Call Me Anna by Patty Duke

The Star- The public saw her as a gifted childstar- the youngest actor to win an Oscar for her roleas Helen Keller in The Miracle Worker and theyoungest actor to have a prime-time television seriesbearing her own name.

The Nightmare- What the public did not see was Anna Marie Duke, a young girl whose life changed forever at age seven when tyrannical mangers stripped her of nearly all that wasfamiliar, beginning with her name. She was deprived of family and friends. Her every word wasprogrammed, her every action monitored and criticized. She was fed liquor and prescription drugs, taught to lie to get work, and relentlessly drilled to win roles.

The Legend- Out of this nightmare emergedPatty Duke, a show business legend still searching for the child, Anna. She won three Emmy Awards and divorced three husbands. A starring role inValley of the Dolls nearly ruined her career. She was notorious for wild spending sprees, turbulent liaisons, and an uncontrollable temper. Until a long hidden illness was diagnosed, and her amazing recovery recovery began.

The Triumph-Call Me Anna is an American success story that grew out of a bizarre and desperate struggle for survival. A harrowing, ultimately triumphant story told by Patty Duke herself-wife, mother, political activist, President of the Screen Actors Guild, and at last, a happy, fulfilled woman whose miracle is her own life.

A memoir reveals Patty Duke’s traumatic and bizarre upbringing, her Academy Award-winning acting career, her headline-making behavior with drugs, drinking, and promiscuity, and her triumphant struggle to a responsible adulthood.

About the Author: Patty Duke(1946-2016) was a true show business legend whose career spanned six decades.Her Oscar win for her role as Helen Keller in The Miracle Workermade her, at the time, the youngest Academy Award winner. Shealso entered the history books as the youngest person to have a show bearing her full name, withThe Patty Duke Show, on which she played genetically unexplainable identical cousins.In addition to her acting, she became the second woman ever elected president of the Screen Actors Guild.

01 May 1988
 

Call Me Anna: The Autobiography of Patty Duke by Patty Duke ISBN 9780553272055