I think Roseanne Montillo is on to something when considering why Truman Capote disdained Anne Woodward so much: their similar backgrounds. Neither was born of upper class New York stock. Neither would have gotten anywhere if not for dint of relationship (Truman’s mom landing a Wall Street guy, Woodward apparently being hot enough to bag a Brahmin). Like the song Creep, they don’t belong here. And both took different, yet stylistically similar paths to get where they were.
This is an incredibly readable book that I would have loved to have seen become a tv show. At the very least, it’s more interesting than Truman Capote’s relationship with his “swans” and his betrayal. Anne Woodward lived a compelling, tragic life and Roseanne Montillo does a great job writing about it, while paralleling her story with Capote’s rise in New York’s high society.
The book falters in its final third. This is supposedly the “murder of the century” (first time I’m hearing about it) but despite an attempt to engender controversy, there was none because there was no indictment. The grand jury listened to the prosector bang away at Anne Woodward for hours on end and unanimously returned no bill of indictment. I would have liked to have known more about how Woodward’s life unfolded in the decades that followed, along with those of her sons. Sadly, the book then turns mostly to Capote’s life, only brushing on when he incorporated Woodward’s story into his hatchet piece on his beloved swans.
So yeah, this is a good idea with clumsy execution but it’s presented well enough and easy to digest.