1 comments about Managing Television News: A Handbook for Ethical and Effective Producing (LEA's Communication Series) (Lea's Communication Series).

1. I use this book in my course "News Producing" at the University of Missouri. It provides an excellent combination of practical lessons and context about the producer's role in television news. There is information about working with other players in the TV news environment, from anchors to the assignment desk to production staffers. This is especially helpful for young producers trying to navigate a world where most of their colleagues are older and more experienced than they. Sections on writing, using production elements, helping reporters with their live shots, ratings and understanding who's watching the local news are also very helpful. The book includes first-person advice from television news professionals, which really brings the textbook to life.

No comments about Scene Design in the American Theatre from 1915 to 1960.

No comments about Structure and Spontaneity: The Process Drama of Cecily O'Neill.

5 comments about Winning Monologs for Young Actors: 65 Honest-To-Life Characterizations to Delight Young Actors and Audiences of All Ages.

1. This is the perfect book for an audition or cold reading. I needed to have a monolog for my theatre class and this was just the thing! The monologs in this book are so perfect for kids. It has monologs for any style of audition and some of the monologs are just hilarious! I truly don't know who wouldnt like this book!



2. I didn't really like this book. The monologs were of an unusual sort, they were really abnormal, that is, most of them were. They also were hard to "act" to. They just weren't my style.



3. this was a pretty good book expected i expected more! it said in the add WINNING and it wasnt really the kind you act out on stage with they were the kind you express yourself or make up a little play for your friends and that is not what i expected i was very disappointed because now i have to find a new book.



4. I found this book excellent for monologues. Trying out for an acting club, we used monologues from here as our cold readings. They put everyone at ease because they are so perfect for kids. Everyone got really into the monologue they were assigned. In the club, we will perform live with big puppets like they use on tv. For each of our puppets, we will use one of these monologues. They're fantastic! The kids we perform for will absolutely love the monologues!



5. a friend of mine gave me this book in preperation for a professional audition i had coming up and i found nothing in it worth performing. the conclusion that i came to is that the peices selected in the book are somewhat shallow and it's my opinion that if a young actor wants to "win" with whatever he/she is performing, that the material will need to be more real to life and personal to the performer. i don't meant to say that the book would not be usefull for acting excersises or cold reading work, i am, however, saying that young actors such as myself need more of a challenge in their performing than this book gives, especially for something as important as an audition.

5 comments about The Dark Shadows Almanac: Millennium Edition.

1. The do it yourself nature of Dark Shadows was a big inspiration for low budget independent filmmakers.
   The fact that it reached millions and broke all the rules of daytime television was an historic achievement.
   It's equally paradoxical that it was budgeted at $70,000 a week by a corporation like ABC television yet the effects are frequently underground and amateur looking which I love. One should keep in mind that all the other network soaps at the time utilized an in-house organ for cheesy music while Dark Shadows featured pre-recorded orchestral music composed by Robert Cobert. This music was integral to the success of the series.
   Superb acting, set design, writing, makeup and music mixed with awful acting, clumsy camerawork, terrible fight choreography and bizarre mistakes made the series unpredictable and exciting. It was at times accidentally avant garde especially during the Adam and Eve creation of life plotline. Viewing old episodes can be addictive.
   The fact that it entered people's living rooms 5 days a week enabled an audience identification and intimacy that was powerful.
   The book has good photos. Behind the scenes commentary and writing by Sam Hall and his son made the Dark Shadows Companion book a better read. The writers of the series deserve alot of respect for the inventiveness and ingenuity they showed. This Almanac book could have used more in depth analysis. It was a quick read.It's mostly minutea for hard core geeks. Alot of obscure factoids that don't particularly enlighten or matter. I wanted more, but that's the nature of Dark Shadows.



2. I can't say enough about this thoroughly written and researched almanac. As a young child, I watched Dark Shadows and became a fan, although I didn't always follow the plot. It left such a deep impression on me that when our local PBS station aired episodes in the mid to late 1980's, I became an avid viewer. After PBS stopped airing the serial, I thought all was lost. I've been renting the DVD's and this Almanac has been invaluable to me. It's filled with the history of the show and it's many actors. I highly recommend it to anyone who is a fan of this series!!! It's a must buy!



3. I found this book to be very interesting with lots of trivia and tid bits about the show, its creator and its actors. It also contains many pictures of its cast over the years. I highly recommend this book to any Dark Shadows fan!



4. When I was a young lad, I used to run home from school to watch Dark Shadows, that most excellent Gothic horror television program that ran from 1966-1971. Though the show has been off the air for many years, I never forgot my fondness for the show. Now that it is available on tape and DVD, I am back into it. My pleasure was made complete when I got a hold of a copy of this book.

   This book contains everything I could want: interviews, pictures of the cast and settings, a list of characters, a list of actors, a list of storylines, a timeline of the story, a timeline of the show itself, and so much more! I would love to list everything that is in this book, but it would take me far too long! Suffice it to say, this is a great book, and a Must-Have for any fan of Dark Shadows!




5. I'm relatively a newcomer to "Dark Shadows," fell in love with it from the start, and have been catching the episodes on the Sci-Fi Channel ever since. It was wonderful to learn about the history of the show from these two books. The technical aspects of the show fascinate me, and much info is supplied on how the show was made, etc. There are character/actor lists and descriptions, behind-the-scenes anecdotes, tons of interesting trivia, bloopers list (it's fun to see the mishaps that happen on camera - the show was done live-on-tape...), some great photos, and all kinds of interesting info on the show...

   Any "Dark Shadows" fan would enjoy this book, as well as "Dark Shadows Memories" which provides a complete episode list and lots more memories from several members of the cast.

   It's awesome that original actors from the show, such as Kathryn Leigh Scott and Lara Parker, put together these books on "Dark Shadows" - it makes them that much better! :)

No comments about The Place of the Stage: License, Play, and Power in Renaissance England.

No comments about Theatres of Independence: Drama, Theory, and Urban Performance in India since 1947 (Studies Theatre Hist & Culture).

No comments about African American Performance and Theater History: A Critical Reader.

No comments about 80 Years of the Oscar: The Official History of the Academy Awards.

3 comments about Sophia Living and Loving: Her Own Story.

1. Not very many movie stars, I think, have ever sold tickets to male and female alike: but Sophia Loren did, and probably still could. Even fewer female movie stars who first came to public notice for the "abundanza" of their chests, have, I think, managed to turn into real actresses right in front of our eyes. And only one, I think, has managed to win an Academy Award for a film in a foreign language, following on a career of films in that foreign language, Italian, while never tasting a great English language success. That one, "certo," is Sophia Loren, still very much on the scene for one thing and another. Quite a few years ago, she collaborated with A.E. Hotchner on this book, and it's still one of the best.
   
   Her Oscar, of course, came for her powerhouse performance in "Two Women," a role that well-illustrated how she could move from sexpot to actress. How many glamorous leading ladies-- who happened to be married to their producers, no less-- would take the role of a mother older than themselves, in a film in which they had originally intended to play the daughter? And play it without makeup, in a wardrobe Gina Lollobrigida wouldn't use for rags?
   
   This is only the half of it, for, in order to be able to give that performance, Loren had to dig back to her hungry childhood during World War II. Few of us would want to.
   
   But one of the interesting things about this book is Loren's honesty. She was, as many people know, born illegitimate and very poor in Naples; during the war, her entire village slept in a single rat-infested railway tunnel and scavenged for food. She gives us a good look here at the grit and stamina that got her out of Pozzuoli and into pictures.
   
   In fact, she seems to be a woman of awesome grit, capable of hanging on for years until she got that slippery producer, Carlo Ponti to the altar. Then, she was capable of spending her two pregnancies isolated in her bed: it's what she had to do to have her children.
   
   There's more in the book, of course, such as her affair with Cary Grant and the choice she had to make between him and Carlo Ponti. Many sources agree that she was one of the great loves of Grant's life, and he never quite got over her loss.
   
   For many years, Rome's cinema elite rebuffed her. The Catholic Church preached against her. And she actually faced criminal prosecutions for adultery and public sinning.
   
   But let's not forget that the same woman who gave us "Two Women," also gave us a series of sparkling sex comedies, and the scintillating "Houseboat" with Cary Grant. Her striptease in "Yesterday Today and Tomorrow," for which she prepped with the exotic dancers from Paris's famous Crazy Horse Saloon, absolutely sizzled, yet still had an undercurrent of humor in it,from Mastroianni's command to "do a striptease, with just the refrigerator light on." That unbuttoned Neopolitan humor continued through "Marriage Italian Style," and "A Special Day," and could continue still, should Loren ever decide to go back to film. An actress with as little vanity as Loren could work forever.
   
   How many stars, after all, would quote this remark of Cary Grant's on their first meeting? "How do you do, Miss Lolloloren, or is it Lorenigida? Ah, you Italian actress, I can never get your names straight?
   
   But I think the rest of the world has long since managed to.
   
   This book is a fine piece of work from Hotchner. The woman who said of herself," my mouth is too large, my nose is too long, and my chin and lips are too broad," couldn't have been an easy subject.



2. I'm not usually attracted to Italian women but Sophia Loren is in a class all by herself. Coming into fame in an era in which most movie stars were peroxide blondes (and to tell the truth it hasn't really changed all that much in Hollywood-worse even-women are not only still majority blonde but flat-backed stick figures!), this sensuous woman's dark and exotic beauty sent young American men's "you know whats" throbbing!
   It is ashame this book is out of print. I used to sneak it away from my mother's shelf and run off to look at the photos. The classic wet shot of Sophia from "Boy On A Dolphin" plus several topless shots from her early days as well as pictures of Sophia in gater belts and stockings (circa late-60's/early-70's) and much shots of her showing off those gorgeously full boobs of hers! I was 12 and I "discovered" my manhood from those photos. The woman is in her 70's now and in her latest film appearance, "Ready To Wear" ("Pret-a-Porter"), she was still beautiful, sexy and alluring. She had it all over her co-stars, Julia Roberts and Kim Basinger. Thank you Ms. Loren.



3. Numerous books have been published about Sophia Loren, since this one came out in late 70's. Many of them are very good, but this particular book is still the best for couple of reasons. First of all, it is a 100% autobiography, written by one of the most amazing, and not just most beautiful, women in the world. Loren's character is reflected on every page, as she narrates her life, starting with her family background all the way to talking about her own children. Secondly, she writes with candor that would surely shock a reader, who is used to reading polished and often pretentious autobiographies of Hollywood stars. Loren, the writer, does not shy away from admitting to being the uggliest girl in town, while growing up; to feeling such human emotions as rage, fear, jealousy, hate at various stages of her life...Yet, after you finish reading this book, you will be amazed at the fact that Loren's greatest emotions have invariably been that of a compassionate, forgiving, and loving woman.