Between Flops

A Biography of Preston Sturges

By: James Curtis

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Paperback | 22 August 2025

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360 Pages

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22.86 x 15.24 x 2.03

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In the decade of the 1940s, a remarkable string of vibrant and original films captivated America. Many were commercial as well as critical successes. All bore the distinctive imprint of their maker, a man as colorful as his most memorable characters.

Preston Sturges set a new standard for creativity in Hollywood. He not only wrote such films as "The Lady Eve", "Sullivan's Travels", "The Palm Beach Story", and "The Miracle of Morgan's Creek", he also directed them at the rate of two a year. He opened the door for an entire generation of writers-turned-directors and made some of the most popular comedies of the sound era. At his peak, he earned the third-highest salary in the country. He was an inventor, songwriter, actor, playwright, restaurateur, industrialist, and winner of an Academy Award. He even owned a production company with his temperamental equal, Howard Hughes.

Yet, barely ten years after it all began, it was over. Alienated by his reckless zeal for perfection, the studios turned away from him. Unable to work, Sturges took his young family to Europe, where he struggled desperately in growing obscurity to work the old magic just one more time.

Drawn from interviews, letters, and other primary source materials, this was the first full-length biography of a legendary American filmmaker, a man who made and lost two fortunes and whose genius shown brightly, as he put it, "between flops".

Industry Reviews

"One of the most entertaining and engrossing film biographies I've encountered, doing justice not only to that truly eccentric genius at the core but also to his time and place in both Hollywood and its culture."

- Judith Crist

"A sobering picture of the sweat and disappointment that lie beneath the Hollywood hoopla."

- Newsweek

"Brilliant... Curtis' writing style and wit shine as brightly as those of his subject. It is the ultimate in Hollywood package deals, a biographer who fully complements his subject. Like Sturges' films, the book itself is virtually perfect."

- The Windsor Star

"A thorough, factual account of Sturges' complex life, a considerable feat of research and synthesis."

- Film Quarterly

"This lively biography sensibly keeps its focus on Preston Sturges' career... the comedies he wrote and directed for Paramount in the early '40s--The Great McGinty, Christmas in July, The Lady Eve, Sullivan's Travels, The Palm Beach Story, The Miracle of Morgan's Creek, and Hail the Conquering Hero."

- Newsday

"An enjoyable, absorbing story about one of Hollywood's most colorful real-life characters."

- Los Angeles Herald-Examiner

"Recounts with compassion and wit the story of Preston's wild, shoot-the-rapids life... a lamentably overdue and richly merited tribute."

- Garson Kanin

"An imposing account of an imposing life"

- National Review

"...covers Sturges' life, from his bohemian childhood through professional triumphs and failures thoroughly and well... a solid, readable biography."

- Publisher's Weekly

"...an elegant job... the best movie biography of the year."

- The Buffalo News

"Interviews with individuals once close to Sturges and material from the writer's personal archives have been integrated into Curtis' chronicle, adding intimacy and insight... a life inspected here with vigor and integrity."

- Booklist

"Sturges' story continually holds us fascinated due to Curtis' compassionate writing."

- West Coast Review of Books

" ...the definitive telling of Sturges' life."

- Variety

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