Shannon John Shea’s new book I’M RUBBER, YOU’RE GLUE is a fascinating look at the life of a special effects makeup artist in the Hollywood film industry, starting during the Golden Age of practical effects work in the 1980s. For years he maintained The First Person Monster Blog online, telling wonderfully entertaining tales of the making of your favorite effects laden films. Earlier in 2014 he announced that he would be discontinuing the blog to focus on collecting his memories and experiences for this book. Fans of the blog need not worry…the material in the book is not simply a copy and paste of the blog’s contents. Shannon goes into incredible detail, covering his childhood and inspirations to working in the industry. Shannon is now an established fixture of the special effects world, having worked on such modern classics as PREDATOR, TERMINATOR 2, JURASSIC PARK and MEN IN BLACK 3, but when he first moved to Los Angeles from a New Orleans suburb in the early 80s, he was a young, inexperienced kid with more enthusiasm than skill. The story of how this “wet behind the ears” kid went from barely scraping by (and sometimes not even that), looking for jobs, to being a Hollywood professional is thoroughly engaging.
This is the first volume of Shannon’s story and covers the time from his birth in the early 60s to working for Stan Winston on PREDATOR. In between, he tells of working on low budget horror films in horrible conditions to meeting and working with his heroes in the most professional of environments.
Speaking of heroes, Shannon really holds nothing back when describing his dealings with some of the Hollywood special effects legends. He does not make judgements, but tells the story honestly and straight. Sometimes those stories are none too complementary. But he turns that honest lens on himself as well. The result does not feel like a gossipy “tell-all,” but more like a history lesson that does not flinch away from examining the ugly parts.
The copy that I read is an unedited version in PDF form that Shannon made available. The final version promises to be 15,000 words shorter, available as an e-book, with a variety of photographs. I am really glad to have had the chance to read the unedited version, as I really don’t see a lot of fat that needs to be cut out. All of the stories that Shannon passes on in these pages are entertaining and informative. Plus, it’s fun to check out the typos.
While his writing is strong, Shannon does not try to be a poet or novelist. Rather, he takes the role of friendly mentor, telling you stories of the past while passing on many lessons learned. The writing style is almost conversational in tone, which makes for quick and fun reading. If the term “page turner” can apply to a non-fiction e-book, then it certainly is appropriate here.
If you are interested in the effects industry or behind the scenes Hollywood in general, you can find what you’re looking for in this book. The unedited preview version is available to purchase for $15 for most of January (2015). This also gets you access to the photographs as they become available. In my opinion, it’s worth it to get this unedited version…which you can get HERE. And be sure to visit the Facebook page for I’M RUBBER, YOU’RE GLUE while you're at it!
~ Langley J. West
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