Dying of Politeness by Geena Davis: book review

Dying of Politeness by Geena Davis (2022) is the memoir of the two-time Oscar-winning American actress, best known for her role in the 1991 movie Thelma and Louise and the television series Commander in Chief (2005-2006).

I love the way she begins the story of her rise to fame. It is not ‘a nice even line’ climbing upwards, but a meandering, setback-ridden road – possibly as a result of her being ‘a cripplingly polite New Englander who was much too tall to hide.’

At the age of three, she knew she wanted to be in movies. By acting in roles that she says were ‘bolder, freer, and more authentic’ than her own, she succeeded and became known as a full-fledged ‘badass.’

She also writes of her schooling, friends, partners, modelling, marriages, campaigns, the perils of being tall, and sporting achievements – such as archery and being in the trials semi-final for the Sydney 2000 Olympics.

Everything is told in a delightfully hilarious way: from the audition for her first movie role as April in Tootsie in 1982 in which Dustin Hoffman provided lots of acting advice to her guest-starring roles on an episode of Knight Rider with David Hasselhoff and Family Ties with Michael J. Fox. Her accounts of the making of the Thelma and Louise (1991) movie and A League of Their Own (1992) are wonderful.

This is an interesting and uplifting book, giving insight into the professional life of Geena Davis and providing inspiration for others.

MARTINA NICOLLS

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MARTINA NICOLLS is an international human rights-based consultant in education, healing and wellbeing, peace and stabilization, foreign aid audits and evaluations, and the author of: The Paris Residences of James Joyce (2020), Similar But Different in the Animal Kingdom (2017), The Shortness of Life: A Mongolian Lament (2015), Liberia’s Deadest Ends (2012), Bardot’s Comet (2011), Kashmir on a Knife-Edge (2010) and The Sudan Curse (2009). She lives in Paris.

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