Taken to the Stage: An Autography

While attending parochial school in upstate New York, Kennedy formed a lofty goal: to join her beloved saints in heaven by way of Broadway. As she explains in her good-humored, vivacious, combined growing-up-Catholic/showbiz memoir, she embraced the theater because it was spiritually safe, a place where she could act out earthly temptations without endangering her soul (""Oh life! How to love you, and get away clean?!""). After graduating from Smith College and moving to New York City, however, Kennedy found her career ambition upstaging her Catholic morals. She writes honestly and amusingly about the special hells of acting: casting couches, to which she admits sinking in search of an agent; brutal competitiveness among actors (""Hi, you're cute, you're never going on"" was how Lucie Arnaz greeted Kennedy, her understudy, at rehearsal). She also details her interactions with celebrities including Andy Warhol, Sid Caesar and Stella Adler, and her sudden reversals of fortune--after being toasted in Hollywood as the star of the hit TV pilot Three Girls Three, she learned of the series' cancellation months after the fact. No martyr, Kennedy has learned life's lessons as she once did her catechism. After the births of her children, she accepted her more limited roles in the spotlight with grace and joy--qualities in abundance in this spirited reminiscence. Photos. Author tour. (Aug.) FYI: This fall, Kennedy will appear regularly on Aaron Spelling's series Savannah.