Five for Hollywood: Their Friendship, Their Fame, Their Tragedies

This account of the intertwined lives of James Dean, Montgomery Clift, Natalie Wood, Rock Hudson and Elizabeth Taylor is a shabby rehash of the stars' already well-documented excesses. Except for cursory praise for Dean's talent as a method actor and a note of appreciation for Taylor as the only survivor among the five subjects, Parker ( King of Fools ) has little positive or new to say. The elaborate cover-up of Hudson's gay lifestyle, Wood's stormy relationship with Robert Wagner, Clift's addictions and Taylor's many marriages are detailed, as is Dean's troubled life. With Dean dead 35 years, Clift all but forgotten, and with our era's more enlightened attitudes toward sexual preferences and addictive personalities, the book is unlikely to cause a scandal with its revelations, or titillate and enthrall readers. Photos. BOMC and Preferred Choice Book Club alternates; first serial to the Star. (May)