Evans

There are few activities in life I enjoy more than listening to Robert Evans read his book The Kid Stays in the Picture. (Wait, is that even considered an activity? It is if you're as lazy as I am!) I found the book on tape about 8 years ago and I've listened to it three times in its entirety, and dip into it randomly now and then, always while driving. I've only ever owned vehicles with cassette players, and The Kid has traveled with me in two different cars, one truck, at least a dozen states and God knows how many miles. Fortunately my girlfriend also finds his megalomaniacal ravings entertaining, if somewhat repellent, and Evans' nasal, coke-ravaged voice accompanied us on drives to Edisto Beach and Washington, D.C. and back. Am I obsessed? Worse — I'm addicted.
His audio book reading is the same recording used for the voiceover on the documentary of Kid, but the film is much shorter, and anyway it's better to listen to Evans' tales without the visuals the documentary offers. If you haven't read/heard/seen Kid, you might still be familiar with this brilliant parody/hommage. Patton Oswalt does a bit on him as well.
The widespread fascination with his biography, especially his reading of it, seems to lie primarily in how utter oblivious Evans is to his self-absorption. Every incident of his life is recounted with the utmost melodrama, and even if he starts out a story being self-deprecating, by anecdote's end he's in the catbird seat. His narrative is especially hysterical/cringe-worthy when he talks about his love life, marriage and the birth of his son. You expect him to be cocky and asinine when telling stories about schmoozing with Jack Nicholson, Francis Coppola and politicians, but it's as if the guy has worked in movies so long he remembers his real life as contrived as the old fashioned Hollywood pictures he used to act in. He seems to honestly think educated, adult people spoke to him with the ridiculous dialogue he assigns them.
I said I listened to his entire bio 3 times, but that's not entirely true. My copy is missing the fourth and final cassette. Tape 3 ends with him standing beside Henry Kissinger in the Oval Office, looking into President Nixon's bathroom. (I am not making this up. Who knows if he is?) His friendship with Kissinger is something he takes obvious pride in, deriving way more pleasure from it than running Paramount, his marriage to Ali McGraw or his son. He begins the book with the premiere of The Godfather, and how he convinced Kissinger to skip out on Vietnam peace talks abroad to attend. I've been tempted to purchase the missing tape on Amazon, but I like the idea of leaving Evans and Dr. K side by side there outside Nixon's crapper. I have read the book and seen the movie, but all I really remember about the end is Steve McQueen sleeps with Ali and Evans does a Scarface-sized mountain of coke. And The Cotton Club really sucked. As did The Two Jakes.

Here's Mr. Modesty himself.