Film Entertainment

One was a tough junkman's son, the other a cosseted mama's boy, but they dreamed the same mighty dream: that the right movies could make a profit and change both the culture and individual lives. Sharing a religion and an evangelical zeal for film, Louis B. Mayer (1884-1957) and Irving Thalberg (1899-1936) were unlikely partners in one of the most significant collaborations in movie history. Over the course of their decade-long relationship, as key players at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and major players in Hollywood, they joined forces in redefining and mastering the template for the film industry.

Though she has shunned the media spotlight, Academy Award-winning actress Tatum O'Neal at last goes on the record to tell her story - a tale of personal turmoil and ultimate triumph that is part Hollywood tell-all, part Greek tragedy, and part Shakespearean drama.

What is it really like to be a housewife? We all want to know, but only the women we love to watch and the people who make the show have the whole story. Well, listen in close, because they’re about to tell all.

From such cult hits as Raising Arizona and The Big Lebowski to major critical darlings Fargo, No Country for Old Men, and Inside Llewyn Davis, Ethan and Joel Coen have cultivated a bleakly comical, instantly recognizable voice in modern American cinema. Film critic Adam Nayman carefully sifts through their complex cinematic universe in an effort to plot, as he puts it, "some Grand Unified Theory of Coen-ness." The book combines critical text with a visual aesthetic that honors the Coens' singular mix of darkness and levity.

On a cold Saturday afternoon in 1975, two men (who had known each other for eight years before they’d ever exchanged a word) met for lunch in a Chicago pub. Gene Siskel was the film critic for the Chicago Tribune. Roger Ebert had recently won the Pulitzer Prize—the first ever awarded to a film critic—for his work at the Chicago Sun-Times. To say they despised each other was an understatement.

Scandalous, sentimental, frank, and sincere - the ultimate inside account of a television and film icon. Burt Reynolds has been a Hollywood leading man for six decades, known for his legendary performances, sex-symbol status, and storied Hollywood romances. In his long career of stardom, during which he was number one at the box office for five years in a row, Reynolds has seen it all. But Enough About Me will tell his story through the people he’s encountered on his amazing journey.

Christina Crawford's book was an immediate bestseller, addressing the infrequently discussed topic of child abuse. When Paramount Pictures released the film, starring Faye Dunaway as Crawford, it was critically panned, and remains one of the most legendary critical bombs in film history. The lavish, big-screen adaptation drew unexpected laughter in the scenes depicting life in the Crawford household. Rarely have such good intentions been met with such ridicule.

A remarkably candid biography of the remarkably candid - and brilliant - Carrie Fisher. Sourced by friends, colleagues, and witnesses to all stages of Fisher’s life, Carrie Fisher: A Life on the Edge is an empathic and even-handed portrayal of a woman who - as Princess Leia, but mostly as herself - was a feminist heroine, one who died at a time when we need her blazing, healing honesty more than ever.

On May 25, 1977, a problem-plagued, budget-straining, independent science-fiction film opened in a mere 32 American movie theatres. Conceived, written, and directed by a little-known filmmaker named George Lucas, Star Wars reinvented the cinematic landscape, ushering in a new way for movies to be made, marketed, and merchandised. Simply put, George Lucas is one of the most influential filmmakers of the past 50 years.

There is one sure-fire way of improving your novel fast...You may know the fundamentals of how to write fiction. You may be more than competent in plot, structure and characters. But if your dialogue is dull it will drag the whole story down...Don't sabotage your chances of selling your work to readers or publishers because the dialogue is unexceptional. Dazzle them with what the characters say. How to Write Dazzling Dialogue will give you the tools to do it.

Saturday Night is the intimate, original history of Saturday Night Live, from its beginnings as an outlaw program produced by an unruly band of renegades from the comedy underground to a TV institution that made stars of John Belushi, Dan Aykroyd, Bill Murray, Chevy Chase, Gilda Radner, Jane Curtin, Laraine Newman, Garrett Morris, Joe Piscopo and Eddie Murphy. This is the book that revealed to the world what really happened behind the scenes during the first ten years of this groundbreaking program, from the battles SNL fought with NBC to the battles fought within the show itself.

Strikingly glamorous and famously inscrutable, Greta Garbo managed, in 16 short years, to infiltrate America’s subconscious; her decision to suddenly end her film career at the age of 36 only made her more irresistible. Garbo appeared in only 24 movies, yet her impact on the world was rivaled only by Marilyn Monroe. She was a phenomenon, a Sphinx, a myth, but also a Swedish peasant girl, uneducated, naïve, and always on her guard. Acclaimed critic and editor Robert Gottlieb attempts to capture the ever-elusive essence of Garbo through the eyes of others.

From private feuds and on-set disasters to fanfare that swept the nation and the realities of child stardom, culture journalist Ashley Spencer offers the first unauthorized look at the heyday of TV’s House of Mouse, featuring hundreds of exclusive new interviews with former Disney executives, creatives, and talent to explore the highs, lows, and everything in between.

As the cofounder of Creative Artists Agency, Michael Ovitz earned a reputation for ruthless negotiation, brilliant strategy, and fierce loyalty to his clients. He reinvented the role of the agent and helped shape the careers of hundreds of A-list entertainers, directors, and writers. But this personal history is much more than a fascinating account of celebrity friendships and bare-knuckled deal making. It's also an underdog's story: How did a middle-class kid from Encino work his way into the William Morris mailroom and eventually become the most powerful person in Hollywood?

Chinatown is the Holy Grail of 1970s cinema. Its twist ending is the most notorious in American film and its closing line of dialogue the most haunting. Here for the first time is the incredible true story of its making. In Sam Wasson's telling, it becomes the defining story of the most colorful characters in the most colorful period of Hollywood history. Here is Jack Nicholson at the height of his powers, as compelling a movie star as there has ever been, embarking on his great, doomed love affair with Anjelica Huston.

I've been in this life for 50 years, been trying to work out its riddle for 42 and been keeping diaries of clues to that riddle for the last 35. Notes about successes and failures, joys and sorrows, things that made me marvel and things that made me laugh out loud. How to be fair. How to have less stress. How to have fun. How to hurt people less. How to get hurt less. How to be a good man. How to have meaning in life. How to be more me.

HBO changed how stories could be told on TV. The Sopranos, Sex and the City, The Wire, Game of Thrones. The network’s meteoric rise heralded the second golden age of television with serialized shows that examined and reflected American anxieties, fears, and secret passions through complicated characters who were flawed and often unlikable.

Join the entire Dunder Mifflin gang on a journey back to Scranton: Here's the hilarious inside story of how a little show that barely survived its first season became the most watched series in the universe.

By the acclaimed author of Pictures at a Revolution and Five Came Back comes a magnificent biography of one of the most protean creative forces in American entertainment history, a life of dazzling highs and vertiginous plunges - some of the worst largely unknown until now. Mark Harris explores, with brilliantly vivid detail and insight, the life, work, struggle, and passion of an artist and man in constant motion.

In the perfect companion piece to his first book, Blake Snyder delivers even more insider information gleaned from a 20-year track record as one of Hollywood's most successful spec screenwriters. Designed for screenwriters, novelists, and movie fans, this book gives listeners key breakdowns of the 50 most instructional movies from the past 30 years. From M*A*S*H to Crash, Alien to Saw, and 10 to Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Snyder reveals how screenwriters in the past tackled the same challenges faced by screenwriters today.