Category: Latest News from McFarland

New on our bookshelf:

Murder Movie Makers: Directors Dissect Their Killer Flicks
Matthew Edwards

Serial killers, mass murderers, spree killers, outlaws, and real-life homicidal maniacs have long held a grim fascination for both filmmakers and viewers. Since the 1970s, hundreds of films and television movies have been made covering killers from Charles Manson to Ted Bundy and the Zodiac Killer creating a uniquely morbid sub-genre within horror and thrillers.

This collection of interviews sheds light on 17 filmmakers and screenwriters who tackled this controversial subject while attempting to explore the warped world of infamous killers. The interviews include John McNaughton (Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer), Tom Hanson (The Zodiac Killer), David Wickes (Jack the Ripper), Chris Gerolmo (Citizen X), Chuck Parello (The Hillside Stranglers), David Jacobson (Dahmer) and Clive Saunders on his ill-fated experience directing Gacy. Offering candid insights into the creative process behind these movies, the interviews also show the pitfalls and moral controversy the filmmakers had to wrestle with to bring their visions to the screen.

New on our bookshelf:

The British Aristocracy in Popular Culture: Essays on 200 Years of Representations
Edited by Stefania Michelucci, Ian Duncan and Luisa Villa

As traditional social hierarchies fall away, ever steeper levels of economic inequality and the entrenchment of new class distinctions lend a new glamor to the idea of aristocracy: witness the worldwide popularity of Downton Abbey, or the seemingly insatiable public fascination with the private lives of the British royal family. This collection of new essays investigates the enduring attraction to the icon of the aristocrat and the spectacle of aristocratic society. It traces the ambivalent reactions the aristocracy provokes and the needs (political, ideological, psychological, and otherwise) it caters to in modern times when the economic power of the landed classes have been eroded and their political role curtailed. In this interdisciplinary collection, aristocracy is considered from multiple viewpoints, including British and American literature, European history and politics, cultural studies, linguistics, visual arts, music, and media studies.

Now available in softcover:

Clark Gable, in Pictures: Candid Images of the Actor’s Life
Chrystopher J. Spicer

From the very beginning of Clark Gable’s screen career, the life of the glamorous film star came under the scrutiny of the camera. While audiences are familiar with the public Gable as seen through the studio lens, the private Gable as seen in photos taken by members of the public, friends, and family is much less known.

This collection of candid photographs, many of them published here for the first time, has been compiled by biographer Chrystopher J. Spicer from his archives and from sources around the world. As with Spicer’s acclaimed centenary biography Clark Gable (McFarland, 2002), this volume provides rare insight into the life of the man behind the star.

New on our bookshelf:

Gender and Werewolf Cinema
Jason Barr

It all begins with a howl, the unsettling sound which tells audiences that someone will soon become a werewolf. But the changes that occur during that transformation aren’t just physical; they are psychological as well. Unremarkable men become domineering leaders. Innocuous men become violent and overtly sexual. In films from The Wolf Man and An American Werewolf in London to Ginger Snaps, when the protagonists become werewolves, their perceptions of their gender and their masculinity or femininity change dramatically.

This volume explores how werewolves in cinema have provided an avenue for frank and often enlightening conversations about gender roles and masculinity. Werewolves are indeed a harbinger of change, but the genre of werewolf cinema itself has changed over time in how different styles of masculinity and different gender identities are portrayed.

New on our bookshelf:

Film Directors and Emotion: An Affective Turn in Contemporary American Cinema
Darragh Greene and Graham Price

Cinema is an affective medium. Films move us to feel wonder, joy, and love as well as fear, anger, and hatred. Today, we are living through a new age of sensibility when emotion is given priority over reason. Yet, there is a counter-cultural current in contemporary American cinema that offers a more nuanced treatment of emotion. Both aesthetically and eidetically, this new cinema of affect allows viewers to make up their own minds about what they feel and think.

This book focuses on key films by important auteur-directors—David Fincher, Bryan Singer, Christopher Nolan, Kathryn Bigelow, Richard Linklater, Barry Jenkins, Greta Gerwig, and Pete Docter—who are to the forefront of this new cinema. It explores how they anatomize affect and how it functions in the creation or degradation of character and society.

From our founding in 1979, McFarland has championed serious scholarship about popular culture. Longtime customers remember the classics like Bill Warren’s Keep Watching the Skies!—how many of you own the original hardcover in yellow cloth binding? Today, popular culture studies is perhaps our best-known line, with more than 2,000 books about horror and science fiction film, old time radio, biographies from the Golden Age of Hollywood, current television series, theatre, dance…whatever your interest, you’re sure to find it here. To express our appreciation for readers old and new, we’re offering 40% off ALL titles about popular culture through May 17 with coupon code POP40. Thank you for continuing to support McFarland, and we hope you find a few good books for your pop shelf!

New on our bookshelf:

Madeleine Carroll: Actress and Humanitarian, from The 39 Steps to the Red Cross
John Pascoe

At the height of her celebrity, Madeleine Carroll (1906–1987) was the world’s highest-paid actress. She worked alongside such greats as Laurence Olivier and Charles Laughton, British directors Victor Saville and Alfred Hitchcock, and Hollywood directors John Ford and Otto Preminger. She also did radio and television shows—all of which she abandoned to become a Red Cross worker.

Piecing together long-lost facts, the author describes Carroll’s almost indescribable life, narrating her personal highs and lows, as well as her fervent commitment to helping others—particularly child victims of war.

New on our bookshelf:

The Streaming of Hill House: Essays on the Haunting Netflix Adaption
Edited by Kevin J. Wetmore, Jr.

Netflix’s The Haunting of Hill House has received both critical acclaim and heaps of contempt for its reimagining of Shirley Jackson’s seminal horror novel. Some found Mike Flanagan’s series inventive, respectful and terrifying. Others believed it denigrated and diminished its source material, with some even calling it a “betrayal” of Jackson. Though the novel has produced a great deal of scholarship, this is the first critical collection to look at the television series. Featuring all new essays from noted scholars and award-winning horror authors, this collection goes beyond comparing the novel and the Netflix adaptation to look at the series through the lenses of gender, architecture, education, hauntology, addiction, and trauma studies including analysis of the show in the context of 9/11 and #Me Too. Specific essays compare the series with other texts, from Flanagan’s other films and other adaptations of Jackson’s novel, to the television series Supernatural, Toni Morrison’s Beloved and the 2018 film Hereditary. Together, this collection probes a terrifying television series about how scary reality can truly be, usually because of what it says about our lives in America today.

New on our bookshelf:

The Songs of Genesis: A Complete Guide to the Studio Recordings
Steve Aldous

Quintessentially British, Genesis spearheaded progressive rock in the 1970s, evolving into a chart-topping success through the end of the millennium. Influencing rock groups such as Radiohead, Phish, Rush, Marillion and Elbow, the experimental format of Genesis’ songs inspired new avenues for music to explore. From the 23-minute masterpiece “Supper’s Ready,” via the sublime beauty of “Ripples” and the bold experimentation of “Mama”, to hits such as “Invisible Touch” and “I Can’t Dance,” their material was inventive and unique. This book is the chronological history of the band’s music, with critical analysis and key details of each of the 204 songs Genesis recorded and released.

New on our bookshelf:

The First Oscar Hammerstein and New York’s Golden Age of Theater and Music
Adolph S. Tomars

Oscar Hammerstein I came to New York in the 1860s, a Prussian runaway with $1.50 in his pocket, and found work at a cigar factory. A decade later he was publishing the nation’s leading tobacco trade journal and held dozens of patents for cigar-rolling machinery. He made a fortune and turned his efforts to theater.

He built eight of them, including four around Longacre Square—later Times Square—which became a thriving theater district. A daring impresario, he was involved at all levels, from booking to composition to stagecraft. Throughout the Gay Nineties and early 20th century, he billed the world’s top actors, prima donnas and vaudeville acts.

Then, as now, show business was speculation and high adventure, with rivalries fought in the headlines. Always a storm center, Hammerstein played a skillful chess game with both partners and performers while staging first-class shows for capacity crowds. This biography—from an unfinished manuscript by the son of one of his stage managers—recounts the heyday of his bold productions, his often turbulent relationships with associates, and the birth of Broadway.

New on our bookshelf:

Appalachian Fiddler Albert Hash: The Last Leaf on the Tree
Malcolm L. Smith with Edwin Lacy

World-class luthier and renowned guitarist Wayne Henderson calls Albert Hash “a real folk hero.” A virtuoso fiddler from the Blue Ridge, Hash built more than 300 fiddles in his lifetime, recorded numerous times with a variety of bands and inspired countless instrument makers and musicians in the mountains of rural Southwest Virginia near the North Carolina border. His biography is the story of a resourceful, humble man who dedicated his life to his art, community and Appalachian musical heritage.

New on our bookshelf:

Crime and Spy Jazz on Screen, 1950–1970: A History and Discography
Crime and Spy Jazz on Screen Since 1971: A History and Discography
Derrick Bang

Henry Mancini’s Peter Gunn theme. Lalo Schifrin’s Mission: Impossible theme. John Barry’s arrangement of the James Bond theme. These iconic melodies have remained a part of the pop culture landscape since their debuts in the late 1950s and early ’60s: a “golden decade” that highlighted an era when movie studios and TV production companies employed full orchestral ensembles to provide a jazz backdrop for the suspenseful adventures of secret agents, private detectives, cops, spies and heist-minded criminals. Hundreds of additional films and television shows made during this period were propelled by similarly swinging title themes and underscores, many of which have (undeservedly) faded into obscurity. This meticulously researched book traces the embryonic use of jazz in mainstream entertainment from the early 1950s—when conservative viewers still considered this genre “the devil’s music”—to its explosive heyday throughout the 1960s. Fans frustrated by the lack of attention paid to jazz soundtrack composers—including Jerry Goldsmith, Edwin Astley, Roy Budd, Quincy Jones, Dave Grusin, Jerry Fielding and many, many others—will find solace in these pages (along with all the information needed to enhance one’s music library). The exploration of action jazz continues in this book’s companion volume, Crime and Action Jazz on Screen Since 1971.

New on our bookshelf:

Exploring Star Trek: Voyager: Critical Essays
Edited by Robert L. Lively

In 1995, Star Trek: Voyager brought a new dynamic to Star Trek’s familiar, starship oriented, show. Lost 70,000 light-years in space, Voyager and its crew faced an uncertain and changeable future, echoing anxieties felt in the United States at the time. These fifteen essays explore the context, characters, and themes of Star Trek: Voyager, as they relate to the culture and zeitgeist of the 1990s. Essays on gender show how the series both challenges and reinforces typical SF stereotypes through the characters of Captain Janeway, Kes and Seven of Nine, while essays on identity examine the show’s intersections with disability studies, race and multiracial identities, family dynamics, and emerging AI and humanity. Using the epic journey of Homer’s Odyssey as a starting point for the series, and ending with an examination of the impacts of inception at the birth of the internet age, this book shows the many ways in which Voyager negotiated different perspectives for what the future of the galaxy and the USA could be.

New on our bookshelf:

Excavating Indiana Jones: Essays on the Films and Franchise
Edited by Randy Laist

With his signature bullwhip and fedora, the rousing sounds of his orchestral anthem, and his eventful explorations into the arcana of world religions, Indiana Jones—archeologist, adventurer, and ophidiophobe—has become one of the most recognizable heroes of the big screen. Since his debut in the 1981 film Raiders of the Lost Ark, Indiana Jones has gone on to anchor several sequels, and a fifth film is currently in development. At the same time, the character has spilled out into multiple multimedia manifestations and has become a familiar icon within the collective cultural imagination.

Despite the longevity and popularity of the Indiana Jones franchise, however, it has rarely been the focus of sustained criticism. In Excavating Indiana Jones, a collection of international scholars analyzes Indiana Jones tales from a variety of perspectives, examining the films’ representation of history, cultural politics, and identity, and also tracing the adaptation of the franchise into comic books, video games, and theme park attractions.

New on our bookshelf:

Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing and Horror Cinema: A Revised and Expanded Filmography of Their Terrifying Collaborations, 2d ed.
Mark A. Miller and David J. Hogan

From their first pairing in Hamlet (1948) to House of the Long Shadows (1983), British film stars Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing forged perhaps the most successful collaboration in horror film history. In its revised and expanded second edition, this volume examines their 22 movie team-ups, with critical commentary, complete cast and credits, production information, details on cinematography and make-up, exhibition history and box-office figures. A wealth of background about Hammer, Amicus and other production companies is provided, along with more than 100 illustrations.

Lee and Cushing describe particulars of their partnership in original interviews. Exclusive interviews with Robert Bloch, Hazel Court and nearly fifty other actors, directors and others who worked on the Lee-Cushing films are included.

New on our bookshelf:

Nick McLean Behind the Camera: The Life and Works of a Hollywood Cinematographer
Wayne Byrne and Nick McLean

Nick McLean was one of the most acclaimed camera operators in American cinema of the 1970s, during which time he shot many classics of the New Hollywood movement including McCabe & Mrs. Miller, Heaven Can Wait, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, The Deer Hunter, Marathon Man, and Being There. As a cinematographer throughout the 1980s, McLean would film blockbusters such as Cannonball Run II, City Heat, The Goonies, and Short Circuit before being lured into television to photograph some of the biggest shows in town, including Evening Shade, Cybill, and the pop culture phenomenon Friends, for which he was thrice Emmy-nominated.

This candid biography takes readers on an entertaining journey through five decades of Hollywood filmmaking, detailing McLean’s personal and professional relationships with some of the biggest film stars and directors in Hollywood (such as Robert Altman, Warren Beatty, Sylvester Stallone, Burt Reynolds, John Travolta, Paul Newman, George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, Alfred Hitchcock, and Mel Brooks) while delivering a behind-the-scenes look at some revered classics and beloved blockbusters of American film and television.

New on our bookshelf:

John Derek: Actor, Director, Photographer
Michelangelo Capua

Actor and director John Derek was born in Hollywood, where his striking good looks helped get him a contract with David O’ Selznick. Derek’s career took off after Humphrey Bogart made him his costar in the cultish noir Knock at Any Doors. Derek appeared in such Academy Award-nominated films as All the King’s Men, Run for Cover, The Ten Commandments and Exodus, and worked with directors like Nicholas Ray, Cecil B. DeMille, Otto Preminger and others.

He was a competent, dedicated performer even in his last, trivial roles. In the 1960s, his career in decline, he began directing his own films. Although critics panned the string of movies he made starring his three wives—Ursula Andress, Linda Evans and Bo Derek—some were box-office hits, like Tarzan, the Ape Man. This biography covers his extraordinary life and career, with extensive analysis of his films.

New on our bookshelf:

Sicily on Screen: Essays on the Representation of the Island and Its Culture
Edited by Giovanna Summerfield

With its physical beauty and kaleidoscopic cultural background, Sicily has long been a source of inspiration for filmmakers.

Twelve new essays by international scholars—and additional writings from directors Roberta Torre, Giovanna Taviani, and Costanza Quatriglio—seek to offset the near-absence of scholarship focusing on the relationship between the Mediterranean island and cinema. Touching on class relations, immigration, gender and poverty, the essays examine how Sicily is depicted in fiction, satire and documentaries.

Situated between North and South, East and West, innovation and tradition, authenticity and displacement, Sicily acts as a microcosm of the world, a place to explore numerous narratives and develop intercultural dialogue. It is also the center of cinematographic discussions and events such as the Taormina Film Festival and the SalinaDocFest. The volume presents Sicily almost as a character and creator in its own right.

New on our bookshelf:

Stars of Jazz: A Complete History of the Innovative Television Series, 1956–1958
James A. Harrod

Imagine an educational television series featuring America’s greatest jazz artists in performance, airing every week from 1956 to 1958 on KABC, Los Angeles.

Stars of Jazz was hosted by Bobby Troup, the songwriter, pianist and vocalist. Each show provided information about the performance that heightened viewers’ appreciation. The series garnered praise from critics and numerous awards including an Emmy from the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. A landmark series visually, too, it presented many television firsts including experimental films by designers Charles and Ray Eames.

All 130 shows were filmed as kinescopes. Surviving films were donated to the UCLA Film & Television Archive, where 16 shows have been restored; 29 additional shows are in the collection. The remaining 85 kinescopes were long ago discarded.

This first full documentation of Stars of Jazz identifies every musician, vocalist, and guest who appeared on the series and lists every song performed on the series along with composer and lyricist credits. More than 100 photographs include images from many of the lost episodes.