This bio-bibliography is the first book to examine the life and career of one of Hollywood's most durable leading men, Richard Widmark. Though never considered in the same star category as Burt Lancaster or Gregory Peck, his era, Widmark nonetheless established himself as a dependable and popular leading man in westerns, dramas, adventures, gangster and war films, and by 1984, he had appeared in 62 full-length films. From his earliest days in radio and on stage, to more recent appearances in films and on television, the entire performing arts career of Richard Widmark is chronicled in this volume, and documented with complete bibliographic entries. Respecting Widmark's reputation for privacy, Holston has focused on the public aspect of the actor's career, tracing the abundance of interesting on-screen events that have made up his life. The book begins with a chronology of significant dates and events in Widmark's career and is followed by a biographical sketch. Separate sections cite credits for radio, Broadway stage, film, and television appearances, as well as a complete listing of Widmark works that are available on home video. The book concludes with a lengthy annotated bibliography of works about Widmark, as well as a complete index. A number of illustrations are also included. As the only book devoted exclusively to Richard Widmark, this work will be a valuable resource to film fans and scholars, an important reference for courses on motion picture history and the development of the film industry, and a significant addition to university and public libraries.

Interviews with 21 prominent feature film editors highlight this long-overdue look at the role of film editors, the importance of their work, and the nature of their craft. Organized to provide historical continuity and to trace professional collaborations among the subjects, "Selected TakeS" features editors whose credits include such diverse films as "Ben Hur," "The French Connection," "The Godfather," and "E.T."

Each chapter includes a brief introduction to the artist, background information, a filmography of feature-length works, and personal recollections of specific films, producers, and directors, as well as helpful comments on editing techniques. A glossary of terms commonly used in film editing and pertinent references found in the interviews complement the work. Film students, scholars, and educators, as well as film industry professionals and moviegoers, will find "Selected TakeS" both entertaining and instructive.

The Science of Writing Characters is a comprehensive handbook to help writers create compelling and psychologically-credible characters that come to life on the page. Drawing on the latest psychological theory and research, ranging from personality theory to evolutionary science, the book equips screenwriters and novelists with all the techniques they need to build complex, dimensional characters from the bottom up. Writers learn how to create rounded characters using the 'Big Five' dimensions of personality and then are shown how these personality traits shape action, relationships and dialogue. Throughout The Science of Writing Characters, psychological theories and research are translated into handy practical tips, which are illustrated through examples of characters in action in well-known films, television series and novels, ranging from Three Billboards Outside Ebbing Missouri and Game of Thrones to The Bonfire of the Vanities and The Goldfinch. This very practical approach makes the book an engaging and accessible companion guide for all writers who want to better understand how they can make memorable characters with the potential for global appeal.

Peter Valenti presents an objective evaluation of Flynn's impact on both American popular culture and the development of motion pictures. The book begins with a brief biography of the actor, followed by a complete history of his screen, radio, and television career, an annotated guide to popular and scholarly materials on Flynn, and a bibliography of his own writings and the publications in which they appeared. Valenti ends with a series of personal interviews held with Flynn at various points in his often infamous career.

The First Female Stars: Women of the Silent Era rediscovers the fascinating lives and pioneering achievements of 15 women who dared to venture into early motion pictures, an industry dominated by men, and who not only succeeded but became the focal points of the industry. Each star earned a position at the height of her profession, and though many are largely forgotten today, made a lasting and significant contribution to early cinema. In this entertaining and informative volume, author David Menefee reveals these women and their signature roles, drawing on many original sources to show us how such actresses as Theda Bara, Sarah Bernhardt, Dorothy Gish, and Norma Talmadge were received in their time, and the many ways in which their influence remains important today. Each profile contains a biographical treatment, an analysis of key films from her career, a discussion of the actress's influence on the medium, and selected filmography. Each also includes two photographs, most often one of the actress herself and a still from a film.

Believing that transformation is possible and that it must come from within, Clar Doyle illustrates the vital connection between drama and critical pedagogy. Presuming that a practice informed by the theory of critical pedagogy is essential to achieve an emancipatory education, Doyle shows how well drama and aesthetic education can encourage a pedagogy that is critical. He explores the real as well as the perceived values and understandings given to the aesthetic in school settings, how tastes and awareness are produced and how students' backgrounds inform the way in which art and drama are experienced. Furthermore, Doyle shows the ways in which the dominant cultural agencies rob both teachers and students of creativity through their reproductive policies.

The book explores such critical questions as: the nature of culture; the historical place of drama within education; and the debate between drama and theatre as it applies to schooling. With a critical perspective, he reviews the current status of drama education and suggests ways in which educators can redefine their mission and refine their practice. By examining the influence of the culture industry and the issues surrounding style choices, Doyle highlights the challenge that teachers must meet in order to use performance skills to tease out attitudes and understandings. He concludes by showing how drama can help students, not only to bring about change in their own lives, but to effect change in the world around them.

Although Bob Hope has been the subject of many biographies, no book yet has fully explored the comic persona he created in vaudeville and radio, brought to fruition in dozens of films from the 1930s through the 1960s, and made a lasting influence on comedians from Woody Allen to Conan O'Brien. Now, in The Road to Comedy: The Films of Bob Hope, noted film comedy authority Donald W. McCaffrey finally places Hope in his well-deserved position among the highest rank of film comedians of his era. Drawing on archival materials and interviews with collaborators, McCaffrey analyzes each major film in depth, with due attention to particular sequences that reveal how Hope created a unique comic personality that lasted over dozens of very popular films, from the "Road movies" with Bing Crosby through such underrated classics as Son of Paleface, Monsieur Beaucaire, and Casanova's Big Night. In so doing, McCaffrey introduces readers to a Bob Hope now overshadowed by his own reputation. We see here that Hope's significance has been greater than any USO appearance or television special might suggest. Because many of these movies have recently been made available on DVD--the first time in decades that they've been easily available to the general public--the volume will also serve as an excellent introduction for those wanting to see these films for the first time.

In 1999 the Maryinsky (formerly Kirov) Ballet and Theater in St. Petersburg re-created its 1890 production of Sleeping Beauty. The revival showed the classic work in its original sets and costumes and restored pantomime and choreography that had been eliminated over the past century. Nevertheless, the work proved unexpectedly controversial, with many Russian dance professionals and historians denouncing it. In order to understand how a historically informed performance could be ridiculed by those responsible for writing the history of Russian and Soviet ballet, Tim School discusses the tradition, ideology, and popular legend that have shaped the development of Sleeping Beauty. In the process he provides a history of Russian and Soviet ballet during the twentieth century. A fascinating slice of cultural history, the book will appeal not only to dance historians but also to those interested in the arts and cultural policies of the Soviet and post-Soviet periods.

Appearing in about 60 films and dozens of stage and radio productions, John Barrymore (1882-1942) was arguably the most idolized performing arts figure of his generation. Renowned for his ability to make even the flimsiest roles come to life with power and passion, the Great Profile reached his apex with title role performances in stagings of Richard III (1920) and Hamlet (1922-25). This book charts his legendary and sometimes scandalous life and career. A biography discusses his love of roles requiring physical or psychological distortion, his four failed marriages, and his memorable achievements on the stage and screen. Chapters that follow contain entries for his performances in stage, film, and radio productions, with each entry providing cast and credit listings, plot synopses, critical commentary, and excerpts from reviews. Also included are a discography, a chapter on plays and films with characters modeled after Barrymore, an annotated bibliography, and discussions of archives and special collections. The volume closes with a personal essay by Barrymore's Shakespearean vocal coach, Margaret Carrington. This essay, written by a pivotal figure in Barrymore's development as a serious actor, has never before been published.

The Artef (1925-1940) began as a radical Yiddish workers' theatre and developed into a major American Yiddish theatre company. It was among the acknowledged pillars of the Theatre of Social Consciousness, a movement that redefined the course for the American stage during the half century that followed.

In the 1920s and 1930s, New York was widely recognized as the world capital of the Yiddish theatre. The Artef was a principal theatrical institution during this so-called Golden Era. Established in 1925 as a proletarian theatrical organization affiliated with the Jewish section of the American communist movement, the Artef was hailed by Brooks Atkinson as one of the artistic ornaments in town. In 1934 the Artef moved to Broadway, where it continued to perform until its demise in 1940.

This work examines the history of Artef and analyzes the artistic, ideological, and organizational aspects of its work. The company's major productions are discussed, with a focus on the central issues raised by script, direction, and acting. The book attempts to demonstrate that radical politics often shaped and determined the evolution of the theatre, and that its artistic and organizational life must be seen within the context of the political and cultural movement of which it was a part. The work is divided into three major segments: Chapters I-IV discuss the ideological, social, and cultural forces that gave rise to the Artef, the crystallization of the organization, and the work of its acting studio, which in 1928 became the acting collective of the Artef; Chapters V-VIII cover the period of 1929-1934, the formative years of the Artef and their correspondence to communist Third Period doctrine; Chapters IX-XIII are devoted to the theatre's successful Broadway period, which paralleled the Communist Party's liberal Popular Front era. The last chapter discusses the efforts to revive the Artef, and its inevitable demise following the 1939 German-Russian Nonaggression Pact. This is a major work in Jewish Theatre Studies that will be of great use to scholars and other researchers involved with Jewish and Performance Theatre Studies as well as the history of the American Left.

The National Student Drama Festival has been British theatre's best-kept secret for the last fifty years.

"This book aims to help the teacher of Acting and his pupil--the novice who aspires to become proficient in the most elusive of arts. In it no distinction is made between the amateur and professional but only between the good and bad actor."from the author's introduction

Theo Angelopoulos is widely regarded as one of the most distinctive contemporary filmmakers and a highly idiosyncratic film stylist. His work, from the early 1970s to The Beekeeper, Landscape in the Mist, The Suspended Step of the Stalk and the recent Cannes prize-winner Ulysses' Gaze, demonstrates a unique sensibility and a preoccupation with form (notably, the long take, space, and time) and with content, particularly Greek politics and history, and notions of the journey, border-crossing, and exile. This new collection of essays surveys his entire cinematic output and presents a discussion of his major films, themes, and concerns. The contributors argue that Angelopoulos' sustained oeuvre has kept alive the tradition of postwar modernism--the cinema of Antonioni, Jancso, and Ozu--in the largely hostile environment of the 1980s and 1990s. A major work for students and researchers on contemporary European film.

This book presents a combined biographical, critical, and bibliographical estimate of Laurel & Hardy's significance in film comedy, the arts in general, and as popular culture icons. Of the two, Laurel decidedly evolves as the central player in this duo biography. The reasons for this are several, but mainly stem from Laurel's role as team spokesman; his late life accessibility; media coverage given to his private life; and the fact that he outlived Hardy by eight years--from 1957 to 1965--a period in which the ever burgeoning public fascination with the team reached new proportions. Hardy's artistic input, however, is currently being given a revisionist upgrading, which Gehring addresses.

The book is divided into five chapters. Chapter 1 is a biography of Laurel & Hardy, exploring the public and private sides of their lives. Chapter 2 is a critique of four broad influences of Laurel & Hardy--as special icons of comic frustrations; as developers of a change in film comedy pacing (which also eased their transition from silent to sound film); as movie pioneers in the innovative early use of comic sound; and, most importantly, as key participants in the evolution of the comic antihero into American mainstream humor. Chapter 3 is composed of two very early reprinted Laurel & Hardy articles and a special Encore collection. Chapter 4 is a very ambitious Laurel & Hardy bibliographical essay, assessing key reference materials and locating research collections open to the student and/or scholar. This involves many obscure, often early and/or untranslated articles drawn from research in Ulverston England--Laurel's birthplace--London and Paris. Chapter 5 is a bibliographical checklist of all sources recommended in Chapter 4. This volume should be of special interest to all Laurel & Hardy aficionados, and students/scholars of comedy.

During the course of 2020, artist Charlotte Verity made more than 100 watercolour monotypes in response to the plants and flowers growing in her London garden. Echoing Green: The Printed Year is the result of a year’s fierce observation of urban nature. Week by week, through a painter's eye we watch the seasons unfold through technical experimentation, colour and format. Verity’s poetic images are contemplative and spacious, surprising us with their luminosity and intensity of colour. They insist on the enjoyment to be found in simply taking the time to look.

The only comprehensive guide to the crime films of the forties and fifties, this volume focuses on the major events that shaped and molded the genre: war, alienation, drugs, and organized crime. The body of the work offers over 1,200 entries that feature concise summaries, analyses, and credits. The volume is a continuation of the author's earlier work, A Guide to American Crime Films of the Thirties (Greenwood, 1995). The book includes those stars that the public had already embraced as gangsters in the thirties such as James Cagney, Humphrey Bogart, and Edward G. Robinson and brings them into a new era in which they are transformed into enforcers of the law. This work will be of interest to scholars, students, and film buffs alike. The work demonstrates the shift from the simpler gangster modes of the 1930s as it takes the reader forward to the more sophisticated films of the late fifties. Although the book is organized alphabetically, the introduction alerts the reader to the major social phenomena that influenced the genre of these decades. Also offered are credits that cover titles, release dates, distributors, directors, screenwriters, and major players. The 1,200 entries include detailed plot summaries and thematic analyses as well as relevant information on sources, remakes, and sequels.

The movie theater has in many ways served as a barometer of the evolution of urban America over the past century. "The Community of Cinema" explores how the growth and decline of the inner city has been intertwined with the history of the movie theater, how the cinema helped redefine the use of downtowns to include entertainment and socialization, a sense of social place in our society, and the use of spectacle as a part of our daily experience in shopping, eating, and business. This is the first book to examine directly the importance of the movie theater in the creation and growth of the modern American downtown, and its fostering of its own sense of place and community.

"The Community of Cinema" also attempts to bridge the various fields included in the subject of cinema's impact on culture and form, among them film studies, architecture, urban planning, and sociology. In so doing, author James M. Forsher explores in each chapter the ways in which the community of cinema came about, the changes it sparked in the downtown and neighborhood shopping districts, and the sense of community it added to our society as a whole.