Many Broadway stars appeared in Hollywood cinema from its earliest days. Some were 19th century stage idols who reprised famous roles on film as early as 1894. One was born as early as 1829. Another was cast in the performance during which Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. One took her stage name from her native state. Some modern-day stars also began their careers on Broadway before appearing in films. This book details the careers of 300 performers who went from stage to screen in all genres of film. A few made only a single movie, others hundreds. Each entry includes highlights of the performer's career, a list of stage appearances and a filmography.

The Ritz Brothers were a popular comedy trio in vaudeville, nightclubs, movies and television for more than four decades. Today largely overlooked among the classic comedy pantheon, they have been acknowledged as inspirations by such comics as Mel Brooks, Milton Berle, Jerry Lewis and Sid Caesar. This first full-length study of their work examines all the Ritz Brothers' feature films and short subjects 1934-1976, and their television appearances, with background information from the 20th Century-Fox archives. Contemporaneous and modern-day reviews and critiques are included.

Although a major star in the 1910s, Theda Bara--known as "The Vamp"--was largely neglected until the 1990s, when her fame began to resurface. Since then, there have been biographies, documentaries and other works that have brought the silent film actress back into the spotlight, including a painstaking stills reconstruction of her lost epic Cleopatra. This is a complete examination of Bara's more than 40 films, as well as her theater and radio appearances, down to the smallest detail. With the vast majority of Bara's films considered lost, it is a particularly valuable resource for fans and scholars, and includes information about each film's genesis, director, plot, censorship problems, and critical and public reactions. Also included is a biographical overview, with many illuminating anecdotes.

The headline of the Variety extra on October 27, 1926, proclaimed "Vitaphone1 Thrills L.A.!" Vitaphone, a subsidiary of Warner Bros. formed in association with Western Electric, was one of the major producers of talkies, even though its sound-on-disc technology barely lasted four years. The Vitaphone features and shorts that have survived intact, or that have been so carefully restored, preserve much of the show business history that might otherwise have been lost with the industry's fast-paced advances in movie making. This book is a catalogue of Vitaphone features and shorts. The first section lists the features and shorts by release number. The New York productions (1926-1940) are listed first, followed by the West Coast productions (1927-1970). For shorts, the following particulars, if known and if applicable, are given: title, alternate title(s), instrumental and vocal selections performed on screen, composer(s) and performers of instrumental and vocal selections, release date and synopsis of the film, names of major cast members and directors, set information if two or fewer sets were used, and the amount paid to early performers. For features, entries list release dates, genre, and major cast members. The section on performers includes only those who appeared in shorts, listing dates and places of birth when known.

The Fantasticks tells an age-old tale. Its ingredients are simple: a boy, a girl, two fathers, and a wall. Its scenery, a tattered cardboard moon, hovers over an empty wooden platform. With these bare essentials, Jones and Schmdt launched a theatrical phenomenon unmatched the world over.

Provides the music and lyrics for the long-running Broadway musical

Publisher's Note: Products purchased from Third Party sellers are not guaranteed by the publisher for quality, authenticity, or access to any online entitlements included with the product. 12,500 entries. 196 countries. 365 days. Find out what's going on any day of the year, anywhere across the globe! If you're looking to tie a promotional event to a special month, travel to a music festival halfway around the world, blog about a historical milestone or do a celebrity birthday round-up on your radio show or Twitter feed, Chase's Calendar of Events is the one resource that has it all. For broadcasters, journalists, event planners, public relations professionals, librarians, editors, writers or simply the curious, this is one reference you can't do without! Chase's Calendar of Events 2015 brings you: Major sporting events such as the FIFA Women's World Cup (June 6), the Pan American Games (July 10) and the 48th Transpacific Yacht Race (July 13). Milestones such as the 800th anniversary of the Magna Carta, 200th anniversary of Waterloo, 150th anniversary of Lincoln's assassination, 75th anniversary of Dunkirk and the Battle of Britain, 150th birth anniversary of poet W.B. Yeats and much more. New birthday entries for news makers like the new king of Spain, Felipe VI of Bourbon and Greece (Jan 30), or political activist Nadezhda Tolokonnikova (Nov 7); sports stars such as Meryl Davis (Jan 1) and Johnny Manziel (Dec 6); and entertainers Lupita Nyong'o (Mar 1), Chiwetel Ejiofor (July 10), Jamie Dornan (May 1), Dakota Johnson (Oct 4), Lorde (Nov 7) and Macklemore (June 19). New special days such as Take Your Poet to Work Day (July 15), National Black Women in Jazz and the Arts Day (Mar 1), National Biscotti Day (Sept 29), Runner's Selfie Day (June 23), No Selfies Day (Mar 16) and many more. New! Get exclusive access to the Chase's Calendar of Events companion website with: What's on Today? All the holidays, events, anniversaries, celebrity birthdays, and so on for the current day Advanced Search: customize your search--date ranges, location, key word, category, attendance--however you want! Unique Festivals of the World: a new, interactive map of the world--click on a country and discover its major festivals Tabbed pages for Major Awards, About the Holidays, Spotlight for 2015, Glossary of Calendar Terms and Special Months For information on the url and password of the companion website, please see details inside the book.

This greatly expanded (over 18,500 entries versus 9,000 in the earlier edition) and updated edition includes everyone from John Aasen, an 8-foot, 9-inch circus star who appeared in silent film comedies, to Vladimir Kosma Zworykin, who invented the iconoscope and kinescope that together constituted the first all-electronic television system. This is the most complete necrology available on people from the silent era. The entries are arranged alphabetically by professional name, and include birth and death dates, the place of birth and death, real name when it differs from the professional name, married name for women, birth certificate date when available, age at death, and bibliographic data of any autobiography or biography. When available the cause of death is also provided. Following these data, there is a reference to any obituary printed in The New York Times, Variety or, occasionally, another publication, including the obituary's headline.

“860 glittering pages” (Janet Maslin, The New York Times): The first volume of the full-scale astonishing life of one of our greatest screen actresses—her work, her world, her Hollywood through an American century. Frank Capra called her, “The greatest emotional actress the screen has yet known.” Now Victoria Wilson gives us the first volume of the rich, complex life of Barbara Stanwyck, an actress whose career in pictures spanned four decades beginning with the coming of sound (eighty-eight motion pictures) and lasted in television from its infancy in the 1950s through the 1980s. Here is Stanwyck, revealed as the quintessential Brooklyn girl whose family was in fact of old New England stock; her years in New York as a dancer and Broadway star; her fraught marriage to Frank Fay, Broadway genius; the adoption of a son, embattled from the outset; her partnership with Zeppo Marx (the “unfunny Marx brother”) who altered the course of Stanwyck’s movie career and with her created one of the finest horse breeding farms in the west; and her fairytale romance and marriage to the younger Robert Taylor, America’s most sought-after male star. Here is the shaping of her career through 1940 with many of Hollywood's most important directors, among them Frank Capra, “Wild Bill” William Wellman, George Stevens, John Ford, King Vidor, Cecil B. Demille, Preston Sturges, set against the times—the Depression, the New Deal, the rise of the unions, the advent of World War II, and a fast-changing, coming-of-age motion picture industry. And at the heart of the book, Stanwyck herself—her strengths, her fears, her frailties, losses, and desires—how she made use of the darkness in her soul, transforming herself from shunned outsider into one of Hollywood’s most revered screen actresses. Fifteen years in the making—and written with full access to Stanwyck’s family, friends, colleagues and never-before-seen letters, journals, and photographs. Wilson’s one-of-a-kind biography—“large, thrilling, and sensitive” (Michael Lindsay-Hogg, Town & Country)—is an “epic Hollywood narrative” (USA TODAY), “so readable, and as direct as its subject” (The New York Times). With 274 photographs, many published for the first time.

It all starts with the release of fidgety, suspicious Percy Talbott from state prison after serving a five-year sentence. We don't know why, only that she's released and on her way to Gilead and its "colors of paradise." But when she arrives it is February and bitter cold, and the only one around to meet her is restless Sheriff Joe Turner, who takes her to the Spitfire Grill to help the aging Hannah Ferguson run the diner. All is gray, dismal and listless around them, and the characters are in the "winter of their lives" emotionally and spiritually.