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Saturday, June 15, 2013

Thoughts on life by Shirley MacLaine

Shirley MacLaine captured the minds and heart of millions of fans by some of her best performances in several Hollywood movies, especially the Academy award winning movie "Apartment" with Jack Lemmon. In this book she shares very intimate and somewhat controversial ideas of life, but this is not unexpected from Shirley as she always has been a social revolutionary. She says that she has learned to ease up on worry, scheming for films or roles, planning for better surroundings, and feeling anger at American leaders who operate politically rather than humanely. She says; she is getting freer from the expectations of the external world. In fact, the one worry she can't seem to give up and get over is the fear of being lonely. Her thoughts, at times becomes quite intense and metaphysical; when she observes that she has found that people are looking for something to fill the loneliness inside them; It doesn't matter how wealthy or well situated they are, the thought turns to why are we here, what is the point of life, is God real, are we alone in the universe?

When she was in 50s, MacLaine says that she was unhappy at getting a lot of grandmother roles, even though in her own mind, she is still young and bouncy. She speaks very candidly about her best friend Elizabeth Taylor, whom she calls, a very down-to-earth person, loyal, funny and a woman to be adored completely. MacLaine is honest about open marriage, sex and living fully. She insists that having an open mind about life is helpful. She admits she had had "an awful lot of lovers". She often fell for the leading men she worked with, although she wasn't attracted to Jack Lemmon, her co-star in The Apartment, because he was too nice, or Jack Nicholson, whom she starred with in Terms of Endearment, because he was too dangerous.

MacLaine is tremendously talented and a gifted woman who shares her ideas about everything that matters, from religion to politics and philosophy. Reading her story is a joy.

Reference: I'm over All that: and Other Confessions by Shirley MacLaine

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