Author Samuel Garza Bernstein's Cesar Romero: The Joker Is Wild (from University of Kentucky Press) grants a vast, adoring look at one of classic Hollywood's most revered performers.
What makes the hardback (288-pages) biography flow so well is that Bernstein never judges the Cuban American actor (an epitome of "Latin lover" status), but rather creates a thorough ascent for him, covering his rocky relationship with his father, his early links to New York and New Jersey, his prolific periods as a dancer and stage actor, and then his big break into prominent movies, beginning with the box-office slip, The Devil is a Woman, and the box-office smash, The Thin Man, but Bernstein also references (via text and photos) such varied gems as Captain from Castille, The Lost Continent 1951, Around the World in 80 Days 1956, Latitude Zero, The Racers, Judgment Day, Mortuary Academy, Week-End in Havana, Springtime in the Rockies, Vera Cruz, The Proud and the Damned and the moving Deep Waters.
Romero's mega-success as Batman's the Joker is handled with great, insightful gusto, conjoined with respectful commendation of the performer's feature-length appearances as the heroic Cisco Kid, his costarring role as mobster A.J. Arno in Disney's Dexter Riley trilogy (headlined by Kurt Russell), and his stellar stints as the perfidious Don Estaban de la Cruz on Disney's Zorro, as arms dealer Amos Armat on Buck Rogers in the 25th Century and as the venerable Peter Stravos on Falcon Crest.
Romero's sexual orientation is referenced, with an implied, romantic tie to Tyrone Power, but to his credit, Bernstein never mars his text with wild speculation or pompous confirmations, allowing readers to draw their own conclusions.
As a wonderful bonus, The Joker Is Wild includes a comprehensive, year-by-year list of Romero's movies and television appearances, all of which brim with encyclopedic enthusiasm and accuracy, for Bernstein isn't only a polished writer, but one who respects the past and the intricacies and nuances that define it. As such, he paints Romero for what he is and remains: indisputable, cinema royalty.
Cesar Romero: The Joker Is Wild is available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble.
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