BookOpinion

Long before Orange County, Calif. became “The OC”, a young Steve Martin used Disneyland and other county landmarks as backdrops for honing his stage and comic skills.
Martin’s book, “Born Standing Up“, is his memoir of the first half of his life…including an Orange County from a different era.

Martin and excerpts from “Born Standing Up” were recently featured in an article in the OC Register:

Take a tour of comedian Steve Martin’s Orange County
The comedian and writer grew up in Garden Grove, worked at Disneyland as a kid and cut his teeth as a performer at Knott’s.

By Peter Larsen

If we are shaped by the places we go and people we know in our childhoods, then Steve Martin is an absolute product of Orange County in the ’50s and ’60s.

Young Steve Martin worked at the magic shop at Disneyland. (courtesy Steve Martin)

From the well-known outlines of the actor-comedian-writer’s life we already knew that Martin grew up in Garden Grove, worked at Disneyland and Knott’s Berry Farm as a teen, and launched his career as a comic in the long-gone folk clubs here some 40 years ago.

But with the recent arrival of “Born Standing Up” (Scribner, $25), Martin’s memoir of the first half of his life, the details of his years here – the significant places on the map of his life – are revealed in the star’s own words and memories…

Full story/OC Register

Janet Maslin of The New York Times writes that “Born Standing Up” is a “lean, incisive new book about the trajectory of [Martin’s] life in comedy…”Born Standing Up” does a sharp-witted job of breaking down the step-by-step process that brought Steve Martin from Disneyland, where he spent his version of a Dickensian childhood as a schoolboy employee, to both the pinnacle of stardom and the brink of disaster…tightly focused…”Born Standing Up” is a surprising book: smart, serious, heartfelt and confessional without being maudlin.”

This from Jerry Seinfeld in GQ: “Absolutely magnificent. One of the best books about comedy and being a comedian ever written.”

Time Magazine’s Richard Corliss reviews: “The writing is evocative, unflinching and cool. When Martin takes a scalpel to his life, what you feel is the precision of the surgeon more than the primal scream of the unanaesthetized patient…”Born Standing Up” is neither fanfare nor confession. It gives off a vibe of rigorous honesty. With lots of laughs.”

Having lived “behind the Orange Curtain”, Steve Martin’s “Born Standing Up“ is an inspiring break-out story, also reminding me of the sweet smell of orange blossoms that once permeated the air.

- Alexander