Here, extracts from diaries, memoirs, private letters, obituaries and other rare ephemera are drawn together to build a contemporary account of the acting achievements and personal lives of three inspiring figures from the late 19th-century theatre; Herbert Beerbohm Tree, Henry Irving and Ellen Terry.

Hollywood's first sex symbol, the ' It ' girl, Clara Bow was born in the slums of Brooklyn in a family plagued with alcoholism and insanity. She catapulted to fame after winning Motion Picture magazine's 1921 " Fame and Fortune" contest. The greatest box-office draw of her day-she once received 45,000 fan letters in a single month, Clara Bow's on screen vitality and allure that beguiled thousands, however, would be her undoing off-camera. David Stenn captures her legendary rise to stardom and fall from grace, her success marred by studio exploitation and sexual scandals.

Most people agree that witnessing a live performance is not the same as seeing it on screen; however, most of the performances we experience are in recorded forms. Some aver that the recorded form of a performance necessarily distorts it or betrays it, focusing on the relationship between the original event and its recorded versions. By contrast, Reactivations focuses on how the audience experiences the performance, as opposed to its documentation. How does a spectator access and experience a performance from its documentation? What is the value of performance documentation? The book treats performance documentation as a specific discursive use of media that arose in the middle of the 20th century alongside such forms of performance as the Happening and that is different, both discursively and as a practice, from traditional theater and dance photography. Philip Auslander explores the phenomenal relationship between the spectator who experiences the performance from the document and the document itself. The document is not merely a secondary iteration of the original event but a vehicle that gives us meaningful access to the performance itself as an artistic work.

Entertainment Weekly's BIG FALL BOOKS PREVIEW Selection Best Book of 2019 -- Publisher's Weekly Based on new and revelatory material from Brando's own private archives, an award-winning film biographer presents a deeply-textured, ambitious, and definitive portrait of the greatest movie actor of the twentieth century, the elusive Marlon Brando, bringing his extraordinarily complex life into view as never before. The most influential movie actor of his era, Marlon Brando changed the way other actors perceived their craft. His approach was natural, honest, and deeply personal, resulting in performances-most notably in A Streetcar Named Desire and On the Waterfront-that are without parallel. Brando was heralded as the American Hamlet-the Yank who surpassed British stage royalty Laurence Olivier, John Gielgud, and Ralph Richardson as the standard of greatness in the mid-twentieth century. Brando's impact on American culture matches his professional significance; he both challenged and codified our ideas of masculinity and sexuality. Brando was also one of the first stars to use his fame as a platform to address social, political, and moral issues, courageously calling out America's deeply rooted racism. William Mann's brilliant biography of the Hollywood legend illuminates this culture icon for a new age. Mann astutely argues that Brando was not only a great actor but also a cultural soothsayer, a Cassandra warning us about the challenges to come. Brando's admonitions against the monetization of nearly every aspect of the culture were prescient. His public protests against racial segregation and discrimination at the height of the Civil Rights movement-getting himself arrested at least once-were criticized as being needlessly provocative. Yet those actions of fifty years ago have become a model many actors follow today. Psychologically astute and masterfully researched, based on new and revelatory material, The Contender explores the star and the man in full, including the childhood traumas that reverberated through his professional and personal life. It is a dazzling biography of our nation's greatest actor that is sure to become an instant classic. The Contender includes sixteen pages of photographs.

You had to decide to let yourself be turned upside down, you had to accept to see the idea you had forged about yourself progressively shatter. In the summer of 1969, at 19 years old, Didier Mouturat gave up on college, shattering his parents hopes that he follow a safe and conventional course. Fresh from the wild Parisian student revolt of 1968, with its street battles and slogans, he set out to find a life that would be truly alive, deciding to be a classical actor. When he met Cyrille Dives, however, the universe of masks quietly turned his world upside down. This book describes Mouturats apprenticeship to a unique theater artist. In the 1970s and early 80s, Dives created a theater of masks, a Western parallel to Japanese Noh. Dives was a true bohemian artist, a sculptor of masks, a painter and theatrical director. Cyrille Dives was also a spiritual master. Mouturats apprenticeship encompassed everything from walking in a way that brings a mask to life to cultivating a beginners mind. Slowly and subtly, the theater apprenticeship became an encounter with the deeper truth of his own being. I am speaking of an intimate, progressive discovery that we are not masters of our own being that it is only the result of a system of reactions that tyrannize us. Mouturat becomes Divess right-hand man, helping establish a theater and a school of masks. That work is evident here in enchanting illustrations, as well as words. Yet as translated by the scholar and author Roger Lipsey, Mouturat also offers a pithy chronicle of a search for meaning and inner being.

Josef von Sternberg's 1930 film The Blue Angel (Der blaue Engel) is among the best known films of the Weimar Republic (1919-1933). A significant landmark as one of Germany's first major sound films, it is known primarily for launching Marlene Dietrich into Hollywood stardom and for initiating the mythic pairing of the Austrian-born American director von Sternberg with the star performer Dietrich. This fascinating cultural history of The Blue Angel provides a new interpretive framework with which to approach this classic Weimar film and suggests that discourses on mass and high culture are integral to the film's thematic and narrative structure. These discourses surface above all in the relationship between the two main characters, the cabaret entertainer Lola Lola (Marlene Dietrich) and the high school teacher Immanuel Rath (one-time Oscar winner Emil Jannings). In addition to offering insight into some of the major debates that informed the Weimar Republic, this book demonstrates that similar issues continue to shape the contemporary cultural landscape of Germany. Barbara Kosta thus also looks at Dietrich as a contemporary cultural icon and at her symbolic value since German unification and at Lola Lola's various "incarnations."

Characters are central to our experiences of screened fictions and invite a host of questions. The contributors to Screening Characters draw on archival material, interviews, philosophical inquiry, and conceptual analysis in order to give new, thought-provoking answers to these queries. Providing multifaceted accounts of the nature of screen characters, contributions are organized around a series of important subjects, including issues of class, race, ethics, and generic types as they are encountered in moving image media. These topics, in turn, are personified by such memorable figures as Cary Grant, Jon Hamm, Audrey Hepburn, and Seul-gi Kim, in addition to avatars, online personalities, animated characters, and the ensembles of shows such as The Sopranos, Mad Men, and Breaking Bad.

THE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER Funny and outspoken, Rylan is one of the UK's most-loved presenters and a true household name. Rylan first emerged on our screens in September 2012 and in the ten years since then has become a one-of-a-kind national treasure. In this brand-new memoir, Rylan invites us deeper into his world to reflect on all the things he's learnt from a decade in the limelight, whilst also pulling back the curtain on his personal journey. Covering everything from fame and celebrity to his mental health and identity, family and relationships to his love of reality TV, he recounts his life lessons with humour, candour and a huge amount of heart. From the moments that have shaped him to the mistakes that have made him, and the unusual pastimes that have obsessed him along the way. With unforgettable stories about his rise to fame, his biggest regrets and his special bond with his beloved mum, TEN: The decade that changed my future is as warm and honest, enormously entertaining and full of surprises as its brilliant Sunday Times bestselling author. This is Rylan as you've never seen him before - an intimate, fascinating and joyful insight into an extraordinary ten years on the telly and in our hearts.

Stan Lai (Lai Shengchuan) is one of the most celebrated theatre practitioners working in the Chinese-speaking world. His work over three decades has pioneered the course of modern Chinese language theatre in Taiwan, China, and other Chinese speaking regions. ""The preeminent Chinese playwright and stage director of this generation."" (China Daily) ""The best Chinese language playwright and director in the world."" (BBC) Lai's works include masterpieces of the modern Chinese language theatre like Secret Love in Peach Blossom Land, The Village, and his epic 8 hour A Dream Like A Dream, all of which are in this collection. These volumes feature works from across Lai's career, providing an exceptional selection of a diverse range of performances. Volume One contains: Secret Love in Peach Blossom Land Look Who's Crosstalking Tonight The Island and the Other Shore I Me She Him Menage a 13

The first full length academic study of Hepburn's star persona and films featuring reseach into the experience of British women who have admired her in the 1950s, 1960s and the 1990s. Examines the historical specificity of discourses of feminity circulating around Hepburn and her female fans, suggesting that the flexibility of Hepburn's image has contributed to her enduring appeal. Makes a significant contribution to the growing field of star studies. Argues that class and gender are siginifcant factors in the relatonship between stars and audiences. -- .

The first volume to examine the iconic Elizabeth Taylor in this light, Elizabeth Taylor: A Private Life for Public Consumption paints Taylor as the seminal representation of "celebrity." A figure of enormous charisma and cultural sway, she intrigued a global audience with her marriages and extra-marital improprieties, as well as her extravagant jewelry, her never-ending illnesses, her dependency on alcohol, and her perplexing friendship with Michael Jackson. Despite her continued world-renown, however, most people would be hard-pressed to name even three of her films, though she made over seventy. Ellis Cashmore traces our modern, hyperactive celebrity culture back to a single instant in Taylor's life: the publicizing of her scandalous affair with Richard Burton by photographer Marcelo Geppetti in 1962, which announced the arrival of a new generation of predatory photojournalists and, along with them, a strange conflation between the public and private lives of celebrities. Taylor's life and public reception, Cashmore reveals, epitomizes the modern phenomenon of "celebrity."

This title offers a unique opportunity to view the creation of Shakespeare's after-life and reputation through the works of his major theatrical interpreters. This facsimile edition is backed up by full scholarly apparatus and will appeal to those undertaking research in Shakespearian Studies, Nineteenth-Century Studies and the History of the Theatre and Performance.

Beginning with the early Arab-American playwright, poet and novelist Kahlil Gibran and concluding with contemporary playwright Yussef El Guindi, this book provides an historical overview and critical analysis of the plays, films and performances of self-identified Arab Americans. Arab-American identity, self-representation and the notion of resistance literature in these works are addressed. Playwrights, performers and filmmakers covered include Ameen Fares Rihani, Danny Thomas, Heather Raffo, Ahmed Ahmed, Mona Mansour and Cherien Dabis. These artists, traditionally underrepresented in entertainment, publishing and academia, have created works that exemplify the burgeoning Arab-American arts movement. By addressing cinema, stand-up comedy and solo performance, the author introduces audiences to contemporary genres that are currently shaping Arab American culture in the U.S.

Cindy Williams, half of the comedic duo of Laverne & Shirley, has had a wild and lively career in show business. This book is an engaging and heartfelt journey from Williams's blue collar roots to unexpected stardom-from being pranked by Jim Morrison while waiting tables at Whisky a Go Go to starring in one of the most iconic shows on television. With wit and candor, Cindy tells stories of her struggles as a child growing up with meager means and dreaming of becoming an actress. She also shares many misadventures and amusing anecdotes about some of the most famous actors in Hollywood. Never taking herself too seriously, Cindy finds humor and irony in the challenging world of show business.

Anna May Wong was an extraordinary Asian American woman who became the country's most famous film actress of Chinese descent. From small parts in silent films to starring roles in Hollywood and across the Atlantic, Wong made an impression on audiences of all persuasions. In Perpetually Cool, Anthony Chan takes the reader on a compelling journey through Wong's early years in Los Angeles and her first Hollywood pictures. Chan also examines the scope and nature of race, gender, and power and their impact on Wong's personal growth as a Chinese American. Perpetually Cool is not only the captivating story of a cinematic career, but also of roots and identity, as it recounts Wong's desire to connect with her heritage in the United States and in China. Chan provides extensive textual analyses of Wong's signature films, especially The Toll of the Sea (1922), The Thief of Bagdad (1924) with Douglas Fairbanks, and her most famous role as Hui Fei in Shanghai Express (1932), opposite Marlene Dietrich. Perpetually Cool is a fitting tribute to the influence of this Chinese American icon.

In the first book-length study of the work and legacy of West End actor-manager George Alexander since the 1930s, George Alexander and the Work of the Actor Manager examines the key part this figure played in presenting new drama by authors including Oscar Wilde and Henry James. The book sheds new light on the figure of the actor-manager, assessing in detail the influence of Alexander within and beyond his time. At the St. James's Theatre in London between 1891 and 1918, through a range of strategies including the support of new writers, and adaptation of fiction to the stage, Alexander sustained professional status through practices that continue to be reflected in the cultural industries today. A range of evidence is employed including production reviews, anecdotal accounts, financial records, and personal correspondence, to reveal how he operated as a business entrepreneur as well as an artistic innovator.

This critical and inclusive edited collection offers an overview of the musical in relation to issues of race, culture and identity. Bringing together contributions from cultural, American and theatre studies for the first time, the chapters offer fresh perspectives on musical theatre history, calling for a radical and inclusive new approach. By questioning ideas about what the musical is about and who it for, this groundbreaking book retells the story of the musical, prioritising previously neglected voices to reshape our understanding of the form. Timely and engaging, this is required reading for undergraduate and postgraduate students of musical theatre. It offers an intersectional approach which will also be invaluable for theatre practitioners.

David Rothenberg's multilayered life thrust him into Broadway's brightest lights prison riots political campaigns civil rights sit-ins and a Central American civil war. In his memoir EFortune in My EyesE his journey includes many of the most celebrated names in the theater: Richard Burton Elizabeth Taylor Bette Davis Sir John Gielgud Peggy Lee Alvin Ailey Lauren Bacall Christine Ebersole and numerous others.THHe produced an Off-Broadway prison drama EFortune and Men's EyesE which reshaped his life. John Herbert's chilling play led directly to the creation of the Fortune Society which has evolved into one of the nation's most formidable advocacy and service organizations in criminal justice.THRothenberg was Elizabeth Taylor's opening night date at the Richard Burton Hamlet a a distant cry from his entering Attica prison during that institution's famed inmate uprising; these are just two of the experiences revealed in this memoir. As a theater publicist and producer a and as a social activist a he shares experiences with politicians and with anonymous men and women out of prison who have fought to reclaim their lives. The human drama of the formerly incarcerated that unfolds in this book is a match for many of the entertainment world's most fabled characters.

Features actors who were significant in their development of new and innovative ways of performing Shakespeare. This title contains extracts from diaries, memoirs, private letters, and obituaries that present a contemporary account of their acting achievements and personal lives.

Erin Osmon presents a detailed, human account of the Rust Belt-born musician Jason Molina-a visionary, prolific, and at times cantankerous singer-songwriter with an autodidactic style that captivated his devoted fans. The songwriting giant behind the bands Songs: Ohia and Magnolia Electric Co. had a knack for spinning tales, from the many personal myths he cultivated throughout his life to the poems and ballads he penned and performed. As with too many great musicians, Molina's complicated relationship with the truth, combined with a secretive relationship with the bottle, ultimately claimed his life. With a new foreword from singer-songwriter Will Johnson, Jason Molina: Riding with the Ghost details Molina's personal trials and triumphs and reveals for the first time the true story of Molina's last months and works, including an unpublished album unknown to many of his fans. Offering unfettered access to the mind and artistry of Molina through exclusive interviews with family, friends, and collaborators, the book also explores the Midwest music underground and the development of Bloomington, Indiana-based label Secretly Canadian. As the first authorized and detailed account of this prolific songwriter and self-mythologizer, Jason Molina provides readers with unparalleled insight into Molina's tormented life and the fascinating Midwest musical underground that birthed him. It's a story for the ages that speaks volumes to the triumphs and trials of the artistic spirit while exploring the meaningful music that Molina's creative genius left behind.

'Darkly comic, beautifully written and full of surprises' Daily Mail 'Really funny. David is a great writer' Paula Hawkins, Good Housekeeping 'A riotously good novel, witty and earnest, brimming with sharply drawn characters and creeping suspense. David Thewlis is a fabulous writer' Anna Bailey, Sunday Times bestselling author of Tall Bones 'A deliciously smart, hilarious human drama with the pace and intrigue of a gripping thriller. One of the year's most memorable novels' B P Walter, Sunday Times bestselling author of The Dinner Guest Celebrated director Jack Drake can't get through his latest film (his most personal yet) without his wife Martha's support. The only problem is, she's dead... When Jack sees Betty Dean - actress, mother, trainwreck - playing the part of a crazed nun on stage in an indie production of The Devils, he is struck dumb by her resemblance to Martha. Desperate to find a way to complete his masterpiece, he hires her to go and stay in his house in France and resuscitate Martha in the role of 'loving spouse'. But as Betty spends her days roaming the large, sunlit rooms of Jack's mansion - filled to the brim with odd treasures and the occasional crucifix - and her evenings playing the part of Martha over scripted video calls with Jack, she finds her method acting taking her to increasingly dark places. And as Martha comes back to life, she carries with her the truth about her suicide - and the secret she guarded until the end. A darkly funny novel set between a London film set and a villa in the south of France. A mix of Vertigo and Jonathan Coe, written by a master storyteller. PRAISE FOR DAVID THEWLIS'S FICTION 'David Thewlis has written an extraordinarily good novel, which is not only brilliant in its own right, but stands proudly beside his work as an actor, no mean boast' Billy Connolly 'Hilarious and horror-filled' Francesca Segal, Observer 'A fine study in character disintegration... Very funny' David Baddiel, The Times 'Exquisitely written with a warm heart and a wry wit... Stunning' Elle 'Queasily entertaining' Financial Times 'A sharp ear for dialogue and a scabrously satiric prose style' Daily Mail 'Laugh-out-loud, darkly intelligent' Publishers Weekly 'This is far more than an actor's vanity project: Thewlis has talent' Kirkus

In Do You Remember? Celebrating Fifty Years of Earth, Wind & Fire, Trenton Bailey traces the humble beginning of Maurice White, his development as a musician, and his formation of Earth, Wind & Fire, a band that became a global phenomenon during the 1970s. By the early 1980s, the music industry was changing, and White had grown weary after working constantly for more than a decade. He decided to put the band on hiatus for more than three years. The band made a comeback in 1987, but White's health crisis soon forced them to tour without him. During the twenty-first century, the band has received numerous accolades and lifetime achievement and hall of fame awards. The band remains relevant today, collaborating with younger artists and maintaining their classic sound. Earth, Wind & Fire stood apart from other soul bands with their philosophical lyrics and extravagant visual art, much of which is studied in the book, including album covers, concerts, and music videos. The lyrics of hit songs are examined alongside an analysis of the band's chart success. Earth, Wind & Fire has produced twenty-one studio albums and several compilation albums. Each album is analyzed for content and quality. Earth, Wind & Fire is also known for using ancient Egyptian symbols, and Bailey thoroughly details those symbols and Maurice White's fascination with Egyptology. After enduring many personnel changes, Earth, Wind & Fire continues to perform around the world and captivate diverse audiences.