A Film Critic's Bio
Many of the other reviewers on this page complain that Sikov's book is stuffed with too many details on the movies and other show biz background and doesn't give enough on Sellers' personal life; others love the movie details and think Sikov gives just enough info on Sellers' mother and wives and kids and so on. The thing to remember, I think, is that Sikov is a film critic, not a psychologist. He writes what he knows, and he really does know film. His discussions of the often chaotic details of the development, production, marketing, and reviewing of the Sellers movies are in fact wonderful, if that's what you're mostly looking for in a biography of a movie star. I had the same reaction as another reviewer: his plot summaries and quotations from the movies made me want to go out and buy the DVDs.

If you're looking for the dirt, well, there's enough of it here for many readers, but Sikov isn't really interested in all the sordid details of Sellers' life, and it's easy to understand why some readers grew frustrated. Sikov tends to pass over the steamier moments of his story with a quick quotation from a friend of Sellers, or somebody he was working with at the time. The book you want if you're interested in the dirt is Roger Lewis's The Life and Death of Peter Sellers, on which Stephen Hopkins' 2004 movie starring Geoffrey Rush was based.

Lewis is also much more interested in psychoanalyzing Sellers than Sikov. I must admit that I would have liked to see a bit more of that in Sikov's book. How exactly did bad mothering make Sellers the depersonalized terror that he became? Sikov quotes a number of Sellers' friends as "diagnosing" him as "manic-depressive," but we never get any background for or comment on that claim; it's just something that several people say about Sellers. Once again: Sikov really isn't interested in such matters. He's interested in the performances, and uses stories about Sellers' personality or private life as occasional fillers to get us from one movie story to the next.

Another aspect of Sellers' life that doesn't particularly interest Sikov is money. We are told about Sellers' love of money, his need to be rich and to flaunt his wealth, and we do hear of his salary negotiations on many films; but in the seventies, before he and Blake Edwards get back together to start making Pink Panther movies again, he goes into a slump, makes six or seven dogs in a row, and Sikov tells us "the money was running out." Really? What does that mean, exactly? Shortly afterwards, we begin to hear that Sellers had to move around a lot, and eventually settled in Ireland, because of "tax difficulties"--what tax difficulties? Sikov never tells us; that just isn't interesting.

Still, if you love movies (and why would you be reading about Peter Sellers if you didn't?), and are endlessly fascinated by how movies get made, this is an excellent biography. Sikov's light touch, flawless journalistic style (which often borders wonderfully on the grotesque, as when he writes of Sellers' Chauncey Gardiner in Being There that "He is a mental earlobe trying to be a fin"), and cheerful cynicism about marriage, love, happiness, and so on give the reader a reassuring (I want to say MORAL) standpoint from which to view the miseries of Peter Sellers' life.

Too much career, not enough personal
I really enjoyed this book and I'm becoming a bigger and bigger Sellers fan. Being that I'm 20 everything I watch of his new to me. The book just really really yammered on about every movie and I mean EVERY movie he did. I could have taken a little more personal stuff; more stories of eratic behavior, drug taking, and sex. I got through it quick, but by the end it had worn itself out and I was ready for it to be over. I recomend watching the movie, "The Life and Death of Peter Sellers" I really enjoy it.

Extremely Interesting, Will Permanently Change Your View
If all you know about Peter Sellers consists of what you've seen in his films, and you want to keep things that way, then stay away from this biography. It will permanently alter your regard for him, when after reading it you see him onscreen -- conceptually similar to the way you can't truly concentrate on a movie, any more, when Woody Allen or O.J. Simpson or (for wholly different reasons) Christopher Reeve appears. Sellers' childhood life, monstrously mismanaged by his mother, gave rise to both his immense talent and atrocious immaturity/impropriety as an adult. He comprehensively lived a child's life during his childhood, wholly unstructured and unorganized and undisciplined, propagating a glorious sense of fun, imagination and mimicry which formed the foundation of his adult career. Simultaneously, as the author points out, he never developed the "inhibitors" that prevent normal grown-ups from losing emotional control and/or unpredictably launching into violent behavior. Sellers' sporadically terrible behavior toward his first wife and children, were it to occur today and become public knowledge, would completely taint his career. He behaved abominably toward them and, objectively speaking, should have been brought to justice as an abusive husband and father.

This is a good bio to read, but be aware it will add another, and not too pleasant, layer to your thoughts about its subject.

A very insightful and sad look at a brilliant comic.
It's to bad that Mr. Sellers did not see himself the way many of us who watch his movies see him. To me, and many more, he was and is the king of physical humor and sight gags. His body movements were perfection and his delivery was always prefect. This book goes behind the camera and takes a look at the man himself and that look is not always a pretty one. He had many demons like drug addiction he was unfaithful many times, also he was a terrible father and he was by all accounts an *.*hole to everyone. But at times he could be very generous and caring. If you do not want your image of Sellers to be tarnished then you may not want to read this book, but if you are still curious about the man and his life then this is the book to read. It isn't always pretty, but it is very thorough and does not hold any punches. I still think he is the king of comedy.

The Real Face of Peter Sellers
What with a film about Sellers's life and work to be shown on HBO this Decemeber, it only seems right that I, as a confirmed Sellers-aholic, weigh in on one of the two major books written about the man behind the many masks (The titled work on which the film was based, I have yet to read).

Peter Sellers onscreen was a delight to behold, even in his most mediocre films. Peter Sellers offscreen could be a monster to those around him, but this was all part of his many moods. A man-child with no distinct personality of his own, he found himself only through the roles he took on (Dr. Strangelove, Inspector Clouseau, Chauncy the Gardener).

Ed Sikov's book, which I read about a year ago, recounts all the triumph and tragedy, angst and ecstasy, and the many contradictions of Sellers the man and movie star. It reads like a sympathetic but unbiased take on the man and his work. Sikov goes at great length to show not only the horrible things that Sellers did, but also the wonderful things he did on occasion (while tempering this with the knowledge that Sellers expected much in return). I doubt a more honest and yet tender portrait of the man could be written.

Sikov doesn't shy from Sellers's problems, but he offers some insight into why they might have come to be: a distant father, a needy mother, and relatives who indulged the young boy, all the way to his last wife's abuse of their estate in order to kill herself with drugs. Throughout it all, Sellers is the central figure around which madness unravels, and unravele him as well. You come away from it feeling pity for Sellers because of the circumstances which contributed to his madness, but mindful as well of the lives he touched (for good or bad) with his talent and ego.

You won't find yourself embracing Sellers when you finish the book, but you won't find yourself eager to rid him from your pantheon of comedy heroes either. Peter Sellers was a walking contradiction, and Ed Sikov does his best to expose the many faces Sellers showed not only to the world at large but to those he loved in particular. A man of such genius deserves no less than to have his story honestly rendered, and "Mr. Strangelove" does that exceptionally.