Legend has it that Hollywood lures gifted writers into its service with sunshine and money, only to treat them as glorified typists and plot-mechanics, peripheral to the main business of moviemaking. This is what Ian Hamilton describes as 'the writer-in-chains saga that emerges from any study of Hollywood during its so-called golden years - the period I have marked as running from 1915-1951.' But in this superb account of what befell the likes of Faulkner, Fitzgerald, Chandler and Huxley by working for the Dream Factory, Hamilton argues that these writers 'were in the movies by choice: they earned far more money than their colleagues who did not write for films, and in several cases they applied themselves conscientiously to the not-unimportant task at hand. And they had a lot of laughs...' 'Fascinating and enjoyable.' New Statesman 'Abounds in marvelous stories, apocryphal, fabulous, funny and even true.' Observer Faber Finds is devoted to restoring to readers a wealth of lost or neglected classics and authors of distinction. The range embraces fiction, non-fiction, the arts and children's books. For a full list of available titles visit www.faberfinds.co.uk. To join the dialogue with fellow book-lovers please see our blog, www.faberfindsblog.co.uk.

This book is intended for film buffs of all ages, and in fact anyone interested in learning more about the history of fi lm. 6 Degrees of Film will take you on a short trip through the history of the movies where you will learn about the surprising connections between the fi lms of the past and the films of today Some stories may surprise you, and some will simply entertain. 6 Degrees of Film connects the films and the film makers from the Silent Era and the Golden Age of Film with many of the movies that are made today. Youll learn why we are in a new Golden Age of Film that is defined by movies like Star Wars and companies such as George Lucas state-of the-art special-effects company-Industrial Light & Magic.

Screenwriters are storytellers and dream builders. They forge new worlds and beings, bringing them to life through storylines and idiosyncratic details. Yet up until now, no one has told the story of these creative and indispensable artists. The Writers is the only comprehensive qualitative analysis of the history of writers and writing in the film, television, and streaming media industries in America. Featuring in-depth interviews with over fifty writers—including Mel Brooks, Norman Lear, Carl Reiner, and Frank Pierson—The Writers delivers a compelling, behind-the-scenes look at the role and rights of writers in Hollywood and New York over the past century. Granted unprecedented access to the archives of the Writers Guild Foundation, Miranda J. Banks also mines over 100 never-before-published oral histories with legends such as Nora Ephron and Ring Lardner Jr., whose insight and humor provide a window onto the enduring priorities, policies, and practices of the Writers Guild. With an ear for the language of storytellers, Banks deftly analyzes watershed moments in the industry: the advent of sound, World War II, the blacklist, ascension of television, the American New Wave, the rise and fall of VHS and DVD, and the boom of streaming media. The Writers spans historical and contemporary moments, and draws upon American cultural history, film and television scholarship and the passionate politics of labor and management. Published on the sixtieth anniversary of the formation of the Writers Guild of America, this book tells the story of the triumphs and struggles of these vociferous and contentious hero-makers.

The first full-length study of the authorial and cross-media practices of the English novelist Elinor Glyn (1864-1943), Elinor Glyn as Novelist, Moviemaker, Glamour Icon and Businesswoman examines Glyn’s work as a novelist in the United Kingdom followed by her success in Hollywood where she adapted her popular romantic novels into films. Making extensive use of newly available archival materials, Vincent L. Barnett and Alexis Weedon explore Glyn’s experiences from multiple perspectives, including the artistic, legal and financial aspects of the adaptation process. At the same time, they document Glyn’s personal and professional relationships with a number of prominent individuals in the Hollywood studio system, including Louis B. Mayer and Irving Thalberg. The authors contextualize Glyn’s involvement in scenario-writing in relationship to other novelists in Hollywood, such as Edgar Wallace and Arnold Bennett, and also show how Glyn worked across Europe and America to transform her stories into other forms of media such as plays and movies. Providing a new perspective from which to understand the historical development of both British and American media industries in the first half of the twentieth century, this book will appeal to historians working in the fields of cultural and film studies, publishing and business history.

The fiction of F. Scott Fitzgerald serves as a compelling and incisive chronicle of the Jazz Age and Depression Era. This collection explores the degree to which Fitzgerald was in tune with, and keenly observant of, the social, historical and cultural contexts of the 1920s and 1930s. Original essays from forty international scholars survey a wide range of critical and biographical scholarship published on Fitzgerald, examining how it has evolved in relation to critical and cultural trends. The essays also reveal the micro-contexts that have particular relevance for Fitzgerald's work - from the literary traditions of naturalism, realism and high modernism to the emergence of youth culture and prohibition, early twentieth-century fashion, architecture and design, and Hollywood - underscoring the full extent to which Fitzgerald internalized the world around him.

Offering unique insights into the writing and production of television drama series such as The Killing and Borgen, produced by DR, the Danish Broadcasting Corporation, Novrup Redvall explores the creative collaborations in writers' rooms and 'production hotels' through detailed case studies of Denmark's public service production culture.

Going beyond a biography, this text uses the life of blacklisted Hollywood writer and director Abraham Lincoln Polonsky to help us understand the relationship between art and politics in American culture and to uncover the effects of US anticommunism and anti-Semitism.

The Film Novelist is the first primer on writing film novels- whether you are a beginning novelist, a seasoned writer wanting to cross over into script/novel writing, or a creative writing teacher looking for proven ways to launch new writers. So, what is the difference between a screenplay and a film novel? Screenplays indicate solely what the audience is to see or hear on screen. Film novels are short, and take about as long to read as a feature film takes to watch. The description, dialogue, and narration of a film novel can simply be lifted out and used as the description, dialogue, and voice-over narration for a script. The author has devised a fifteen week program starting from a one-sentence pitch to the novel itself, which includes filming a scene from your script/novel. He grounds the discussion of early film novels, like The Maltese Falcon, Of Mice and Men, and The Misfits, to provide historical and theoretical background while detailing the practical, sequential approach for completing a short novel and script.

Today, the director is considered the leading artistic force behind a film. The production of a Hollywood movie requires the labor of many people, from screenwriters and editors to cinematographers and boom operators, but the director as author of the film overshadows them all. How did this concept of the director become so deeply ingrained in our understanding of cinema? In Hollywood’s Artists, Virginia Wright Wexman offers a groundbreaking history of how movie directors became cinematic auteurs that reveals and pinpoints the influence of the Directors Guild of America (DGA). Guided by Frank Capra’s mantra “one man, one film,” the Guild has portrayed its director-members as the creators responsible for turning Hollywood entertainment into cinematic art. Wexman details how the DGA differentiated itself from other industry unions, focusing on issues of status and creative control as opposed to bread-and-butter concerns like wages and working conditions. She also traces the Guild’s struggle for creative and legal power, exploring subjects from the language of on-screen credits to the House Un-American Activities Committee’s investigations of the movie industry. Wexman emphasizes the gendered nature of images of the great director, demonstrating how the DGA promoted the idea of the director as a masculine hero. Drawing on a broad array of archival sources, interviews, and theoretical and sociological insight, Hollywood’s Artists sheds new light on the ways in which the Directors Guild of America has shaped the role and image of directors both within the Hollywood system and in the culture at large.

This work explores the many ways in which the developing film industry of the early twentieth century influenced the writings of F. Scott Fitzgerald, focusing specifically on his novels This Side of Paradise, The Great Gatsby, Tender Is the Night, and the incomplete The Last Tycoon. The Beautiful and the Damned is also discussed briefly. Early chapters examine Fitzgerald's literary adaptation of visual film techniques (pans, freeze frames, slow motion) and aural cinematic concepts (sound effects, diegetic sound) within his most popular novels. The final chapter summarizes the effect such techniques had in augmenting and defining Fitzgerald's unique literary style.