British suburbanites Laurence and Beverly are entertaining their new neighbors, Angela and Tony as well as Susan, whose teenage daughter, Abigail is having a party to which Susan has been dis-invited. Over drinks and snacks, cliches and fatuous small talk abound.

Yorkshire-born Ken Annakin was one of the greatest international film directors. The last of the English directors to make it in the international arena (others included Hitchcock and Lean), this autobiography traces Annakin's career from his early British films through to Hollywood. He has directed, written and produced over 50 feature films in Africa, India, Malaysia, Scandinavia, China, Europe and the United States. His films include: Swiss Family Robinson, The Longest Day, Battle of the Bulge, and Those Magnificent Men in their Flying Machines. Annakin's autobiography will include personal and revealing insights into many film personalities, including:

Claudette Colbert

David Niven

Rod Steiger

Henry Fonda

Robert Ryan

Julie Christie

Charles Bronson

Peter Ustinov

Walt Disney

Edward G. Robinson

Raquel Welch

Tony Curtis

Olivia de Havilland

Charlton Heston

Robert Wagner

Peter Sellers

Darryl Zanuck

Terry Thomas

This book is forthright and pulls no punches; it will soon become a classic among director's autobiographies. Detailing his own frustrations with sex-mad producers, drug-addicted actors, and unions which sabotaged multi-million dollar feature films, Annakin details a career of dizzying highs and bleak lows. This master of "family entertainment" also sounds a clarion call for a return to motion pictures which are fun for the whole family. So You Wanna Be A Director? is an entertaining and witty travelogue, as well as an important document of film history.

The story of the Peterloo massacre, a defining moment in the history of British democracy, told with passion and authority.

'A superb account of one of the defining moments in modern British history' Tristram Hunt.

'Peterloo is one of the greatest scandals of British political history ... Jacqueline Riding tells this tragic story with mesmerising skill' John Bew.

'Fast-paced and full of fascinating detail' Tim Clayton.

On a hot late summer's day, a crowd of 60,000 gathered in St Peter's Field. They came from all over Lancashire – ordinary working-class men, women and children – walking to the sound of hymns and folk songs, wearing their best clothes and holding silk banners aloft. Their mood was happy, their purpose wholly serious: to demand fundamental reform of a corrupt electoral system.

By the end of the day fifteen people, including two women and a child, were dead or dying and 650 injured, hacked down by drunken yeomanry after local magistrates panicked at the size of the crowd. Four years after defeating the 'tyrant' Bonaparte at Waterloo, the British state had turned its forces against its own people as they peaceably exercised their time-honoured liberties. As well as describing the events of 16 August in shattering detail, Jacqueline Riding evokes the febrile state of England in the late 1810s, paints a memorable portrait of the reform movement and its charismatic leaders, and assesses the political legacy of the massacre to the present day.

As fast-paced and powerful as it is rigorously researched, Peterloo: The Story of the Manchester Massacre adds significantly to our understanding of a tragic staging-post on Britain's journey to full democracy.

Director Mike Leigh takes a satirical look at middle-class values in the 70s. Upwardly mobile couple Beverley and Laurence host an informal drinks evening when their neighbour's teenage daughter, Abigail, throws a party. Tensions arise as bored, bitchy housewife Beverley (Alison Steadman) flirts with her new neighbour, patronises his wife, embarasses Abigail's mother Sue and drives her over-stressed husband to the point of no return.

This new revised edition brings Mike Leigh's career up-to-date, including his film about J.M.W. Turner, MisterTurner, and his epic masterpiece, Peterloo. Five-time Oscar nominee and BAFTA winner, the only British director to have won the top prize at both Cannes (for Secrets & Lies) and Venice (for Vera Drake) - Mike Leigh is unquestionably one of world cinema's pre-eminent figures. Now, in this definitive career-length interview, he reflects on all that has gone into the making of his unique body of work. In their commingling of bleakness and humour, Leigh's films recreate the tragi-comic world of people whose everyday lives are far from glamorous: a world in which 'the done thing' usually prevails, contrary to our inner hopes, wants or needs. Leigh's work has always reflected its times and entered the vernacular, whether the harsh studies of Meantime and Naked or the humour of the now-legendary Abigail's Party and Nuts in May. Above all, Leigh is an accomplished storyteller, and these films deal with universal themes: births, marriages and deaths, parenthood and failed relationships, families and their secrets and lies. Within these pages Leigh speaks to Amy Raphael more openly than ever before of his life and inimitable working method, revealing himself as passionate, forthright, no sufferer of fools, but the owner of a dry and playful Mancunian wit.

Mike Leigh writes and directs this Academy Award-nominated biographical drama about British artist J.M.W. Turner, who is here portrayed by Timothy Spall. The film explores the last 25 years or so of Turner's life in which he suffers greatly after the loss of his beloved father William (Paul Jesson) and has relations with his housekeeper Hannah Danby (Dorothy Atkinson) and, later, landlady Sophia Booth (Marion Bailey), who he lives with in Chelsea until his death. During this time he refuses to acknowledge the existence of his two illegitimate daughters Evelina (Sandy Foster) and Georgiana (Amy Dawson) and develops his painting style, which is often both praised and criticised. The cast also includes Lesley Manville, Karl Johnson and Ruth Sheen.

An insightful collection of original interviews with the innovative director of "Secrets & Lies" A five-time Oscar nominee and BAFTA winner and the only British director to have won the top prize at both Cannes (for "Secrets & Lies") and Venice (for "Vera Drake"), Mike Leigh is unquestionably one of world cinema's preeminent figures. First trained in theater, Leigh devised his own method for the making of first plays and then films, based on months of improvisation and rehearsal with actors prior to shooting. Leigh's actors invent characters based on real people, each unaware of what the other is up to or the larger design Leigh has in mind.

In their commingling of bleakness and humor, Leigh's films re-create the tragicomic world of people whose everyday lives are far from glamorous: a world in which "the done thing" usually prevails, contrary to our inner hopes, wants, or needs. Leigh's work has always reflected its times and entered the vernacular, whether the harsh studies of "Meantime "and "Naked "or the humor of the now legendary "Abigail's Party "and "Nuts in May," Above all, Leigh is an accomplished storyteller, and these films deal with universal themes: births, marriages and deaths, parenthood and failed relationships, families and their secrets and lies. Leigh speaks to Amy Raphael more openly than ever before about his life and inimitable working method, revealing himself as passionate, wise, and the owner of a dry and playful Mancunian wit.

A comedy of low-life manners from the man whose "strength is his satirical observation of English tribal customs."--"Guardian" (UK)

THE 40TH ANNIVERSARY EDITION OF 40TH MIKE LEIGH'S CLASSIC PLAY - WITH A NEW INTRODUCTION FROM THE PLAYWRITE. Forty years on from its first performance at the Hampstead Theatre and original screening on BBC1 soon after, Mike Leigh's Abigail's Party - telling of two marriages spectacularly unravelling at an awkward neighbourhood drinks party - remains a pinnacle of British theatre. Here is the original script, complete with a new introduction by Mike Leigh describing the play's unlikely genesis, how it came to be made and where he believes it fits within his oeuvre as one of the country's leading writers and directors. 'The play came from my intuitive sense of the spirit and the flavour of the times, and from a growing personal fear of, and frustration with the suburban existence' Mike Leigh, from his new introduction 'Leigh's play isn't simply about marriage and Essex, but also about the unhappy state of the realm' Guardian

East London, the early 1980s. Frank Pollack (Jeff Robert) and his sons Mark and Colin (Phil Daniels and Tim Roth) are all unemployed. The situation seems hopeless, and things are made worse when Colin's Auntie Barbara (Marion Bailey) tries to help out by offering him some decorating work, an act which arouses Mark's jealousy and ultimately effects everyone in the family. Directed by Mike Leigh and also featuring Gary Oldman as Colin's skinhead mate Coxy.