Review by Ian Keogh
Known for the poise, grace and beauty she brought to her film roles, Audrey Hepburn was a remarkable woman far beyond that, not least for life choices made both before and after her cinema career. One is that she committed passionately and wholeheartedly to her appointment as an ambassador for global children’s charity UNICEF. It’s with those activities that Michele Botton opens this first graphic novel biography of her life, showing her in Ethiopia during the famine of the 1980s.
Thereafter, Botton seemingly sacrifices the dangers of Hepburn’s younger years in the Nazi-occupied Netherlands, contenting himself with a passing reference in order to move straight to her first audition. However, Botton uses flashbacks all the way through, thoughtfully connecting the past with present day events just related, and using them to explain aspects of Hepburn’s personality.
Her striking cartoon likeness solidifies the entire book, placed in recognisable locations and accompanied by other people whose feelings are conveyed. When it comes to the likenesses of others, though, Dorilys Giacchetto supplies anonymous people, although that may be a question of image rights for the likes of William Holden, Shirley MacLaine and Gregory Peck. She does provide the bonus of charming portraits starting the chapters, each representing a film Hepburn starred in.
There are plenty of them over short chapters, and we learn how Hepburn liked to challenge herself when acting, while also fretting over the pressures of a film career on home life and marriage. Botton does only allude to some matters rather than delving deeply in, but the point is always made with clarity.
This isn’t a complete biography. For instance Botton ends with a powerful speech given at a UNICEF press conference rather than Hepburn’s illness and comparatively early death, but what’s here is as charming and timeless as Hepburn herself. It covers most career touchstones and brings out the thoughtful and compassionate person Hepburn was, making his a good starting point for further exploration, either of her films or more complete prose biographies.
