November 15, 2001
Susan Rubin ExploresSpielberg’s Childhood
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Steven Spielberg has inspired dozens of biographies, none of them written with the filmmaker's consent. But Susan Goldman Rubin's new book, "Steven Spielberg: Crazy for Movies" (Harry N. Abrams, 2001), has input from Spielberg's production company and in-depth interviews with his parents and sisters. Rubin landed their cooperation because the family admired her track record, and loved her intended focus on how Spielberg's childhood shaped his films, she said.
Rubin, who lives in Malibu, has produced 25 books, with her most celebrated being "Fireflies in the Dark: The Story of Friedl Dicker-Brandeis and the Children of Terezin." She turned to Spielberg because she too, is crazy about movies. Through conversations with Spielberg's family, she discovered "that he was such a fearful child, just like me." With her publisher's blessing, she devotes a chapter to Spielberg's Survivors of the Shoah Foundation, and she is donating a portion of her royalties toward the foundation's work. "As a Jew and as someone who has such strong feelings about the Holocaust, this is something I can do."
Rubin will be signing "Fireflies in the Dark" at the Los Angeles Museum of the Holocaust on Dec. 2, from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. For more information, call (323) 761-8170. -- Beverly Gray, Education Editor
