Sidney Lumet

Download Sidney Lumet full books in PDF, epub, and Kindle. Read online Sidney Lumet ebook anywhere anytime directly on your device. Fast Download speed and no annoying ads. We cannot guarantee that every ebooks is available!

Making Movies

Author : Sidney Lumet
Publisher : Vintage
ISBN 13 : 0307763668
Total Pages : 240 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (77 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Making Movies by : Sidney Lumet

Download or read book Making Movies written by Sidney Lumet and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2010-09-01 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Why does a director choose a particular script? What must they do in order to keep actors fresh and truthful through take after take of a single scene? How do you stage a shootout—involving more than one hundred extras and three colliding taxis—in the heart of New York’s diamond district? What does it take to keep the studio honchos happy? From the first rehearsal to the final screening, Making Movies is a master’s take, delivered with clarity, candor, and a wealth of anecdote. For in this book, Sidney Lumet, one of our most consistently acclaimed directors, gives us both a professional memoir and a definitive guide to the art, craft, and business of the motion picture. Drawing on forty years of experience on movies that range from Long Day’s Journey into Night to Network and The Verdict—and with such stars as Katharine Hepburn, Paul Newman, Marlon Brando, and Al Pacino—Lumet explains how painstaking labor and inspired split-second decisions can result in two hours of screen magic.

Sidney Lumet

Author : Maura Spiegel
Publisher : St. Martin's Press
ISBN 13 : 1250030145
Total Pages : 269 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (5 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Sidney Lumet by : Maura Spiegel

Download or read book Sidney Lumet written by Maura Spiegel and published by St. Martin's Press. This book was released on 2019-12-10 with total page 269 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first-ever biography of the seminal American director whose remarkable life traces a line through American entertainment history Acclaimed as the ultimate New York movie director, Sidney Lumet began his astonishing five-decades-long directing career with the now classic 12 Angry Men, followed by such landmark films as Serpico, Dog Day Afternoon, and Network. His remarkably varied output included award-winning adaptations of plays by Anton Chekhov, Arthur Miller, Tennessee Williams, and Eugene O’Neill, whose Long Day’s Journey into Night featured Katharine Hepburn and Ralph Richardson in their most devastating performances. Renowned as an “actor’s director,” Lumet attracted an unmatched roster of stars, among them: Henry Fonda, Sophia Loren, Marlon Brando, Anna Magnani, Sean Connery, Ingrid Bergman, Paul Newman, Al Pacino, Ethan Hawke, and Philip-Seymour Hoffman, accruing eighteen Oscar nods for his actors along the way. With the help of exclusive interviews with family, colleagues, and friends, author Maura Spiegel provides a vibrant portrait of the life and work of this extraordinary director whose influence is felt through generations, and takes us inside the Federal Theater, the Group Theatre, the Actors Studio, and the early “golden age” of television. From his surprising personal life, with four marriages to remarkable women—all of whom opened their living rooms to Lumet’s world of artists and performers like Marilyn Monroe and Michael Jackson—to the world of Yiddish theater and Broadway spectacles, Sidney Lumet: A Life is a book that anyone interested in American film of the twentieth century will not want to miss.

Sidney Lumet

Author : Sidney Lumet
Publisher : Univ. Press of Mississippi
ISBN 13 : 9781578067244
Total Pages : 260 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (672 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Sidney Lumet by : Sidney Lumet

Download or read book Sidney Lumet written by Sidney Lumet and published by Univ. Press of Mississippi. This book was released on 2006 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A collection of over twenty interviews with the director of Serpico, Dog Day Afternoon, The Verdict, and 12 Angry Men

Sidney Lumet

Author : Aubrey Malone
Publisher : McFarland
ISBN 13 : 1476675538
Total Pages : 221 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (766 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Sidney Lumet by : Aubrey Malone

Download or read book Sidney Lumet written by Aubrey Malone and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2019-12-18 with total page 221 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Punctilious to a fault, Sidney Lumet favored intense rehearsal, which enabled him to bring in most of his films under budget and under schedule. An energized director who captured the heart of New York like no other, he created a vast canon of work that stands as a testament to his passionate concern for justice and his great empathy for the hundreds of people with whom he collaborated during a career that spanned more than five decades. This is the first full-scale biography of a man who is generally regarded as one of the most affable directors of his time. Using the oral testimonies of those who worked with him both behind and in front of the camera, this book explores Lumet's personality and working methods.

Orpheus Descending

Author : Tennessee Williams
Publisher : Dramatists Play Service, Inc.
ISBN 13 : 9780822208655
Total Pages : 92 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (86 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Orpheus Descending by : Tennessee Williams

Download or read book Orpheus Descending written by Tennessee Williams and published by Dramatists Play Service, Inc.. This book was released on 1983 with total page 92 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: THE STORY: As The New York Times describes, The play tells of a woman storekeeper and a handsome, guileless youth who comes in off the highway. A guitar-player, he is a rural Orpheus who descends to rescue his love--not in Hades, precisely,

Sidney Lumet

Author : Frank R. Cunningham
Publisher : University Press of Kentucky
ISBN 13 : 0813158265
Total Pages : 360 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (131 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Sidney Lumet by : Frank R. Cunningham

Download or read book Sidney Lumet written by Frank R. Cunningham and published by University Press of Kentucky. This book was released on 2014-10-17 with total page 360 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since 1957, Sidney Lumet, the most prolific American director of his generation, has deepened audiences' awareness of social, ethical, and feminist issues through such distinguished films as 12 Angry Men, The Verdict, Running on Empty, and Critical Care. Especially praised for his literary adaptations -- including Long Day's Journey into Night and Murder on the Orient Express -- Lumet has also directed such trenchant urban films as Dog Day Afternoon, Serpico, and Network. In this new edition Frank Cunningham expands his analysis of Lumet's earlier films and examines his most recent work, from A Stranger Among Us (1992) to Gloria (1999). Also new to this edition are discussions of five other films, including The Appointment, Murder on the Orient Express, and Running on Empty. Cunningham studies in depth over thirty of Lumet's most significant films and surveys other films and the television productions to reveal their enduring artistic and humanistic importance.

Mad as Hell

Author : Dave Itzkoff
Publisher : Times Books
ISBN 13 : 0805095705
Total Pages : 304 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (5 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Mad as Hell by : Dave Itzkoff

Download or read book Mad as Hell written by Dave Itzkoff and published by Times Books. This book was released on 2014-02-18 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The behind-the-scenes story of the making of the iconic movie Network, which transformed the way we think about television and the way television thinks about us "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore!" Those words, spoken by an unhinged anchorman named Howard Beale, "the mad prophet of the airwaves," took America by storm in 1976, when Network became a sensation. With a superb cast (including Faye Dunaway, William Holden, Peter Finch, and Robert Duvall) directed by Sidney Lumet, the film won four Academy Awards and indelibly shaped how we think about corporate and media power. In Mad As Hell, Dave Itzkoff of The New York Times recounts the surprising and dramatic story of how Network made it to the screen. Such a movie rarely gets made any more—one man's vision of the world, independent of studio testing or market research. And that man was Paddy Chayefsky, the tough, driven, Oscar-winning screenwriter whose vision—outlandish for its time—is all too real today. Itzkoff uses interviews with the cast and crew, as well as Chayefsky's notes, letters, and drafts to re-create the action in front of and behind the camera at a time of swirling cultural turmoil. The result is a riveting account that enriches our appreciation of this prophetic and still-startling film. Itzkoff also speaks with today's leading broadcasters and filmmakers to assess Network's lasting impact on television and popular culture. They testify to the enduring genius of Paddy Chayefsky, who foresaw the future and whose life offers an unforgettable lesson about the true cost of self-expression.

Street Smart

Author : Richard A. Blake
Publisher : University Press of Kentucky
ISBN 13 : 0813187648
Total Pages : 447 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (131 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Street Smart by : Richard A. Blake

Download or read book Street Smart written by Richard A. Blake and published by University Press of Kentucky. This book was released on 2021-11-21 with total page 447 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: New York has appeared in more movies than Michael Caine, and the resulting overfamiliarity to moviegoers poses a problem for critics and filmmakers alike. Audiences often mistake the New York image of skyscrapers and bright lights for the real thing, when in fact the City is a network of clearly defined villages, each with a unique personality. Standard film depictions of New Yorkers as a rush-hour mass of undifferentiated humanity obscure the connections formed between people and places in the City's diverse neighborhoods. Street Smart examines the cultural influences of New York's neighborhoods on the work of four quintessentially New York filmmakers: Sidney Lumet, Woody Allen, Martin Scorsese, and Spike Lee. The City's heterogeneous economic and ethnic districts, where people live, work, shop, worship, and go to school, often bear little relation to the image of New York City created by the movies. To these directors, their home city is as tangible as the smell of fried onions in the stairwell of an apartment building, and it is this New York, not the bustling, glittery illusion portrayed in earlier films, that shapes their sensibilities and receives expression in their films. Richard A. Blake shows how the Jewish enclaves on Manhattan's Lower East Side profoundly influence Sidney Lumet's most noted characters as they struggle to form and maintain their identities under challenging circumstances. Both Woody Allen's light comedies and his more serious cinematic fare reflect the director's origins in the Flatbush neighborhood in Brooklyn and the displacement he felt after relocating to Manhattan. Martin Scorsese's upbringing on Elizabeth Street in Manhattan's Little Italy resonates in his gritty portraits of urban modernity. Blake also looks at the films of Spike Lee, whose adolescence in Fort Greene, a socioeconomically diverse Brooklyn neighborhood, exposed him to widely ranging views that add depth to his complicated treatises on power, culture, and race. Lumet, Allen, Scorsese, and Lee's individual identities were shaped by their neighborhoods, and in turn, their life experiences have shaped their artistic vision. In Street Smart, Richard A. Blake examines the critical influence of "place" on the films of four of America's most accomplished contemporary filmmakers.

Follies of God

Author : James Grissom
Publisher : Vintage
ISBN 13 : 1101972777
Total Pages : 418 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (19 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Follies of God by : James Grissom

Download or read book Follies of God written by James Grissom and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2016-08-09 with total page 418 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This remarkably illuminating portrait of Tennessee Williams lifts the veil on the heart and soul of his artistic inspiration: the unspoken collaboration between playwright and actor. At a low moment in Williams’s life, he summoned to New Orleans a young twenty-year-old writer, James Grissom, who had written him a letter asking for advice. After a long, intense conversation, Williams sent Grissom on a journey on his behalf to find out if he or his work had mattered to those who had so deeply mattered to him. Among the more than seventy women and men with whom Grissom talked were giants of American theater and film: Lillian Gish, (“the escort who brought me to Blanche”), Jessica Tandy (the original Blanche DuBois on Broadway), Eva Le Gallienne (“She was a stone against which I could rub my talent and feel that it became sharper”), Maureen Stapleton, Julie Harris, Bette Davis, Katherine Hepburn, Elia Kazan, Marlon Brando, John Gielgud, and many more. Follies of God provides dazzling insight into how Williams conjured the dramatic characters and plays that so transformed American theater.

The Meryl Streep Movie Club

Author : Mia March
Publisher : Simon and Schuster
ISBN 13 : 1471112799
Total Pages : 352 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (711 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis The Meryl Streep Movie Club by : Mia March

Download or read book The Meryl Streep Movie Club written by Mia March and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2012-07-03 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Welcome to The Three Captains. A charming bijou guesthouse on the Maine coast which is a haven of calm for guests and owners alike. When Lolly summons home her nieces, Isabel and June - one recovering from a broken heart, the other struggling to bring up her young son singlehandedly - they assume she's going to sell The 3 Cs, the place they called home after they lost their parents in a car accident. But the truth is much more heartbreaking than that. Along with Lolly's daughter Kat - also at a crossroads in her life - the women spend their first summer together in years and home truths and long-buried secrets begin to emerge. Then movie buff Lolly invites her three offspring to attend her legendary movie nights and what at first seems like a few hours of distraction from their tumultuous lives becomes so much more. What they discover shakes them to the core, brings them together after years of discord, and provides them with the inspiration that they need to truly connect with each other and find happiness.

The Book of Daniel

Author : E.L. Doctorow
Publisher : Random House
ISBN 13 : 0307762955
Total Pages : 320 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (77 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis The Book of Daniel by : E.L. Doctorow

Download or read book The Book of Daniel written by E.L. Doctorow and published by Random House. This book was released on 2010-11-10 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The central figure of this novel is a young man whose parents were executed for conspiring to steal atomic secrets for Russia. His name is Daniel Isaacson, and as the story opens, his parents have been dead for many years. He has had a long time to adjust to their deaths. He has not adjusted. Out of the shambles of his childhood, he has constructed a new life—marriage to an adoring girl who gives him a son of his own, and a career in scholarship. It is a life that enrages him. In the silence of the library at Columbia University, where he is supposedly writing a Ph.D. dissertation, Daniel composes something quite different. It is a confession of his most intimate relationships—with his wife, his foster parents, and his kid sister Susan, whose own radicalism so reproaches him. It is a book of memories: riding a bus with his parents to the ill-fated Paul Robeson concert in Peekskill; watching the FBI take his father away; appearing with Susan at rallies protesting their parents’ innocence; visiting his mother and father in the Death House. It is a book of investigation: transcribing Daniel’s interviews with people who knew his parents, or who knew about them; and logging his strange researches and discoveries in the library stacks. It is a book of judgments of everyone involved in the case—lawyers, police, informers, friends, and the Isaacson family itself. It is a book rich in characters, from elderly grand- mothers of immigrant culture, to covert radicals of the McCarthy era, to hippie marchers on the Pen-tagon. It is a book that spans the quarter-century of American life since World War II. It is a book about the nature of Left politics in this country—its sacrificial rites, its peculiar cruelties, its humility, its bitterness. It is a book about some of the beautiful and terrible feelings of childhood. It is about the nature of guilt and innocence, and about the relations of people to nations. It is The Book of Daniel.

Who the Devil Made It

Author : Peter Bogdanovich
Publisher : Ballantine Books
ISBN 13 : 0307817458
Total Pages : 1127 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (78 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Who the Devil Made It by : Peter Bogdanovich

Download or read book Who the Devil Made It written by Peter Bogdanovich and published by Ballantine Books. This book was released on 2012-05-30 with total page 1127 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “A must have for any film nut.”—Details Peter Bogdanovich, award-winning director, screenwriter, actor and critic, interviews 16 legendary directors over a 15-year period. Their richly illuminating conversations combine to make this a riveting chronicle of Hollywood and picture making. Join him in conversations with: Robert Aldrich • George Cukor • Allan Dwan • Howard Hanks • Alfred Hitchcock • Chuck Jones • Fritz Lang • Joseph H. Lewis • Sidney Lumet • Leo McCarey • Otto Preminger • Don Siegel • Josef von Sternberg • Frank Tashlin • Edgar G. Ulmer • Raoul Walsh NOTE: This edition does not include photographs. Praise for Who the Devil Made It “Illuminating . . . These were (and sometimes are: a few yet breathe) men rooted in history as much as in Hollywood. Their collected memories make the past look fearfully rich beside a present that is poverty-stricken in everything except money.”—The New Yorker “Bogdanovich is one of America’s finest writers on the cinema. . . . Thank goodness [his] Who the Devil Made It has come along to remind us that films and writing about film were, at one time, focused on the work and not strictly on the bottom line.”—The Boston Globe “A treasure trove on the craft of directing.”—Newsday “Monumental . . . The directors’ reminiscences about technique, working methods, sources of ideas, and relationships with actors and studios are thoroughly entertaining.”—Publishers Weekly “A fine achievement that helps illuminate the art and craft of some remarkable directors . . . There are plenty of revealing anecdotes.”—Kirkus Reviews

Reginald Rose and the Journey of 12 Angry Men

Author : Phil Rosenzweig
Publisher : Fordham Univ Press
ISBN 13 : 0823297756
Total Pages : 339 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (232 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Reginald Rose and the Journey of 12 Angry Men by : Phil Rosenzweig

Download or read book Reginald Rose and the Journey of 12 Angry Men written by Phil Rosenzweig and published by Fordham Univ Press. This book was released on 2021-10-05 with total page 339 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Finalist, 2021 Wall Award (Formerly the Theatre Library Association Award) The untold story behind one of America’s greatest dramas In early 1957, a low-budget black-and-white movie opened across the United States. Consisting of little more than a dozen men arguing in a dingy room, it was a failure at the box office and soon faded from view. Today, 12 Angry Men is acclaimed as a movie classic, revered by the critics, beloved by the public, and widely performed as a stage play, touching audiences around the world. It is also a favorite of the legal profession for its portrayal of ordinary citizens reaching a just verdict and widely taught for its depiction of group dynamics and human relations. Few twentieth-century American dramatic works have had the acclaim and impact of 12 Angry Men. Reginald Rose and the Journey of “12 Angry Men” tells two stories: the life of a great writer and the journey of his most famous work, one that ultimately outshined its author. More than any writer in the Golden Age of Television, Reginald Rose took up vital social issues of the day—from racial prejudice to juvenile delinquency to civil liberties—and made them accessible to a wide audience. His 1960s series, The Defenders, was the finest drama of its age and set the standard for legal dramas. This book brings Reginald Rose’s long and successful career, its origins and accomplishments, into view at long last. By placing 12 Angry Men in its historical and social context—the rise of television, the blacklist, and the struggle for civil rights—author Phil Rosenzweig traces the story of this brilliant courtroom drama, beginning with the chance experience that inspired Rose, to its performance on CBS’s Westinghouse Studio One in 1954, to the feature film with Henry Fonda. The book describes Sidney Lumet’s casting, the sudden death of one actor, and the contribution of cinematographer Boris Kaufman. It explores the various drafts of the drama, with characters modified and scenes added and deleted, with Rose settling on the shattering climax only days before filming began. Drawing on extensive research and brimming with insight, this book casts new light on one of America’s great dramas—and about its author, a man of immense talent and courage. Author royalties will be donated equally to the Feerick Center for Social Justice at Fordham Law School and the Justice John Paul Stevens Jury Center at Chicago-Kent College of Law.

Cinematic Storytelling

Author : Jennifer Van Sijll
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9781932907056
Total Pages : 257 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (7 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Cinematic Storytelling by : Jennifer Van Sijll

Download or read book Cinematic Storytelling written by Jennifer Van Sijll and published by . This book was released on 2005 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What the industry's most succcessful writers and directors have in common is that they have mastered the cinematic conventions specific to the medium.

Hollywood's Chosen People

Author : Daniel Bernardi
Publisher : Wayne State University Press
ISBN 13 : 0814338070
Total Pages : 280 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (143 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Hollywood's Chosen People by : Daniel Bernardi

Download or read book Hollywood's Chosen People written by Daniel Bernardi and published by Wayne State University Press. This book was released on 2012-09-17 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As studio bosses, directors, and actors, Jews have been heavily involved in film history and vitally involved in all aspects of film production. Yet Jewish characters have been represented onscreen in stereotypical and disturbing ways, while Jews have also helped to produce some of the most troubling stereotypes of people of color in Hollywood film history. In Hollywood's Chosen People: The Jewish Experience in American Cinema, leading scholars consider the complex relationship between Jews and the film industry, as Jews have helped to construct Hollywood's vision of the American dream and American collective identity and have in turn been shaped by those representations. Editors Daniel Bernardi, Murray Pomerance, and Hava Tirosh-Samuelson introduce the volume with an overview of the history of Jews in American popular culture and the American film industry. Multidisciplinary contributors go on to discuss topics such as early Jewish films and directors, institutionalized anti-Semitism, Jewish identity and gossip culture, and issues of Jewish performance on film. Contributors draw on a diverse sampling of films, from representations of the Holocaust on film to screen comedy; filmmakers and writers, including David Mamet, George Cukor, Sidney Lumet, Edward Sloman, and Steven Spielberg; and stars, like Barbra Streisand, Adam Sandler, and Ben Stiller. The Jewish experience in American cinema reveals much about the degree to which Jews have been integrated into and contribute to the making of American popular film culture. Scholars of Jewish studies, film studies, American history, and American culture as well as anyone interested in film history will find this volume fascinating reading.

Norman Jewison

Author : Ira Wells
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9781989555385
Total Pages : 400 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (553 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Norman Jewison by : Ira Wells

Download or read book Norman Jewison written by Ira Wells and published by . This book was released on 2021-05-04 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Norman Jewison directed some of the most iconic and beloved films of an era, from In the Heat of the Night and The Thomas Crown Affair to Jesus Christ Superstar and Moonstruck. But despite being what his friend William Goldman called "a giant of the industry," Jewison could also walk the streets of any city in the world and go unrecognized. Jewison was a man of contradictions: he cared more about telling great stories than gaining fame and fortune by showcasing movie stars, but generations of Hollywood's marquee actors - Judy Garland, Sidney Poitier, Faye Dunaway, Al Pacino, Jane Fonda, Burt Reynolds, Goldie Hawn, Bruce Willis, Denzel Washington - trusted him at crucial moments in their careers. Yet, for all his talent and the passionate support of his actors, Jewison suffered heartbreaking rejection from the executives who refused to believe in his dreams. Norman Jewison: A Director's Life is a story of artistic survival and reinvention, and about the fate of original cinematic ideas in an industry increasingly captive to corporate greed. Drawing upon exhaustive archival research and dozens of interviews, Ira Wells provides a soulful portrait of an idealist who had to fight for every frame of his legacy. Here are Norman's legendary collaborators--Hal Ashby, William Rose, Steve McQueen, and more--brought to vivid life in original letters, telegrams, and revealing, unpublished interviews. A clear-eyed reassessment of Hollywood's final golden age, Norman Jewison: A Director's Life is both the intimate portrait of an artist and a rallying cry for anyone who has had to fight for their creative vision.

Cinema '62

Author : Stephen Farber
Publisher : Rutgers University Press
ISBN 13 : 1978808836
Total Pages : 270 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (788 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Cinema '62 by : Stephen Farber

Download or read book Cinema '62 written by Stephen Farber and published by Rutgers University Press. This book was released on 2020-03-13 with total page 270 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Lawrence of Arabia, The Miracle Worker, To Kill a Mockingbird, The Manchurian Candidate, Gypsy, Sweet Bird of Youth, The Longest Day, The Music Man, What Ever Happened to Baby Jane, and more. Most conventional film histories dismiss the early 1960s as a pallid era, a downtime between the heights of the classic studio system and the rise of New Hollywood directors like Scorsese and Altman in the 1970s. It seemed to be a moment when the movie industry was floundering as the popularity of television caused a downturn in cinema attendance. Cinema ’62 challenges these assumptions by making the bold claim that 1962 was a peak year for film, with a high standard of quality that has not been equaled since. Stephen Farber and Michael McClellan show how 1962 saw great late-period work by classic Hollywood directors like John Ford, Howard Hawks, and John Huston, as well as stars like Bette Davis, James Stewart, Katharine Hepburn, and Barbara Stanwyck. Yet it was also a seminal year for talented young directors like Sidney Lumet, Sam Peckinpah, and Stanley Kubrick, not to mention rising stars like Warren Beatty, Jane Fonda, Robert Redford, Peter O’Toole, and Omar Sharif. Above all, 1962—the year of To Kill a Mockingbird and The Manchurian Candidate—gave cinema attendees the kinds of adult, artistic, and uncompromising visions they would never see on television, including classics from Fellini, Bergman, and Kurosawa. Culminating in an analysis of the year’s Best Picture winner and top-grossing film, Lawrence of Arabia, and the factors that made that magnificent epic possible, Cinema ’62 makes a strong case that the movies peaked in the Kennedy era.