Alan Alda's biography has exactly what you would expect in a biography. His real name, information about his family, a few major incidents, his life as a struggling actor sprinkled with a few tragedies here and there. A few things I found interesting were that he grew up around strippers & burlesque houses, his dad was a semi-popular actor and his mother literally belonged in a mental asylum. And ofcourse his dealings with these things and how they helped shape him into an actor.
I picked up this book to get an extended dosage of Hawkeye but he is nothing like the womanizing alcoholic he portrays in MASH. Although his hilarious writing style, which reminds me of the dark sarcasm of Marten Troost, keeps the book interesting.
The latter half of the book includes the back-stage stories of MASH and thats when things get really interesting. I found myself saying out loud "Oh Oh I've seen that episode" when he talks about how (or why) those episodes played out the way they did. Apparently the cast n crew were a pretty tight knit group.
I'd recommend this book to anybody looking for a quick read (only about 250), with a fast pace and enough humor to keep you smiling throughout the book.
