Readers discover the incredible story behind Darren Criss’s meteoric rise to fame with this high-interest topic. The multitalented musician and actor is most famous for his role as Blaine Anderson on the hit television show Glee, but this book reveals that there is much more to Darren Criss’s story than just his television career. Readers explore his roles on stage and screen in addition to his work as a singer and songwriter. Accessible text, bright photographs, and a detailed timeline of his life and career keep readers of all ages entertained as they learn fun facts about this up-and-coming star.
In a Chicago junk shop three small-time crooks plot to rob a man of his coin collection, the showpiece of which is a valuable "Buffalo nickel". These high-minded grifters fancy themselves businessmen pursuing legitmate free enterprise. But the reality of the three--Donny, the oafish junk shop owner; Bobby, a young junkie Donny has taken under his wing; and "Teach"; a violently paranoid braggart--is that they are merely pawns caught up in their own game of last-chance, dead-end, empty pipe dreams.
Tells the story of transsexual rocker Hedwig Schmidt, an East German immigrant whose sex change operation has been botched and who finds herself living in a trailer park in Kansas.
A must-have for hardcore Gleeks and casual fans alike, this guide is packed with resources, photos, and inside stories about everybody’s favorite glee club. Tracing the success of the show through its 70-plus awards and consistently sky-high ratings, Share the Glee takes a look back at the original cast and follows its evolution over four seasons, through celebrity guest stars Josh Groban, Britney Spears, and Gwyneth Paltrow, and up to the recent announcement that American Idol star Adam Lambert and X-Factor judge Demi Lovato will be joining the show for Season Five. Though Cory Monteith’s Finn will be absent from the show, he lives on in this tribute that explores his hardships as a teenager to his on-screen relationship with Rachel Berry and real-life relationship with Lea Michele. Change is a constant in Season Five, with the departure of Quinn, Mercedes, Brittany, Puck, and Mike. Share the Glee is the perfect tool to commemorate your beloved characters and introduce your soon-to-be favorites.
The debut picture book from #1 New York Times bestselling author Chris Colfer Once upon a time, there was a little girl who didn't quite fit in. When she runs away, she happens upon a curvy tree who helps her understand the importance of being different! This picture book stands alone, but also plays an important role in the Land of Stories series--making this a must-have book for fans and new readers alike!
It was as if American television audiences discovered the musical in the early 21st century. In 2009 Glee took the Fox Network and American television by storm with the unexpected unification of primetime programming, awkward teens, and powerful voices spontaneously bursting into song. After raking in the highest rating for a new show in the 2009-2010 season, Glee would continue to cultivate rabid fans, tie-in soundtracks and merchandising, and a spinoff reality competition show until its conclusion in 2015. Alongside Glee, NBC and Fox would crank up musical visibility with the nighttime drama Smash and a string of live musical productions. Then came ABC's comedic fantasy musical series Galavant and the CW's surprise Golden Globe darling My Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. Television and the musical appeared to be a perfect match. But, as author Kelly Kessler illustrates, television had at that point been carrying on a sixty-year, symbiotic love affair with the musical. From Rodgers and Hammerstein's appearance on the first Toast of the Town telecast and Mary Martin's iconic Peter Pan airings to Barbra Streisand's 1960s CBS specials, The Carol Burnett Show, Cop Rock, Great Performances, and a string of one-off musical episodes of sitcoms, nighttime soaps, fantasy shows, and soap operas, television has always embraced the musical. Kessler shows how the form is written across the history of American television and how its various incarnations tell the stories of shifting American culture and changing television, film, and theatrical landscapes. She recounts and explores this rich, decades-long history by traversing musicals, stars, and sounds from film, Broadway, and Las Vegas to the small screen.
Comic Performativities: Identity, Internet Outrage, and the Aesthetics of Communication studies patterns of criticism and public debate in the relationship between humour, identity, and offense. In an increasingly reductive and politically charged debate, right-wing pundits argue leftist politics has compromised a free and open discussion, while scholars take right-wing critics to task for reifying systems of oppression under the guise of reason and respect. In response, Goltz scrutinises twenty-first century "comedic controversies," the notion of "political correctness," and the so-called "outrage machine" of social media. How should we appropriately determine whether a joke is "sexist," "racist," or "offensive"? Informed by communication, performance, and critical identity theory, Goltz examines infamous controversies involving performers like Sarah Silverman, Amy Schumer, and Seth MacFarlane, and the social media backlash that redefined these events. He investigates the ironic interplay between spoken word, identity, physicality and, as a result, the contrasting meanings potentially construed. Consequently, the book encourages a greater appreciation of the aesthetics involved in comedic performance that help signpost interpretation and emphasizes the role of the audience as self-reflexive and self-aware. This book highlights the significant parallels between the nature of performance art and comedic performance in order to elevate analysis of, and discussion around, contemporary comedy. In doing so, it is an important critical contribution to the field of performance studies and cultural criticism, as well as communication studies, at both the undergraduate and postgraduate level.
