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In the book his laughing and loving readers have been waiting for, our generation's master of full-hearted humor lays open the soul of his life story. Roy Blount Jr.--Georgia boy turned New York wit, lover of baseball and interesting women, bumbling adventurer, literary lion, salty-limerick virtuoso and impassioned father--journeys into the past and his psyche (also all the way to China, sixty feet underwater and to various Manhattan hot spots) in search of the answers to three riddles that have haunted him intimately: One: the riddle of "the family curse." Two: the riddle of what drives him (or anyone) to be funny. Three: the riddle of what so cruelly tangled his unseverable bond with the beguiling, beaten orphan girl who became the impossible mother who raised him to Be Sweet. Roy Blount's memoir is sardonic and sentimental, hilarious and grieving, brazen and bashful, tough and tender--sometimes by turns and sometimes all at once. Almost harshly honest, yet sportively wayward, Be Sweet resonates with the complex but bouncy chords of a whole man singing, clinkers and all.
From the early days of minstrelsy to Black Broadway, this book is the story of African American entertainment as seen through the eyes of some of its most famous as well as others of its practitioners. The book moves from the beginning of African American participation in show business up through the present age. Will Marion Cook and Billy McClain are discovered in action at the very dawn of black parity in the entertainment field; six chapters later, the young Sammy Davis, Jr., breaks through the invisible ceiling that has kept those before him "in their place." In between, the likes of Valaida Snow, Nora Holt, Billy Strayhorn, Hazel Scott, Dinah Washington, and others are found making contributions to the fight against racism both in and out of "the business."
Armed with an eighth-grade education, an inexhaustible imagination, and an innate talent for dancing, Hermes Pan (1909-1990) was a boy from Tennessee who became the most prolific, popular, and memorable choreographer of the glory days of the Hollywood musical. While he may be most well-known for the Fred Astaire-Ginger Rogers musicals which he choreographed at RKO film studios, he also created dances at Twentieth Century-Fox, M-G-M, Paramount, and later for television, winning both the Oscar and the Emmy for best choreography.In Hermes Pan: The Man Who Danced with Fred Astaire, Pan emerges as a man in full, an artist inseparable from his works. He was a choreographer deeply interested in his dancers' personalities, and his dances became his way of embracing and understanding the outside world. Though his time in a Trappist monastery proved to him that he was more suited to choreography than to life as a monk, Pan remained a deeply devout Roman Catholic throughout his creative life, a person firmly convinced of the powers of prayer. While he was rarely to be seen without several beautiful women at his side, it was no secret that Pan was homosexual and even had a life partner. As Pan worked at the nexus of the cinema industry's creative circles during the golden age of the film musical, this book traces not only Pan's personal life but also the history of the Hollywood musical itself. It is a study of Pan, who emerges here as a benevolent perfectionist, and equally of the stars, composers, and directors with whom he worked, from Astaire and Rogers to Betty Grable, Rita Hayworth, Elizabeth Taylor, Sammy Davis Jr., Frank Sinatra, Bob Fosse, George Gershwin, Samuel Goldwyn, and countless other luminaries of American popular entertainment.Author John Franceschina bases his telling of Pan's life on extensive first-hand research into Pan's unpublished correspondence and his own interviews. Pan enjoyed one of the most illustrious careers of any Hollywood dance director, and because his work also spanned across Broadway and television, this book will appeal to readers interested in musical theater history, dance history, and film.
On stage from her childhood, Martha Raye (1916-1994) proudly embraced the role of the clown, her gift for slapstick comedy enhanced by a fine singing voice. She became a star with her first feature film, Rhythm on the Range (1936), as the zany, loudmouthed girl looking for love--or chasing it as it ran away. She won popular and critical acclaim with The Martha Raye Show (1954-1956) before it was abruptly cancelled, partly because of her chaotic personal life. Drawing on new interviews with her colleagues, this retrospective covers the life and career of an enduringly funny lady who influenced a generation of women comedians. Her reign as a top NBC star of the 1950s is covered, along with her appearances on popular variety shows, her roles in fondly remembered series like The Bugaloos, McMillan and Alice, and her film career that teamed her with the likes of Jack Benny, Charlie Chaplin and Doris Day.
* Two gripping memoirs by British night-fighter crewmen * Action-adventure tales of aerial combat aboard Beaufighter and Mosquito aircraft * Accounts of Pathfinders who flew ahead of bomber formations and marked targets deep inside German territory * How new technologies like airborne radar, one of World War II's best-kept secrets, were used * How night-fighters helped save British cities from destruction Lewis Brandon was a navigator and squadron leader with the Royal Air Force in World War II, earning the Distinguished Service Order and Distinguished Flying Cross for his actions. Albert Smith joined the RAF at sixteen and completed 90 missions in Wellingtons and Mosquitos.
"The author of A Streetcar Named Desire and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof drew on personal and family drama for material. Essays examine how Williams's confessional style influenced Inge, Mamet, Kushner, Lori-Parks and others. There is a special study of African-American theater. Features interview with Albee on Williams' influence"--Provided by publisher.
Most World War II submarine stories are glorifications of war written by submarine captains about their own boats. But the USS Pampanito was not a typical submarine. The sub and its crew caused plenty of destruction, but they found the pinnacle of their honor and fame in a dramatic sea rescue. Gregory F. Michno relates the experiences of the crewmen—both enlisted men and officers—who served on the USS Pampanito. The Pampanito story begins with the boat's construction in 1943, continues through its six combat missions, and concludes with its decommissioning after the war in 1945. The heart of the book is the September 12, 1944, attack on a Japanese convoy carrying English and Australian POWs from the Burma-Siam Railway (of Bridge on the River Kwai fame) to prison camps in Japan. The Pampanito helped sink two of the prison ships, unwittingly killing hundreds of Allied soldiers, but then returned to rescue the survivors. The crew picked a record seventy-three men from the sea.