Fascinating memoir

How I Clawed My Way to the Middle

Author: John Wood Publisher: Penguin/Viking RRP: 34.99 Reviewer: Mary Ann Elliott

MUCH-LOVED actor John Wood has been a part of Australia’s entertainment industry for over four decades, earning himself a long list of credits along the way.

A veteran of stage and screen, his career has encompassed every kind of role from Shakespeare to David Williamson and a few musicals and long-running TV shows in between, winning several best actor awards.

The popular Rafferty’s Rules and Blue Heelers earned the highest-rating television dramas ever.

Who is the man behind the stage curtains? Like the man himself, John Wood’s account of his working and personal life is unpretentious, witty and charming.

From his working class beginnings in Melbourne through to working with the best and brightest in the acting industry, John takes the reader on an engrossing journey.

He recounts the uncertainty of the actor’s life, even though he says, “On stage is where I feel most alive, engaged and sure of my place in the world”.

He relates his early influences, his parents, his childhood, and the effect World War 2 had on his father as a POW.

At high school John was introduced to Shakespeare which became a lifelong love. All the while yearning to be an actor, jobs followed; brickie’s labourer, machine press operator, abattoir employee, and running money to Victorian Railways’ head office.

Surviving on a six dollar a week scholarship at NIDA, John eventually ‘clawed’ his way to the boards and the silver screen, and the rest as they say, is history.

From budding actor to ‘old pro’, John narrates his fascinating behind-the- footlights memoir with complete candour, never shirking from calling a spade a spade.

His humility shines through as he pays tribute to many friends and colleagues as well as his family.

Would he do it all again? Read his story to find out.