The most successful Bond of all time. One of the most stylish men in Britain. A United Nations ambassador. Skydiving with the Queen herself. Is there anything Daniel Craig can't do? With the release of No Time to Die, Craig will appear for the fifth time as James Bond. The public and the critics have been united in their praise for Craig in the most-pressurised role there is in global film. However, there has been much more to Craig over the years than just Bond. Roles in Layer Cake, Knives Out and the movie adaptation of Stieg Larssons's The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo have met with acclaim, and shown breadth and charisma beyond being 007. In this biography, author Sarah Marshall explores the road to success for one of Britain's finest actors - from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama his status as a global icon. A must for any fan, this biography examines not just the star gracing billboards and magazines covers, but also the character of the man behind the famous blue eyes.

Colleen Moore (1899-1988) was one of the most popular and beloved stars of the American silent screen. Remembered primarily as a comedienne in such films as Ella Cinders (1926) and Orchids and Ermine (1927), Moore's career was also filled with dramatic roles which often reflected greater societal trends. A trailblazing performer, her legacy was overshadowed by the female stars that followed her, notably Louise Brooks and Clara Bow. An in-depth examination of Moore's early life and film career, the book focuses on the ways in which her family and the times in which she lived influenced the roles she chose. Included are forewords written by film historian Joseph Yranski, a friend of the actress, and by Moore's stepdaughter, Judith Hargrave Coleman.

This day-by-day account of the legend's life-the first of its kind-succeeds in the daunting task of tracking Judy's myriad professional pursuits, the personal crises she triumphed over, and her many accomplishments. Lavishly illustrated with eighty rare photos, this volume contains new information to enthrall even the most knowledgeable Garland fan. For those just encountering Judy, this book provides the perfect introduction, an engrossing narrative bursting with information: her performance dates, concert set lists, and recording session schedules; the evolving critical reception to her work; the many celebrities that came into contact with and adored Judy, from the Beatles to Elvis to Sinatra; her filming itineraries and guest appearances; excerpts from rare interviews and press conferences; and much more. Here is Judy Garland as never viewed before, in a way that allows readers to see her whole life on a daily basis and come to their own conclusion about what her life was really about. They will encounter a survivor, parent, friend, and one of the greatest entertainers the world has ever known, who overcame one obstacle after another in order to devote forty-five of her forty-seven years to delighting her fans. From her debut performance as a Gumm Sister at age two to her final day, Judy Garland is the definitive chronicle of this remarkable icon.

"The most complete and engrossing biography yet of this exotic Southern girl...Excellent."--Liz Smith
She was the sex symbol who dazzled all the other sex symbols. She was the temptress who drove Frank Sinatra to the brink of suicide and haunted him to the end of his life. Ernest Hemingway saved one of her kidney stones as a sacred memento, and Howard Hughes begged her to marry him--but she knocked out his front teeth instead.
She was one of the great icons in Hollywood history--star of "The Killers," "The Barefoot Contessa," and "The Night of the Iguana"--and one of the few whose actual life was grander and more colorful than any movie. Her jaw-dropping beauty, charismatic presence, and fabulous, scandalous adventures fueled the legend of Ava Gardner--Hollywood's most glamorous, restless and uninhibited star.
"A seductive book."--"The New York Times"
"Deliciously entertaining."--"Publishers Weekly"
"Irresistible and finally heartbreaking."--"The ""Newark"" Star-Ledger"
" "
"Super."--"USA"" Today"
In this acclaimed first full biography of Gardner, Lee Server recreates--with great style and vivid detail--the actress's life, from her beginnings as a barefoot North Carolina farm girl to her heady days as a Hollywood goddess. He paints the full spectacle of her tumultuous private life--including her string of failed marriages to Mickey Rooney, Sinatra and Artie Shaw--and Gardner's lifelong search for adventure and love.
"Ava Gardner": ""Love is Nothing"" is both an exceptional work of biography and a richly entertaining read.

Harold Lloyd, born in 1893, became one of the greatest comic actors in America. This is a compendium of all things Lloyd, with entries on noteworthy persons, recurring themes, crucial elements of Lloyd's life (birth, education, marriage, family, hobbies, death, etc.), his prime co-stars and co-workers, the films that made him a legend (201 of them), and numerous other topics covering every facet of the man and the actor, all fully cross-referenced and accompanied by a vast collection of images and advertisements. Lacking the vaudeville training of his chief contemporaries, Lloyd nonetheless grew quickly from a gag technician to a skilled actor. In 1917, he created his famed Glass Character, but a live bomb amongst the props maimed his hand two years later. Keeping his handicap hidden by use of a revolutionary prosthetic, he continued to both charm and enthrall audiences. 'The action may be outlandish', he said of himself, 'but the characters - most particularly the central character - must not be'. An Appendix A lists the Lloyd shorts in the order produced, with the Production Code assigned by the Rolin Film Company officials. Appendix B is a proper filmography, listing each Lloyd film from 1913 to 1966 in chronological order.

Dorothy Lee is best remembered for her screen appearances with the popular comedy team of Bert Wheeler and Robert Woolsey. She went from being a struggling vaudeville performer to the female vocalist in one of the most successful bands in the country--to becoming a star in the new-fangled ""talking pictures,"" all within the span of a few short years. During the Great Depression, she lived a fairy-tale existence, rubbing shoulders with Hollywood luminaries and earning an income that most people could only dream of. She retired and balanced domestic life with charity work. And she saw, to her amazement, a revived interest in the movie career she had written off long ago. Based on years of conversations between the authors and their subject, this book is an informative biography filled with revealing insights on navigating the studio system during Hollywood's Golden Age and the ephemeral nature of fame.

From the obscure 1958 Sonja Henie vehicle Hello London to the 2000 Academy Award winner Gladiator (released posthumously), the screen career of dynamic British actor Oliver Reed (1937-1999) is thoroughly documented in this illustrated filmography. Following a concise capsule biography, the authors chronologically list all 96 of Reed's films, among them The Curse of the Werewolf, Oliver!, The Devils, The Three Musketeers and Tommy. Each entry contains extensive cast and production credits, a synopsis, critical commentary and contemporary reviews. Included are forewords by actors Sir Christopher Lee and Ron Moody, and an afterword by Oliver Reed's frequent director Michael Winner. Additional comments by Reed's friends and coworkers Janette Scott, Catherine Feller, William Hobbs, Jennie Linden, Jimmy Sangster and Samantha Eggar provide fascinating and insightful offscreen glimpses of a major cinema icon.

The quintessential suave hero, Roger Moore has enjoyed a successful career that has spanned seven decades, from early television through the golden age of Hollywood and on to international superstardom. Dashing, handsome, and every inch the archetypal English gentleman, he is most widely known for making seven blockbuster films as arguably the most debonair 007 of all time. He has worked with some of the world's most legendary stars, including such luminaries as Noel Coward, Sean Connery, Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, Lana Turner, Gregory Peck, Cary Grant, Richard Harris, and Michael Caine. For the first time, Roger shares his recollections of playing some of the world's most famous roles as well as myriad stories from his personal life, including events from his childhood in London and his experiences during World War II. Filled with anecdotes from his encounters with celebrities of every variety and his memories from the heydays of Hollywood, this is a frank, funny, and disarmingly charming story of a life lived among the stars.

Why is What's My Line? TV star and Pulitzer-Prize-nominated investigative reporter Dorothy Kilgallen one of the most feared journalists in history? Why has her threatened exposure of the truth about the JFK assassination triggered a cover-up by at least four government agencies and resulted in abuse of power at the highest levels? Denial of Justice-written in the spirit of bestselling author Mark Shaw's gripping true crime murder mystery, The Reporter Who Knew Too Much-tells the inside story of why Kilgallen was such a threat leading up to her unsolved murder in 1965. Shaw includes facts that have never before been published, including eyewitness accounts of the underbelly of Kilgallen's private life, revealing statements by family members convinced she was murdered, and shocking new information about Jack Ruby's part in the JFK assassination that only Kilgallen knew about, causing her to be marked for danger. Peppered with additional evidence signaling the potential motives of Kilgallen's arch enemies J. Edgar Hoover, mobster Carlos Marcello, Frank Sinatra, her husband Richard, and her last lover, Denial of Justice adds the final chapter to the story behind why the famous journalist was killed, with no investigation to follow despite a staged death scene. More information can be found at www.thedorothykilgallenstory.com.

Since its foundation in 1991, Blue Raincoat Theatre Company is Ireland's only full-time venue-based professional theatre ensemble and has become renowned for its movement, visual and aural proficiencies and precision. This book explores those signatures from a number of vantage points, conveying the complex challenges faced by Blue Raincoat as they respond to changing aesthetic and economic circumstances. Particular consideration is given to set, costume, sound and lighting design. Influenced and informed by renowned international theatre makers such as Etienne Decroux, Jacques Copeau, Roy Hart and Anne Bogart, Blue Raincoat productions are generally non-natural in their sensibility, with a few notable exceptions. Productions such as the stage adaptations of Flann O'Brien's The Third Policeman, At Swim Two Birds and The Poor Mouth, Samuel Beckett's Endgame and Eugene Ionesco's The Chairs speak to the artifice of the theatre itself, where actors and designers work collaboratively to reveal the function of the performance. W.B. Yeats's one act ritual dramas demand physical, vocal and technical rigour and flexibility. This book explores the marvellously textured and complex nature of Blue Raincoat's work, revealing the magic that results from their unique style of theatre making.

The cinephile community knows Abbas Kiarostami (1940-2016) as one of the most important filmmakers of the previous decades. This volume illustrates why the Iranian filmmaker achieved critical acclaim around the globe and details his many contributions to the art of filmmaking. Kiarostami began his illustrious career in his native Iran in the 1970s, although European and American audiences did not begin to take notice until he released his 1987 feature Where's the Friend's House? His films defy established conventions, placing audiences as active viewers who must make decisions about actions and characters while watching the narratives unfold. He asks viewers to question the genre construct (Close-Up) and challenges them to determine how to watch and imagine a narrative (Ten and Shirin). In recognition for his approach to the craft, Kiarostami was awarded many honors during his lifetime, including the top prize at the Cannes Film Festival in 1997 for Taste of Cherry. In Abbas Kiarostami: Interviews, editor Monika Raesch collects eighteen interviews (several translated into English for the first time), lectures, and other materials that span Kiarostami's career in the film industry. In addition to exploring his expertise, the texts provide insight into his life philosophy. This volume offers a well-rounded picture of the filmmaker through his conversations with journalists, film scholars, critics, students, and audience members.

Kathy Garver, the teenage heartthrob from the hit series Family Affair (1966-1971), was no one-hit wonder, but a journeywoman actress who appeared in such classic films as Night of the Hunter and The Ten Commandments long before she became a television icon. This memoir is a recollection of a working actress's experiences, from the many films, television shows, and stage plays in which she performed, to her second career as a voice-over specialist in popular animated films and audiobooks. Featuring anecdotes, Hollywood history, and details of her relationships with such stars as Charlton Heston and Jon Provost, Surviving Cissy is a veritable quilt of Kathy's exciting life.

During the 1960s, a bushel of B-movies were produced and aimed at the predominantly teenage drive-in movie audience. At first teens couldn't get enough of the bikini-clad beauties dancing on the beach or being wooed by Elvis Presley, but by 1966 young audiences became more interested in the mini-skirted, go-go boot wearing, independent-minded gals of spy spoofs, hot rod movies and biker flicks. Profiled herein are fifty sexy, young actresses that teenage girls envied and teenage boys desired including Quinn O'Hara, Melody Patterson, Hilarie Thompson, Donna Loren, Pat Priest, Meredith MacRae, Arlene Martel, Cynthia Pepper, and Beverly Washburn. Some like Sue Ane Langdon, Juliet Prowse, Marlyn Mason, and Carole Wells, appeared in major studio productions while others, such as Regina Carrol, Susan Hart, Angelique Pettyjohn and Suzie Kaye were relegated to drive-in movies only. Each biography contains a complete filmography. Some also include the actresses' candid comments and anecdotes about their films, the people they worked with, and their feelings about acting. A list of web sites that provide further information is also included.

Edmond O'Brien was one of the most versatile actors of his generation who made an abiding impact in a series of iconic noir films. From a man reporting his own murder in D. O. A. (1949) to the conflicted title character in The Bigamist (1953), O'Brien delineated par excellence the confusion of an Everyman in the complex post-war world. He created a gallery of memorable portrayals in all mediums across the genres, from Shakespeare to westerns and comedies; he also turned his hand to directing. His unique talent was rewarded with an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor as the harassed press agent Oscar Muldoon in Joseph Mankiewicz's bitter Cinderella fable The Barefoot Contessa (1954). This first in-depth study of O'Brien charts his life and career from the Broadway stage to Hollywood in its heyday and the rise of television. It shows him as a devoted family man dedicated to his art whose career was ended prematurely by mounting health problems but whose work endures. He was always different: as he once observed "It's from me the audience expects the unusual. I like it that way."

Are UFO's Alien Spacecraft from other planets or time machines from our future? How does their propulsion system function? Did our ancestors come to earth in spacecraft from another world? Are Stonehenge, the pyramids and the Nazca Lines temples to pay homage to a master race from the stars? Do we have to exceed the speed of light to travel to other planets or are there gateways here on earth to other worlds and parallel dimensions? Are dinosaurs really extinct? See the photographic evidence. Travel on a journey with the author as he takes you on a true adventure through man's voyage into new frontiers from outer space, to documented encounters with alien spacecraft, monsters from the deep sea, and into the astral plane, realm of the disembodied dead. Explore inner space and tap the potential of the human mind. Discover the power of hypnosis, handwriting analysis, altered states of consciousness, body language, astral projection, and automatic writing. Learn to apply these tools in your own life to become a happier, healthier and more effective human being.

Thirty years ago a promising young actor published his account of preparing for and playing the role of Richard III. Antony Sher's Year of the King has since become a classic of theatre literature. In 2014, Sher, now in his sixties, was cast as Falstaff in Gregory Doran's Royal Shakespeare Company production of the two parts of Henry IV. Both the production and Sher's Falstaff were acclaimed by critics and audiences alike, with Sher winning the Critics' Circle Award for Best Shakespearean Performance. Year of the Fat Knight is Antony Sher's account - splendidly supplemented by his own paintings and sketches - of researching, rehearsing and performing one of Shakespeare's best-known and most popular characters. He tells us how he had doubts about playing the part at all, how he sought to reconcile Falstaff's obesity, drunkenness, cowardice and charm, how he wrestled with the fat suit needed to bulk him up, and how he explored the complexities and contradictions of this comic yet often dangerous personality. On the way, Sher paints a uniquely close-up portrait of the RSC at work.Year of the Fat Knight is a terrific read, rich in humour and with a built-in tension as opening night draws relentlessly nearer. It also stands as a celebration of the craft of character acting. All in all, it is destined to rank with Year of the King as one of the most enduring accounts of the creation of a giant Shakespearean role. Praise for Year of the King: 'This is a most wonderfully authentic account of the experience of creating a performance' Sunday Times 'The most exciting actor of his generation and an eloquent writer on the side' Observer Praise for Sher's Falstaff: 'A magnificent, magnetic performance - Sher plays down the fatness to emphasise the knight's upper-class origins. But, just as you start to warm to this Falstaff, you are reminded of his rapacity' Guardian 'It is Sher's irrepressible Falstaff that will linger in the memory - a lord of misrule who's absurd, delightful and in the end deeply sad' Evening Standard

"A thorough and sophisticated effort to answer an interesting question: How did an indifferently raised, self-flagellating kid from a just-making-ends-meet, desultorily functioning Long Island family, in Massapequa, turn into Alec Baldwin, gifted actor, familiar public figure, impressively thoughtful person, notorious pugilist? . . . Beautifully written and unexpectedly moving . . . . Baldwin writes with great knowledge about old films, the art of acting, what he has learned from other actors, and about the differences among television, film and theater. . . . He's a highly literate and fluent writer."--New York Times One of the most accomplished and outspoken actors today chronicles the highs and lows of his life in this beautifully written, candid memoir. Over the past three decades, Alec Baldwin has established himself as one of Hollywood's most gifted, hilarious, and controversial leading men. From his work in popular movies, including Beetlejuice, Working Girl, Glengarry Glen Ross, The Cooler, and Martin Scorsese's The Departed to his role as Jack Donaghy on Tina Fey's irreverent series 30 Rock--for which he won two Emmys, three Golden Globes, and seven Screen Actors Guild Awards--and as Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump on Saturday Night Live, he's both a household name and a deeply respected actor. In Nevertheless, Baldwin transcends his public persona, making public facets of his life he has long kept private. In this honest, affecting memoir, he introduces us to the Long Island child who felt burdened by his family's financial strains and his parents' unhappy marriage; the Washington, DC, college student gearing up for a career in politics; the self-named "Love Taxi" who helped friends solve their romantic problems while neglecting his own; the young soap actor learning from giants of the theatre; the addict drawn to drugs and alcohol who struggles with sobriety; the husband and father who acknowledges his failings and battles to overcome them; and the consummate professional for whom the work is everything. Throughout Nevertheless, one constant emerges: the fearlessness that defines and drives Baldwin's life. Told with his signature candor, astute observational savvy, and devastating wit, Nevertheless reveals an Alec Baldwin we have never fully seen before.

This is the ultimate anthology of theatrical anecdotes, edited by lifelong theatre-lover Gyles Brandreth in the Oxford tradition, and covering every kind of theatrical story and experience from the age of Shakespeare and Marlowe to the age of Stoppard and Mamet, from Richard Burbage to Richard Briers, from Nell Gwynn to Daniel Day-Lewis, from Sarah Bernhardt to Judi Dench. Players, playwrights, prompters, producers-they all feature. The Oxford Book of Theatrical Anecdotes provides a comprehensive, revealing, and hugely entertaining portrait of the world of theatre across four hundred years. Many of the anecdotes are humorous: all have something pertinent and illuminating to say about an aspect of theatrical life-whether it is the art of playwriting, the craft of covering up missed cues, the drama of the First Night, the nightmare of touring, or the secret ingredients of star quality. Edmund Kean, Henry Irving, John Gielgud, Laurence Olivier, Ellen Terry, Edith Evans, Maggie Smith, Helen Mirren-the great 'names' are all here, of course, but there are tales of the unexpected, too-and the unknown. This is a book-presented in five acts, with a suitably anecdotal and personal prologue from Gyles Brandreth-where, once in a while, the understudy takes centre-stage and Gyles Brandreth treats triumph and disaster just the same, including stories from the tattiest touring companies as well as from Broadway, the West End and theatres, large and small, in Australia, India, and across Europe.

Doug Stanhope is one of the most critically acclaimed and stridently unrepentant comedians of his generation. What will surprise some is that he owes so much of his dark and sometimes uncomfortably honest sense of humor to his mother, Bonnie. It was the cartoons in her Hustler magazine issues that molded the beginnings of his comedic journey, long before he was old enough to know what to do with the actual pornography. It was Bonnie who recited Monty Python sketches with him, introduced him to Richard Pryor, and rescued him from a psychologist when he brought that brand of humor to school. And it was Bonnie who took him along to all of her AA meetings, where Doug undoubtedly found inspiration for his own storytelling. Digging Up Mother follows Doug's absurd, chaotic, and often obscene life as it intersects with that of his best friend, biggest fan, and love of his life--his mother. And it all starts with her death--one of the most memorable and amazing farewells you will ever read.

From Senator Al Franken - #1 bestselling author and beloved SNL alum -- comes the story of an award-winning comedian who decided to run for office and then discovered why award-winning comedians tend not to do that. "Flips the classic born-in-a-shack rise to political office tale on its head. I skipped meals to read this book - also unusual - because every page was funny. It made me deliriously happy." -- Louise Erdrich, The New York Times This is a book about an unlikely campaign that had an even more improbable ending: the closest outcome in history and an unprecedented eight-month recount saga, which is pretty funny in retrospect. It's a book about what happens when the nation's foremost progressive satirist gets a chance to serve in the United States Senate and, defying the low expectations of the pundit class, actually turns out to be good at it. It's a book about our deeply polarized, frequently depressing, occasionally inspiring political culture, written from inside the belly of the beast. In this candid personal memoir, the honorable gentleman from Minnesota takes his army of loyal fans along with him from Saturday Night Live to the campaign trail, inside the halls of Congress, and behind the scenes of some of the most dramatic and/or hilarious moments of his new career in politics. Has Al Franken become a true Giant of the Senate? Franken asks readers to decide for themselves.

Don Ameche, Eve Arden, George Burns, Bette Davis, Greer Garson, Rex Harrison, Lilli Palmer, George Raft, Ginger Rogers, Barbara Stanwyck, Orson Welles, Cornel Wilde--these are among the stars who graced the silver screen in Hollywoods Golden Age. Biographies and filmographies of these actors and actresses and 70 others who had passed from the scene by September 1996 are presented in this reference work. The biographical section focuses on how they came to be involved with whom they shared the screen. The filmography lists all the films in which they appeared, along with the studio and the year of release.