Review: Have I Told You This Already? by Lauren Graham

Have I Told You This Already?: Stories I Don’t Want to Forget to Remember by Lauren Graham

Recommended: not really…
If you know you really like her style of humor, if you’re interested in acting/filming minutiae

Summary

With her signature sense of humor and down-to-earth storytelling, Lauren Graham opens up about her years working in the entertainment business–from the sublime to the ridiculous–and shares personal stories about everything from family and friendship to the challenges of aging gracefully in Hollywood. In RIP Barneys New York, she writes about an early job as a salesperson at the legendary department store — and the time she inadvertently shoplifted; in Ne Oublie she warns us about the perils of coming from an extremely forgetful family; and in Actor-y Factory she recounts what a day in the life of an actor looks like (unless you’re Brad Pitt).

Filled with surprising anecdotes, sage advice, and laugh-out-loud observations, Graham’s latest collection of all-new, original essays showcases the winning charm and wit that she’s known for.

Thoughts

Boy, I did not like this. What a surprise! I guess I don’t like her style of humor? It just wasn’t humorous to me, if it was meant to be. A lot of these were annoying, and frankly a lot of the topics felt superficial and shallow and that’s not always terrible, but in this case it just didn’t work for me. I ended up skimming several of the stories, and in completely skipping one or two of them.

I’ve never watched Gilmore Girls, but I don’t think that should matter because it’s really not a focus in this collection. If you’re coming here for GG content, you’re looking in the wrong place! It seemed more like a miscellaneous collection of her writings and reflections, primarily on her career and life outside of acting while trying to make it a steady job.

Then there were other sections that made me wonder why they were included at all, like the list of advice about directing that did not feel applicable to most people, and seemed more like a page she ripped out of her journal to fill up some more space in the book even though it wasn’t really relevant or entertaining. It was also an extremely long list.

I don’t know, y’all. I didn’t want to finish it, but did because it was fairly short and I wanted to count it towards my nonfiction goal for the month. Not the greatest of reasons. 🤷‍♀️