This is Michael Maxwell with the Sioux City Public Library and you’re listening to Check It Out.
Today, I am recommending Pageboy: A Memoir by Elliot Page.
When I think of Elliot Page, I think of the Moldy Peaches song “Anyone Else but You”, the twee folk-pop theme song to Page’s biggest movie, Juno. It’s easy to forget what a chokehold that movie had on the culture back in the late 2000s. It feels like one of the last true word-of-mouth Blockbusters we had before the age of IP-driven comic book and toy movies that we’re stuck in now. Page’s starring role in Juno positioned him as an avatar of the time period’s indie culture. One can anticipate that Elliot Page will be associated with the 2000s in much the same way we associate Alicia Silverstone with the 1990s and Molly Ringwald with the 1980s. If Elliot Page did not release this vulnerable book, perhaps he would be trapped there in our collective memory as a cultural curio from a bygone era. Instead, Page has completely reintroduced himself with this stunning story.
Page’s flippantly witty Juno character has a quip for every situation, and Juno is likely one of the foundational reference points for the Millennial generation’s highly ironic sense of humor. Page mentions how he will forever be “Juno” to so many people no matter what, but I think anyone who reads this groundbreaking memoir will definitely learn to separate the two. It’s interesting to see which parts of the hip, sarcastic tone of that movie are true to Page’s real self, but also to see how much the real Elliot Page differs from this persona. In Pageboy, Elliot Page renders his coming out narrative in a plain-spoken and forward way that clarifies his inner turmoil for readers who lack personal experiences to draw on.
Check out Pageboy: a Memoir by Elliot Page at the Sioux City Public Library today.
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