Could you write a 'tell all' memoir?
Tyrades! by Danny Tyree
“I’m a b-a-a-a-a-d boy!” - Lou Costello
You’ve probably seen the recent tidal wave of “tell all” memoirs by celebrities such as Sylvester Stallone, Alice Cooper, Christopher Lloyd and Michael Douglas (with Willie Nelson’s “The Last Leaf” due in November).
I aspire to write my own biography someday, but don’t expect it to be as juicy and riveting as the reminiscences of the aforementioned A-listers . I mean, Cooper’s life story is titled “Devil on My Shoulder” and Douglas’s is titled “One Helluva Ride.” Mine would probably be “Ear Hair on My Shoulder” or “How Do You Get This Thing Out of Second Gear?”
Still, the glitterati haven’t cornered the market on attention-grabbing exploits. I suppose many of y’all can regale listeners with tales of championship trophies, illicit love affairs, vicious exes, drunken brawls and high-speed chases; but my life has been more low-key. My best anecdotes are “borrowed” from other people.
My fuddy-duddy nature started with my parents. They had their quirks but they never traumatized me the way the parents of famous singers and actors seem contractually obligated to.
For instance, “Show and Tell Day” meant sharing one of my father’s Army souvenirs or one of my mother’s antiques, not shouting, “Please! No detention hall! I didn’t realize Mom’s pimp was going to shoot Ralphie’s pet hamster!”
And Thanksgiving meant drawing “hand turkeys,” not drawing cocaine-infused hand turkeys.
My “turbulent” teen years revolved around family, school, church, after-school job and comic books – leaving no time for broken curfews, fake IDs and steamy car windows. Ironically, many a Thursday night was spent watching Michael Douglas and Karl Malden patrol “The Streets of San Francisco.” (I now suspect Malden’s “Don’t leave home without them” commercials for Travelers’ Cheques served the double purpose of reminding Douglas about certain essential products.)
My adult life has been rich and rewarding, especially the 35 years of marriage. (35 years and counting – counting the number of complaints about my snoring, counting the number of times we have to visit just one more shoe store, counting the …but I digress.) But it has not been a period marked by lottery jackpots, rehab, public meltdowns, flings, burned bridges, brunches with royalty, trendy eating disorders (other than grinding my teeth at the bathroom scales) or whatever else The Other Half does.
I’m certainly never pursued by the paparazzi. Even Flock cameras declare, “I see nothing! I know nothing!” when I drive by.
I guess the celebrities releasing memoirs this year are getting their stories told “while the gettin’ is good,” because the plummeting number of Americans who read for pleasure will straitjacket future autobiographers.
Not everyone can handle condensing 37 orgies, five Truman Capote slap-fights, six offspring born to stalkers and 11 requests to “get your Mercedes off the top of the Eiffel Tower, mon ami” into a single Bazooka Joe bubblegum strip.
How will you spend your free time in the coming weeks? Curled up with a confessional by your favorite Hollywood luminary? Checking off another wild and crazy bucket list goal? (“Finally remembered to buy another mop bucket. Break out the faux champagne!”) Tentatively jotting down some memorable experiences that can’t be made public until five years after your great-grandchildren are deceased?
Me? I’ll muddle through with my favorite anecdotes.
Because, if my father, Kirk Douglas, told me once, he told me a million times…
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Copyright 2026 Danny Tyree, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.
Danny Tyree welcomes email responses at tyreetyrades@aol.com and visits to his Facebook fan page “Tyree’s Tyrades.”
Copyright 2026 Danny Tyree, All Rights Reserved. Credit: Cagle.com
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