpoints. His style of questioning has never really changed. Using short, direct questions, he extracts the answers America awaits. It truly has been a remarkable journey.
--- Reviewed by Marge Fletcher
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