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Mr. Scarlett Johansson

Some things to know about the new Colin Jost memoir:

*There is actually nothing on Scarlett Johansson. This seems unconscionable. If you're to-be-married to Scarlett--who just netted two Oscar nominations in one year, who ranks as one of the most powerful people in Hollywood, who regularly wades into scandals involving Woody Allen, race, gender--then you have to talk about Scarlett.

*Some essays don't work. There's a piece on Google, for example--wholly free of insight, character development, plot--that ought to have been left on the floor in the editor's office.

*Jost--like Amy Schumer and Tina Fey, among others--sometimes feels excessive pressure to be funny. There is a desperate urge to end on a "cute" button, at the end of each essay. This seems like a shame. I wonder what might have happened if Jost didn't feel such intense pressure to "perform."

*All that said, I admired the honesty with which Jost looked at his early life. Sometimes memoirists make themselves into victims, or refuse to draw conclusions from experience. You can't say that about Jost. Refreshingly, Jost points out several moments at which he was an asshole (sending bad submissions to "Reader's Digest," arriving unprepared at a Lorne Michaels interview, sleeping through a summer study tour of Russia). This is all delightful. Jost's analysis of his own juvenile writing--with excerpts!--ranks as an important highlight.

*No sketch of Kristen Wiig? No actual thoughts on Aidy Bryant? How can this be?

Three of five stars.
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