Customer Reviews (1)

McLuhan Was Right
Much as I love the 6FU series, with its offbeat Alan Ball humor, intelligent scripts, beautifully fleshed-out characters and surprising editing, I was a little disappointed in the book.

I'm not sure what I expected. The strengths of the TV show are in the production; it's not the actors or sets which make it special but the way the show is assembled. It would be difficult therefore if not impossible to capture the unique flavor of the show in a non-moving medium.

The book tries mightily -- scrapbook entries from the characters' earlier lives, details of documents mentioned only in passing on the show, additional background on the family members and lots and lots of photos. But all this information strikes me as somewhat beside the point, because it's not the characters or the sets which make 6FU what it is. For dedicated 6FU fans the indulgence is a warm fuzzy experience, but it's not like experiencing ths show.

The elaborate packaging and kaleidoscopic content look for all the world like a Marshall McLuhan book -- whose message the book bears out. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Like a biography of a rock band
Perry's first version of this biography of the Monty Python comedy team was published in 1983 and I read it in 1987. Some good friends who knew that I was python phanatic gave me this, not knowing of an earlier version--and how would they, because there is no indication on this book that it is a rewrite/reprint of anything. The indica page even states that this is a first edition and doesn't list the earlier book as the source of any material. Strange are the ways of publishers. The subject of Perry's writing deserves the update. The team has only grown in popularity over the intervening years and the members continue to entertain audiences with new work, from Gilliam's directing/writing career to Cleese's acting. The Life of Python reads like a biography of a rock band, which Python actually is more similar to than the traditional comedy group such as the Marx brothers. They are also, like the great rock groups of the sixties, now missing one member, making the chance of a true reformation impossible. Graham Chapman's death is not preventing Eric Idle from attempting a reunion "concert," this time to be presented in Las Vegas (the very idea of which appeals to the members' sense of humor).

The basic material of the book is to try to track each member of the group from their comedic beginnings to the formation of the troupe and then to the work following the cancellation of the TV series, all interwoven by time. Sounds like a mess, but it works. Perry interviewed all the members, sometimes more than once, and the book is liberally sprinkled with quotes. This new version has color photos as well as black and white, which fills the book (every page has a picture on it). This is probably the definitive biography of the group, although Kim "Howard" Johnson's The First 20X Years of Monty Python is a close second.

Fascinating Biographies on the six masters of British Humor
As a Monty Python follower, I love books like these. Although it's not full of hilarious lines, it does have great bios on all six members of the group. However, it starts with the pages completely out of order. This is apparently on purpose, but it doesn't help the book. I found it somehow easy to get into this book and read through the biographies. This book comes recommended, however, I always seem to get hold of such items right before they go out of stock. This one should still be out there. It's a treasure in my collection of Python books. ... Read more

Book Description
This is a book for theatre-lovers, written for anyone who shares the author's curiosity about the art of acting and about theatre past and present.The first section centres on Elizabethan theatre practice, the second highlights themes, episodes and contemporary taste in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in England, and the third focuses on twentieth-century performances of Shakespeare at Stratford in the 1970s and in the New Globe as the new century begins.The extensive cast of actors discussed includes Richard Tarlton, Will Kemp, David Garrick, Samuel Foote, Richard and Mary Ann Yates, Thomas Weston, John Kemble, Edmund Kean, Frederick Robson, Henry Irving, Ian Richardson and Ben Kingsley. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

What's good on the page is even better when the author reads
The virtues of Martin Jarvis's breezy, insightful and well-crafted autobiography have been noticed here and elsewhere.I can report that the pleasure to be derived from it is increased ten fold by listening to Martin Jarvis reading it.The voice is beautifully modulated, and apparently undamaged by forty years of theatre, TV, film and radio work.Not only is the text beautifully read, but there are also many demonstrations of Martin's Jarvis's uncanny ability to mimic and adopt other voices.You'll not only hear what Sir John Gielguid, Sir Alan Ayckbourn and Harold Pinter say, you actually believe they are there, speaking to you.Even the great radio actress Marjorie Westbury, to whom Martin Jarvis pays a high tribute, is somehow heard again in Jarvis's reading.There is also a Polish film director, and a Hollywood agent whose impersonations you will never forget.

Whether you're a theater enthusiast, an admirer of Martin Jarvis's work, a budding actor, or just someone who likes to be amused and entertained, you'll find this audio book set to be a great investment.

Oh so readable
Loved Martin Jarvis's acting stories. It's a lesson to some of us who might have thought, in our dreams, that it's all champagne and roses. This elegant Brit warns that it ain't as easy as he and some of his fellow performers make it look - life on stage and screen can be full of downs as well as ups. Jarvis's sense of adventure makes the book a page-turning treat. His Hollywood tales are nothing short of compelling, not to say hilarious. And I have never read a better account of what it is like to be on stage in some of London's most noted theatres. A beautifully written autobiography, bursting with fun, information and wise thoughts about acting. I recently had a good time in the theatre watching this British star play the title role in the Lloyd Webber/Ayckbourn 'By Jeeves, on its way to Broadway. Look out NYC. Will Jarvis be writing about his adventures on the Great White Way? Hope so.

A witty and wise acting life
This autobiography by versatile British actor Martin Jarvis answers just about every question you've ever wanted to ask concerning the mysteries - and absurdities - of his profession. Whether he is writing about his experiences in Royal National Theatre productions with Sir Peter Hall or the intense atmosphere on the set of James Cameron's Titanic, Jarvis is never less than spellbinding. He is fascinating, too, about the detailed work that has gone into his many starring roles in the plays of Alan Ayckbourn, Harold Pinter and David Hare. And the account of his Theatre Royal Hamlet is a comic classic.His pen portraits of Sir John Gielgud, Robert Duvall, Angela Lansbury, Leonardo di Caprio, Kate Winslet, and the incomparable Dame Judi Dench leap from the page with a glittering perception. I adored the stories about the author's introduction to Hollywood - the character of the hysterical manager, Travis, has to be read to be believed. But beneath the humour, Jarvis' elegant prose conveys an extraordinary sense of the value and worth of being an actor. He is moving, too, as he takes us back to his beginnings at school in South London and his early successes (and failures) at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. I particularly appreciated the tales of student work with Anthony Hopkins, Mike Leigh and Patrick Stewart. This is the best book on the secret world of actors since William Redfield's brilliant 'Letters from an Actor'. I wholeheartedly agree with Dame Judi's assessment, displayed on the cover of this unmissable paperback: "Marvellously written - I laughed and Laughed!" ... Read more

Book Description
Despite the richness of the subject and the importance frequently ascribed to the phenomena of rhythm and timing in the arts, the topic as a whole has been neglected.Janet Goodridge writes from a practical movement background and draws on a wide range of sources to illuminate the subject in relation to theatre, drama, dance, ceremony, and ritual.

Written for all those working in, or interested in the expressive arts - teaching, directing and performing - arts therapies, inter-personal communication and anthropology, the book provides a first step towards a cross-cultural, interdisciplinary perspective. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

An excellent book for all students of movement
This book covers a wide field - theatre, dance, communication and has lots of lively examples, both written and visual.It's the kind of book to dip into as a fund of information.Excellent bibliography and notes to followup for future study. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

THE BEST WRITER ON THE ART OF THEATRE
Just as James Agee (deceased) and Pauline Kael (alive, but retired) remain the best writers on the Art of Film, so Kenneth Tynan (again, deceased) is still the best writer on the Art of Theatre. Tynan wrote so beautifully and wittily and lovingly about the stage and the people who inhabit it and he was also responsible in a major way for the success of the National Theatre of Great Britain along with his friend and professional partner, Laurence Olivier.(an essay on Olivier is one of the high-points of this book.)It was Tynan who "discovered" Harold Pinter, who "made the career" of John Osbourne and was a major factor in reviving the career of Noel Coward, after years of neglect:as Literary Manager of the National, it was Tynan who urged a revival of Coward's classic "Hay Fever."

This collection of 50 essays is absolutely essential reading for anyone who has a love of theatre or simply of celebrity and star power.No one writing today writes as well as Tynan did nor consistently shows his affection for Show Business.If you regularly read today's so-called critics, you come away with the feeling that they become INSULTED that plays they dislike were actually produced!

I highly recommend this book.It is passionate, charming and, at times, really funny stuff.But, please, do yourself a favor and haunt every used book shop you know to find a copy of Tynan's out-of-print collected theatre reviews from the U.S. (he wrote for "The New Yorker") and England called CURTAINS.It is absolutely the best book of criticism you'll ever read.

Fireworks galore!
Tynan was one of the century's great journalists, capable of capturing a performer in two paragraphs, yet equally adept at longer essays, several of which are collected here. The pieces on Stoppard and Louise Brooks areparticularly fine. The reviewer below is right: the writing is to die for;but, compared to Epstein, Tynan is a super-hevyweight, with ten times theforce and prose-potency.

Brilliant and funny
Enormously entertaining and the writing is to die for. Epstein regards Tynan as a lightweight and in a way I guess he is, but a skilled lightweight is still a thing of beauty and Tynan IS skilled. I staredunderlining favorite passages but had to stop because I was underliningalmost everything. ... Read more

Book Description
Fragments of Fear examines a wide range of British horror films and the stories behind them.The early melodramas of Tod Slaughter right through to Hammer and their rivals Tigon and Amicus, plus mavericks like Michael Reeves, sex/horror director Peter Walker and more recent talents such as Clive Barker, director of "Hellraiser", are all discussed. Films studied range in scope from the sadism of "Peeping Tom" to the mutant SF of "A Clockwork Orange" and the softcore porn/horror of Jose Larraz' "Vampyres".

Lavishly illustrated throughout, author Andy Boot unravels a tangled history and discovers many little-known gems amid the more familiar images of Hammer, including a wealth of exploitational cinema. Fragments of Fear establishes the British horror movie as a genre which can easily stand up to its more lauded American counterpart in the depth and diversity of its scope. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Illustrations worth the price alone
This is an overview of British horror films. Yet the subject is much wider than just horror; that is unless you consider "The Giant Behemoth" and "Fire Maidens From Outer Space" horror. In all there are approximately 400 films (an eight page Filmography) mentioned in this book.
It is well organized in like subject matter with several sections on Hammer films. It even comes with a warning that there is adult material; this is probably due to body and body parts being uncovered.
This is not just another pretty picture book as Andy Boot goes into many descriptive comparisons that go beyond the juicy facts.

Great overview of British Horror films
This book is a great overview of British Horror films. I have found several films that I now need to try and find on DVD or video that I had either not thought about in decades or had never heard of (The Ghoul, Horrors of the Black Museum, The Earth Dies Screaming, et al.) The writing is well done and the author does a fine job of covering a ton of films in too little space. I own several books from the film series by Creation Books and this title is one of my favorites. ... Read more

Book Description
This two-volume collection--based on an exhaustive study of the earliest editions--brings together Southerne's ten plays and the small surviving body of non-dramatic writing.Along with his two well-known tragedies, The Fatal Marriage and Oroonoko, these volumes also include three outstanding
comedies, Sir Anthony Love, The Wives' Excuse, and The Maid's Last Prayer, which have been praised in recent studies of Restoration drama for their wit, psychological realism, and adventurous stagecraft. The introduction contains the first biography of Southerne based on a comprehensive study of the
surviving documentary records, and the editors have incorporated generous notes clarifying the many contemporary allusions and relating Southerne's work to its sources and models. ... Read more