Before the New Documentary, there was the book, "Mary: The Mary Tyler Moore Story"

Photo byJacobs Brown Media

Before Being Mary Tyler Moore, the new HBOMax documentary, there was the book, Mary: The Mary Tyler Moore Story, which covers the entire life and career of the iconic actress.

Best known for the classic TV sitcoms, The Dick Van Dyke Show, and The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Moore also made several TV guest appearances and movies. Namely, Ordinary People.

Those interviewed for the book, include Dick Van Dyke Show writer Bill Persky, who remained a life-long friend to Moore; actress Karen Kramer, who had auditioned for the Laura Petrie role and knew Moore in their early days of television; actor Larry Mathews, who played little Richie Petrie; and actor Gavin Macleod, who guest-starred on The Dick Van Dyke Show, only to later co-star with Moore on The Mary Tyler Moore Show.

Those also interviewed for the book include actor Ed Asner, another co-star from The Mary Tyler Moore Show, writer Treva Silverman who, like Bill Persky, remained Moore’s good friend throughout her life; and actress Carol Channing, who co-starred with Moore in the 1967 classic movie, Thoroughly Modern Millie.

Mary: The Mary Tyler Moore Story also features rare commentary about Moore from Dick Van Dyke, Dick Van Dyke Show creator Carl Reiner, and Grant Tinker, who met and married Moore during production of The Dick Van Dyke Show, among many others.

Mary: The Mary Tyler Moore Story presents a unique perspective of Moore’s five years on The Dick Van Dyke Show, and explores in detail her personal and professional accomplishments, before, during, and after The Dick Van Dyke Show and The Mary Tyler Moore Show.

Mary: The Mary Tyler Moore Story offers the most in-depth, full-scale biography of Moore's entire life and career. No previous biography or any other book about Moore or any of her television shows chronicles her various TV sitcoms, TV-movies, and specials, feature films, and stage appearances with as much detail. Not even her own two memoirs covered the last ten years of her life, which Mary: The Mary Tyler Moore Story does to great lengths.