Thomson’s book is part of Yale’s excellent Jewish Lives series. The Warner brother’s studio has given us many wonderful films to enjoy including one of my favorites – CASABLANCA which was rushed into production to make the most of the war effort at the time. Warner Brothers was a studio run by a family of Jewish emigres, headed by Jack Warner. Thomson describes Jack as “not just a clown, a singer and a show-off, but a modern showman who was going to end up telling the family story and smiling at America”. Under his stewardship, the studio gave the country gangsters in great suits, dames, gunfire, wisecracks, and above all, a tone – “wry, fond of sentiment yet hard-boiled, as if to say we’re Americans, we can take it and dish it out”. Three of the four brothers were born in a small village north of Warsaw, when Poland was part of the Russian empire. Their father was a shoemaker. He took his family from there to Hamburg, to Liverpool, to Ontario (where Jack was born) and then finally resting in Baltimore, MD. For those wanting a more thorough understanding of the Warners’ complex relationship with their Jewish heritage, Neal Gabler’s “An Empire of Their Own” is a more impressive achievement. (you can find that one in our library as well). However, this new book charts the rise of an unpromising film studio from its shaky beginnings through its ascent to the pinnacle of Hollywood influence and popularity. These four brothers arrived in America as unschooled Jewish immigrants and founded a studio that became the smartest, toughest, and most radical in all of Hollywood. It is a very worthy addition to the Jewish Lives series.