The Journals of Spalding Gray

These selections from the journals of actor and monologist Spalding Gray span the late 60s through his untimely death in 2004, providing a fascinating glimpse into his psyche, personal life, and how he approached his work. The cast includes Gray's mother (who committed suicide in 1967), the three women he loved (Liz LeCompte, Ren%C3%A9e Shafransky, and Kathleen Russo), his psychiatrist Paul Pavel, and later, his two sons.%C2%A0Gray is not easy to like%E2%80%94a narcissistic alcoholic, abusive to the women in his life, jealous of others' success%E2%80%94but he manages to charm, and ultimately wins the reader's sympathy. Casey does an excellent job filling in the blanks with biographical information and narrates most of the last few years of Gray's life when, depressed and suffering from brain damage, he was in and out of mental hospitals and rarely wrote in his journal. The few chilling entries that are included from this time show a man obsessed with committing suicide.%C2%A0Fans of Gray's work will savor this window into the mind of a complicated genius. (Oct.)