Behind the Candelabra, Scott Thorson's memoir of his affair with Liberace, was first published shortly after the glittery piano legend's death in 1987; its most extraordinary revelations have been tabloid fodder for decades.
Re-released to coincide with the premiere of an adaptation directed by Steven Soderbergh for HBO, the book now reads less like a celebrity tell-all and more like a strikingly earnest coming-of-age tale that also provides deep perspective on how impossible it was for a popular entertainer to be openly gay just 25 years ago.
Introduced to Liberace through a mutual friend while still in his teens, Thorson signed on to work in a capacity that obviously included an unspoken sexual component. Initially unattracted to the much older Liberace, Thorson eventually was swept into his opulent, extravagant lifestyle, developing real affection for his benefactor. When, after five years, things went bad and Thorson found himself replaced like the employee he ostensibly was, he lashed out with a lawsuit and had to endure the humiliation of his former lover's denial of their relationship--Liberace died of AIDS but went to his grave swearing he was not gay--as well as the public's contempt.
Amid the tragedy of tender youth, of course, there is plenty of campy pleasure to be had in Behind the Candelabra, including ill-advised plastic surgery and Lucite pianos, but the sense of pathos permeates far deeper than the snark. --Cherie Ann Parker, freelance journalist and book critic