Dystopian literature is a potent vehicle for criticizing existing social conditions and political systems. While utopian literature portrays ideal worlds, dystopian literature depicts the flaws and failures of imaginative societies. Often these societies are related to utopias, and the dystopian writers have chosen to reveal shortcomings of those social systems previously considered ideal. This reference overviews dystopian theory and summarizes and analyzes numerous dystopian works. By reviewing the critical thought of particular dystopian theorists, the beginning of the volume provides a theoretical context for the remainder of the book. Because dystopian literature is so closely related to utopian writing, the reference profiles and discusses eight important utopian works. The rest of the book includes entries for numerous dystopian novels, plays, and films. Each entry summarizes the work and discusses dystopian themes. The entries include short bibliographies, with full bibliographic information provided at the end of the volume. This comprehensive guide covers the full period from Thomas More's Utopia to the present day.

This reference work on Boris Karloff presents a comprehensive record of the life and career of this famous performer. The volume begins with a biography, which succinctly presents the facts of Karloff's life. A chronology of his significant achievements follows. The remaining chapters overview Karloff's broad career. Chapters document and comment upon his film, stage, radio, and television performances. A discography is included as well. The book concludes with an annotated bibliography of books and articles about Karloff, along with a comprehensive index.

This provocative work analyzes Mae West's long life and productive career in three major phases: the early theater years, her meteoric film career in the thirties, and her subsequent life as a popular culture legend. It examines her theatrical approach to life and her unique talent for translating a low comic variety style into a subtle satire of melodramatic conventions. West's attempts to control her comic creation led her into many public battles over her claims to authorship of her plays and filmscripts. The book's bibliography explores her talents as a writer, summarizing the plays and books she wrote and investigating the validity of those claims. A thorough study of West's background and attitudes, this volume combines the approaches of both biographical and critical/artistic analysis and broadens our understanding of how Mae West fits into American popular culture. The book examines West's philosophy of success and how it was reflected in her personal and professional life, and places her in a historical and cultural perspective without forcing her personality into predetermined categories. This bio-bibliography provides a fresh view of the legendary Mae West, and a new insight into the complexity of her artistry and social vision. It will be a valuable addition to all public libraries, and a useful resource in the study of American popular culture and film history.

Michael Cimino’s The Deer Hunter was met with both critical and commercial success upon its release in 1978. However, it was also highly controversial and came to be seen as a powerful statement on the human cost of America's longest war and as a colonialist glorification of anti-Asian violence. Brad Prager's study of the film considers its significance as a war movie and contextualizes its critical reception. Drawing on an archive of contemporaneous materials, as well as an in-depth analysis of the film’s lighting, mise-en-scène, multiple cameras and shifting depths of field, Prager examines how the film simultaneously presents itself as a work of cinematic realism, while problematically blurring the lines between fact and fiction. While Cimino felt he had no responsibility to historical truth, depicting a highly stylized version of his own fantasies about the Vietnam War, Prager argues that The Deer Hunter’s formal elements were used to bolster his troubling depictions of war and race. Finally, comparing the film with later depictions of US-led intervention such as Albert and Allen Hughes’s Dead Presidents (1995) and Spike Lee’s Da Five Bloods (2020), Prager illuminates The Deer Hunter’s major presumptions, blind spots and omissions, while also presenting a case for its classic status.

The book focuses on radio and sound docufiction and docudrama through comparative analysis of the British and the Italian output from post war years to the 2010s, from both a historical and formal point of view. It sheds light on a rather neglected area of study providing a systematic survey of the development of the form and of its current status and perspectives, and at the same time constructing viable analytical tools that can be used to investigate individual productions. Considering the different docudramatic output in formats and quantity in the two countries, the book explores case studies from BBC Radio, which continue to air a high number of programmes with a great variety of formats and subgenres, and Italian case studies from both independent bodies and the Radio RAI, whose docudramatic production has declined since the late 1980s. Specifically, the study seeks to explain how radio language in its purely acoustic dimension allows access to unpredictable layers of truth often complementary, when not overtly alternative, to the documental truth of declaredly journalistic or scientific programmes. A well-researched resource for university students, scholars, researchers and educators in media, sociology of media and history. In-depth analysis of an original topic.

From his role in The Terminator to his more recent work as Governator of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger has played a major role in American popular culture. This accessible and entertaining biography traces the trajectory of Arnold's career-sports figure turned movie star turned entrepreneur turned politician. Elected as governor of California in 2003, Arnold Schwarzenegger now dramatically and vividly represents the determination and, to a great extent, the relentlessness necessary for achieving great fame, political power, and iconic status. While many readers will have read about his benchmark achievements, this biography will reveal the surprising complexities behind the public scenes and put them into a larger cultural context. Photos and a timeline of significant events round out this insightful biography. From his role in The Terminator to his more recent work as Governator of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger has played a major role in American popular culture. This biography traces the fascinating trajectory of Arnold's career-sports figure turned movie star turned entrepreneur turned politician. Elected as governor of California in 2003, Arnold Schwarzenegger now dramatically and vividly represents the determination and, to a great extent, the relentlessness necessary for achieving great fame, political power, and iconic status. Arnold's life has been characterized by public notoriety. While many readers will have heard or read about his benchmark achievements, this biography will reveal the surprising complexities behind the public scenes and put them into a larger cultural context. Photos and a timeline of significant events round out this entertaining and insightful biography.

Ever since the premiere for the first Mickey Mouse cartoon in 1928, Disney has played a central role in American popular culture, which has progressively expanded to include a global market. The company positioned itself to be a central role in family entertainment, and many of its offerings – from films to consumable products – have deeply embedded themselves into not only the imaginations of children and adults, but also into the threads of one’s life experience. It is difficult to go through life without encountering one Disney product. Because of this, fans of Disney build connections with their favourite characters and franchises, some of which are fuelled further by Disney’s own marketing practices. Similarly, Disney responds to the cultural values of the era through its films and other media offerings. In this volume, scholars from varying backgrounds take a close look at facets of the Disney canon as more than agents of entertainment or consumption, and into underlying messages at the very heart of the Disney phenomenon: the cultural response that drives the corporation’s massive production and marketing machine. The relationship between Disney and its fans is one of loyalty and love, shaping cultural behaviours and values through the brand and its products. Disney responds in kind with a synergistic approach that makes it possible to experience Disney in any format at any given time. Primary readership will be academics, researchers, educators, scholars and students working in the fields of media and cultural studies, especially those interested in marketing and branding, and in the Disney Company in general. The accessible writing style and the range of topics covered make it suitable for postgraduate students and academics working in these fields, as well as third-year undergraduate students. The book will also appeal to academics working in the related fields of tourism studies, film and television studies and, given the focus of some of the chapters, in gender studies. Although academic in focus, the accessible writing style does mean that it may also have appeal to the non-academic reader and fans of Disney.

The noughties witnessed rapid change in Action Cinema, carrying with it the new action stars of the previous decade, and the boundary blurring experimentation of films such as The Matrix, that incorporated not only action but science fiction. The now dominant Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) debuted, and the Young Adult fictional worlds of Harry Potter and The Hunger Games further developed the scope of the action sequences. Despite this context, the action genre had still not engaged fully with contemporary social issues. Focusing on a less acknowledged period in Action Cinema history, Gender and Action Films: Road Warriors, Bombshells and Atomic Blondes examines specific action stars such as Michelle Rodriguez, Zhang Ziyi, and Pam Grier to analyse how female stars encounter the male gaze. Split into four parts – ‘Star Bodies’, ‘Transmedia Action’, ‘Intergenerational Action’ and ‘Politics and Race’, chapter authors prioritise female led action movies and champion a more meaningful interaction and representation between the action genre and contemporary issues of race, sexuality, and gender. Offering novel interpretations of depictions of gender within action movies, this edited collection demonstrates gender portrayal can be developed to incorporate meaningful representation in the wake of the movements such as #Oscarssowhite or #MeToo that have confronted Hollywood. The collection is a must-have for academics, students and lovers of film and media and those interested in gender studies.

A tweet by American actor and activist Alyssa Milano, sent on October 15, 2017, opened the floodgates to an outpouring of testimony and witnessing across the Twitterverse that reverberated throughout social media. Facebook status lines quickly began to read “Me too,� and #MeToo was trending. That tweet re-launched the ‘me too’ movement, which was started in 2006 by Tarana Burke. Performing #MeToo: How Not to Look Away does not attempt to deliver a comprehensive examination of how #MeToo is performed. What it does aim at presenting is a set of perspectives on the events identified as representative of the movement through a lens or lenses that are multinational, as well as work and analysis from a variety of time periods, written in a diversity of styles. By providing this means of engaging with examples of the many interpretations of and responses to the #MeToo movement, and by identifying these responses (and those of audiences) as provocations, of examples of how not to look away, the collected chapters are intended to invite reflection, discussion and, hopefully, incite action. It gives writers from diverse cultural and environmental contexts an opportunity to speak about this cultural moment in their own voices. There is a wide geographical range and variety of forms of performance addressed in this timely new book. The international group of contributors are based in the UK, USA, Australia, South Africa, Scotland, Canada, India, Italy and South Korea. The topics addressed by writers include socially engaged practice; celebrity feminism, archive and repertoire; rape/war; misogynistic speech; stage management and intimacy facilitation; key institutions’ responses; spatial practices as well as temporal ones; academic call-outs; caste/class; political contexts; adaptation of classic texts; activist events; bouffon (a clown technique) and audience response Forms of performance practice include applied theatre, performance protest, verbatim, solo performance, institutional practice, staging of plays, street responses, academic, adaptation of classic text, play reading events and the musical. Although there is much to read in the media and alternative media on the #MeToo movement, this is the first attempt to analyse the movement from and in such diverse contexts. Bringing together twelve writers to speak about works they have either performed, witnessed or studied gives the reader a nuanced way of looking at the movement and its impact. It is also an incredible archive of this moment in time that points to its importance.  Suitable for use in several graduate and undergraduate courses, including performance studies, feminist studies, sociology, psychology, anthropology, environmental or liberal studies and social history. Essential reading for theatre workers, academics, students, and anyone with an interest in feminism, contemporary theatre or human rights. For artists considering projects that include the themes of #MeToo, and for producers and directors of such projects looking for good practices around how to create environments of safety in their organizations, as well as those who wish to organize communities of artists. For anyone interested in learning more about how to support the movement, or an interest in the specific social narratives told in each individual chapter. For women, feminists and anyone with an interest in the issues.

Classical Rhetoric, the art of persuasion, formed the sum and substance of Shakespeare’s education and was the basis of his understanding of the power of language and how it worked to move, delight and teach. Rhetoric, which seeks to explain the way that language works to influence others, provides a powerful, transformative tool for approaching text in performance. This book helps you understand the key concepts of rhetoric. It gives clear explanations, stripped of jargon, and examples of rhetorical technique in the plays. It also provides engaging, practical exercises to unlock character and to identify themes in the plays through the lens of rhetoric. Academically rigorous, based on more than a decade of practical experience in the use of rhetoric in drama at the highest level, it is an ideal companion for anyone engaging with Shakespeare in performance.

The first of its kind, this companion to British-Jewish theatre brings a neglected dimension in the work of many prominent British theatre-makers to the fore. Its structure reflects the historical development of British-Jewish theatre from the 1950s onwards, beginning with an analysis of the first generation of writers that now forms the core of post-war British drama (including Tom Stoppard, Harold Pinter and Arnold Wesker) and moving on to significant thematic force-fields and faultlines such as the Holocaust, antisemitism and Israel/Palestine. The book also covers the new generation of British-Jewish playwrights, with a special emphasis on the contribution of women writers and the role of particular theatres in the development of British-Jewish theatre, as well as TV drama. Included in the book are fascinating interviews with a set of significant theatre practitioners working today, including Ryan Craig, Patrick Marber, John Nathan, Julia Pascal and Nicholas Hytner. The companion addresses, not only aesthetic and ideological concerns, but also recent transformations with regard to institutional contexts and frameworks of cultural policies.

Despite its rise in the global market, recent political progress, and a surging interest worldwide, Korean films are relatively unknown and rarely studied. This new work begins by investigating the history, industry structure, and trends of filmmaking in Korea, going on to examine how Hollywood films have affected both Korean mainstream and nonmainstream film industries in terms of both means of production and narrative. Moreover, the authors analyze the ways in which Korean films of recent years have represented the modernization process in Korea itself, as well as the ideological implications that arise from the cinematic constructions of Korean imagination.

More than a mere chronological account of Korean cinematic history, DEGREESIKorean Film DEGREESR attempts to consider the films as a popular cultural form that have a life beyond their theatrical runs: stars, genres, and key movies become part of any culture's identity, and in their narratives and meanings can be located evidence of the ways in which a culture makes sense of itself. Korea has never before been given such an extensive treatment of this central idea, and here for the first time, the nation's culture and cinema are merged into one discussion that both reflects and shapes our understanding of it.

This directory details the output of transcriptions from the Armed Forces Radio Service from the beginning in 1942 up to 1967. Since many official papers of the early days are no longer available, the information was gathered from many private sources. The range of programs the AFRS covered was immense. Particularly during the war years the accent was on entertainment. Popular and classical music and comedy and drama shows were rebroadcast over AFRS stations all over the world. The AFRS also produced many programs designed to inform and educate. This directory attempts to present the complete range of series the AFRS transmitted.

Collectors and followers of popular, country or series music and of drama or comedy shows will appreciate the short description of the AFRS shows, complete with cast names and issues and recording dates, that comprise the entries. The entries are organized by series and include the Libraries series, H-Series, Network Series, R-Series, and Assigned Matrix Numbers. An appendix of non-AFRS transcriptions is included along with a bibliography for further research.

Game of Thrones was an international sensation, and has been looked at from many different angles. But to date there has been little research into its audiences: who they were, how they engaged with and responded to it. This book presents the findings of a major international research project that garnered more than 10,000 responses to an innovative 'qualiquantitative' questionnaire. Among its findings are: a new way of understanding the place and role of favourite characters in audiences’ responses; new insights into the role of fantasy in encouraging thinking about our own world; and an account of two combined emotions – relish and anguish – which structure audiences’ reactions to controversial elements in the series. -- .

National Portrait Gallery: The Collection is published to celebrate the reopening of the Gallery after a three-year redevelopment project. Designed by Daniela Rocha, this engaging and inviting book takes the reader on a chronological journey through Britain’s history in portraiture, from the Tudors to Now, featuring the country’s most impactful and famous individuals, from Queen Elizabeth I to Mary Seacole, and Virginia Woolf to David Bowie. The book is richly illustrated with beautiful paintings, photographs, sculptures, drawings and digital works. Readers will enjoy a selection of the most popular and recognisable portraits from the Collection, accompanied by short chapter introductions that introduce key historical periods, their most exciting figures, and their most important historical, political, social and cultural moments. This accessible structure allows the reader to dip into any of the beautiful portraits and their stories, and understand their place in British history. An Introduction by Director Dr. Nicholas Cullinan will highlight why portraiture has been fundamental to people and society historically, but also to contemporary audiences, by exploring themes of culture, identity and the representation of diversity. This will also introduce readers to the nation’s newly-reopened National Portrait Gallery, explaining how it came to be the nation’s home of portraits and the world’s most significant Collection of people.

The 1st of the 24 Marvel Cinematic Universe Infinity Saga film titles being published as a complete set. This fully illustrated tome treats fans to a comprehensive, unique and privileged behind-the-scenes look at the creative process behind the state-of-the-art technology used in the blockbuster motion picture. Follow the film’s complete artistic evolution, from initial concept through armor design and on to the final rendering seen on screen. Here is everything you need to know about the making of the movie from all the key players – including director Jon Favreau; the special-effects gurus at Stan Winston Studios; and the award-winning concept illustrators, visual-effects designers and storyboard artists who worked on the set and behind the scenes to create the art of Iron Man.