Edmund Goulding S Dark Victory

At the dawn of sound, he wrote the story for the Academy Award-winning musical The Broadway Melody and collaborated memorably with Gloria Swanson and Joseph Kennedy for The Trespasser. He excelled at anti-war drama (White Banners, The Dawn Patrol, We Are Not Alone), fantastic Bette Davis weepies (Dark Victory, The Old Maid, The Great Lie), lilting romantic dramas (The Constant Nymph, Claudia), big-budgeted literary adaptations (The Razor's Edge), and even film noir (Nightmare Alley).

Dark Victory, released in 1939, was a daring movie for its time. it depicted its heroine, Bette Davis, dying of a brain tumor. The film blended romance and realism so successfully that it is still a model for movies about death and dying today. Bette Davis drew upon every mood she had ever expressed—insouciance, impatience, anger, passion, acquiescence. She worked hard at the role, reveling in a story that, according to her account, she had actively campaigned for. She also benefited greatly by the professional talents of director Edmund Goulding and screenwriter Casey Robinson and a supporting cast that included Humphrey Bogart.

The legendary Hollywood star blazes a fiery trail in this enthralling portrait of a brilliant actress and the movies her talent elevated to greatness She was magnificent and exasperating in equal measure. Jack Warner called her "an explosive little broad with a sharp left." Humphrey Bogart once remarked, "Unless you're very big she can knock you down." Bette Davis was a force of nature—an idiosyncratic talent who nevertheless defined the words "movie star" for more than half a century and who created an extraordinary body of work filled with unforgettable performances. In Dark Victory, the noted film critic and biographer Ed Sikov paints the most detailed picture ever delivered of this intelligent, opinionated, and unusual woman who was—in the words of a close friend—"one of the major events of the twentieth century." Drawing on new interviews with friends, directors, and admirers, as well as archival research and a fresh look at the films, this stylish, intimate biography reveals Davis's personal as well as professional life in a way that is both revealing and sympathetic. With his wise and well-informed take on the production and accomplishments of such movie milestones as Jezebel, All About Eve, and Now, Voyager, as well as the turbulent life and complicated personality of the actress who made them, Sikov's Dark Victory brings to life the two-time Academy Award–winning actress's unmistakable screen style, and shows the reader how Davis's art was her own dark victory.

Given the popular and scholarly interest in the First World War it is surprising how little contemporary literary work is available. This five-volume reset edition aims to redress this balance, making available an extensive collection of newly-edited short stories, novels and plays from 1914–19.

THE STORY: Judith, skeptical, wealthy, loves horses and parties; her existence is bounded by her social world. She learns that she must undergo a delicate brain operation. Dr. Steele, on the point of retiring, is an idealist, who has found in human

Miriam Hopkins (1902--1972) first captured moviegoers' attention in daring precode films such as Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931), The Story of Temple Drake (1933), and Ernst Lubitsch's Trouble in Paradise (1932). Though she enjoyed popular and critical acclaim in her long career -- receiving an Academy Award nomination for Becky Sharp (1935) and a Golden Globe nomination for The Heiress (1949) -- she is most often remembered for being one of the most difficult actresses of Hollywood's golden age. Whether she was fighting with studio moguls over her roles or feuding with her avowed archrival, Bette Davis, her reputation for temperamental behavior is legendary. In the first comprehensive biography of this colorful performer, Allan R. Ellenberger illuminates Hopkins's fascinating life and legacy. Her freewheeling film career was exceptional in studio-era Hollywood, and she managed to establish herself as a top star at Paramount, RKO, Goldwyn, and Warner Bros. Over the course of five decades, Hopkins appeared in thirty-six films, forty stage plays, and countless radio programs. Later, she emerged as a pioneer of TV drama. Ellenberger also explores Hopkins's private life, including her relationships with such intellectuals as Theodore Dreiser, Dorothy Parker, Gertrude Stein, and Tennessee Williams. Although she was never blacklisted for her suspected Communist leanings, her association with these freethinkers and her involvement with certain political organizations led the FBI to keep a file on her for nearly forty years. This skillful biography treats readers to the intriguing stories and controversies surrounding Hopkins and her career, but also looks beyond her Hollywood persona to explore the star as an uncompromising artist. The result is an entertaining portrait of a brilliant yet underappreciated performer.

Bette Davis, whose career spanned almost 50 years and covered theatre, radio, TV and motion pictures, was at one time the first lady of the big screen. Working with such storied performers as Henry Fonda, Humphrey Bogart, and Joan Crawford, and directors Edmund Goulding, William Wyler and Robert Aldrich, Bette Davis provided some of the most memorable performances in movie history. This volume contains detailed analyses of Bette Davis' top twelve films spanning 1938 to 1987 and including The Letter, All About Eve, The Little Foxes, Jezebel, What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? and The Whales of August. Each film is discussed in depth, with an examination of its script, direction, camerawork and performances, particularly as they relate to Davis's work. A second group of films, memorable largely for Davis's performance rather than the overall success of the work, are also examined. Special emphasis is placed on the way Davis viewed her own work as well as the detrimental effect her devotion to her career had on her personal life. Appendices contain a list of her marriages and children; her Oscar nominations; a discussion of Davis's missed opportunities; and a partial chronology of her films.

Gloria Swanson defined what it meant to be a movie star, but her unforgettable role in Sunset Boulevard overshadowed the true story of her life. Now Stephen Michael Shearer sets the record straight in the first in-depth biography of the film legend. Swanson was Hollywood's first successful glamour queen. Her stardom as an actress in the mid-1920s earned her millions of fans and millions of dollars. Realizing her box office value early in her career, she took control of her life. Soon she was not only producing her own films, she was choosing her scripts, selecting her leading men, casting her projects, creating her own fashions, guiding her publicity, and living an extravagant and sometimes extraordinary celebrity lifestyle. She also collected a long line of lovers (including Joseph P. Kennedy) and married men of her choosing (including a French marquis, thus becoming America's first member of "nobility"). As a devoted and loving mother, she managed a quiet success of raising three children. Perhaps most important, as a keen businesswoman she also was able to extend her career more than sixty years. Her astounding comeback as Norma Desmond in Billy Wilder's Sunset Boulevard catapulted her back into the limelight. But it also created her long-misunderstood persona, one that this meticulous biography shows was only part of this independent and unparalleled woman.