I was about to begin this review by saying this is the perfect coffee-table book but then… coffee has very little to do with it. Better to say it’s the ideal toilet book: two- or three-page chapters on Hollywood legends and their drinking in particular and debauchery in general. Speaking as someone whom nature has, perforce, made abstemious, I read the exploits of the people here with something like wonder: how can the human system cope with such vast amounts of alcohol? I, certainly, cannot. One or two pints and it’s the sick pit for me.

On a more general point, just what is the connection between excess and creativity? For some, they seem entwined – although how much this is learned reinforcement and how much necessary spark I wonder. Writing, acting: it’s like diving, head first into the deep blue. Scary stuff, and not so surprising that some might resort to a snifter or two. But, done once, it easily becomes a habit, and a dangerous one. To make, to create, is to enter into God’s province and his plan: it entails, it demands sacrifice, whether one knows it or not. And the sacrifice will be made, whether one knows it or not.

Otherwise, just enjoy the gossip about the famously beautiful (and a few writers too).