Paul Newman on his posthumous autobiography: “Joanne turned me into a sexual creature”

There is a month left before the posthumous autobiography of Paul Newmanentitled The extraordinary life of an ordinary manin which he recognizes that his wife, Joanne Woodward, was the one who turned him into a “sexual creature”. The one who was one of the best actors of all time, and one of the most handsome, also admits to having blamed himself all his life for the death of his son Scott for overdose.

At the end of November it will be possible to read in Spain the sincere but unfinished autobiography of the protagonist of unforgettable films such as The hit, The Legend of the Untamed o Two men and one destiny. It is a posthumous memoir in which he tells his memories with all sincerity and is complemented by testimonies from his family, friends and Hollywood personalities with whom he worked.

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Paul Newman talks about his second wife, Joanne Woodward, his intimacy with her and how she made him a “sex symbol”. He assures that thanks to the actress she realized the sexual force of her image on the big screen and acknowledges that she changed him to the point that “Joanne gave birth to a sexual creature”.

While the actor assures that he was looking for “pure lust”, his wife encouraged him to carry out what she called “our experiments. We leave a trail of lust everywhere, whether in hotels, public parks and rental cars”.

In the book Newman recalls how he really realized that he had achieved success. It was in one of the most commented scenes of the erotic cinema classic “Emmmanuelle”, because one of the protagonists takes a picture of him from a magazine: “That was truly the moment of my arrival to success”, he confesses.

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Guilt for the death of his son

In the memoirs Newman acknowledges how he felt guilty all his life for the death of his son Scott, who died in 1978 at the age of 28, due to an overdose of drugs and alcohol. Bluntly, he explains, “I kept thinking I was going through a phase of adolescent poor decisions. I never thought it would be fatal.”

The actor gnaws at himself wondering if, “Was there any way I could have told him that he didn’t have to be like me? … That he didn’t have to do macho stuff and he could just be himself?” With painful sincerity, the protagonist of The cat on the zinc roof admits the “many times I’ve gotten down on my knees and apologized to Scott. I apologize for that part of me that provided the impetus for its own destruction. What would it have taken to prevent that? I’m not sure,” he says. in the book, according to excerpts published by People magazine.

alcohol problems

In one of those compiled interviews, the protagonist of the burning colossus He even reflected on his own problems with alcohol: “It’s an interesting challenge to know how far you can go with drinking without self-destruction. In the early 70s, I think I took it as far as it could go, before realizing that I had gone too far,” he confesses.

Melissa Newmanone of the daughters of the star, explained at the time how the autobiographical project that was born in 1986 was conceived. His father asked his journalist friend, Stewart Henry Sternwho would collect his memories with the sole premise that they were totally sincere.

In 1991 they stopped working and the tapes were forgotten. After the death, the recordings appeared, from which fourteen thousand pages of transcripts emerged. To these were added memories of his two wives, Jackie Wittie and Joanne Woodward, their daughters, as well as numerous colleagues, such as Tom Cruise.