Sue Margolis’s “sexy British romp[s]” (USA Today) have captivated readers who enjoy an “irreverent, sharp-witted look at love and dating” (Houston Chronicle). Now she returns with a novel about a suddenly single mom whose life needs a lift. When her gambling addict husband died, Sarah Green was left penniless—and with two children to raise. Since then, she’s been desperate to keep her professional and personal lives on firm financial footing. And what could be safer than dating an accountant and working at a non-emergency crime help line? But then Sarah’s aunt dies, leaving Sarah her once famous—now flailing—lingerie shop. With her fashion background, Sarah reluctantly decides to make a go of it, even if that means breaking up with her too-prudent boyfriend over the risk. Suddenly Sarah finds herself falling for Hugh, the handsome struggling actor she hired to renovate her new boutique, and entering a prestigious lingerie competition. Taking chances has never been her forte, but the built-in support of family and friends could give her the boost she’s been looking for....

Studios have been gaming the Oscar nominationsfor years - it's time the Academy took action! "Category fraud," Guy Lodge wrote in Variety, is"the practice of campaigning a leading performance in a supportingcategory (or, more rarely, vice versa) to increase an actor's chances ofa nomination or win - and, in some cases, to avoid competition." There have been instances of category fraud ever since the Academy introduced the Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress categories in 1936to honour the work of character actors and featured players without themhaving to compete at the Oscars with famous movie stars. In recent years, however, as awards season campaigns have becomea ruthless and expensive business, category fraud has become more commonand egregious. With publicists taking any opportunity to secure nominationsfor their famous clients, many lesser-known performers are missing outon well-deserved recognition at the Oscars. Supporting performersare being pushed aside by famous stars in co-lead roles, backedby powerful studios and well-funded 'for your consideration' campaigns. When studios first began promoting established stars in co-lead roles for the supporting categories in the1950s, influential figures in the Screen Actors Guild protested and the Academy was forced to change its rules. Once the controversy subsided, however, the reform was repealed.Half a century later the practice is back: bigger and uglier than ever. Category Fraud charts the controversial history of this betrayal ofthe original reason for the introduction of the supporting categoriesand argues that it's once again time the Academy took action."

A fascinating history of motion pictures through the lens of the Academy Awards, the Best Picture winners, and the box-office contenders. In Best Pick: A Journey through Film History and the Academy Awards, John Dorney, Jessica Regan, and Tom Salinsky provide a captivating decade-by-decade exploration of the Oscars. For each decade, they examine the making of classic films, trends and innovations in cinema, behind-the-scenes scandals at the awards ceremony, and who won and why. Twenty films are reviewed in-depth, alongside ten detailed “making-of” accounts and capsule reviews of every single Best Picture winner in history. In addition, each Best Picture winner is carefully scrutinized to answer the ultimate question: “Did the Academy get it right?” Full of wonderful stories, cogent analysis, and fascinating insights, Best Pick is a witty and enthralling look at the people, politics, movies, and trends that have shaped our cinematic world.

Natalie Wood and “lovely” Richard Beymer, to the mercurial Jerome Robbins and “passionate” Rita Moreno, with whom Chakiris remains friends. “I know exactly where my gratitude belongs,” Chakiris writes, “and I still marvel at how, unbeknownst to me at the time, the joyful path of my life was paved one night in 1949 when Jerome Robbins sat Leonard Bernstein and Arthur Laurents down in his apartment and announced, ‘I have an idea.’"

Updated to include the 2014 Academy Awards, this is the definitive guide to 86 years of the Oscars, including every nominee and winner in every category, plus red carpet highlights, unforgettable photographs, and insider information from onstage and behind the scenes. The Academy Awards invites us to share in the celebration of 86 years of best actors, actresses, directors, cinematographers, costume designers, and more, plus the greatest films in movie-making history. All of the winners and the losers of Hollywood's prestigious award ceremony are covered here in detail, together with all of the glamour and gossip that is the Oscars®. Written by film experts Jim Piazza and Gail Kinn, who are sought out by the media every year for their insider knowledge of movies and Hollywood, The Academy Awards is both a handy reference and a detailed history of the annual event. Organized by year, beginning with the very first awards given in 1927, The Academy Awards presents in each chapter a complete and fun-to-read overview of the ceremony, including highlights of the most memorable moments (and outfits!) of the evening. Piazza and Kinn also provide details and little-known facts about award winners for best picture, best actor and actress, best supporting actor and actress, and honorary awards, plus a complete list of nominees in every category. Packed with more than 500 photographs from the ceremonies and red carpet, as well as stills from the movies themselves, this unauthorized book delivers what fans want most: all the facts, enhanced by juicy commentary and pictures galore.

Joel Grey, the Tony and Academy Award-winning Master of Ceremonies in Cabaret finally tells his remarkable life story. Born Joel David Katz to a wild and wooly Jewish American family in Cleveland, Ohio in 1932, Joel began his life in the theater at the age of 9, starting in children’s theater and then moving to the main stage. He was hooked, and his seven decades long career charts the evolution of American entertainment - from Vaudeville performances with his father, Mickey Katz to the seedy gangster filled nightclubs of the forties, the bright lights of Broadway and dizzying glamour of Hollywood, to juggernaut musicals like Cabaret, Chicago, and Wicked. Master of Ceremonies is a memoir of a life lived in and out of the limelight, but it is also the story of the man behind the stage makeup. Coming of age in a time when being yourself tended to be not only difficult but also dangerous, Joel has to act both on and off the stage. He spends his high school years sleeping with the girls-next-door while carrying on a scandalous affair with an older man. Romances with to-die-for Vegas Showgirls are balanced with late night liaisons with like-minded guys, until finally Joel falls in love and marries a talented and beautiful woman, starts a family, and has a pretty much picture perfect life. But 24 years later when the marriage dissolves, Joel has to once again find his place in a world that has radically changed. Drawing back the curtain on a career filled with show-stopping numbers, larger-than-life stars and even singing in the shower with Bjork, Master of Ceremonies is also a portrait of an artist coming to terms with his evolving identity. When an actor plays a character, he has to find out what makes them who they are; their needs, dreams, and fears. It’s a difficult thing to do, but sometimes the hardest role in an actor’s life is that of himself. Deftly capturing the joy of performing as well as the pain and secrets of an era we have only just started to leave behind, Joel’s story is one of love, loss, hard-won honesty, redemption, and success.

Do you know which televised awards show gives a prize for "Favourite Smile"? Or which Oscar host announced that he was going to raffle off a car during the ceremony? Do you know who won the Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Actress of the 20th Century? In Reel Winners, Richard Crouse, Reel to Real movie critic and CBC Radio’s "titan of trivia," gives you the lowdown on movie awards, from eight decades of Hollywood self-congratulation to international awards to the toasts from the fringe (like The Skinnies, which celebrate actors and their skin conditions). Reel Winners is the definitive guide to the inside scoop on movie awards.

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, 1982 A black sergeant cries out in the night, "They still hate you," then is shot twice and falls dead. Set in 1944 at Fort Neal, a segregated army camp in Louisiana, Charles Fuller's forceful drama--which has been regularly seen in both its original stage and its later screen version starring Denzel Washington--tracks the investigation of this murder. But A Soldier's Play is more than a detective story: it is a tough, incisive exploration of racial tensions and ambiguities among blacks and between blacks and whites that gives no easy answers and assigns no simple blame.

Over his 30-plus-year acting career, Roy Scheider has redefined America’s idea of a leading man, thanks to his talent for playing an urban everyman that audiences relate to and root for, despite flaws and failures. He rose to fame in the early 1970s in the Oscar-winning films Klute and The French Connection (his first Oscar nomination). Roy garnered more critical acclaim in Jaws and Marathon Man, as well as a second Oscar nomination for All That Jazz. Scheider’s life and career are chronicled in this work. Beginning with his childhood in New Jersey, it traces his development from a community theater actor to a world-renowned movie star, and covers his more recent work in the Golden Globe–winning RKO 281 and the Shakespearean drama King of Texas. Includes a complete filmography and index.

From legendary playwright August Wilson comes the powerful, stunning dramatic bestseller that won him critical acclaim, including the Tony Award for Best Play and the Pulitzer Prize. Troy Maxson is a strong man, a hard man. He has had to be to survive. Troy Maxson has gone through life in an America where to be proud and black is to face pressures that could crush a man, body and soul. But the 1950s are yielding to the new spirit of liberation in the 1960s, a spirit that is changing the world Troy Maxson has learned to deal with the only way he can, a spirit that is making him a stranger, angry and afraid, in a world he never knew and to a wife and son he understands less and less. This is a modern classic, a book that deals with the impossibly difficult themes of race in America, set during the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 60s. Now an Academy Award-winning film directed by and starring Denzel Washington, along with Academy Award and Golden Globe winner Viola Davis.