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AMORALMAN: A True Story and Other Lies
by Derek DelGaudioTruth and lies are two sides of the same coin. But who's flipping it? A thought-provoking and brilliantly entertaining work of nonfiction from one of the world's leading deceivers, the creator and star of the astonishing theater show and forthcoming film In & Of Itself.Derek DelGaudio believed he was a decent, honest man. But when irrefutable evidence to the contrary is found in an old journal, his memories are reawakened and Derek is forced to confront--and try to understand--his role in a significant act of deception from his past. Using his youthful notebook entries as a road map, Derek embarks on a soulful, often funny, sometimes dark journey, retracing the path that led him to a world populated by charlatans, card cheats, and con artists. As stories are peeled away and artifices are revealed, Derek examines the mystery behind his father's vanishing act, the secret he inherited from his mother, the obsession he developed with sleight-of-hand that shaped his future, and the affinity he felt for the professional swindlers who taught him how to deceive others. And once he finds himself working as a crooked dealer in a big-money Hollywood card game, Derek begins to question his own sense of morality, and discovers that even a master of deception can find himself trapped inside an illusion.A M O R A L M A N is a wildly engaging exploration of the fictions we live as truths. It is ultimately a book about the lies we tell ourselves and the realities we manufacture in others.
The Amorous Busboy of Decatur Avenue: A Child of the Fifties Looks Back
by Robert KleinDear Reader,When we asked the beloved award-winning comedian and actor Robert Klein to write a book, you can imagine our utter surprise when he told us that he wanted to write about sixth-century Chinese pottery. Thankfully, he hit a creative brick wall (since he doesn't really know anything about pottery from China or anywhere else). Then came similar failures to write books about sea turtles, circumnavigation of the globe, building jet engines at home, the sociology of chickens, or fungi of the skin.Luckily, Mr. Klein's paramount concern was the consumer. He knew that if we, his publishers, were going to boldly ask you to purchase his book (see above for price), he would have to write something so good, so worthwhile, so meaningful as to make you want to send additional money to your bookseller in gratitude for having allowed you to partake in this reading experience.So Mr. Klein set out to write about what he knows best: himself. This book is about the adventures of a child who becomes a young man: how he thinks and dreams and lusts and fears and laughs and handles adversity. From the beginning of his distinguished career as a comedian, Robert Klein established himself as a pioneer in observational humor and razor-sharp routines that are infectiously funny. Now -- for the first time -- Klein brings his trademark humor and honesty to the printed page. In this portrait of a comic as a young man, Klein takes us back to the people and streets of his Bronx neighborhood, the eccentric cast of characters in the Catskills hotels and bungalow colonies where he worked, the college dorms where he received more than an academic education, the 1964 World's Fair where he fell in love, New York City and Chicago in the 1960s as he developed his talent, and Los Angeles just as he was about to embark on a show business career. Throughout, Klein reveals the hilarity of growing up and explores the mysteries and his own foibles in sex and relationships. He recounts with wit and poignancy losing his virginity with a prostitute, bringing home a German girlfriend to his Jewish family, and the amorous adventures of the busboy he once was.With an ego more fragile than Chinese pottery, Robert Klein has written a funny and evocative coming-of-age memoir -- well worth the price (if we say so ourselves). Enjoy.All the best,The Publisher
Amos's Killer Concert Caper
by Gary PaulsenAmos is desperate. He's desperate for two tickets to the romantic event of his young life...the Road Kill concert! He'll do anything to get them because he heard from a friend of a friend of a friend of Melissa Hansen that: she's way into Road Kill.
Amputation in Literature and Film: Artificial Limbs, Prosthetic Relations, and the Semiotics of "Loss" (Literary Disability Studies)
by Maren Scheurer Erik GraysonAmputation in Literature and Film: Artificial Limbs, Prosthetic Relations, and the Semiotics of “Loss” explores the many ways in which literature and film have engaged with the subject of amputation. The scholars featured in this volume draw upon a wide variety of texts, both lesser-known and canonical, across historical periods and language traditions to interrogate the intersections of disability studies with social, political, cultural, and philosophical concerns. Whether focusing on ancient texts by Zhuangzi or Ovid, renaissance drama, folktales collected by the Brothers Grimm, novels or silent film, the chapters in this volume highlight the dialectics of “loss” and “gain” in narratives of amputation to encourage critical dialogue and forge an integrated, embodied understanding of experiences of impairment in which mind and body, metaphor and materiality, theory and politics are considered as interrelated and interacting aspects of disability and ability.
Amusing the Million
by John F. KassonAmusing the Million examines the historical context in which Coney Island made its reputation as an amusement park and shows how America's changing social and economic conditions formed the basis of a new mass culture.
Amy Winehouse (Lives of the Musicians)
by Kate SolomonIn her intense, brief life, Amy Winehouse's music spoke directly to millions. And since her death, her fans have only increased.Amy Winehouse is one of those pop stars that comes along so rarely we're not sure we knew what we had when we had her. Her story speaks to us not because the relentless tabloid coverage of her darker days unfolded in real time, but because she tapped into deeply personal yet universal feelings and displayed them to us in all their painful, raw glory. She turned our demons into something we could dance and sing to, and she skewered those who wronged her in ways we could only dream of.
Amy Winehouse (Lives of the Musicians)
by Kate SolomonIn her intense, brief life, Amy Winehouse's music spoke directly to millions. And since her death, her fans have only increased.Amy Winehouse is one of those pop stars that comes along so rarely we're not sure we knew what we had when we had her. Her story speaks to us not because the relentless tabloid coverage of her darker days unfolded in real time, but because she tapped into deeply personal yet universal feelings and displayed them to us in all their painful, raw glory. She turned our demons into something we could dance and sing to, and she skewered those who wronged her in ways we could only dream of.
Ana M. López: Essays (SUNY series in Latin American Cinema)
by Ana M LópezAna M. López is one of the foremost film and media scholars in the world. Her work has addressed Latin American filmmaking in every historical period, across countries and genres—from early cinema to the present; from Brazil, Cuba, and Mexico to diasporic and Latinx cinemas in the United States; from documentary to melodrama to politically militant film. López's groundbreaking essays have transformed Latin American film studies, opening up new approaches, theoretical frameworks, and lines of investigation while also extending beyond cinema to analyze its connections with television, radio, and broader cultural phenomena. Bringing together twenty-five essays from throughout her career, including three that have been translated into English for this volume, Ana M. López is divided into three sections: the transnational turn in Latin American film studies; analysis of genre and modes; and debates surrounding race, ethnicity, and gender. Expertly curated and edited by Laura Podalsky and Dolores Tierney, the volume includes introductory material throughout to map and situate López's key interventions and to aid students and scholars less familiar with her work.
The Anachronistic Turn: Historical Fiction, Drama, Film and Television
by Stephanie RussoThe Anachronistic Turn: Historical Fiction, Drama, Film and Television is the first study to investigate the ways in which the creative use of anachronism in historical fictions can allow us to rethink the relationship between past and present. Through an examination of literary, cinematic, and popular texts and practices, this book investigates how twenty-first century historical fictions use creative anachronisms as a way of understanding modern issues and anxieties. Drawing together a wide range of texts across all forms of historical fiction - novels, dramas, musicals, films and television - this book re-frames anachronism not as an error, but as a deliberate strategy that emphasises the fictionalising tendencies of all forms of historical writing. The book achieves this by exploring three core themes: the developing trends in the twenty-first century for creators of historical fiction to include deliberate anachronisms, such as contemporary references, music, and language; the ways in which the deliberate use of anachronism in historical fiction can allow us to rethink the relationship between past and present, and; the way that contemporary historical fiction uses anachronism to better understand modern issues and anxieties. This book will appeal to students and scholars of historical fiction, contemporary historical film and television studies, and historical theatre studies.
Analysing Popular Music: Image, Sound and Text
by Mr David MachinPopular music is far more than just songs we listen to; its meanings are also in album covers, lyrics, subcultures, voices and video soundscapes. Like language these elements can be used to communicate complex cultural ideas, values, concepts and identities.<P> Analysing Popular Music is a lively look at the semiotic resources found in the sounds, visuals and words that comprise the 'code book' of popular music. It explains exactly how popular music comes to mean so much. Packed with examples, exercises and a glossary, this book provides the reader with the knowledge and skills they need to carry out their own analyses of songs, soundtracks, lyrics and album covers.<P> Written for students with no prior musical knowledge, Analysing Popular Music is the perfect toolkit for students in sociology, media and communication studies to analyse, understand - and celebrate - popular music.
Analysing the Screenplay
by Jill NelmesMost producers and directors acknowledge the crucial role of the screenplay, yet the film script has received little academic attention until recently, even though the screenplay has been in existence since the end of the 19th century. Analysing the Screenplay highlights the screenplay as an important form in itself, as opposed to merely being the first stage of the production process. It explores a number of possible approaches to studying the screenplay, considering the depth and breadth of the subject area, including: the history and early development of the screenplay in the United States, France and Britain the process of screenplay writing and its peculiar relationship to film production the assumption that the screenplay is standardised in form and certain stories or styles are universal the range of writing outside the mainstream, from independent film to story ideas in Bhutanese film production to animation possible critical approaches to analysing the screenplay. Analysing the Screenplay is a comprehensive anthology, offering a global selection of contributions from internationally renowned, specialist authors. Together they provide readers with an insight into this fascinating yet complex written form. This anthology will be of interest to undergraduate and postgraduate students on a range of Film Studies courses, particularly those on scriptwriting.
The Analysis of Performance Art: A Guide to its Theory and Practice
by Anthony Howell A. HowellThis finely illustrated book offers a simple yet comprehensive 'grammar' of a new discipline. Performance Art first became popular in the fifties when artists began creating 'happenings'. Since then the artist as a performer has challenged many of the accepted rules of the theatre and radically altered our notion of what constitutes visual art. This is the first publication to outline the essential characteristics of the field and to put forward a method for teaching the subject as a discipline distinct from dance, drama, painting or sculpture.Taking the theory of primary and secondary colours as his model, Anthony Howell posits three primaries of action and shows how these may be mixed to obtain a secondary range of actions. Based on a taught course, the system is designed for practical use in the studio and is also entertaining to explore. Examples are cited from leading performance groups and practitioners such as Bobbie Baker, Orlan, Stelarc, Annie Sprinkle, Robert Wilson, Goat Island, and Station House Opera. This volume, however, is not just an illustrated grammar of action - it also shows how the syntax of that grammar has psychoanalytic repercussions. This enables the performer to relate the system to lived experience, ensuring a realisation that meaning is being dealt with through these actions and that the stystem set forth is more than a dry structuring of the characteristics of movement.Freud's notion of 'transference' and Lacan's understanding of 'repetition' are compared to a performer's usage of the same terms. Thus the book provides a psychoanalytic critique of performance at the same time as it outlines an efficient method for creating live work on both fine art and theatre courses.
Analysis through Action for Actors and Directors: From Stanislavsky to Contemporary Performance
by David ChambersAnalysis through Action for Actors and Directors is a comprehensive view of an innovative and exciting process for making new theatre.As well as an understanding of how Analysis through Action has developed over time, this book also demonstrates how it can be put into practice in today’s theatre. The first part of this book traces the exciting genealogy from Stanislavsky’s unfinished experiments, through the insights of geniuses Maria Knebel and Georgii Tovstonogov, down to today’s avant-garde auteurs. The second part is a practical manual based on extensive field testing by the author and colleagues. Here, two key components of the process are elucidated: Text Actions – ten interwoven text analysis steps – to be twinned with the thrilling rehearsal process using focused and joyful improvisations called Études.Written for new or experienced theatre students and practitioners, this book will enrich the technique of any theatre artist and anyone else interested in the theatre and its future.
Analyzing Media Messages: Using Quantitative Content Analysis in Research (2nd Edition) (LEA Communication Series)
by Daniel Riff Stephen Lacy Frederick Fico Daniel Riffe<p>Analyzing Media Messages provides a comprehensive and comprehensible guide to conducting content analysis research. It establishes a formal definition of quantitative content analysis; gives step-by-step instruction on designing a content analysis study; and explores in depth research questions that recur in content analysis, in such areas as measurement, sampling, reliability, data analysis, validity, and technology. <p>This Second Edition maintains the concise, accessible approach of the first edition while offering an updated discussion and new examples. The goal of this resource is to make content analysis understandable, and to produce a useful guide for novice and experienced researchers alike. <p>Accompanied by detailed, practical examples of current and classic applications, this volume is appropriate for use as a primary text for content analysis coursework, or as a supplemental text in research methods courses. It is also an indispensable reference for researchers in mass communication fields, political science, and other social and behavioral sciences.</p>
Analyzing Narrative: Discourse and Sociolinguistic Perspectives
by Anna De Fina Alexandra GeorgakopoulouThe socially minded linguistic study of storytelling in everyday life has been rapidly expanding. This book provides a critical engagement with this dynamic field of narrative studies, addressing long-standing questions such as definitions of narrative and views of narrative structure but also more recent preoccupations such as narrative discourse and identities, narrative language, power and ideologies. It also offers an overview of a wide range of methodologies, analytical modes and perspectives on narrative from conversation analysis to critical discourse analysis, to linguistic anthropology and ethnography of communication. The discussion engages with studies of narrative in multiple situational and cultural settings, from informal-intimate to institutional. It also demonstrates how recent trends in narrative analysis, such as small stories research, positioning analysis and sociocultural orientations, have contributed to a new paradigm that approaches narratives not simply as texts, but rather as complex communicative practices intimately linked with the production of social life.
Analyzing World Fiction
by Frederick Luis AldamaWhy are many readers drawn to stories that texture ethnic experiences and identities other than their own? How do authors such as Salman Rushdie and Maxine Hong Kingston, or filmmakers in Bollywood or Mexico City produce complex fiction that satisfies audiences worldwide? In Analyzing World Fiction, fifteen renowned luminaries use tools of narratology and insights from cognitive science and neurobiology to provide answers to these questions and more. With essays ranging from James Phelan’s “Voice, Politics, and Judgments in Their Eyes Were Watching God” and Hilary Dannenberg’s “Narrating Multiculturalism in British Media: Voice and Cultural Identity in Television” to Ellen McCracken’s exploration of paratextual strategies in Chicana literature, this expansive collection turns the tide on approaches to postcolonial and multicultural phenomena that tend to compress author and narrator, text and real life. Striving to celebrate the art of fiction, the voices in this anthology explore the “ingredients” that make for powerful, universally intriguing, deeply human story-weaving. Systematically synthesizing the tools of narrative theory along with findings from the brain sciences to analyze multicultural and postcolonial film, literature, and television, the contributors pioneer new techniques for appreciating all facets of the wonder of storytelling.
Anamorphic Authorship in Canonical Film Adaptation: A Case Study of Shakespearean Films (Palgrave Studies in Adaptation and Visual Culture)
by Robert GealThis book develops a new approach for the study of films adapted from canonical ‘originals’ such as Shakespeare’s plays. Departing from the current consensus that adaptation is a heightened example of how all texts inform and are informed by other texts, this book instead argues that film adaptations of canonical works extend cinema’s inherent mystification and concealment of its own artifice. Film adaptation consistently manipulates and obfuscates its traces of ‘original’ authorial enunciation, and oscillates between overtly authored articulation and seemingly un-authored unfolding. To analyse this process, the book moves from a dialogic to a psychoanalytic poststructuralist account of film adaptations of Shakespeare’s plays. The differences between these rival approaches to adaptation are explored in depth in the first part of the book, while the second part constructs a taxonomy of the various ways in which authorial signs are simultaneously foregrounded and concealed in adaptation’s anamorphic drama of authorship.
Anarchic Dance
by Liz Aggiss Billy Cowie Ian BramleyLiz Aggiss and Billy Cowie, known collectively as Divas Dance Theatre, are renowned for their highly visual, interdisciplinary brand of dance performance that incorporates elements of theatre, film, opera, poetry and vaudevillian humour. Anarchic Dance, consisting of a book and DVD-Rom, is a visual and textual record of their boundary-shattering performance work. The DVD-Rom features extracts from Aggiss and Cowie's work, including the highly-acclaimed dance film Motion Control (premiered on BBC2 in 2002), rare video footage of their punk-comic live performances as The Wild Wigglers and reconstructions of Aggiss's solo performance in Grotesque Dancer. These films are cross-referenced in the book, allowing readers to match performance and commentary as Aggiss and Cowie invite a broad range of writers to examine their live performance and dance screen practice through analysis, theory, discussion and personal response. Extensively illustrated with black and white and colour photographs Anarchic Dance, provides a comprehensive investigation into Cowie and Aggiss’s collaborative partnership and demonstrates a range of exciting approaches through which dance performance can be engaged critically.
Anarchy in High Heels: A Memoir
by Denise LarsonAnarchy in High Heels is not a state of dress; it&’s a state of mind.A San Francisco porno theater might be the last place you&’d expect to plant the seed of a feminist troupe, but truth is stranger than fiction.In 1972, access to birth control and a burn-your-bra ethos were leading young women to repudiate their 1950s conservative upbringing and embrace a new liberation. Denise Larson was a timid twenty-four-year-old actress wannabe when, at an after-hours countercultural event, The People&’s Nickelodeon, she accidentally created Les Nickelettes. This banding together of ¬¬like-minded women with an anything-goes spirit unlocked a deeply hidden female humor. For the first time, Denise allowed the suppressed satirical thoughts dancing through her head to come out in the open. Together with Les Nickelettes, which quickly became a brazen women&’s lib troupe, she presented a series of feminist skits, stunts, and musical comedy plays. In 1980, The Bay Guardian described the group as &“nutty, messy, flashy, trashy, and very funny.&”With sisterhood providing the moxie, Denise took on leadership positions not common for women at the time: playwright, stage director, producer, and administrative/artistic director. But, in the end, the most important thing she learned was the power of female friendship.
Anastasia: The Movie Novel
by Cathy East DubowskiA night to remember... We all said it would be a night to remember. And it was. But not as we had dreamed. No one could have imagined the events that would befall us. I am the Dowager Empress Marie of Russia. And it was the worst night of my long life.
Anatomy of a Premise Line: How to Master Premise and Story Development for Writing Success
by Jeff LyonsIf a story is going to fail, it will do so first at the premise level. Anatomy of a Premise Line: How to Master Premise and Story Development for Writing Success is the only book of its kind to identify a seven-step development process that can be repeated and applied to any story idea. This process will save you time, money, and potentially months of wasted writing. So whether you are trying to write a feature screenplay, develop a television pilot, or just trying to figure out your next story move as a writer, this book gives you the tools you need to know which ideas are worth pursuing. In addition to the 7-step premise development tool, Anatomy of a Premise Line also presents a premise and idea testing methodology that can be used to test any developed premise line. Customized exercises and worksheets are included to facilitate knowledge transfer, so that by the end of the book, you will have a fully developed premise line, log line, tagline, and a completed premise-testing checklist. Here is some of what you will learn inside: Ways to determine whether or not your story is a good fit for print or screen Case studies and hands-on worksheets to help you learn by participating in the process Tips on how to effectively work through writer’s block A companion website (www.routledge.com/cw/lyons) with additional worksheets, videos, and interactive tools to help you learn the basics of perfecting a killer premise line
The Anatomy of Exercise And Movement: For the Study of Dance, Pilates, Sport and Yoga
by Jo Staugaard-JonesThis book serves as a bridge between biomechanics and the practice of sport, Pilates, yoga, and dance, providing the reader with a complete understanding of how the body functions while exercising.
The Anatomy of Genres: How Story Forms Explain the Way the World Works
by John TrubyA guide to understanding the major genres of the story world by the legendary writing teacher and author of The Anatomy of Story, John Truby.Most people think genres are simply categories on Netflix or Amazon that provide a helpful guide to making entertainment choices. Most people are wrong. Genre stories aren’t just a small subset of the films, video games, TV shows, and books that people consume. They are the all-stars of the entertainment world, comprising the vast majority of popular stories worldwide. That’s why businesses—movie studios, production companies, video game studios, and publishing houses—buy and sell them. Writers who want to succeed professionally must write the stories these businesses want to buy. Simply put, the storytelling game is won by mastering the structure of genres.The Anatomy of Genres: How Story Forms Explain the Way the World Works is the legendary writing teacher John Truby’s step-by-step guide to understanding and using the basic building blocks of the story world. He details the three ironclad rules of successful genre writing, and analyzes more than a dozen major genres and the essential plot events, or “beats,” that define each of them. As he shows, the ability to combine these beats in the right way is what separates stories that sell from those that don’t. Truby also reveals how a single story can combine elements of different genres, and how the best writers use this technique to craft unforgettable stories that stand out from the crowd. Just as Truby’s first book, The Anatomy of Story, changed the way writers develop stories, The Anatomy of Genres will enhance their quality and expand the impact they have on the world.
Anatomy of Story: 22 Steps to Becoming a Master Storyteller
by John TrubyJohn Truby is one of the most respected and sought-after story consultants in the film industry, and his students have gone on to pen some of Hollywood's most successful films, including Sleepless in Seattle, Scream, and Shrek. The Anatomy of Story is his long-awaited first book, and it shares all his secrets for writing a compelling script. Based on the lessons in his award-winning class, Great Screenwriting, The Anatomy of Story draws on a broad range of philosophy and mythology, offering fresh techniques and insightful anecdotes alongside Truby's own unique approach to building an effective, multifaceted narrative.
Anchored in Love: An Intimate Portrait of June Carter Cash
by Johnny CashJune Carter lived literally her whole life on a stage. To her fans, she was the sassy, saucy singing partner and soul mate to one of music's greatest icons. To herself, she was the self-designated matriarch and keeper of country music's most revered family name. But behind the "Country Girl" persona was an enormously complex and often-tormented woman. Although she played for presidents and princes on the great music stages of the world, the reality of her life was not always so exalted. Only one person could possibly peel back the layers and take us into the shadows of this lady. In this extraordinary account, John Carter Cash chronicles a life of destiny and despair as seen through a son's eyes-and heart. Be prepared to smile and celebrate. And to cry. For while history will forever define June by her role as Johnny Cash's queen consort, you will learn that there were tears on that crown. This is a unique, compelling look into the high price June Carter Cash paid for her name.