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Drawing on unpublished writings and revealing interviews, film critic J.R. Jones deftly explores the many contradictory facets of Robert Ryan's public and private lives, and how these lives intertwined in one of the most compelling actors of a generation.

About the Author:
J.R.

Even many film scholars are unaware of this aspect of Ryan’s career. This biography emphasizes it."

~Richard B. Jewell, author of RKO Radio Pictures: A Titan is Born

"J.R. His writing has appeared in New York Press, Kenyon Review, Da Capo Best Music Writing, and Noir City. He introduces political history throughout, in ways that are both relevant and revelatory.""

~Foster Hirsch, author of The Dark Side of the Screen: Film Noir

"Too many critical biographies lurch back and forth between biography and criticism.

The Lives of Robert Ryan is a worthy biography, and, above all, an opportunity to revisit the films in which the actor still lives.""

~Imogen Sara Smith, Film Quarterly

""[A]n engaging biography of a Golden Age movie star who was a welcome presence even if — and perhaps particularly when — he lit up the screen with a sneer and filled it with menace.

He lives in Chicago.

Press Reviews:
“As self-effacing yet as solid and as ethically engaged as Robert Ryan himself, J.R. Jones offers a comprehensive and sensitive chronicle of one of the giants of American movie acting.”—Jonathan Rosenbaum, author of Movie Wars

“Too many critical biographies lurch back and forth between biography and criticism.

His riveting performances expose the darkest impulses of the American psyche during the Cold War.

At the same time, Ryan's marriage to a liberal Quaker and his own sense of conscience launched him into a tireless career of peace and civil rights activism that stood in direct contrast to his screen persona. This biography emphasizes it.”—Richard B.

Jewell, author of RKO Radio Pictures: A Titan is Born

See the publisher website: Wesleyan University Press

See the complete filmography of Robert Ryan on the website: IMDB ... Jones describes a complex man who grappled publicly with the world's demons and privately with his own, among them alcohol and depression.""

~Douglass K.

Daniel, Associated Press

""[Robert Ryan] has begun to get the appreciation he deserves.

The Lives of Robert Ryan

"[A]n engaging biography of a Golden Age movie star who was a welcome presence even if — and perhaps particularly when — he lit up the screen with a sneer and filled it with menace.

A masterly biography that portrays an actor devoted to his craft and dedicated to his personal convictions.""

~Richard Dickey, Library Journal

""On screen, there always was something unsettling and unsettled behind Robert Ryan's eyes. Jones is an award-winning film critic and editor for the Chicago Reader.

Jones's meticulous, revealing book on Robert Ryan places the actor's life and career against the turbulent politics of the Cold War and the Red Scare in Hollywood. Jones describes a complex man who grappled publicly with the world's demons and privately with his own, among them alcohol and depression."

~Douglass K. Daniel, Associated Press

""Ryan was born in Chicago, so it's fitting that a Chicago critic would be behind the new biography The Lives of Robert Ryan.

Ryan was a fearless liberal who embraced controversial causes during a time when most Hollywood stars remained apolitical. Over the next quarter century he created a gallery of brooding, neurotic, and violent characters in such movies as Bad Day at Black Rock, Billy Budd, The Dirty Dozen, and The Wild Bunch. His many lives — stage and television performer, political activist, progressive education proponent, husband and father — are finely detailed by Jones with the help of Ryan's private writings and those of his wife, Jessica, a novelist.

It's a revelatory book, superbly written and worthy of the fascinating man at its center.""

~Jim Beaver, Roundup Magazine

""Jones has done a superb job in researching Ryan's writings, wife Jessica's memoirs, and interviewing his children and numerous industry colleagues.