Charming, entertaining memoir, with some heavy bits near the end. The stuff about Gilmore Girls was great! It could have been a lot longer.

Thank you to Netgalley and Simon & Schuster Canada for the digital galley in exchange for my honest review.

Kelly Bishop’s memoir touches on her early life, passion for animals, pro-choice activism, disappointing first husband, and affairs, but delves deep into her relationship with show business and the love of her life, Lee Leonard.

The tone is wistful, and offers wisdom about spirituality, work ethic, and believing in oneself.

I flew through it, reading the entire memoir in one day, and as a fan of Gilmore Girls, immediately seeking out Bunheads, The Marvelous Mrs Maisel, and The Watchful Eye for more of Bishop’s performances.

firstly I would like to thank NetGalley and Simon & Schuster Canada for this ARC in exchange for an honest review🫶🏻

I have always known Kelly Bishop as THE Emily Gilmore from the hit tv show “Gilmore Girls”.. but that’s all I’ve ever known her for.. she is MUCH more than that. She’s a broadway star, and an incredible actress who has done many MANY roles from big to small. She’s done and gone through so much in her life that I can’t even begin to imagine the pain she felt with all the loss she had to endure. But what I’ve learned from her is that she got back up every single time life through something at her. She was optimistic every single time. Auditions after auditions from when she was just a teenager up until today. I have never known her work before Gilmore Girls. She was just “Emily Gilmore” to me.. but she’s more than that like I said❤️ I admired this Memoir so much. It was truly heartbreaking at times, but it was also healing, and loving. I loved reading all about what Kelly has done from when she was a child up until today. Being surprised she had done all of that was the best part. I was shocked every time! But I’m so happy everything worked out for her and she found happiness with herself❤️ she will forever to me be “The Third Gilmore Girl” truly❤️

Cards on the table: I'm a huge Gilmore Girls and Amy Sherman-Palladino fan. I love Emily Gilmore. She is a firecracker character and I'll now watch anything Kelly Bishop is in. But other than knowing she is talented, prior to reading this book, Kelly was a mystery to me.

This was a one night read. It was fast-paced and fun. It blew my mind how much Kelly and the other dancers were part of the process of creating the Chorus Line. Listening to 'At the ballet...' hits differently now. Kelly's journey from ballet to broadway to Emily Gilmore fascinated me. If you've seen Bunheads, Kelly is very much more Fanny than Emily in real life: a badass broad. If you love Gilmore Girls, or want a great actor biography, I recommend this one.

Thank you, Simon & Schuster Canada, for this advanced reader's copy.

I devoured The Third Gilmore Girl. Bishop's determination, hardwork and dedication to her career was inspiring. Her descriptions of love, loss, friendships and struggle were palpable. I appreciate her vulnerability and honesty in discussing hard topics from addiction to abortion and her unwavering ability to be true to herself.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Gilmore Girls is my absolute favourite show in the entire world, and I feel absolutely honoured that I was selected for this ARC! I love Emily Gilmore (Kelly Bishop) so much and I am so excited to get to know more about her previous to her life on Gilmore Girls (and during of course 🤪) AND THE FOREWORD BY ASP 😍😍😍😍 My Gilmore loving heart is just so full right now!!
I actually only found out recently that Kelly (Carole 🤪) Bishop was like a mega-famous bad a** b before Gilmore Girls, and I am literally salivating to learn all about her life and career!
Everything about this book just made me love Kelly more. From the “preferring animals to people”, to wanting to be the best dancer&actress she could possibly be to “pay her mom back” for everything she had done for her, to just the whole tone/narration of the book; I read the whole thing in Kelly’s voice without even meaning to 🤪 It was just written so HER 💕
It was heart-breaking to read about how Kelly grew up and how hard she worked and how much her mother/other mentors did for her and then she wanted to be amazing to “pay them back” for everything they had done for her … just 😭😭😭😭 tears for real
I just loved this book so much! I will always give a 5 ⭐️ because I am not ever going to judge someone’s life story, but this one was like a 10 ⭐️ I just could not stop reading! I loved learning how my beloved character grew up and all the things she did to get her to being Emily Gilmore. I had no idea she was a dancer! like I’m so shocked and trying to picture Emily Gilmore being on Broadway 🤪 I also really enjoyed learning things about other people that I didn’t know (Morgan Freeman started as a dancer?? and Kelly danced with him?? AMAZING)
I absolutely LOVE the cover Kelly looks absolutely STUNNING at 80!!!! Like how is that woman 80?!?! 😍😍😍😍😍😍
I really appreciate how candid Kelly is in this book and letting us know all the gritty (JUICY 🤪) details on her personal life! That’s the real stuff we all want to know 🤪
I am so happy to have read this book because now I am seeing so many little details that were in Gilmore Girls that must have been put in there BECAUSE of Kelly’s life story… I am so excited to watch the series through again and be able to pick up on all these little “easter eggs” that Amy put in the show.
I literally can’t say enough good things about this book; it was a truly delightful read.

The Third Gilmore Girl by Kelly Bishop is an incredibly thoughtful and well-written memoir of a legend of stage and screen. Gilmore Girls is one of my favourite shows but I did not know very much about Kelly Bishop beyond her various roles in Amy Sherman-Palladino productions. I loved getting to learn about Kelly's career, from her time as a ballet dancer to Vegas showgirl to Tony award winner. Her writing is reflective and sharp, and I love hearing her thoughts about show business, Broadway, and the characters she has played. This memoir was the perfect mix of career and personal life, with thoughts on grief, illness, and aging as an actor. I am so incredibly happy that I was able to read this book and I look forward to seeing what Kelly does next!

Advanced Book Review! Thank you @simonschusterca and @netgalley and for sending me this book for review. Opinions are my own.
The Third Gilmore Girl by Kelly Bishop was my most anticipated memoir of the year. I am a massive Gilmore Girls fan, Dirty Dancing is one of my favourite movies, and I loved her character in The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, so I was super excited to receive an advanced copy and I literally dropped everything else I was reading and devoured it in a couple days.
As I was reading, I could hear Kelly Bishop’s distinct voice in my head. I will probably want to listen to this when it’s out in audiobook format (assuming she narrates it).
I’ve read a little bit about the history of Broadway and the importance of A Chorus Line to revitalizing Broadway, and, by extension, New York City, in the 1970s. I’ve seen it performed once at a more amateur theatre and while it wasn’t my favourite show, I loved reading about how Kelly Bishop not only originated the role of Sheila on Broadway, but that the character was actually based on her life story. While I was reading I was googling videos of Kelly Bishop in A Chorus Line, her Tony acceptance speech and the tony performance. She looked, and sounded, exactly the same.
I loved learning more about Kelly Bishop’s life, her honesty about the challenges she faced and the amazing experiences she had, and highly recommend this memoir for any theatre or Gilmore Girls fan. At 80 years old, I look forward to seeing what she does next.