Showing results by publisher "Phoenix BookS" in Entertainment & Performing Arts

Join Rick Reynolds as he guides you through the foibles, fumbles and pratfalls of his own life beginning with his bizarre childhood. From the drowning of his father at a family picnic, to a bank-robbing stepfather, to his mother's 3 marriages and innumerable affairs, Reynolds portrays a striking picture of the lengths people will go for love and the human connection.

It was the triumph and the tragedy of his life. As a producer, he had reached the pinnacle of success; there was nowhere else to go. In this biography, noted Hollywood chronicler Bob Thomas reveals the stormy career of a shrewd, self-confident intellectual whiz kid who today personifies the image of a studio head during the Golden Age of movies. It tells of the women Selznick loved and the fortunes he amassed and lost; of the great stars he made and the magnificent motion pictures he created— the man who was an entrepreneurial genius, a driven perfectionist, and the author of endless memos.

Sit right back and take a nostalgic, first-hand look into the world of Gilligan's Island— everything you ever wanted to know about the show from the Professor himself, Russell Johnson. Directly from the ship's log, Johnson takes you to the day when Sherwood Schwartz shipwrecked seven strangers on a tiny desert isle—and America hasn't been the same since.

The sizzling sequel to the Hollywood expose You'll Never Make Love in This Town Again. In the late 1990s, Hollywood was rocked by the publication of You'll Never Make Love in This Town Again. Four women—Robin, Liza, Linda, and Tiffany—dared to name names and tell tales about what really happens with celebrities behind closed doors. Shocking and fearless, their no-holds-barred accounts became a publishing sensation. In this sequel, only the names have changed.

From the comic mind of the one and only Jonathan Winters comes this side-splitting collection of the comedian's most off-the-wall antics and impressions. Grandma Frickert, Chester Honeyhugger, and other comic characters all make appearances on this best-of compilation.

Few people had a better perspective on comedy and comedians than the master of it all, Steve Allen. In Funny People, Allen conveys insightful and personal observations—by anecdote and example—of some of the 20th century' s greatest comic performers: Jack Benny, George Burns, Milton Berle, and Jimmy Durante. Laugh along with Steve as he offers witty and perceptive looks at comedy legends whose work has stood the test of time.

In the world of opera, no figure in modern times loomed larger than the late Luciano Pavarotti, especially in his triumphant collaborations with Placido Domingo and Jose Carreras as the Three Tenors. Pavarotti captured the imagination of audiences around the world. In this memoir, the Grammy-award winning legend shares both the fortunate and the regrettable events that marked his life, including his forays into popular music, his performances in China, and the boos he endured at La Scala.

In 1895, teenager Schmuel Goldfisz left the Warsaw ghetto to become Samuel Goldwyn, one of the most acclaimed producers in Hollywood history. Among Goldwyn' s films are such classics as The Pride of the Yankees, Wuthering Heights, and The Bishop' s Wife— all famous for conveying the "Goldwyn Touch." In this detailed biography, acclaimed author A. Scott Berg recounts the fascinating life of one of the most colorful personalities of Hollywood' s Golden Age.

No one else produced as many television programs as Aaron Spelling. And very few enjoyed such career longevity, with more than forty years in the business— from Dick Powell's Zane Grey Theater in 1959 until his last hit shows, 7th Heaven and Charmed, aired in 2006.

The place: New York. The time: the early 1980s. The scene: the red-hot comedy clubs, very late at night. The cast: five would-be stand-up comics, their egos, and their girls. The result: a downright hilarious novel about trying to be funny for fame, fortune, and fornication. This is Bill Maher's report from the front, a stageside table at the birth of the comedy boom. You'll laugh in all the right places.

Ever notice how bad song lyrics get stuck in your head? It's not just you. After Pulitzer Prize-winning humorist Dave Barry's column about this tendency, reader response was enormous. But Barry didn't know what he was getting himself into when he invited his Legion of Alert Readers to submit their nominees in the Bad Song Survey. "Song badness," he soon learned, "is an issue that Americans care deeply about."

By "assembling" some of the most fascinating figures in world history, Meeting of Minds provided a groundbreaking opportunity for audiences to be exposed to ideas by way of a medium not normally known for its intellectual vigor. Portrayed by actors, panelists engage in stimulating round-table discussions that were conducted like any other talk show but featured prominent influencers from bygone generations—not just philosophers and politicians, but poets, playwrights, and presidents.

Terrify your friends and the neighborhood trick-or-treaters with these terrifying screams, horrifying moans, and bloodcurdling shrieks all backed by the sounds of an eerie organ during a thunderous storm and narrated by the chilling voice of a demonic monster.

In this Grammy-nominated recording, Emmy winner Jonathan Winters proves that he was one of the funniest performers on the planet. His comic routines were legendary, and this collection of inspired telephone voice messages is just further proof of his gleeful wit—even when he was just "phoning it in." In more than a dozen "messages," Winters takes on numerous personas, playing such absurd characters as antiques dealer Andre, Western film actor Tabby Hayes, and Winters' most beloved creation, octogenarian Maude Frickert—among many others.

Considered one of the greatest filmmakers of the twentieth century, legendary director, producer, and screenwriter Orson Welles was also an acclaimed actor, whose distinctive voice commanded attention. In this recording, Welles offers historic interpretations of excerpts from classic literature. This collection features time-honored works by several distinguished contributors, including American authors Nathaniel Hawthorne and Edgar Allan Poe, as well as Joseph Conrad, Rudyard Kipling, Saki, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Oscar Wilde.

Recognizable for his cherubic countenance and roles playing mild-mannered fathers in movies and on TV, Dick Van Patten had one of the lengthiest and most impressive track records in the acting business. As a child, Van Patten performed alongside Broadway stars such as Melvyn Douglas, Tallulah Bankhead, Alfred Lunt,and Lynn Fontanne, often winning roles over newcomers such as Marlon Brando and Roddy McDowell. He worked in radio and became a familiar face in the early days of television, ultimately becoming an "everydad" in the1970s comedy/drama Eight Is Enough.

Featuring eight episodes of seven classic radio programs, this compelling collection of nostalgia will entertain listeners of all eras. Featured in this set are a live quiz show—You Bet Your Life, hosted by comic legend Groucho Marx—a thrilling segment of X-Minus One ("The C-Chute" ) written by science fiction icon Isaac Asimov, and the true crime program Gangbusters, hosted by former heavyweight champion boxer Jim Braddock, a friend of one of the detectives who investigated the case.

Freudian slips, spoonerisms, double-talk, and nonsense from famous and infamous figures past and present, are all here in one digest that will have you howling with laughter. Imagine saying to the Beatles, "You'll never make it…Go back to Liverpool." That's what a Decca Records executive told the Fab Four in 1962. Senator S.I. Hayakawa allegedly pointed out, "The best cure for insomnia is to get a lot of sleep."

While TV is prevalent in most of our lives, few of us have much knowledge of its behind-the-scenes operations. In this riveting expose, veteran writer and producer Ian Gurvitz illuminates a side of the business few people get to see. Drawing on notes from his personal journal, Gurvitz details two years in the dizzying ups-and-downs life of a Hollywood television writer— the pitch meetings, the table readings, the rewrites, the studios, the networks, and the executives who make all the decisions.

By "assembling" some of the most fascinating figures in world history, Meeting of Minds provided a groundbreaking opportunity for audiences to be exposed to ideas by way of a medium not normally known for its intellectual vigor. Portrayed by actors, panelists engage in stimulating round-table discussions that were conducted like any other talk show but featured prominent influencers from bygone generations—not just philosophers and politicians, but poets, playwrights, and presidents.