The show was interesting but spoiled by ads - at one point there were three
interruptions in less than 10 minutes. Bravo! used to be more
commercial-free. Complaints aside, there is extensive footage of Howard
Engel at his computer, walking around Toronto and in the Cooperman sites in
St. Catharines. They also used clips from the two films based on his books.
Interviews included Margaret Cannon, the Globe and Mail mystery reviewer,
Peter Robinson, Eric Wright, Engel's daughter Charlotte and several others.
There was quite a bit at the beginning about his first marriage to writer
Marion Engel. Much emphasis was placed on the tragedies in his life - his
second wife died of brain cancer. Then there was the stroke and his
remarkable recovery. All in all, I'd say the film is worth watching for.
Susan
-----Original Message-----
From: rara-avis-l@yahoogroups.com [mailto:rara-avis-l@yahoogroups.com] On
Behalf Of Kevin Burton Smith
Sent: July 8, 2008 12:44 PM
To: rara-avis-l@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RARA-AVIS: Re: Capturing Cooperman
On Jul 7, 2008, at 5:52 AM, rara-avis-l@
<mailto:rara-avis-l%40yahoogroups.com> yahoogroups.com wrote:
> Hello All,
>
> I thought I would pass along the fact that tonight at 8 p.m. on Bravo
> (at least in Canada) there is a one hour documentary called CAPTURING
> COOPERMAN all about Howard Engel and his Benny Cooperman series. It
> apparently will focus on his return to crime writing following
> suffering a stroke.
>
> Could be quite interesting...
I'll say.
The backstory of Engel's last Cooperman, THE MEMORY BOOK, is even
better than the book itself, and possibly the best example of writerly
true grit I've heard in years. Forget boozing, cussing, climbing
mountains to shoot tigers or posing in a leather jacket with 43 guns
to prove how tough they are -- let's see these little boy poseurs try
and pull a Howard.
Not that the Cooperman books are truly hard-boiled, at least by the
sliding standards of this list -- (his character was played by Saul
Rubinek on TV, after all) but I've always felt there was an underlying
toughness to the character just dying to be really explored...
I'll have to keep an eye out for CAPTURING COOPERMAN on Bravo! down
here.... but in the meantime, bookedtv has a new interview with Engel
at http://www.booked. <http://www.booked.tv/html/podcast/choose5.htm>
tv/html/podcast/choose5.htm
How was the show?
Kevin
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