The classic serial, invented by BBC Radio Drama 60 years ago, survived and adapted itself to television, the arrival of color, and the global market in what has become a flood of classics with all channels competing for ratings and overseas sales. This book traces these developments and analzes the genre's response to social, economic, technical, and cultural changes, which have re-shaped it into the form we recognize today. The book contains considerable interview material with performers and media professionals.
The classic serial, invented by BBC Radio Drama sixty years ago, survived and adapted itself to television, the arrival of colour and the global market in what has become a flood of classics with all channels competing for ratings and overseas sales. This richly detailed book traces these developments and analyses the genre's response to social, economic, technical and cultural changes, which have re-shaped it into the form we recognise today. The book contains considerable interview material with performers and media professionals.
“This exciting book goes to the heart of a creative commercialand public service culture - it shows why ITV matters and howit was made to work so well. A tremendous contribution.” Professor Jean Seaton, University of Westminster “This is a valuable addition to studies of ITV's history andprogramming...” Tom O'Malley, Professor of Media Studies, University of Wales, Aberyswyth, and Co-Editor of Media History. Since breaking the BBC’s monopoly in 1955, ITV has been at thecentre of the British television landscape. To coincide with thefiftieth anniversary of the first ITV broadcast, this accessible bookoffers a range of perspectives on the complex and multifaceted history ofBritain’s first commercial broadcaster. The book explores key tensions and conflicts which have influenced theITV service. Chapters focus on particular institutions, includingLondon Weekend Television and ITN, and programme forms, includingWho Wants to be a Millionaire?, Upstairs Downstairs and Trisha.The contributors show that ITV has had to tread an uneasy line betweenpublic service and commercial imperatives, between a pluralistic regionalstructure and a national network, and between popular appeal andquality programming. A timeline of key events in the history of ITV is alsoincluded. ITV Cultures provides a timely intervention in debates on broadcastingand cultural history for academics and researchers, and a livelyintroduction to the history of ITV for students and general readers. Contributors: Rod Allen, City University; Jonathan Bignell, University of Reading; John Ellis, Royal Holloway, University of London; Jackie Harrison, University of Sheffield; Jamie Medhurst, University of Wales, Aberystwyth; Matt Hills, Cardiff University; Steve Neale, University of Exeter; Helen Wheatley, University of Reading; Sherryl Wilson, Bournemouth University.
Great Expectations has had a long, active and sometimes surprising life since its first serialized appearance in All the Year Round between 1 December 1860 and 3 August 1861. In this new publishing and reception history, Mary Hammond demonstrates that while Dickens’s thirteenth novel can tell us a great deal about the dynamic mid-Victorian moment into which it was born, its afterlife beyond the nineteenth-century Anglophone world reveals the full extent of its versatility. Re-assessing generations of Dickens scholarship and using newly discovered archival material, Hammond covers the formative history of Great Expectations' early years, analyses the extent and significance of its global reach, and explores the ways in which it has functioned as literature and stage, TV, film and radio drama from its first appearance to the latest film version of 2012. Appendices include contemporary reviews and comprehensive bibliographies of adaptations and translations. The book is a rich resource for scholars and students of Dickens; of comparative literature; and of publishing, readership, and media history.
Never before has period drama offered viewers such an assortment of complex male characters, from transported felons and syphilitic detectives to shell shocked soldiers and gangland criminals. Neo-Victorian Gothic fictions like Penny Dreadful represent masculinity at its darkest, Poldark and Outlander have refashioned the romantic hero and anti-heritage series like Peaky Blinders portray masculinity in crisis, at moments when the patriarchy was being bombarded by forces like World War I, the rise of first wave feminism and the breakdown of Empire. Scholars of film, media, literature and history explore the very different types of maleness offered by contemporary television and show how the intersection of class, race, history and masculinity in period dramas has come to hold such broad appeal to twenty-first-century audiences.
Now firmly established as one of the leading textbooks in the increasingly popular field of radio studies, Radio in Context provides students with a practical, critical and comprehensive understanding of the main principles and techniques used in radio programming. Organized around the most commonly studied radio genres and setting production within a range of different contexts – professional, institutional and historical - the text offers an ideal blend of theory and practical guidance. Readers of this fully updated new edition will continue to benefit from this core text, as it reflects important technological, regulatory and institutional changes since its initial publication in 2004 and expands on key areas such as digital radio, broadcasting over the internet, and the interplay between radio and social media. Supported by a full glossary, tips on getting into radio and exercises to develop practical and critical skills, Radio in Context is the ideal companion for anyone studying radio, the media, communications and/or journalism, at undergraduate and postgraduate levels, as well as short courses in radio or audio production techniques. Now firmly established as one of the leading textbooks in the increasingly popular field of radio studies, Radio in Context provides students with a practical, critical and comprehensive understanding of the main principles and techniques used in radio programming. Organized around the most commonly studied radio genres and setting production within a range of different contexts – professional, institutional and historical - the text offers an ideal blend of theory and practical guidance. Readers of this fully updated new edition will continue to benefit from this core text, as it reflects important technological, regulatory and institutional changes since its initial publication in 2004 and expands on key areas such as digital radio, broadcasting over the internet, and the interplay between radio and social media. Supported by a full glossary, tips on getting into radio and exercises to develop practical and critical skills, Radio in Context is the ideal companion for anyone studying radio, the media, communications and/or journalism, at undergraduate and postgraduate levels, as well as short courses in radio or audio production techniques.
Jefferson Hunter examines English films and television dramas as they relate to English culture in the 20th century. He traces themes such as the influence of U.S. crime drama on English film, and film adaptations of literary works as they appear in screen work from the 1930s to the present. A Canterbury Tale and the documentary Listen to Britain are analyzed in the context of village pageants and other wartime explorations of Englishness at risk. English crime dramas are set against the writings of George Orwell, while a famous line from Noel Coward leads to a discussion of music and image in works like Brief Encounter and Look Back in Anger. Screen adaptation is also broached in analyses of the 1985 BBC version of Dickens's Bleak House and Merchant-Ivory's The Remains of the Day.
Adapting a novel for cinema or television is first and foremost a business enterprise, where the screenwriter has to take into account the wishes of conflicting interest groups, including producers, stars, directors, and spectators."
This field-defining book offers an interpretation of the recent figurations of neo-Victorianism published over the last ten years. Using a range of critical and cultural viewpoints, it highlights the problematic nature of this 'new' genre and its relationship to re-interpretative critical perspectives on the nineteenth century.
