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Backstreet Boys
by Anna Louise GoldenWhen they say Quit Playing Games With My Heart, you better listen-- 'cause they're the Backstreet Boys, one of the hottest boy-bands ever to take the stage. These five ultra-fine guys have won the hearts of millions. So step back into their awesome world and see what made them tick at this exciting, early stage of their careers. An insider's look back at the band: Howie Dorough was the peacemaker of the group. But watch out-this flirtatious hunk was also known as the "Latin lover." Kevin Richardson, as the group's gorgeous oldest member, sometimes had to be the responsible one. Nick Carter, the band's youngest member, wasn't called "Chaos" for nothing-- this blond-haired, blue-eyed cutie was a major prankster! Brian Littrell, a big-time hottie, was the comedian of the bunch-- Jim Carrey was his idol, and he loved to play practical jokes. AJ McLean, deeply romantic-- he wrote the band's love ballads, and this sexy songster was rarely seen without his trademark sunglasses.Fall in love all over again with the Backstreet Boys as they celebrate more than twenty years of top-charting success.
Backstreet Mom: A Mother's Tale of Backstreet Boy AJ McLean's Rise to Fame, Struggle with Addiction, and Ultimate Triumph
by Denise I. McLean Nicole P. GotlinFeatured on "Oprah" and "Good Morning America. Backstreet Mom is the story of one single mother's courageous battle to save her son could be the story of any woman with a child in trouble. There's more money at stake, more public attention and a larger than life career in the balance. An integral part of the Backstreet Boys from the very beginning, AJ McClean's mother, Denise, traveled with the group and served as their publicist and fan club coordinator. In close proximity to the successes and heartbreaks of her son's career, Denise watched her son's painful descent into alcoholism and depression. This revealing account tells the tale of AJ's rise to superstardom, his decline into addiction, and his struggles through rehab, and offers a look at the harsh world of the music industry. Any mother who's ever faced the pain of a child unraveling will find herself in the pages of this honest and inspiring memoir.
Backward Glances: Contemporary Chinese Cultures and the Female Homoerotic Imaginary
by Fran MartinBackward Glances reveals that the passionate love one woman feels for another occupies a position of unsuspected centrality in contemporary Chinese mass cultures. By examining representations of erotic and romantic love between women in popular films, elite and pulp fiction, and television dramas, Fran Martin shows how youthful same-sex love is often framed as a universal, even ennobling, feminine experience. She argues that a temporal logic dominates depictions of female homoeroticism, and she traces that logic across texts produced and consumed in mainland China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan during the twentieth century and the early twenty-first. Attentive to both transnational cultural flows and local particularities, Martin shows how loving relations between women in mass culture are usually represented as past experiences. Adult protagonists revel in the repeated, mournful narration of their memories. Yet these portrayals do not simply or finally consign the same-sex loving woman to the past--they also cause her to reappear ceaselessly in the present. As Martin explains, memorial schoolgirl love stories are popular throughout contemporary Chinese cultures. The same-sex attracted young woman appears in both openly homophobic and proudly queer-affirmative narratives, as well as in stories whose ideological valence is less immediately clear. Martin demonstrates that the stories, television programs, and films she analyzes are not idiosyncratic depictions of marginal figures, but manifestations of a broader, mainstream cultural preoccupation. Her investigation of representations of same-sex love between women sheds new light on contemporary Chinese understandings of sex, love, gender, marriage, and the cultural ordering of human life.
Backwards & In Heels: The Past, Present and Future of Women Working in Film
by Alicia MaloneStories of women in the film industry, onscreen and off, and interviews with Ava DuVernay, America Ferrera, Geena Davis, Octavia Spencer, and more. Ginger Rogers did everything that Fred Astaire did. She just did it backwards and in high heels . . . One of the first people to ever pick up a motion picture camera was a woman—as was the first screenwriter to win two Academy Awards, the inventor of the boom microphone, and the first person to be credited with the title Film Editor. From Hollywood&’s earliest days, women have been revolutionizing, innovating, and shaping how we make movies. Yet their stories are rarely shared. In Backwards and in Heels, film reporter and author of The Female Gaze Alicia Malone tells the history of women in film through stories about incredible ladies who made their mark throughout each era of Hollywood, from the first women directors, to the iconic movie stars, to present-day activists. These inspiring stories also highlight the specific obstacles women have had to face. Backwards and in Heels combines research and exclusive interviews with influential women and men working in Hollywood today, such as Geena Davis, J.J. Abrams, Ava DuVernay, Octavia Spencer, America Ferrera, Paul Feig, Todd Fisher, and many more, as well as film professors, historians, and experts.
Bad Beats and Lucky Draws: Poker Strategies, Winning Hands, and Stories from the Professional Poker Tour
by Phil HellmuthChampion poker player provides strategies, narratives of past poker challenges, examples, and advice from other great players.
Bad Beats and Lucky Draws: Poker Strategies, Winning Hands, and Stories from the Professional Poker Tour
by Phil Hellmuth Jr.Bad Beats and Lucky Draws is your down-and-dirty guide to the world of high-stakes professional poker. Phil Hellmuth, nine-time World Series of Poker Champion and author of Play Poker Like the Pros, presents a blow-by-blow account of many of poker's "clash of the titans" hands from the World Series of Poker, the World Poker Tour, and the European Tour. Phil provides insights into what the players were thinking and includes his own take on what they (and in many cases what he) should have done differently. Highly entertaining and instructive, Bad Beats and Lucky Draws gives you a seat at the table with the best bluffs, reads, and over-the-top plays such as the hand that won Phil his record-tying ninth bracelet at the 2003 World Series to the heartbreaking play that knocked him out of the "Big One." Bad Beats and Lucky Draws also includes special contributions by Doyle BrunsonJohnny ChanAnnie DukeHoward LedererDaniel NegreanuTed ForrestJennifer Harman Layne Flack Men Nguyen John Bonetti
Bad Film Histories: Ethnography and the Early Archive
by Katherine GrooA daring, deep investigation into ethnographic cinema that challenges standard ways of writing film history and breaks important new ground in understanding archives Bad Film Histories is a vital work that unsettles the authority of the archive. Katherine Groo daringly takes readers to the margins of the film record, addressing the undertheorization of film history and offering a rigorous corrective. Taking ethnographic cinema as a crucial case study, Groo challenges standard ways of thinking and writing about film history and questions widespread assumptions about what film artifacts are and what makes them meaningful. Rather than filling holes, Groo endeavors to understand the imprecisions and absences that define film history and its archives. Bad Film Histories draws on numerous works of ethnographic cinema, from Edward S. Curtis&’s In the Land of the Head Hunters, to a Citroën-sponsored &“croisière&” across Africa, to the extensive archives of the Maison Lumière and the Musée Albert-Kahn, to dozens of expedition films from the 1910s and 1920s. The project is deeply grounded in poststructural approaches to history, and throughout Groo draws on these frameworks to offer innovative and accessible readings that explain ethnographic cinema&’s destabilizing energies.As Groo describes, ethnographic works are mostly untitled, unauthored, seemingly infinite in number, and largely unrestored even in their digital afterlives. Her examination of ethnographic cinema provides necessary new thought for both film scholars and those who are thrilled by cinema&’s boundless possibilities. In so doing, she boldly reexamines what early ethnographic cinema is and how these films produce meaning, challenging the foundations of film history and prevailing approaches to the archive.
Bad Girls and Sick Boys: Fantasies in Contemporary Art and Culture
by Linda S. KauffmanLinda S. Kauffman turns the pornography debate on its head with this audacious analysis of recent taboo-shattering fiction, film, and performance art. Investigating the role of fantasy in art, politics, and popular culture, she shows how technological advances in medicine and science (magnetic resonance imaging, computers, and telecommunications) have profoundly altered our concepts of the human body. Cyberspace is producing new forms of identity and subjectivity. The novelists, filmmakers, and performers in Bad Girls and Sick Boys are the interpreters of these brave new worlds, cartographers who are busy mapping the fin-de-millennium environment that already envelops us.Bad Girls and Sick Boys offers a vital and entertaining tour of the current cultural landscape. Kauffman boldly connects the dots between the radical artists who shatter taboos and challenge legal and aesthetic conventions. She links writers like John Hawkes and Robert Coover to Kathy Acker and William Vollmann; filmmakers like Ngozi Onwurah and Isaac Julien to Brian De Palma and Gus Van Sant; and performers like Carolee Schneemann and Annie Sprinkle to the visual arts. Kauffman's lively interviews with J. G. Ballard, David Cronenberg, Bob Flanagan, and Orlan add an extraordinary dimension to her timely and convincing argument.
Bad History and the Logics of Blockbuster Cinema
by Patrick McgeeIn his latest book, Patrick McGee argues for the political and social significance of mass culture through the interpretation of four recent big-budget movies: T itanic, Gangs of New York, Australia, and Inglourious Basterds. Through philosophical and historical contextualization, he reveals the logic of what appears on the screen, a logic that shows how these films both represent and distort the historical record in order to articulate a truth that challenges conventional history as a discipline. Counterdisciplinary in its method, this exciting work asserts that no movie can ever be reduced to the absolutely authentic or the absolutely inauthentic.
Bad Influence: The buzzy debut memoir about growing up online
by Oenone Forbat'An ideal summer read' EVENING STANDARD'Equal parts insightful and entertaining - whatever your take on influencers, Bad Influence is a great read' YOMI ADEGOKEOenone didn't set out to become an influencer. The word barely existed when she started posting on Instagram at university to document her 'fitness journey' after a toxic relationship came to a messy end.In this humorous meditation on her digitized life, Oenone chronicles the pits and peaks of coming of age online. Grappling with modern-day issues on a public stage - from body image and personal boundaries to the limitations of online activism, Bad Influence examines what happens when your day-to-day reality becomes #content - and that #content pays your bills.It asks: can you truly be authentic online? Can social media be a force for good? Is it necessarily bad for our mental health?Written with wit, warmth and honesty, this is a candid account of what it really means to be an influencer, from someone still figuring it out: the good, the bad and the instagrammable.'Warm, juicy, and eye-opening, like having a chat with a best friend' ANNIE LORD'If ever a book captured the zeitgeist, this is it' GRACE CAMPBELL'Funny, warm and brilliantly engaging' LUCY VINE
Bad Influence: The hotly-anticipated debut memoir about growing up online - 'An ideal summer read' EVENING STANDARD
by Oenone ForbatA smart, humorous and candid account of coming of age on the internet, from the much-loved online personality Oenone Forbat.'I have spent most of my adult life online, so much so that it can be hard to know which parts of me are the 'real' me and which parts I have subconsciously edited, facetuned and perhaps exaggerated, to suit being so hyper-visible'Oenone didn't set out to become an influencer. The word barely existed when she started posting on Instagram at university to document her 'fitness journey' after a toxic relationship came to a messy end.In this humorous meditation on her digitized life, Oenone chronicles the pits and peaks of coming of age online. Grappling with modern-day issues on a public stage - from body image and personal boundaries to the limitations of online activism, Bad Influence examines what happens when your day-to-day reality becomes #content - and that #content pays your bills.It asks: can you truly be authentic online? Can social media be a force for good? Is it necessarily bad for our mental health?Written and narrated with wit, warmth and honesty, this is a candid account of what it really means to be an influencer, from someone still figuring it out: the good, the bad and the instagrammable.(P)2023 Quercus Editions Limited
Bad Influence: The hotly-anticipated debut memoir about growing up online - 'An ideal summer read' EVENING STANDARD
by Oenone Forbat'An ideal summer read' EVENING STANDARD'Equal parts insightful and entertaining - whatever your take on influencers, Bad Influence is a great read' YOMI ADEGOKEOenone didn't set out to become an influencer. The word barely existed when she started posting on Instagram at university to document her 'fitness journey' after a toxic relationship came to a messy end.In this humorous meditation on her digitized life, Oenone chronicles the pits and peaks of coming of age online. Grappling with modern-day issues on a public stage - from body image and personal boundaries to the limitations of online activism, Bad Influence examines what happens when your day-to-day reality becomes #content - and that #content pays your bills.It asks: can you truly be authentic online? Can social media be a force for good? Is it necessarily bad for our mental health?Written with wit, warmth and honesty, this is a candid account of what it really means to be an influencer, from someone still figuring it out: the good, the bad and the instagrammable.'Warm, juicy, and eye-opening, like having a chat with a best friend' ANNIE LORD'If ever a book captured the zeitgeist, this is it' GRACE CAMPBELL'Funny, warm and brilliantly engaging' LUCY VINE
Bad Motherfucker: The Life and Movies of Samuel L. Jackson, the Coolest Man in Hollywood
by Gavin EdwardsA fascinating exploration and celebration of the life and work of the coolest man in Hollywood, Samuel L. Jackson—from his star-making turns in the films of Spike Lee and Quentin Tarantino to his ubiquitous roles in the Star Wars and Marvel franchises, not to mention the cult favorite Snakes on a Plane.Samuel L. Jackson&’s embodiment of cool isn&’t just inspirational—it&’s important. Bad Motherfucker lays out how his attitude intersects with his identity as a Black man, why being cool matters in the modern world, and how Jackson can guide us through the current cultural moment in which everyone is losing their cool. Edwards details Jackson&’s fascinating personal history, from stuttering bookworm to gunrunning revolutionary to freebasing addict to A-list movie star.Drawing on original reporting and interviews, the book explores not only the major events of Jackson&’s life but also his obsessions: golf, kung fu movies, profanity. Bad Motherfuckerfeatures a delectable filmography of Jackson&’s movies—140 and counting!—and also includes new movie posters for many of Jackson&’s greatest roles, reimagined by dozens of gifted artists and designers. The book provides a must-read road map through the vast territory of his on-screen career and more: a vivid portrait of Samuel L. Jackson&’s essential self, as well as practical instructions, by example, for how to live and work and be.
Bad News (Routledge Revivals)
by John Hewitt Jean Hart Peter Beharrell Brian Winston Howard Davis Paul Walton John Eldridge Gregg PhiloIt is a commonly held belief that television news in Britain, on whatever channel, is more objective, more trustworthy, more neutral than press reporting. The illusion is exploded in this controversial study by the Glasgow University Media Group, originally published in 1976. The authors undertook an exhaustive monitoring of all television broadcasts over 6 months, from January to June 1975, with particular focus upon industrial news broadcasts, the TUC, strikes and industrial action, business and economic affairs. Their analysis showed how television news favours certain individuals by giving them more time and status. But their findings did not merely deny the neutrality of the news, they gave a new insight into the picture of industrial society that TV news constructs.
Bad Seeds and Holy Terrors: The Child Villains of Horror Film (SUNY series, Horizons of Cinema)
by Dominic LennardSince the 1950s, children have provided some of horror's most effective and enduring villains, from dainty psychopath Rhoda Penmark of The Bad Seed (1956) and spectacularly possessed Regan MacNeil of The Exorcist (1973) to psychic ghost-girl Samara of The Ring (2002) and adopted terror Esther of Orphan (2009). Using a variety of critical approaches, including those of cinema studies, cultural studies, gender studies, and psychoanalysis, Bad Seeds and Holy Terrors offers the first full-length study of these child monsters. In doing so, the book highlights horror as a topic of analysis that is especially pertinent socially and politically, exposing the genre as a site of deep ambivalence toward—and even hatred of—children.
Bad Singer: The Surprising Science of Tone Deafness and How We Hear Music
by Tim FalconerIn the tradition of Daniel Levitin’s This Is Your Brain on Music and Oliver Sacks’ Musicophilia, Bad Singer follows the delightful journey of Tim Falconer as he tries to overcome tone deafness — and along the way discovers what we’re really hearing when we listen to music.Tim Falconer, a self-confessed “bad singer,” always wanted to make music, but soon after he starts singing lessons, he discovers that he’s part of only 2.5 percent of the population afflicted with amusia — in other words, he is scientifically tone-deaf. Bad Singer chronicles his quest to understand human evolution and music, the brain science behind tone-deafness, his search for ways to retrain the adult brain, and his investigation into what we really hear when we listen to music. In an effort to learn more about his brain disorder, he goes to a series of labs where the scientists who test him are as fascinated with him as he is with them. He also sets out to understand why we love music and deconstructs what we really hear when we listen to it. And he unlocks the secret that helps explain why music has such emotional power over us.
Bad: An Unprecedented Investigation into the Michael Jackson Cover-Up (Front Page Detectives)
by Dylan HowardAn Inside View into the Dark Side of a Music Icon He was the King of Pop, a superstar without equal, the idol of millions of young people around the world. But was Michael Jackson also a sexual predator without equal, someone who preyed on the very fans who adored him? Bad is the revelatory untold true story of the strange and larger-than-life career of Michael Jackson, the King of Pop. In the wake of the controversial two-part documentary Leaving Neverland, which told the stories of two young boys who were befriended by the singer and have claimed they suffered years of agonizing abuse, Dylan Howard set out to investigate Jackson&’s life and death in unprecedented depth, to determine—as one lawyer suggested—that the pop star ran &“the most sophisticated child sexual abuse procurement and facilitation operation the world has known.&” After all the highly publicized trials and unfounded accusations, stunning new information has finally come to light: irrefutable evidence that one of the best-known, best-loved figures in the world was a monster behind closed doors—a foul-mouthed, abusive, drug-sodden freak whose deeds and the reasons for those deeds are revealed now for the first time. A dramatic narrative account based on dozens of interviews, Howard shares Jackson&’s own riveting personal journal—obtained exclusively for this book—interviews with family members, multiple first-person sources—some of whom have asked to remain anonymous—as well as thousands of pages of court documents. What he uncovers is a man who was both naive and Machiavellian, unorthodox, a devoted father, shrewd businessman, and drug addict whose life was cut short but whose sound and style have influenced artists of various genres and generations. Remarkably though, in death, there remains two portraits of Michael Jackson: the reigning King of Pop, and a pedophile whose pattern of abuse ruined his reputation. Fans and individuals alike will forever be asking if the insidious claims being made about MJ are true. This is the new narrative and the sad legacy of one of the best-selling music artists of all time. Here is his life story, told for the first time with stories and testimony that will leave you shaken.
Badasses: The Legend of Snake, Foo, Dr. Death, and John Madden's Oakland Raiders
by Peter RichmondCould a very good football team be more than just a very good football team? Could it be something more? Could it be legendary--not just Hall of Fame legendary but legendary as in the tales of ancient warriors, half-real and half-mythical, who mattered because they inspired people who needed to believe in figures mightier than their mundane selves? Could a football team seize the modern imagination because the days of true legend have long passed? Because we no longer have myths in sport or in life? Because long gone are the days when, as Ken Stabler put it to me, "you played for the name on the front of the jersey, not the name on the back"?
Baggage: Tales from a Fully Packed Life
by Alan Cumming"An intimate look at the making of a man, an actor, an advocate—and most importantly—a happy human being. A wonderful book that is funny, honest, fearless, and generous in its vulnerability." —Douglas Stuart, Booker Prize-winning author of Shuggie BainThere is absolutely no logical reason why I am here. The life trajectory my nationality and class and circumstances portended for me was not even remotely close to the one I now navigate. But logic is a science and living is an art.The release I felt in writing my first memoir, Not My Father’s Son, was matched only by how my speaking out empowered so many to engage with their own trauma. I was reminded of the power of my words and the absolute duty of authenticity.But…No one ever fully recovers from their past. There is no cure for it. You just learn to manage and prioritize it. I believe the second you feel you have triumphed or overcome something – an abuse, an injury to the body or the mind, an addiction, a character flaw, a habit, a person – you have merely decided to stop being vigilant and embraced denial as your modus operandi. And that is what this book is about, and for: to remind you not to buy in to the Hollywood ending.Ironically maybe, much of Baggage chronicles my life in Hollywood and how, since I recovered from a nervous breakdown at 28, work has repeatedly whisked me away from personal calamities to sets and stages around the world. It is also about marriage(s): starting with the break-up of my first (to a woman) and ending with the ascension to my second (to a man) with many kissed toads in between! But in everything, each failed relationship or encounter with a legend (Liza! X Men! Gore Vidal! Kubrick! Spice Girls!), in every bad decision or moment of sensual joy I have endeavored to show what I have learned and how I’ve become who I am today: a happy, flawed, vulnerable, fearless middle-aged man, with a lot of baggage.
Bake, Create, and Decorate: 30+ Sweets and Treats (Harry Potter)
by Joanna FarrowCreate delicious cakes, cupcakes, cookies, and other decorative desserts inspired by the Harry Potter films! A companion to the #1 New York Times bestseller The Official Harry Potter Baking Book and The Official Harry Potter Cookbook! Decorate your own magical creations in this official dessert book that's perfect for the youngest fans of the Harry Potter films! This gorgeous book is packed with full-color photography and kid-friendly instructions for how to create 30 cake, cupcake, and cookie designs. Build your own Acromantula out of cupcakes. Design Hogwarts house crest cookies. Frost a cake that looks just like the Knight Bus -- and many more!Each design in the book can be created using simple store-bought cake or cookie mixes. Or whip up your own treats from scratch using the provided basic cake, cookie, and frosting recipes. Plus, assembling cakes and frosting complex designs are made easy for bakers of all ages thanks to the handy templates included at the back of the book.The delicious Wizarding World-themed desserts found in this book are perfect for parties, holidays, movie nights, and more! The perfect book for any beginning baker, aspiring decorator, and Harry Potter fan!
Bakhtin and Theatre: Dialogues with Stanislavski, Meyerhold and Grotowski
by Dick MccawWhat did Bakhtin think about the theatre? That it was outdated? That is ‘stopped being a serious genre’ after Shakespeare? Could a thinker to whose work ideas of theatricality, visuality, and embodied activity were so central really have nothing to say about theatrical practice? Bakhtin and Theatre is the first book to explore the relation between Bakhtin’s ideas and the theatre practice of his time. In that time, Stanislavsky co-founded the Moscow Art Theatre in 1898 and continued to develop his ideas about theatre until his death in 1938. Stanislavsky’s pupil Meyerhold embraced the Russian Revolution and created some stunningly revolutionary productions in the 1920s, breaking with the realism of his former teacher. Less than twenty years after Stanislavsky’s death and Meyerhold’s assassination, a young student called Grotowski was studying in Moscow, soon to break the mould with his Poor Theatre. All three directors challenged the prevailing notion of theatre, drawing on, disagreeing with and challenging each other’s ideas. Bakhtin’s early writings about action, character and authorship provide a revealing framework for understanding this dialogue between these three masters of Twentieth Century theatre.
Balanchine's Apprentice: From Hollywood to New York and Back
by John CliffordA talented young dancer and his brilliant teacher In this long-awaited memoir, dancer and choreographer John Clifford offers a highly personal look inside the day-to-day operations of the New York City Ballet and its creative mastermind, George Balanchine. Balanchine’s Apprentice is the story of Clifford—an exceptionally talented artist—and the guiding inspiration for his life’s work in dance. Growing up in Hollywood with parents in show business, Clifford acted in television productions such as The Danny Kaye Show, The Dinah Shore Show, and Death Valley Days. He recalls the beginning of his obsession with ballet: At age 11 he was cast as the Prince in a touring production of The Nutcracker. The director was none other than the legendary Balanchine, who would eventually invite Clifford to New York City and shape his career as both a mentor and artistic example. During his dazzling tenure with the New York City Ballet, Clifford danced the lead in 47 works, several created for him by Balanchine, Jerome Robbins, and others. He partnered famous ballerinas including Gelsey Kirkland and Allegra Kent. He choreographed eight ballets for the company, his first at age 20. He performed in Russia, Germany, France, and Canada. Afterward, he returned to the West Coast to found the Los Angeles Ballet, where he continued to innovate based on the Balanchine technique. In this book, Clifford provides firsthand insight into Balanchine’s relationships with his dancers, including Suzanne Farrell. Examining his own attachment to his charismatic teacher, Clifford explores questions of creative influence and integrity. His memoir is a portrait of a young dancer who learned and worked at lightning speed, who pursued the calls of art and genius on both coasts of America and around the world.
Balanchine: A special issue of the journal Choreography and Dance
by Robert P. CohanThis detailed portrait of George Balanchine presents new approaches to his choreography. The book examines Balanchine from diverse perspectives and discusses unexplored aspects of his work, such as the notion of Balanchine as an architect, and his experiments with the African-American dance tradition. The articles complement and reinforce each other, taking interdisciplinary perspectives and encouraging a reexamination of, and expansion of, existing opinions.
Balancing Acts: Behind the Scenes at London's National Theatre
by Nicholas HytnerFrom the Tony Award and Laurence Olivier Award-winning former director of London's National Theatre--this is a fascinating, candid, eloquent memoir about his career directing theater, producing films and opera, and working closely with some of the world's most celebrated actors. The list of Nicholas Hytner's accomplishments is long and distinguished: as Artistic Director of London's National Theatre from 2003-2015, he directed and produced a great number of their most popular and memorable plays and musicals, many of which have come to Broadway: Carousel, Richard Bean's One Man, Two Guvnors, David Hare's Stuff Happens among them. He directed both the London and Broadway productions of Miss Saigon, each of which ran for ten years. He directed Alan Bennett's The Madness of George III on both stage and screen. In short: He is one of today's most successful and admired theatrical impresarios. In Balancing Acts, Hytner gives us a detailed behind-the-scenes look at his creative process. From reviving classic musicals and mastering Shakespeare to commissioning new plays, he shows theater making to be a necessarily collaborative exercise, and he writes insightfully about the actors and playwrights he's worked with: Derek Jacobi, Richard Griffiths, Helen Mirren, Maggie Smith, Michael Gambon, Harold Pinter, and Tom Stoppard among them. With a cultural range that spans from The Mikado to The Lady in the Van, Balancing Acts is not only a memoir but a gathering of illuminating notes on the art of directing and a thoughtful meditation on the purpose of theater.
Balancing Acts: Unleashing the Power of Creativity in Your Life and Work
by Daniel LamarreAre you prepared to take the risks necessary to drive innovation and champion an environment of over-the-top invention? Cirque du Soliel CEO Daniel Lamarre shares what it takes for anyone, regardless of position or industry, to embrace the value of creative leadership.At the core of Cirque du Soliel&’s lavish, multi-million-dollar productions is President and CEO Daniel Lamarre, who has mastered the ability to bring business and creativity together across multiple languages and cultures in a way that has never been seen before. The secrets he shares in Balancing Acts are rooted in tremendous faith in your own creative skills and those of the sharpest minds within your organization.Through Daniel&’s story triumph and trials, you&’ll learn:How to shatter the perceived limitations standing in the way of your ability to think creatively and innovatively;When to step up and when to step back so that your team can create a masterpiece that doesn&’t break the bank;How, in using the methods Daniel has uncovered, modern companies with entrenched bureaucracies can bring creativity and business together to foster innovation and boost profits; andHow to use creative thinking to lead your organization to new heights.Whether you work for one of the most creative organizations on the planet like Cirque du Soleil; in a stuffy corporate job; or somewhere in between—Balancing Acts is filled with principles that can strengthen and accelerate any business on the planet.