Griffin Dunne's memoir chronicles fame, art and tragedy in his Hollywood upbringing

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4.2 • 672 Ratings

🗓️ 22 July 2024

⏱️ 11 minutes

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Summary

Actor, producer and director Griffin Dunne grew up during a fascinating time in Hollywood history. In today's episode, he tells Here & Now's Emiko Tamagawa he remembers bowing goodnight to his parents' black-tie party guests, like his aunt Joan Didion and his father's friend, Billy Wilder. His new memoir, The Friday Afternoon Club, captures his family's story in a bygone era of the entertainment industry — including his sister Dominique Dunne's death at the hands of her boyfriend in 1982, and the way that tragedy changed her parents and siblings forever.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey, it's NPR's Book of the Day. I'm Andrew Limbaugh. Griffin Dunn is on the pod today.
0:06.8	And if you don't recognize that name, that's almost intentional on his part. See, he was on
0:12.7	track to be a big deal Hollywood actor. He co-starred in the 1981 movie, an American Werewolf
0:18.5	in London. He starred in the Martin Scorsese movie after
0:21.7	hours, and his dad was a Hollywood producer in addition to being a well-known writer.
0:27.4	Except Griffin Dunn saw what fame did to the people around him, and he decided to shy away
0:32.7	from the spotlight. He's got a new memoir out about his life titled The Friday Afternoon Club, and he talked to here now's Emiko Tamagawa in front of a live audience about what it took to step away. That's ahead.
0:44.5	In the U.S., national security news can feel far away from daily life.
0:49.4	Distant wars, murky conflicts, diplomacy behind closed doors on our new show, Sources and Methods.
0:55.9	NPR reporters on the ground bring you stories of real people helping you understand why distant
1:00.9	events matter here at home.
1:03.5	Listen to sources and methods on the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts.
1:08.9	Before we get to Emiko and Griffin talking, there's another aspect to the story you
1:13.3	should know.
1:14.1	In 1982, Griffin's sister, Dominic Dunn, was killed by her ex-boyfriend when she was 22.
1:20.1	And for this book, Griffin went back and relived some of those memories, not just of the
1:24.8	killing and the trial that followed, but some of the more joyful memories
1:28.2	of Dominique's life, too. Years ago. Just start with the obvious. Why a memoir now? I think
1:34.9	my brother and I are the only surviving members of the immediate family. I'm from a long line of
1:41.5	storytellers, and as time went by, and I lost my mother, and then my father passed, and John and Joan, my aunt and uncle.
1:49.9	I got more sort of perspective on their lives and my own and how I fit into the family.
1:56.3	And I thought, I'm the only one who could tell this.
	...

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