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Hip Hop on Film: Performance Culture, Urban Space, and Genre Transformation in the 1980s
by Kimberley MonteyneEarly hip hop film musicals have either been expunged from cinema history or excoriated in brief passages by critics and other writers. Hip Hop on Film reclaims and reexamines productions such as Breakin' (1984), Beat Street (1984), and Krush Groove (1985) in order to illuminate Hollywood's fascinating efforts to incorporate this nascent urban culture into conventional narrative forms. Such films presented musical conventions against the backdrop of graffiti-splattered trains and abandoned tenements in urban communities of color, setting the stage for radical social and political transformations. Hip hop musicals are also part of the broader history of teen cinema, and films such as Charlie Ahearn's Wild Style (1983) are here examined alongside other contemporary youth-oriented productions. As suburban teen films banished parents and children to the margins of narrative action, hip hop musicals, by contrast, presented inclusive and unconventional filial groupings that included all members of the neighborhood. These alternative social configurations directly referenced specific urban social problems, which affected the stability of inner-city families following diminished governmental assistance in communities of color during the 1980s. Breakdancing, a central element of hip hop musicals, is also reconsidered. It gained widespread acclaim at the same time that these films entered the theaters, but the nation's newly discovered dance form was embattled—caught between a multitude of institutional entities such as the ballet academy, advertising culture, and dance publications that vied to control its meaning, particularly in relation to delineations of gender. As street-trained breakers were enticed to join the world of professional ballet, this newly forged relationship was recast by dance promoters as a way to invigorate and “remasculinize” European dance, while young women simultaneously critiqued conventional masculinities through an appropriation of breakdance. These multiple and volatile histories influenced the first wave of hip hop films, and even structured the sleeper hit Flashdance (1983). This forgotten, ignored, and maligned cinema is not only an important aspect of hip hop history, but is also central to the histories of teen film, the postclassical musical, and even institutional dance. Kimberley Monteyne places these films within the wider context of their cultural antecedents and reconsiders the genre's influence.
The Routledge Companion to Latine Theatre and Performance (Routledge Companions)
by Noe Montez Olga Sanchez SaltveitThe Routledge Companion to Latine Theatre and Performance traces how manifestations of Latine self-determination in contemporary US theatre and performance practices affirm the value of Latine life in a theatrical culture that has a legacy of misrepresentation and erasure.This collection draws on fifty interdisciplinary contributions written by some of the leading Latine theatre and performance scholars and practitioners in the United States to highlight evolving and recurring strategies of world making, activism, and resistance taken by Latine culture makers to gain political agency on and off the stage. The project reveals the continued growth of Latine theatre and performance through chapters covering but not limited to playwriting, casting practices, representation, training, wrestling with anti-Blackness and anti-Indigeneity, theatre for young audiences, community empowerment, and the market forces that govern the US theatre industry. This book enters conversations in performance studies, ethnic studies, American studies, and Latina/e/o/x studies by taking up performance scholar Diana Taylor’s call to consider the ways that “embodied and performed acts generate, record, and transmit knowledge.”This collection is an essential resource for students, scholars, and theatremakers seeking to explore, understand, and advance the huge range and significance of Latine performance.
Twisty Little Passages: An Approach to Interactive Fiction
by Nick MontfortFrom the Book Jacket: Interactive fiction-the best-known form of which is the text game or text adventure-has not received as much critical attention as have such other forms of electronic literature as hypertext fiction and the conversational programs known as chatterbots. Twisty Little Passages (the title refers to a maze in Adventure, the first interactive fiction) is the first book-length consideration of this form, examining it from gaming and literary perspectives. Nick Montfort, an interactive fiction author himself, offers both aficionados and first-time users a way to approach interactive fiction that will lead to a more pleasurable and meaningful experience of it. Twisty Little Passages looks at interactive fiction beginning with its most important literary ancestor, the riddle. Montfort then discusses Adventure and its precursors (including the I Ching and Dungeons and Dragons), and follows this with an examination of mainframe text games developed in response, focusing on the most influential work of that era, Zork. He then considers the introduction of commercial interactive fiction for home computers, particularly that produced by Infocom. Commercial works inspired an.independent reaction, and Montfort describes the emergence of independent creators and the development of an online interactive fiction community in the 1990s. Finally, he considers the influence of interactive fiction on other literary and gaming forms. With Twisty Little Passages. Nick Montfort places interactive fiction in its computational and literary contexts, opening up-this-still-developing form to new consideration.
Harry Styles
by Alice MontgomeryFind out all about Harry Styles - the sexiest member of the hottest boy band on the planet - in this Sunday Times bestselling biography by Alice Montgomery. When Harry Styles auditioned for the X-Factor, little did he know he'd soon be leaving behind school, his Saturday bakery job, obscurity and an ordinary life. One Direction made it to the final and won a record deal, and it wasn't long before Harry's face covered bedroom walls up and down the country. But how did Harry cope with his new-found fame? And what happens when you take America by storm in a 'British Invasion'? With gorgeous green eyes and curls that send girls wild, Harry has found himself surrounded by beautiful women. But what's the truth behind the rumours? Here, his relationships with Caroline Flack, Taylor Swift and the married Lucy Horobin are laid bare. And what next for Harry and 1D? This book by Alice Montgomery will give you the low down on how Harry Styles and the rest of 1D are set to take on the world.Alice Montgomery works in London and is a freelance author. She has written several bestselling biographies, including Susan Boyle: Dreams Can Come True and Katy Perry.
Jamie Dornan: Shades of Desire
by Alice MontgomeryThe first, intimate biography of Jamie Dornan as he takes on one of the most iconic characters in fiction - Christian Grey.Jamie Dornan is about to become the hottest sex symbol on the planet after landing the leading role in the Fifty Shades of Grey movies. But he remains almost as enigmatic as Mr Grey himself.Jamie Dornan: Shades of Desire will reveal everything fans want to know about the mysterious Mr Dornan, from his tragic childhood to his career as a Calvin Klein model, dating Keira Knightley to finding love with his wife Amelia Warner. How does his part as a BDSM-loving billionaire sit alongside his real life role as a family man and father to a young daughter? And how will he cope with fame as the Fifty Shades of Grey films launch him into superstardom?This biography will be the first to show what Jamie Dornan is really like behind closed doors.
Katy Perry: The Unofficial Biography
by Alice MontgomeryThe fascinating account of a girl-next-door turned pop princessEver since the international chart-topping hit, I Kissed a Girl, Katy Perry hasn't stopped making headlines. From reaching number one in charts worldwide to selling out concerts around the globe, her phenomenal success has propelled her to the A-list. But it didn't always seem like she was destined for stardom. Brought up in a deeply religious community, Katy was allowed to listen only to church music. However, with her astounding musical gift, along with plenty of willpower, Katy was determined to follow her dream. Her rise to the top was cemented in 2010, when after a flurry of media gossip, she married the most controversial figure on British TV - Russell Brand. Bestselling biographer Alice Montgomery traces Katy's steps to stardom from her choir girl beginnings to her breakthrough in the music business and her secret wedding ceremony in India, to reveal the intimate story behind the most exciting and unpredictable pop star around.
Susan Boyle: Dreams Can Come True
by Alice MontgomeryOn Britain's Got Talent on 11 April 2009, 48-year-old spinster Susan Magdalane Boyle stepped out onto the stage to jeers and sniggers. As she announced she was going to sing I Dreamed a Dream, the judges Simon Cowell, Amanda Holden and Piers Morgan didn't bother to hide their amusement. One minute later they, and very soon the world, were giving Susan Boyle a standing ovation. She had the voice of an angel and her story was to become a modern day fairytale, a dream come true. In hours the news of Susan's extraordinary, heartbreaking performance had spread around the globe. She was an instant international star. And today she holds the record for the fastest selling female debut album of all time. In this, the first book to explore Susan's amazing rags to riches story, we follow her from her humble West Lothian background to topping the charts and performing for millions worldwide on TV. Whether it was bullying or nearly not entering Britain's Got Talent because "it was a young person's game", when faced with the toughest challenges, Susan never gave up. The memory of her mother inspired her to give her dream one last chance.
Duke Ellington: A Life in Music (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Vocabulary Readers #Leveled Reader: Level: 4, Theme: 5.2)
by Erick MontgomeryBriefly tells of the life of Duke Ellington, the musician.
Duke Ellington: Man of Music (Leveled Readers 4.5.2)
by Erick MontgomeryDuke Ellington was a great composer and musician. How did he change music in America?
A Town Bewitched
by Suzanne De MontignyIt’s tough for Kira, growing up in the small town of Hope as a child prodigy in classical violin, especially when her dad just died. And to make matters worse, Kate McDonough, the red-haired fiddler appears out of nowhere, bewitching the town with her mysterious Celtic music. Even Uncle Jack succumbs to her charms, forgetting his promise to look after Kira’s family. But when someone begins vandalizing the town leaving dead and gutted birds as a calling card, Kira knows without a doubt who’s behind it. Will anyone believe her?
A Sound Move
by Linda MontoyaEddie Hernandez and his band have been invited to play in a festival. One member refuses to practice. Will the band be ready in time?
Evel: The High-flying Life of Evel Knievel - American Showman, Daredevil, and Legend
by Leigh MontvilleFrom New York Times bestselling author Leigh Montville, this riveting and definitive new biography pulls back the red, white, and blue cape on a cultural icon--and reveals the unknown, complex, and controversial man known to millions around the world as Evel Knievel. Evel Knievel was a high-flying daredevil, the father of extreme sports, the personification of excitement and danger and showmanship . . . and in the 1970s Knievel represented a unique slice of American culture and patriotism. His jump over the fountains at Caesar's Palace led to a crash unlike anything ever seen on television, and his attempt to rocket over Snake River Canyon in Idaho was something only P. T. Barnum could have orchestrated. The dazzling motorcycles and red-white-and-blue outfits became an integral part of an American decade. Knievel looked like Elvis . . . but on any given Saturday afternoon millions tuned in to the small screen to see this real-life action hero tempt death. But behind the flash and the frenzy, who was the man? Bestselling author Leigh Montville masterfully explores the life of the complicated man from the small town of Butte, Montana. He delves into Knievel's amazing place in pop culture, as well as his notorious dark side--and his complex and often contradictory relationships with his image, the media, his own family, and his many demons. Evel Knievel's story is an all-American saga, and one that is largely untold. Leigh Montville once again delivers a definitive biography of a one-of-a-kind sports legend.From the Hardcover edition.
The Business of Theatrical Design
by James MoodyFor theatrical design students and theater professionals, here is the essential guide to marketing your skills, furthering your career, and operating a successful business! In The Business of Theatrical Design, design veteran James Moody shares his proven techniques to help costume, scenic, and lighting designers become successful businesspeople. Here is the latest information regarding IRS, state, and business liabilities; salary and fee scales; equipment costs; professional organizations; union and contract issues; and much more. Plus dozens of working producers, promoters, and designers share their insights and offer a thorough, true-to-life profile of this competitive industry. An indispensable resource for anyone looking to pursue a career in the theater!
The Business of Theatrical Design, Second Edition
by James MoodyWritten by a leading design consultant and carefully updated with the latest information on the industry, this is the essential guide to earning a living, marketing skills, furthering a design career, and operating a business. With more than thirty years of backstage and behind-the-scenes experience in theater, film, television, concerts, and special events, James Moody shares his success secrets for the benefit of design students and working designers. Topics include: Finding and landing dream assignmentsNegotiating feesSetting up ideal working spacesBuilding the perfect staffOvercoming fears of accounting and record-keepingChoosing the right insuranceJoining the right unions and professional organizationsAnd more In addition to revealing how to get the great design jobs in traditional entertainment venues, the author shows designers how to think outside the box and seize creative, lucrative opportunities—such as those in theme parks, in concert halls, and with architectural firms. Providing the keys for passionate, talented designers to become successful businesspeople, The Business of Theatrical Design is a must-read for novices and established professionals alike.
Concert Lighting: The Art and Business of Entertainment Lighting
by James Moody Paul DexterConcert Lighting: Tools, Techniques, Art, and Business Fourth Edition provides readers with an updated look at how to succeed in the complex world of concert lighting design and technology. The authors have reorganized the book into three comprehensive and thoroughly revised sections, covering history, equipment and technology, and design, and containing new information on LED technology, pixel mapping, projection options, media servers, automated lighting, solutions for moving lights, DMX, and Ethernet problems, and designer communication and collaboration. This book also explores the cross-media use of concert lighting techniques in film, video, theatre, and the corporate world, highlighted with advice from master designers such as Bruce Rodgers, Cosmo Wilson, and Sarah Landau. From securing precious contracts to knowing the best equipment to use to design a show, Concert Lighting covers everything a designer needs to know about working in the touring industry.
Lighting for Televised Live Events: Making Your Live Production Look Great for the Eye and the Camera
by James L. Moody Jeff RavitzLighting for Televised Live Events unlocks the science, art, philosophies, and language of creating lighting for live entertainment and presentations that work for the television camera as well as for the live audience. The book explores how to retain the essence and excitement of a live production while assuring that the show looks its best on-camera for the millions of viewers that can only see it on their TV, computer, tablet, or mobile phone screen. Readers will learn how to adapt an existing stage show for the camera, as well as how to design live entertainment or events specifically for TV. Filled with real-life examples and illustrations, the book covers a wide range of topics, including: how exposure and color work for the camera; how angle, visual balance, and composition can make people and backgrounds look their best, while preserving theatricality; information on camera equipment, screens, and projectors, as well as the control room environments that are found on a professional shoot; the unique challenges of lighting for the IMAG video screens used at festivals and concerts. Lighting for Televised Live Events is aimed at lighting design students, as well as professional designers that are considering a career — or a career expansion — in television. It is an essential resource for any stage lighting designer whose show may be shot for a television special or a live webcast and who will be asked by their client to collaborate with the incoming video team.
EMI Films and the Limits of British Cinema
by Paul MoodyThis book is the first of its kind to trace the development of one of the largest and most important companies in British cinema history, EMI Films. From 1969 to its eventual demise in 1986, EMI would produce many of the key works of seventies and eighties British cinema, ranging from popular family dramas like The Railway Children (Lionel Jeffries, 1970) through to critically acclaimed arthouse successes like Britannia Hospital (Lindsay Anderson, 1982). However, EMI’s role in these productions has been recorded only marginally, as footnotes in general histories of British cinema. The reasons for this critical neglect raise important questions about the processes involved in the creation of cultural canons and the definition of national culture. This book argues that EMI’s amorphous nature as a transnational film company has led to its omission from this history and makes it an ideal subject to explore the ‘limits’ of British cinema.
Sparrow (Arthur A Levine Novel Bks.)
by Sarah MoonThe story of a sensitive, gifted African American girl who tells us with mordant humor what it feels like to spend every day wishing so hard that you could fly away from it allSparrow has always had a difficult time making friends. She would always rather stay home on the weekends with her mother, an affluent IT executive at a Manhattan bank, reading, or watching the birds, than play with other kids. And that's made school a lonely experience for her. It's made LIFE a lonely experience.But when the one teacher who really understood her -- Mrs. Wexler, the school librarian, a woman who let her eat her lunch in the library office rather than hide in a bathroom stall, a woman who shared her passion for novels and knew just the ones she'd love -- is killed in a freak car accident, Sparrow's world unravels and she's found on the roof of her school in an apparent suicide attempt.With the help of an insightful therapist, Sparrow finally reveals the truth of her inner life. And it's here that she discovers an outlet in rock & roll music...
The Immersive Theatre of GAle GAtes (Routledge Advances in Theatre & Performance Studies)
by Daniella Vinitski MooneyThis book focuses on experimental theatre company, GAle GAtes, credited as "the true innovator" of the contemporary immersive movement. The Immersive Theatre of GAle GAtes is a case-study of this little-known but visionary company, with a focus on its development and dramaturgy. Through rare archival and primary research, as well as historical context, the text chronicles company narrative and celebrates the artistic impulse. The book employs descriptive-narrative and dramaturgical analysis and is composed of historical research, rare archives, and primary source interviews. Chapters focus on the trajectory of the avant-garde leading up to the climate in which the company formed, company formative years, and major works and a discussion on the interdisciplinary and theoretical frameworks critical to its understanding. This study will be of great interest to students and scholars in theatre and performance studies and essential reading for theatre artist and historian alike, with a focus on the experimental theatre landscape.
Black Is the New White: A Memoir
by Paul MooneyWith his no-holds-barred delivery and unique worldview, Paul Mooney continues to stir anger, generate laughter, and provoke thought while attempting to tear down racial and social barriers through his juicy memoir about his years writing comedy with the likes of Richard Pryor, Redd Foxx, the Wayans' Brothers, and Dave Chappelle.For more than forty years—whether writing for Richard Pryor and Saturday Night Live or performing stand-up to sold-out crowds around the country—Paul Mooney has been provocative, incisive, and absolutely hilarious. His comedy has always been indisputably real and raw, reflecting race issues in America, and this fascinating, fearless new memoir continues that unapologetically candid tradition. While other stars soared only to crash and burn, Paul Mooney has stayed chiefly behind the scenes, and he&’s got a lifetime of stories to show for it. As head writer for The Richard Pryor Show, he helped tear down racial barriers and change the course of comedy. He helped Robin Williams and Sarah Bernhard break into show business. He paved the way for superstars like Eddie Murphy. Few have witnessed as much comedy history as Mooney; even fewer could recount it with such riotous honesty and depth of insight. He reveals the truth about his celebrated partnership with the brilliant, self-destructive Richard Pryor, from their first meeting to the very last joke, and reflects on some of his most notorious moments. Decades ago, Paul Mooney set out not just make audiences laugh but to make them think. Black Is the New White is his blisteringly funny, no-holds-barred memoir of how he continues to succeed wildly at both.
The Making and Mirroring of Masculine Subjectivities: Gender, Affect, and Ethics in Modern World Narratives
by Susan MooneyThis book shows how diverse, critical modern world narratives in prose fiction and film emphasize masculine subjectivities through affects and ethics. Highlighting diverse affects and mental states in subjective voices and modes, modern narratives reveal men as feeling, intersubjective beings, and not as detached masters of master narratives. Modern novels and films suggest that masculine subjectivities originate paradoxically from a combination of copying and negation, surplus and lack, sameness and alterity: among fathers and sons, siblings and others. In this comparative study of more than 30 diverse world narratives, Mooney deftly uses psychoanalytic thought, narrative theories of first- and third-person narrators, and Levinasian and feminist ethics of care, creativity, honor, and proximity. We gain a nuanced picture of diverse postpaternal postgentlemen emerging out of older character structures of the knight and gentleman.
Adaptation and the New Art Film: Remaking the Classics in the Twilight of Cinema (Palgrave Studies in Adaptation and Visual Culture)
by William H. MooneySince the 1990s, the expropriation of canonical works of cinema has been a fundamental dimension of art-film exploration. Rainer Werner Fassbinder provides an early model of open adaptation of film classics, followed ever more boldly by the Coen Brothers, Chantal Akerman, Alex Carax, Todd Haynes, Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, Baz Luhrmann, and Olivier Assayas. This book devotes chapters to each of these directors to examine how their films redeploy landmark precursors such as City Lights (1931), Citizen Kane (1941), Rome Open City (1945), All About Eve (1950), and Vertigo (1958) in order to probe our psychological, philosophical, and historical situations in a postmodern société du spectacle. In broadly diverse ways, each of these directors complicates received notions of the past and its representation, while probing the transformative media evolution and dislocation of the present, in film art and in society.
Ballroom Dancing (Performing Arts Ser.)
by Alex MooreNow in its tenth edition, this classic and comprehensive handbook has been revised to bring it up to date in keeping with changes on the dance floor and in the rules of dance competitions. The Quickstep, Waltz, Foxtrot, and Tango are all illustrated and described in great detail.
Ballroom Dancing
by Alex MooreNow in its eleventh edition, this classic and comprehensive handbook has been revised to bring it up to date with changes on the dance floor and in the rules of dance competitions. The Quickstep, Waltz, Foxtrot, and Tango are all illustrated and described in great detail, as well as the versions of most dances approved for championships. Diagrams demonstrate every step from both the Leader’s and Follower’s perspectives, and a collection of photographs new to this edition celebrate the diverse range of dancers involved with ballroom. This is the go-to book for dancers, competition judges, teachers, and anyone who needs to be at the forefront of today’s ballroom technique, from amateur practice to international championships.
Ballroom Dancing
by Alex MooreNow in its eleventh edition, this classic and comprehensive handbook has been revised to bring it up to date with changes on the dance floor and in the rules of dance competitions.The Quickstep, Waltz, Foxtrot, and Tango are all illustrated and described in great detail, as well as the versions of most dances approved for championships. Diagrams demonstrate every step from both the Leader’s and Follower’s perspectives, and a collection of photographs new to this edition celebrate the diverse range of dancers involved with ballroom.This is the go-to book for dancers, competition judges, teachers, and anyone who needs to be at the forefront of today’s ballroom technique, from amateur practice to international championships.