One of Hollywood’s shrewdest chroniclers . . . explains in punchy, propulsive prose, how we went from Tony Soprano to Ted Lasso. . . . Pandora’s Box is as unsparing as Easy Riders, Raging Bulls, and the thesis of the two books is the same: Hollywood’s golden ages don’t arise from the miraculous congregation of geniuses. The industry’s default setting is for crap. . . . [Biskind] focuses . . . on the machinations of high-powered monsters . . . and lays out a sprawling, amoral ecosystem with the dispassion of an omniscient narrator.” — New Yorker
"Peter Biskind has a knack for finding fertile zones in the entertainment landscape, harvesting a rich crop of anecdotes and insights and serving them up with enticing dollops of dirt. . . . Mr. Biskind has a keen eye for all things snarky, cynical and mean. . . . You won’t be able to put his book down.”
— Wall Street Journal
"Biskind sees clear signs that the risk-taking attitude that led to two decades of edgy, adventurous programming—what he labels 'discomfort shows'—is ending." — Financial Times
“Tackling the fall of network TV, rise of cable, and middling new era of streaming, this interview-packed volume might just have the answers to a question that keeps me up at night: How come TV sucks now?” — The Millions
“In his new book, author Peter Biskind catalogs real-life misbehavior by the principals responsible for an array of lauded series with the same unsparing eye that he detailed the excesses of New Hollywood in Easy Riders, Raging Bulls.” — Entertainment Weekly Online
"How Ted Lasso killed Tony Soprano . . . A binge-worthy book about TV's recent history." — The Economist
"This brisk, blistering account of how streaming has changed where we put our eyeballs is classic binge-worthy reading. I had no idea the people involved in creating culture-altering shows are as entertaining as the shows themselves, but Peter Biskind did, and you’ll never look at them same way again.” — Steven Soderbergh
“Peter Biskind’s Pandora’s Box is not only a richly detailed and colorful account, but also an important and historic document on how television has well and defiantly superseded the cinema in the last thirty years. Biskind brilliantly maneuvers his way through a historic panoply of cinematic and television endeavor with the precision of a surgeon’s scalpel. A gripping and compulsive read.” — Brian Cox
“Peter Biskind has always been the most rigorous and amusing Hollywood historian we have, taking on the great men of the past—and now with his trademark cheeky intelligence he takes on the giants of the present age of television-as-cinema. Despite my having lived much of the book’s arc, Biskind offers a fresh perspective on the new Wild West of home entertainment.” — Lena Dunham
“Peter Biskind takes on a wild, whirlwind tour of the birth, life, death, and rebirth of cable and streaming services, introducing us to the people behind them who turn out to be as ferociously nutty as the characters they put on the screen.” — David Nasaw, Arthur M. Schlesinger professor of history emeritus, City University of New York Graduate Center
"A lively writer who includes a lot of vastly entertaining gossip about the increasingly corporate drivers of the changes [in the TV and film industry]. A fascinating topic." — Library Journal (starred review)
“This gossip-filled overview of the past 40 years of television will keep readers glued to their seats.” — Publishers Weekly
“Biskind is known as much for his outspoken opinions as his insightful commentary, and Pandora’s Box is Biskind at his most candid. For readers interested in what goes on behind the scenes in the world of television, a must-read.” — Booklist
