In this second edition of Investing in Movies, industry veteran Joseph N. Cohen provides investors and producers with an analytical framework to assess the opportunities and pitfalls of film investments. The book traces macroeconomic trends and the globalization of the business, including the rise of streamers, as well as the impact these have on potential returns. It offers a broad range of guidelines on how to source interesting projects and advice on what kinds of projects to avoid, as well as numerous ways to maximize risk-adjusted returns. While focusing primarily on investments in independent films, Cohen also provides valuable insights into the studio and independent slate deals that have been marketed to the institutional investment community. As well, this new edition has been updated to fully optimize the current film industry climate including brand new chapters on the Chinese film market, new media/streaming services, and the effects of COVID-19 on the global film market. Written in a detailed and approachable manner, this book is essential for students and aspiring professionals looking to gain an insider perspective against the minefield of film investing.

HUMOR IS AN INTEGRAL PART OF BRITISH LIFE AND LITERATURE
In "The Screwtape Letters, " C.S. Lewis's title character observes that Jokes and Flippancy are valued so highly by the English, "who take their 'sense of humour' so seriously that a deficiency in this sense is almost the only deficiency at which they feel shame." J.B. Priestly, too, in a related observation comments: "It is curious that so few foreigners have noticed that we English are a humorous race....In no other country will you hear so much talk about a sense of humour."
COVERS HUMOROUS LITERATURE FROM MEDIEVAL TO MODERN TIMES
Now for the first time, a comprehensive and up-to-date reference work tackles the subject of humor as it has been expressed in British literature, from "Beowulf" to the present. The 206 signed original essays represent the work of 119 scholars from seven countries and diverse disciplines. Major literary figures such as Jonathan Swift, Oscar Wilde, G.B. Shaw, and Noel Coward are included, as well as lesser known lights such as Francis Beaumont, Stella Gibbons, and George Du Maurier. Readers may be surprised to learn that other literary luminaries such as W.H. Auden, Winston Churchill, Samuel Johnson, and Edith Sitwell have also produced humorous writings.
ANALYZES LITERARY AND COMIC TECHNIQUES
The most important feature of the essays is their literary analysis, which provides an overview of the author's writings, as well as in-depth analyses of comic techniques in the subject's major works. A biography helps place the writer in historical context, providing such information as the place and date of birth, education, honors and achievements, marital status, and place and date of death. In addition to the signed essays, the "Encyclopedia" includes a preface, a chronological index, a list of pseudonyms, an introduction, a list of the contributors, and an index.

The Unofficial Ultimate Harry Potter Spellbook is a beautiful, elegantly designed reference that details all of the known spells cast in the Harry Potter films, books, video games and card games, as well as official Harry Potter spinoffs, such as Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. Each spell is given its own entry including spell name, pronunciation details, a description of the spell effect, spell casting methods, wand movements, hand movements and vocalizations, plus primary sources in which the spell was used. Readers will also find trivia related to each spell, such as who it was used against, what the outcome was, or what a spell's unusual history might be.

"Cruelty and Civilization" offers an in-depth look at the Roman games as a force vital to the functioning of an Empire. Gladiatorial combats, chariot races and other spectacles were a kind of public opiate for the citizens of Ancient Rome. These rites gave rhythm and excitement to daily life in the Empire. From one year to the next, the Roman citizen lived in anticipation of the next games; through them he was able to forget the mediocrity of his own condition as well as his political enslavement. The most minutely organized productions were staged at vast expense, and Rome developed cults for arena champions, who were simultaneously idols and outcasts, doomed to a bloody death.
Roland Auguet not only reconstructs in detail the conduct of these spectacles (gladiatorial combats, the sacrifice of prisoners to wild beasts, the chariot races, the combats between man and beast or beast and beast), but also analyzes the feelings of the crowd and the calculations ofits rulers. He explains why the games dominated the life of the city. Examining the games in the context of a broader study of Roman customs, this book provides a synthesized view of how Roman civilization was to a large degree based on the games.

Enter the thrilling world of Transformers: War for Cybertron Trilogy with this deluxe making-of art book. The fate of Cybertron lies in the hands of the Autobots in this gripping new animated series. The Art and Making of Transformers: War For Cybertron Trilogy provides an incredible behind-the-scenes look at the conception of this exhilarating new story and gives readers insight into the exacting character design that brought the Autobots, Decepticons, Maximals, and Predacons to life. Featuring hundreds of pieces of gorgeous concept art, this deluxe hardcover shows the painstaking detail that went into the creation of the technological world of Cybertron, the vastness of space, and the wilderness of prehistoric Earth. With stunning imagery and exclusive interviews with the show's creators, producers, artists, voice actors, and more, this book will provide the ultimate look into the crafting of the action-packed series.

In Victorian society--rigidly stratified by both income and occupation--performers were drawn from various class backgrounds and enjoyed a unique degree of social mobility. Nevertheless, the living and working conditions of female performers were distinctly different from their male counterparts: fully justifying in social, economic, and gender terms the semantic distinction "actress."
"Actresses as Working Women" utilizes the methodologies of a number of disciplines--labor history, historical demography, sociology, performance analysis, and literary theory--and a vast amount of primary evidence to investigate actresses' separate and equivocal status. Their segregation and marginalization guaranteed economic insecurity. Their attempts to reconcile sexuality and the female life cycle to a physically demanding, itinerant occupation while under constant public scutiny led to assumptions about their morality that were difficult to overcome. Performance conventions--in both theatre and music hall traditions--that reflected popular pornographic images reinforced this stigma, which was documented in contemporaneous erotic literature and the male-controlled culture of vice that permeated theatrical neighborhoods.
One of the first in-depth feminist studies of the history of theatre, "Actresses as Working Women" brings a fresh perspective and voluminous evidence to bear on the study of nineteenth-century theatre.

`Every day we put fire and swords and electricity into our bodies, throw knives at them, contort them, wrap them in snakes, and every day we wake up sure those things won't harm us but also sure that there is so much else that will.'When her mother had a series of strokes, Tessa Fontaine couldn't stand to watch her mother disappear. The Electric Woman tells Tessa's story of joining America's last travelling freak show, and learning to perform death-defying acts in order to come to terms with her mother's illness. In her life-affirming memoir, Tessa finds hope and companionship among sword swallowers and snake charmers.

An illuminating new study of modern Polish verse in performance, offering a major reassessment of the roles of poets and poetry in twentieth-century Polish culture. What's in a voice? Why record oneself reading a poem that also exists on paper? In recent decades, scholars have sought to answer these questions, giving due credit to the art of poetry performance in the anglophone world. Now Aleksandra Kremer trains a sharp ear on modern Polish poetry, assessing the rising importance of authorial sound recordings during the tumultuous twentieth century in Eastern Europe. Kremer traces the adoption by key Polish poets of performance practices intimately tied to new media. In Polish hands, tape recording became something different from what it had been in the West, shaped by its distinctive origins behind the Iron Curtain. The Sound of Modern Polish Poetry reconstructs the historical conditions, audio technologies, and personal motivations that informed poetic performances by such luminaries as Czeslaw Milosz, Wislawa Szymborska, Aleksander Wat, Zbigniew Herbert, Miron Bialoszewski, Anna Swir, and Tadeusz Rozewicz. Through performances both public and private, prepared and improvised, professional and amateur, these poets tested the possibilities of the physical voice and introduced new poetic practices, reading styles, and genres to the Polish literary scene. Recording became, for these artists, a means of announcing their ambiguous place between worlds. Kremer's is a work of criticism as well as recovery, deploying speech-analysis software to shed light on forgotten audio experiments-from poetic "sound postcards," to unusual home performances, to the final testaments of writer-performers. Collectively, their voices reveal new aesthetics of poetry reading and novel concepts of the poetic self.

This pioneering work equips you with the skills needed to create and design powerful stories and concepts for interactive, digital, multi-platform storytelling and experience design that will take audience engagement to the next level. Klaus Sommer Paulsen presents a bold new vision of what storytelling can become if it is reinvented as an audience-centric design method. His practices unlock new ways of combining story with experience for a variety of existing, new and upcoming platforms. Merging theory and practice, storytelling and design principles, this innovative toolkit instructs the next generation of creators on how to successfully balance narratives, design and digital innovation to develop strategies and concepts that both apply and transcend current technology. Packed with theory and exercises intended to unlock new narrative dimensions, Integrated Storytelling by Design is a must-read for creative professionals looking to shape the future of themed, branded and immersive experiences.

Each story in this collection begins with an undesirable or out-of-balance situation and, through the use of metaphor and an imaginative story journey, leads to a more desirable resolution. In this way, the stories also have the potential for nurturing positive values. The stories cover many kinds of universal behaviour. Following the alphabet from A to Z, the behaviour is identified in the story title e.g. anxious, bossy, cranky ... greedy ... jealous ... lazy ... swearing ... uncooperative ... and more. The stories can be told directly, or adapted. They can be turned into home-made picture books and puppet shows, or used as springboards for the creation of new tales for particular behaviour challenges and situations.

Victor Perez brings together the research and expertise of world-leading color scientists, to create a comprehensive guide for VFX Artists in Color Management. The book explores the latest standards of HDR and ACES workflows, in an easily digestible and widely applicable resource. Its purpose is to make artists confident and familiar with Color Management and its science, to improve the quality of visual effects worldwide. Without assuming any previous knowledge, this self-contained book builds the readers understanding from the ground up, exploring all the elements of the Color Workflow at a scientific level. It covers how to setup a consistent pipeline in relation to other departments, inside and outside visual effects, from camera to screen, so everybody is aligned to the same standards, preserving color qualities, consistency, and maintaining the artistic intent end to end. It also delves into all the integral concepts for color management, ranging from Color Theory to Digital Image Fundamentals, and much more. This book is an invaluable resource for VFX students and professionals who want to be well-informed of the latest HDR and ACES pipelines, as well as those at every level of production, wishing to gain a deeper understanding of managing color in visual effects projects.

Now in its tenth edition, the Audio Production Worktext offers a comprehensive introduction to audio production in radio, television, and film. This hands-on, student-friendly text demonstrates how to navigate modern radio production studios and utilize the latest equipment and software. Key chapters address production planning, the use of microphones, audio consoles, and sound production for the visual media. The reader is shown the reality of audio production both within the studio and on location. New to this edition is material covering podcasting, including online storage and distribution. The new edition also includes an updated glossary and appendix on analog and original digital applications, as well as self-study questions and projects that students can use to further enhance their learning. The accompanying instructor website has been refreshed and includes an instructor's manual and PowerPoint images. This book remains an essential text for audio and media production students seeking a thorough introduction to the field.

First published in 1982. The intent of this book is to build an understanding of the people who create humor and are expert at making people laugh. Who are the comedians and clowns of the world? Where do they come from? Why are they so dedicated to tickling funny bones? In what ways are they unique? It is primarily to studying comedians, clowns, and other funny people. It seeks to provide an understanding of the origins, the motivations, and personalities of those who make humor and in exploring the factors that shape actors and other public entertainers.

Tom Piazza's sharp intelligence, insight, and passion fuel this new collection of writings on music, literature, New Orleans, and America itself in desperate times.

For his first book since his award-winning novel City of Refuge and his stunning and influential post-Katrina polemic Why New Orleans Matters, Piazza selects the best of his writings on American roots music and musicians, including his Grammy-winning album notes for Martin Scorsese Presents: The Blues; his classic profile of bluegrass legend Jimmy Martin; essays on Jimmie Rodgers, Charley Patton, and Bob Dylan; and much more.

In the book's second section, Piazza turns his attention to literature, politics, and post-Katrina America in articles and essays on subjects ranging from Charlie Chan movies to the life and work of Norman Mailer, from the New Orleans housing crisis to the BP oil spill, from Jelly Roll Morton's Library of Congress recordings to the future of books. The third and final section delivers a startlingly original meditation on fiction, sentimentality, and cynicism--a major new essay from this brilliant, unpredictable, and absolutely necessary writer.

This book Takes insights from screenwriting to revolutionize our understanding of exhibition curating. Focuses on how despite all genuine efforts to reach broader audiences, museums persistently fear to risk credibility by becoming 'too popular'. Explores the enormous potential to learn from other storytelling forms which are more experienced in the field of entertainment. Offers a comparative in-depth analysis of three classical Hollywood films and three cultural historical exhibitions demonstrates how dramatic suspense techniques can be applied to exhibitions. addresses academics and students in the fields of museum studies, gallery studies, and heritage studies interested in how exhibitions function and in how to achieve dramaturgical effects like suspense.

Focusing on Disney's production of Shanghai Disneyland, this book examines how the Chinese state and the local market influence Disney's ownership and production of the identities and the representations of Shanghai Disneyland. Qualitative methods are here applied to combine both primary and secondary data, including document analysis, participant observation, and in-depth interviews. Shanghai Disneyland is purposely created to be different from the other Disneylands, under the "authentically Disney and distinctly Chinese" mandate. In order to survive and thrive in China, Disney carefully constructs Shanghai Disneyland as Disneyland with Chinese characteristics. Previous studies tend to link Disney with cultural imperialism; however, this book argues that it is not imperialism but glocalization that promotes a global company's interests in China. In particular, the findings suggest state-capital-led glocalization: glocalization led by economic capital of the state (direct investment) and economic capital with the state (market potential). Furthermore, the four categories of glocalization with different conditions, considerations, and consequences illustrate various global-local dynamics in the process of a global formation of locality. The Glocalization of Shanghai Disneyland will appeal to students and scholars of sociology, communication studies, business studies, and Asian studies more broadly.

Rob Ryder made that pledge to his wife, and he was determined to stick to it. As technical consultant on blockbuster sports films, he had seen up close how the film business works and what kind of chaos can, and usually does, ensue. And now he was ready to take it on!

"Hollywood Jock" is the suspenseful, dramatic, outrageous, and honest true story of the year when Rob Ryder, screenwriter, laid it all on the line -- and kicked, scratched, wheeled, dealed, and fought like hell to hit the Tinseltown big time. It is a chronicle of schmoozing producers, shopping screenplays, corralling sports legends, and dodging irate actors -- a fascinating perspective on the highs, the very lows, and the behind-the-scenes madness that makes the world of Hollywood so endlessly compelling . . . and infamously brutal.

Today's successful cinematographer must be equal parts artist, technician, and business-person. The cinematographer needs to master the arts of lighting, composition, framing and other aesthetic considerations, as well as the technology of digital cameras, recorders, and workflows, and must know how to choose the right tools (within their budget) to get the job done. David Stump's Digital Cinematography focuses on the tools and technology of the trade, looking at how digital cameras work, the ramifications of choosing one camera versus another, and how those choices help creative cinematographers to tell a story. This book empowers the reader to correctly choose the appropriate camera and workflow for their project from today's incredibly varied options, as well as understand the ins and outs of implementing those options. Veteran ASC cinematographer David Stump has updated this edition with the latest technology for cameras, lenses, and recorders, as well as included a new section on future cinematographic trends. Ideal for advanced cinematography students as well as working professionals looking for a resource to stay on top of the latest trends, this book is a must read.

This book delves into the notion of intimacy as a defining feature of podcasting, examining the concept of intimacy itself and how the public sphere explores the relationships created and maintained through podcasts The book situates textual analysis of specific American podcasts within podcast criticism, monetization, and production advice Through analysis of these sources' self-descriptions, the text builds a podcasting-specific framework for intimacy and uses that framework to interpret how podcasting imagines the connections it forms within communities Instead of intimacy being inherent, the book argues that podcasting constructs intimacy and uses it to define the quality of its own mediation This book will be of interest to scholars and students of New and Digital Media, Media Studies, Communication Studies, Journalism, Literature, Cultural Studies, and American Studies

This volume features a set of thought-provoking and long overdue approaches to situating Stanley Kubrick's films in contemporary debates around gender, race, and age - with a focus on women's representations Offering new historical and critical perspectives on Kubrick's cinema, the book asks how his work should be viewed bearing in mind issues of gender equality, sexual harassment, and abuse The authors tackle issues such as Kubrick's at times questionable relationships with his actresses and former wives, the dynamics of power, misogyny and miscegenation in his films, and auteur 'apologism', among others The selection discusses these complex issues in Kubrick's work by drawing on archival sources, engaging in close readings of specific films, and exploring Kubrick through unorthodox venture points With an interdisciplinary scope and social justice-centered focus, this book offers new perspectives on a well-established area of study It will appeal to scholars and upper-level students of film studies, media studies, gender studies, and visual culture, as well as to fans of Stanley Kubrick's cinema interested in revisiting his work with a new perspective

'Piercingly honest... witty... wonderful' - The Observer 'My favourite way to learn is when a funny, clever, honest person is teaching me - that's why I love Rosie Wilby!' - Sara Pascoe 'Funny, sweet, entertaining, insightful, life-affirming...' - Viv Groskop 'Hilarious, honest and brilliant' - Helen Thorne 'Rosie Wilby unearths the hope and hilarity that can come from heartbreak' - Abigail Tarttelin In 2011, comedian and podcaster Rosie Wilby was dumped by email... though she did feel a little better about it after correcting her ex's spelling and punctuation. Obsessing about breakups ever since, she embarked on a quest to investigate, understand and conquer the psychology of heartbreak. This book is a love letter to her breakups, a celebration of what they have taught her peppered with anecdotes from illustrious friends and interviews with relationship therapists, scientists and sociologists about separating in the modern age of ghosting, breadcrumbing and conscious uncoupling. Mixing humour, memoir and science, she attempts to assimilate their advice and ideas in order to not break up with Girlfriend, her partner of nearly three years. Will this self-confessed serial monogamist, and breakup addict, finally settle down?