Mr. Andy Kaufman's Gone Wrestling

Man on the Moon: written by Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski; directed by Milos Forman; starring Jim Carrey (Andy Kaufman), Danny DeVito (George Shapiro), Paul Giamatti (Bob Zmuda), and Courtney Love (Lynne Margulies) (1999): Terrific biopic of enigmatic, innovative 1970's comic Andy Kaufman, whose often surreal bits helped inspire such acts as Pee Wee Herman and about a thousand others. Jim Carrey shines as Kaufman, though he generally plays the classic Kaufman performances scattered throughout the movie a bit more broadly than Kaufman did as seen in existing recordings.

The movie takes its name -- not to mention its musical lietmotifs -- from the 1992 R.E.M. song "Man on the Moon." The title refers to various conspiracy theories about the lunar landing as an oblique way to comment on conspiracy theories about Kaufman's death in 1984. Because of Kaufman's love of hoaxes and disguises, many believed that he faked his own death as yet another stunt. In an odd way, Kaufman's Hoaxy side put him in a proud American tradition dating all the way back to Edgar Allan Poe, another Hoaxy fellow whose early death seemed (and still seems) like a hoax to many.

At the very least, Carrey deserved an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor. Looking back at the 1999 Oscars, I find it hard to view Kevin Spacey's Best Actor-winning turn in American Beauty as anything other than ridiculous. It's not just that this is fine work from Carrey -- it's also tremendously funny work. The Academy may undervalue comedy, but in acting, comedy is the hardest thing to do.

Danny De Vito and Paul Giamatti are also great as Kaufman's agent and head writer, respectively. The movie plays a bit fast and loose with the order of events to create a more standard Hollywood narrative. However, the movie also mocks this rewriting of history in Carrey's opening monologue. So there is that. Milos Forman and the writers keep everything both brisk and information-packed. This is a surprisingly informative biopic. Certainly we get a much better grasp of Kaufman's life and work than we did of, say, Stephen Hawking's in The Theory of Everything. 

There's also a refreshing bit near the end that debunks New Agey mystical cures for diseases such as cancer, capping this film with a moment in which a dying Kaufman laughs at accidentally seeing behind the curtain of another performer's hoax. Highly recommended.

Bossypants by Tina Fey

Bossypants by Tina Fey (2011): Funny, breezy autobiography with very little dirt and a surprising amount of practical advice on comedy (the two-page section on 'How to Successfully Improv' is gold, Jerry, pure gold!). Some of the stuff on Fey's Sarah Palin is pretty interesting as well, combining the personal (Palin offered to have Bristol baby-sit Fey's duaghter during their co-appearance on Saturday Night Live) and the political (a few weeks later, Palin complained publically about all those mean impressions of her).

You'll find out that a certain number of 30 Rock bits are based on reality (including the propensity of some male writers at SNL to urinate into containers in their offices because they were too lazy to go to the bathroom), though you'll get very little on the day-to-day workings of the show or wacky stories about wacky goings-on -- probably because 30 Rock is still airing, making it a bit of a necessity to avoid the chance of ruffling any feathers.

Like Steve Carrell on The Office, Fey is a happily married parent who plays a gormless singleton. I'm not sure what that means in the Big Picture, but there it is. Fey also briefly explains where the scar on her face came from, a scar I wasn't actually aware she had until I read this autobiography. The Photoshopped cover riffs on Fey's experiences being on the covers of magazines, by the way. Recommended.