No comments about The Contemporary Monologue: Women.

3 comments about Puppets and Puppet Theatre.

1. This book tells you everything you need to know about how to do a puppet show. If you are interested in puppetry, even just a little bit, get this book right away. Hint: if you want to use latex to make a hand puppet, sculpt the head with a open mouth.



2. This book is good for beginner puppeteers as well as for professional puppet makers. It is full of photographs and ideas, from puppet construction to theater and performance. Is one of those rare books that contains a great amount of useful information.



3. This is a book for professional and seriuous amateurs who want to improve their technical skills about puppet design, stages, and perfomances. Sharing the experience of excelent puppetters, with excelent photos and diagrams. Also is a very well design book, hardcover and sharp quality book. We strongly recommend it, it is one of the most complete and easy to read book we had seen.

3 comments about Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter.

1. I thought these book reviews would help me form opinions on a presentation I have to give on the meaning of the physical letter "A" but after reading almost all of them, I felt inclined to add my opinion. (the book review helped a little, but I didn't really expect anyone to have written exactly what I was looking for anyway) I have to admit, I didn't expect the book to be exciting or great by the looks of the Custom House, which my AP English teacher actually had us skip. But once you get into it and promise yourself that you're not going to stop reading, you become involved in the story and you really get a deep understanding of human nature. Overall, I found the themes and symbols in this book depressing but with a large amount of depth. I would advise all of the readers who think little of the book to reread it with better expectations on what Hawthorne has to say, and to ignore the fact that the sentences are long- they will flow easily if only you immerse yourself in the novel.



2. I'm an average 12 year old who read "The Scarlet Letter"!!!!!!! And YES, I read the UNABRIDGED VERSION!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I was reading all these reviews in confusion. None of the words were complicated. I didn't have to use a dictionary. All in all, it is an excellent book. Although a bit monotonus at times, it is an excellent book with an excellent reflection of the times. I would recomend it, and even if you have to look up every other word, ITS WORTH IT!!!!!!



3. I tried reading this once before and thought it would be depressing. I then tried to read it again and succeeded. It is definitely worth reading if you love books. I didn't expect it to be a love story, but it really was. What Hester and Mr. Dimmesdale did was wrong, but they were repentant. Hester should not have suffered like she did. The writing was so beautiful and turned the story from something generic into something truly beautiful.

5 comments about Disney: The Mouse Betrayed.

1. Forget the political propaganda some posters are trying to attach to this book. It isn't only for Conservatives or "right-wingers". Truth has no political ties. Everyone should know of the horrors Disney has been covering up for years.
   
   These facts aren't gained from one source, nor are they a product of the author's imagination. Schweizer dug deeply into Disney's hidden secrets, talking with a ton of employees, many who weren't afraid to be named. He includes dozens of documents that Disney tried to hide - documents that expose the child molesters Disney hired to entertain your children.
   
   Though Disney knows about unsafe conditions in their amusement park they do nothing to correct them. The pending lawsuits from deaths or serious injury are cheaper to deal with than the cost of repairing the dangers. It's all about profit and greed.
   
   If only half of this book is true it's a frightful read. You and your children may be at serious physical and emotional risk. If you go to Disney World and get hurt, don't sign anything. Don't let the older kids wander off by themselves, not even for a second.
   
   Read the book and judge for yourself the presented facts .



2. I bought this as an impulse buy, confusing it for Stewart's "Disney War." It took me about a page and a half to figure out it was actually right-wing propaganda written with the intent of furthering a Christian-based agenda to tear down the Disney empire for having had the audacity to get "too big."
   
   I worked at the Disney studios of the 90's as well as the theme park of the 80's. I was like many a mystified "Disnoid," having been raised to believe that if you wish upon a star you could get anything you wanted, and that you were always the star of the movie. Working at the parks deconstructed my concept of a world of "magic" and working for the studio instructed me on the ways and means of big corporations. Growth usually comes with pain but it's necessary. There's nothing less attractive than a grown adult stubbornly refusing to leave the world of childhood fantasy. I was bitter and cynical for a long time after my experiences and would have written a book similar in (initial) intent as the Schweizers, had I not grown up. Reading this book actually made me re-examine my bitterness and take the side of the Disney corporation. It is just a business after all.
   
   The Schweizers will try to convince you that Disney is "bad," using a bar for measuring badness that they assume their readers share. It's interesting to read about the things they criticize from a different perspective. An example--I had an accident while working at the park in the 80's and was amazed at the efficient way the company handled it. As a guest I would not have wanted to see someone stumbling around with a bloody head waiting for an ambulance, nor did I have any right to sue, as might have happened today. They whisked me away to a hospital and compensated me fairly, one time, for something that should not have happened but was, after all, an accident. Would the Schweizers be happier if everything stopped while stretchers were paraded through the park every time something happened?
   
   Of course much of the book is concerned with perversion, much of it centering on the "obvious" shared traits of pedophiles and the "gay mafia" that had a stronger presence in the Disney corporation than it currently holds. The ideas the Schweizers are trying to sell--something along the lines of if you go to Disneyland you're likely to be sodomized--would be disturbing if they weren't so ridiculous (quote: "some cross-dressers even tried to hold their OWN parade down Main Street, but it never got fully organized," ha ha). And the presentation--there's even a warning at the beginning of one of the chapters--is done in that "can you BELIEVE this?" style that makes Michael Moore's films so inflammatory. I found these chapters almost enjoyable on a salacious level--the Schweizers seem to take great glee in discussing the grittier, "naughty" topics, presenting just enough detail to entice the reader but withholding as much to make the reader curious, a good advertisement for the very thing they would condemn: "Just how bad ARE Larry Clark's movies/photos? I MUST know for MYSELF." Of course, in the Schweizer world the worst thing you can possibly do is be a man who loves other men. To quote the film "Victor/Victoria": "Kill him but mustn't kiss him."
   
   There's rampant misinformation as the Schweizers bend facts to further their agenda, making these authors the ultimate hypocrites since the point of their book is to point out that this is what the Disney Corporation is doing. I know at least two of the people quoted in the book and their comments were not solicited; they were taken from public resources and quoted completely out of context. Hardly surprising since the foundation of many a Christian's religious belief system is based on this process. I know very few Christians who have slogged through the bible, even less who have taken the time and energy to research the meaning behind the book. With that in mind I did my best to give "Disney: The Mouse Betrayed" a thorough, unbiased and fair reading. There are sections that are well researched and present indisputable truths; ten years on the world has become more than aware that there was a lot of money-grubbing, greed, and deceit involved in the "Eisner" years of Disney. No one is really surprised anymore that big corporations deal in this sort of excess, even if they are organizations founded on providing family entertainment.
   
   However, I find it interesting to note that Disney is still doing fairly well for all of that (and for better or worse) and that the Schweizers' book has faded into obscurity (it can be had for a buck twenty-five on this very page). Their would-be poisonous diatribe against The Mighty Goliath failed; the antidote, much like the cure for the obsessions of Christian fantaticism in general, was education and rationality.



3. I was looking through a friend's copy, and I've gotta say, the section I read on Disney's supposedly lax safety practices disgusted me. I work for the Mouse at Disneyland, and NEVER have I EVER in my backstage experience been given a reason to question my safety when I attend Disney as a guest. Far more damaging was my job in fast food to my desire to eat McDonalds. If anything, I feel more comfortable now knowing exactly how much care they put into the safety of their guests. There will be the occasional instance of human error or guest idiocy, but they do a superb job of minimizing them. For those who take a dim view of Disney's morals, perhaps it's because unsafe rides lead to accidents, which in turn lead to expensive, high-profile lawsuits.
   
   This book, or at least that topic, which was all I could stomach reading, was full of half-truths, misleading statements, and occasionally outright falsehoods. I personally feel insulted, because I've now been unfairly deemed part of the profit-hungry scum of the earth.



4. This volume sets a lofty goal of being a definative work about the failures of Walt Disney Corperation, but in spite of heart-felt emotive writing, the account left, at least this reader with little more clarification of disney practices than I had before reading it.
   
   Some of the allegations seem credible and well backed by named sources and these should concern everybody especially the section of ride and guest safety, but the account breaks down in the credibility department when all the supposed sins of the various subsiduary companies are laid squarely at Disney's feet. I am not saying the company is inocent,just stating the fact that the book fails to make a very good case for castigating the parent company.
   
   Too often first person disgruntalled employee accounts are treated as facts - which they may or may not be. The statistical section was very disappointing in that they used raw numbers without qualification. For example: The number of Disney injuries per employee in hotels compared to the average. The problem is that there are no qualifications of the raw data - consider for example that over a year a hotel staff caring for a hotel that averages a 75% occupancy is unliekly to have as many injuries as a hotel running near 100% occupany as many Disney hotels are. Clearly the more stressed the staff the greater the odds are of injury. Hence comparison of raw data can be misleading and once more the inron-clad evidence of the "Evil Disney" lacks the credibility that would convert the cynics.
   
   Over all the book fails to deliever the material expected in a definative and unemotional manner. Disney may indeed be a mouse betrayed, but it nearly impossible to draw that conclusion based upon the data supplied (or not supplied) here, at least if one is to be intellectually honest



5. This book, so far, is an interesting book. Although I haven't finished it yet, I find the information useful. The employee viewpoints and facts will make my next visit to Disney World a more cautious one.

5 comments about Art.

1. I first saw "Art" performed in London in April of 1997, and it had a profound effect upon me. I did not have the privilege of seeing it with Albert Finney, Tom Courtenay and Ken Stout, but I did see it with three excellent actors. Since then I have seen in it in various other venues. It is almost actor-proof and doesn't require stars.
   It is a play that does not read particularly well; it is very talky, and it needs the interpretive actors to carry it along. At times reading it you feel as if this is theater of the absurd, but when you see it performed it isn't; it is realistic, but satiric.
   It's a play told in very a human and particularized way about friendship, egos, loyalty, communication, esthetics and human nature. Serge buys a more than bland painting; his friend Marc says he hates the painting (partly because he wasn't consulted about the purchase). Marc is unhappy because his friend has turned on him so he seeks the backing of Yvan, a peacemaker and compromiser who says he is moved by the painting, sees or feels resonance in the art, hoping to take a middle ground between the two others.
   There are speeches to the audience in which characters comment on each other. Arguments blossom out from the painting to every aspect of their friendships. Each of the three men is a different kettle of fish, and it may be their differences that kept them together.
   At the end Serge makes the supreme act of reconciliation and friendship. The last lines of the play spoken by Marc are moving and telling. He presents an interpretation of the painting and the real meaning of the picture and the play may be "no man is an island."
   Try to see a flesh and blood acting version of this play. The script doesn't do it justice.
   Nine Lives Too Many
   The Daemon in Our Dreams
   The Rice Queen Spy
   Clawed Back from the Dead



2. "Art", a play written by French author Yasmina Reza (1959-...) in 1994, and translated into English in 1996 by Christopher Hampton, is quite interesting. Despite the fact that it isn't overly long, it tackles difficult subjects such as the nature of friendship and art in a rather original way.
   
   The plot is not complicated, and revolves around three male friends: Serge, Marc and Yvan. The dynamics of their friendship is substantially altered when one of them, Serge, buys a Modernist painting without consulting with the others. Serge simply fell in love with the painting, and believes it is splendid even though it is somewhat strange, all white with some lines in a different tonality of white in the middle. Marc, his assertive friend, finds that the amount Serge paid for the painting (200,000 French francs) is absurdly large, and is offended by the mere idea that his friend Serge likes it and believes it is art. Yvan, on the other hand, doesn't mind, but his non-commital attitude will land him in trouble with both Serge and Marc.
   
   Buying a painting, a seemingly common act, will draw the three friends into an uncomfortable debate about themselves, their relationship, and art. It will also give the reader the opportunity to take his own position in a debate that it is still going own.
   
   All in all, I really liked "Art", and I found the ending specially good. This is the first play by Reza that I have read, but if the rest are as good as this one, I have no doubts that I will read many more.
   
   Belen Alcat



3. This play revolves around three friends, Serge, Marc, and Yvan. All three men are educated and successful, and recently Serge has bought a piece of Art featuring white diagonal lines across a white canvas. Serge is very pleased with his expensive purchase, however Marc has different sentiments. They each confer with their mutual friend Yvan, and again with each other and eventually all together. Disagreements over whether or not the art is any good, or even art at all, begins to divide the friends.
   What makes this play incredible is the way Yasmina Reza captures the subtle human attitudes and emotions that are hidden in our language and the way we interact with one another. To just hear a story about three friends who disagree about the quality of a piece of art would be a bore, but when it is told with the kind of sharp and realistic dialogue that Reza has written, it comes alive. Reza creates an intimacy between the audience and her characters by assigning all three characters short soliloquies throughout the play, so we as readers/an audience understand what each man is thinking as they interact with each other.
   Anyone who has experienced a serious argument with a close friend can appreciate the realism of Reza's work. Those who are not looking for something dramatic can also appreciate the dark humor that present throughout the play. I would recommend this play to just about anyone.



4. "Art," the play by Yasmina Reza, has been translated into English by Christopher Hampton. The back cover info notes that the play ran in Paris beginning in October 1994 and received its British premiere in 1996.

   This 3 character play is about a trio of friends: Marc, Serge, and Yvan. As the play starts Serge has infuriated Marc by buying an all white painting for a huge price. Yvan gets caught in the middle as the three argue over art, the role of the artist, being "modern," personal identity, and relationships.

   This description of the play may make it sound a bit like a "Seinfeld" episode. It's an intriguing and witty play. I've never seen it performed, but because it seems to rely so heavily on the presence of a central prop, "Art" may lose some impact as a pure readers' text (not unlike the situation with August Wilson's play "The Piano Lesson"). Ultimately the drama builds to a powerful conclusion. It's a thought-provoking play; I especially recommend it to those who wonder about the nature of art and its role in our world today.




5. This is an exciting play about friendship and art that moves along at an animated pace from start to finish. As I started reading the play, I had an immediate positive reaction to it, and was swept along by its delightful dialogue. While the play does deal with the question of "What is art?" it does so in a humorous (not pedantic) way through the characters' relationships with one another. The ideas about art are explored in the context of friendship, and ulitmately, I think, the subject of friendship is central to the play. Reza explores the idea: Are we who we are as defined by others, or as defined by ourselves; and further, do we value friendships based on our definition of who the other person is, or on the other person's definition of him or herself? The ideas Reza explores are somewhat reminiscent of Sartre's play "No Exit," but don't make too much of the comparison, since Reza's style and approach is very different, and the situation in which the characters find themselves is a realistic one. Anyone who likes plays about ideas and plays about character will enjoy this fresh, witty play.

4 comments about The Dark Shadows Companion: 25th Anniversary Collection.

1. Exellent Book.If your wanting to know anything about Dark Shadows or are a fan this is the book for you.I have had mine since its first printing.I still take it out and read it.Wonderful pictures,and a complete episode guide.A Must Have!!!



2. The book explains how the show got it's start. You read about how the actors were choosen and about them personally. There is a section about what each actor has done since the show ended. An episode guide gives a brief summary about all 1245 shows. There are several pictures throughout the book. Stories are told about the writing, set designs,and funny things that happened during the run of the show. This is a very interesting book.



3. I thought this book gave tons of interesting information and i enjoyed it. I read it over and over because I have DS club online and give my members trivia information. Great book! I would recommend it to any Dark Shadows fan.



4. This is an excellent book for fans, having both information about the series as well as sources for further information such as fan clubs and where to look for videos. I highly recommend it for fans of Dark Shadows. It also has an episode guide, which comes in handy for viewing and taping favorite episodes. This book has turned me on to some of the many Dark Shadows sites that are accessible on the internet.

1 comments about Scenery: Drafting and Construction for Theatres, Museums, Exhibitions and Trade Shows (Theatre Arts (Routledge Paperback)).

1. I am a Scenic Designer for theatre and film. I work out of Los Angeles now but have travelled the world extensively with my work, and have designed and draughted shows for many of the top teatres and production companies. Never have I had the pleasure to see every nuance of this very complicated and specialised occupation covered so extensively. The book serves as an essential reader/guidebook for anyone who is embarking on a job in this or a related field, whilst also being incredibly useful to those of us who have been in the business for some time. The example drawings are beautifully displayed and explained with clarity in a precise and unpretentious language that suits everybody from the layman to the seasoned proffessional. I have nothing but admiration for John Blurton, who is himself one of the best in the business. Praise Heaven! Scenic Draughting has been delivered a Bible at last!

2 comments about Jennifer Aniston: The Biography of Hollywood's Sweetheart.

1. This is a great book on Jen. Well-written and filled with plenty of color photos! Definitely highly recommended for Jen fans. You will be very satisfied.



2. I read her mother's biography which was reiterated in the first many chapters of this book. It was somewhat entertaining, but not profound or too revealing. I ended the book with a sour taste for Ms. J. Aniston. She seems to lack a bit of class and loves the "f" word! It seems like she has grown immensely from her split with Pitt, but her growth was warped by such sudden fame. I think in many ways, she still seems lost.

5 comments about Natural Born Killers: The Original Screenplay.

1. Tarantino's original script for 'Natural Born Killers' is vastly superior to the movie. Oliver Stone's film version (while still entertaining and transgressive)is meandering and extreme for the sake of extremity (in everything from the jarring editing to unnecessary scenes-like the young woman-Scagnetti murder scene to Mickey hinting at the rape of his hostage and Mallory's subsequent seduction of the gas station attendant). To his credit, I understand what Stone is trying to achieve: a statement about media culture and an increasingly amoral American psyche, but he doesn't quite succeed, in my opinion. The result is an uneven movie with a bit too much padding.
   
   Unlike the original script, the film provides the background stories for Mickey and Mallory so that the audience can empathize with why they are the way they are. There is also a scene in which the killer couple have a spiritual epiphany after encountering a Native American shaman. Despite their respect for the shaman, Mickey accidentally kills him after a bad dream. The movie is effectively commenting on several things: The hypocrisy of a 50's American ideal of family and it's disillusioning affect upon our serial killing antiheroes, in addition, the shaman scene also screams of American hypocrisy-the history between the colonists and Native Americans and also an insincere, self-righteous idea of spirituality on the part of Mickey and Mallory. But these things are lost in translation-what exactly is the movie trying to be, a psychological profile of the American serial killer and how American history and culture shaped such human beings? Or, is it a satire of the 'serial killer' and the (media) culture surrounding him/her? Because Stone's film tries to do both at once, the film feels shallow (even if impassioned) since it cannot satisfy both topics completely.
   
   Tarantino's script, on the other hand, is much more focused. It knows exactly what it is-a black satire of serial killer culture in America. Mickey and Mallory are much more absent in Tarantino's version. Instead, the two are more of a symbol or driving force for the real story, that of the journalists and policemen whom are after them. The hypocrisy of this story is in the characterization of the policemen and journalists because they are less concerned with the welfare of the people than they are with furthering their careers, social status and so forth.
   
   The biggest change, however, is with Mickey and Mallory themselves, who are much more mythical here than in the movie. In the film we understand why they are so extreme (what with their backgrounds and all), not so with this script, where they are ambiguous-they serve more as moderators of the unjust (the corrupt policemen and the opportunist paparazzi), which heightens the satire because the roles of the just and the unjust have been reversed (Mickey and Mallory, although killers, represent love and are the only truly honest characters).
   
   The script has far less unnecessary story bits. As I said earlier, the Stone version has a scene in which Scagnetti kills a young woman. Why is this important? We already knew that he was an opportunist and a corrupt police officer. In the script, Scagnetti's corruption is hinted at several times but doesn't include the murder/rape scene, which would've been overkill. The script is much more subtle in this regard.
   
   Simpler and more focused than the film (not to mention much more fun), I highly recommend this original script. Get it with the flick and compare for yourself!



2. I've always wondered why people read plays but not movie scripts, and after reading "Natural Born Killers," I wonder that even more.
   This is a great script for a movie that could have been excellent if Quentin Tarantino, the script's author, had directed the movie himself. I don't know WHAT Oliver Stone was trying to do.
   The script, in case you don't know, is the story of a husband and wife with an insane past that go on a love-fuelled, almost invincible killing rampage across the country. Their crimes are senseless and random, and the media (and the public) LOVES them. It's the bizarre story of their killing sprees, their romance, their capture, and their escape, and...well, I don't want to give too much away.
   The script follows an incredibly cool format, of being mostly an hour-long TV special about the two killers, intertwined with the people making the TV special and interviewing the killers themselves, intertwined with flashbacks.
   It could have been an amazing movie, but instead we got a weird, cartoonish mess that exudes barely any of the well-developed themes, tight action, and believable characters (individuals and mobs) that Quentin Tarantino actually wrote.
   Read the script, and skip the movie--that's what I say. Read the script, and hope that maybe someday Tarantino will remake the movie himself, the right way, the way it should have been.



3. There are people who seem to either enjoy Stone's movie and hate Quentin's screenplay or vice versa. Fact is I enjoyed both. Quentin Tarantino's original screenplay for "Natural Born Killers" is far different from the nightmarish acid trap that it became once Oliver Stone got his hands on it. Stone's film is far more epic and sadistic though Quentin's version isn't exactly a day at Disney World either. Much of Quentin's work is used in the film version though the way the story is told is so completely different than it was clearly conceived. The opening diner sequence is nearly the exact same as presented in the film though this is really the only one of Mickey and Mallory's murder spree sequences that Quentin intended to include (aside from the court room murder which was "deleted" from Stone's cut). Following that, the script takes a much different approach with it being told almost entirely in a documentary style with Wayne Gale (played in the film by Robert Downey) acting as the central character. Jack Scagnetti, who was a sadistic crooked cop in Stone's "NBK", is far less brutal in this one and is not positioned as a longtime rival of the murderous couple but more as a veteran cop being sold into hauling the two killers to the asylum. While the character of Dewight McClusky (played by Tommy Lee Jones in the movie) was a character in this script as well, his role is decreased and most of his action was written for a character named Wurlitzer, who didn't make Stone's version. The majority of the first half of the filmed "Killers" was not a part of the original Tarantino story and most of the social commentary was also absent. If you're a Tarantino fan or someone who would like a different take on the "NBK" story, this is an intruiging read.



4. I rented the movie directed by Oliver Stone due to the fact that Quentin Tarantino's name was on the story credits and I knew that Oliver Stone among others had messed with his script and Tarantino had removed his name from the screenwriting credits but I wanted to see it anyways.I thought the movie sucked,I hated it.So I bought the original script to see how the movie could've been and this is a great script.There's no mention of how the cinematography should look.There's no sexually abusive sitcom father,nor indian guy.This is how the film should have been.The movie is virtually just a big TV special by Wayne Gale who was played in the movie by Robert Downey Jr. The story is amazingly different.The opening scene is the same though.The story is basically Mickey and Mallory Knox in jail while Mickey is being interviewed by Wayne Gale.That's it.Buy this script.Burn the movie.Enjoy



5. A man who has not lived a life cannot tell a real story. Tarentino's films are universally and fundamentally boring for anyone who has ever lived a real life and not just fantasized about having one. His dipictions of violence eminate from his own personal lack of sexual energy. Sadly, teenage males without girlfriends seem to like these slammed together video games that are being called brilliant, and continue to support the trash factory that generates this type of hyper garbage. It's especially sad when a true film afficienado understands the brilliance of all of the original pictures which he doggedly ripped off and claimed the scenes for his own. If one more person calls this sad, pathetic, lack of a man a genious, I will become even more sick of him. Please get a life and buy a real movie.

4 comments about The Amadeus Book of the Violin: Construction, History, and Music.

1. This book answers the mail if what you need is knowledge of what a violin is, how it became, and how it is used. Provocative, this book goes beyond the usual "...violin evolved from the rebec..." and poses the theory that a violin was developed out of the desire for its timbre vice a straight-line evolution from other stringed instruments. For those with an insatiable appetite for knowledge on this instrument, I recommend this book.



2. While the book isn't, in parts, a real page turner, it is a thorough survey of violin information. With 250 pages on construction and history of violin making, it brings to light much important and interesting information. It really makes clear the unique market that violin buying-selling is and gives historical reasons for this unique market.
   
   Overall, a necessity for the violin lover.



3. A must for all violin players and lovers alike...if you have ever wondered about the life and times of the 4 string wonder instrument that is the violin, this is your book. It goes into construction, history, players and techniques...GET THIS BOOK!!!



4. This book is splendid, talking about the history,playing and the construction of Violins. This Book reveals secrets about the old Italian varnishes, eyewitness accounts of Paganini's performances, bow making, and Ideal thicknesses for places on the bridge. Also, a comparison of different f-holes, string making, bow holds, harmonics, how famous people tested thier strings,the "bach bow", and experiments conducted on the violin are also included. A must see to believe! Indispensible!Way too much to type here!