A captivating exploration of the life, work, and insider insight of legendary film producer Howard Kazanjian Howard Kazanjian, a film producer whose career spans 50 years, has collaborated with Hollywood legends such as Alfred Hitchcock, Billy Wilder, Sam Peckinpah, Steven Spielberg, and George Lucas, and worked on such classics as The Empire Strikes Back, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and Return of the Jedi. Complete with personal anecdotes from the front lines, and coupled with rare archival photographs, this full-length biography tells the story of Kazanjian’s rise in Hollywood and takes us behind the scenes of the producer’s role in some of the biggest blockbusters in film history.
Dora Hand was in a deep sleep. Her bare legs were exposed despite her thick blankets, and a mass of long, auburn hair stretched over her pillow and flowed off the side of her flimsy mattress. A framed, charcoal portrait of an elderly couple hung above her bed on the faded wallpaper and kept company with her slumber. The air outside the window next to the picture was still and cold. The distant sound of voices, back-slapping laughter, profanity, and a piano's tinny, repetitious melody wafted down the main thoroughfare in Dodge City, Kansas, and into the small room. Dodge was an all-night town, "the wickedest little city in America." The streets and saloons were always busy. Residents learned to sleep through the giggling, growling, and gunplay of the cowboys and their paramours for hire. Dora’s dreams were seldom disturbed by the commotion, but the smack of a pair of bullets cutting through the walls of the tiny room cut through the routine nightly noises. The first bullet stuck in the dense plaster partition. The second struck Dora on the right side, just under her arm. There was no time for her to object to the injury; no moment for her to cry out or recoil in pain. In the near distance, a horse squealed and its galloping hooves echoed off the street and faded away. Future legends of the Old West, Charlie Bassett, Bat Masterson, Wyatt Earp, and Bill Tilghman were the lawmen who patrolled the unruly streets. When a cattle baron’s son fled town after the shooting of the popular saloon singer named Dora Hand, the four men--all experts with a gun who knew the harsh, desertlike surrounding terrain--hunted him down like "Thunder Over the Prairie." The posse's ride across the desolate landscape to seek justice influenced the men's friendship, their careers, and their feelings about the justice system. This account of that event is a fast-paced, cinematic glimpse into the Old West that was.
Roy Rogers and Dale Evans ruled the West from the silver screen as the King of Cowboys and and Queen of the West. Off screen, this husband and wife duo raised a family and lived the "Code of the West." Now, in this new book, the Rogers family shares their memories of Roy, Dale, and Trigger, along with their other sidekicks and more than a hundred never before seen, behind the scenes photographs.
The Oklahoma Historical Society Outstanding Book on Oklahoma History for 2012. A riveting biography of a little-known Native-American who shaped history—complete with shootouts, romance, intrigue, and a little politics.
On May 17, 1876, Elizabeth Bacon Custer kissed her husband George goodbye and wished him good fortune in his efforts to fulfill the Army’s orders to drive in the Native Americans who would not willingly relocate to a reservation. Adorned in a black taffeta dress and a velvet riding cap with a red peacock feather that matched George’s red scarf, she watched the proud regiment ride off. It was a splendid picture. This new biography of Elizabeth Bacon Custer relates the story of the famous and dashing couple's romance, reveals their life of adventure throughout the west during the days of the Indian Wars, and recounts the tragic end of the 7th cavalry and the aftermath for the wives. Libbie Custer was an unusual woman who followed her itinerant army husband's career to its end--but she was also an amazing master of propaganda who tried to recreate George Armstrong Custer's image after Little Bighorn. The author of many books about her own life (some of which are still in print) she was one of the most famous women of her time and remains a fascinating character in American history.
By the time Stagecoach made John Wayne a silver-screen star in 1939, the thirty-one-year-old was already a veteran of more than sixty films, having twirled six-guns and foiled cattle rustlers in B Westerns for five studios. By the 1950s he was Hollywood’s most popular actor—an Academy Award nominee destined to become an American icon. This biography reveals the story of his early life, illustrated with rare archival images.
This enhanced eBook transforms The Making of Star Wars into an immersive multimedia experience worthy of the original film. It features exclusive content pulled from the Lucasfilm archives by author J. W. Rinzler: • 26 minutes of rare behind-the-scenes video* • 29 minutes of rare audio interviews with the cast and crew • New bonus photos and artwork not found in the print edition After the 1973 success of American Graffiti, filmmaker George Lucas made the fateful decision to pursue a longtime dream project: a space fantasy movie unlike any ever produced. Lucas envisioned a swashbuckling SF saga inspired by the Flash Gordon serials, classic American westerns, the epic cinema of Japanese auteur Akira Kurosawa, and mythological heroes. Its original title: The Star Wars. The rest is history, and how it was made is a story as entertaining and exciting as the movie that has enthralled millions for more than thirty years—a story that has never been told as it was meant to be. Until now. Using his unprecedented access to the Lucasfilm Archives and its trove of “lost” interviews, photos, production notes, factoids, and anecdotes, Star Wars scholar J. W. Rinzler hurtles readers back in time for a one-of-a-kind behind-the-scenes look at the nearly decade-long quest of George Lucas and his key collaborators to make the “little” movie that became a phenomenon. It’s all here: • the evolution of the now-classic story and characters—including “Annikin Starkiller” and “a huge green-skinned monster with no nose and large gills” named Han Solo • excerpts from George Lucas’s numerous, ever-morphing script drafts • the birth of Industrial Light & Magic, the special-effects company that revolutionized Hollywood filmmaking • the studio-hopping and budget battles that nearly scuttled the entire project • the director’s early casting saga, which might have led to a film spoken mostly in Japanese—including the intensive auditions that won the cast members their roles and made them legends • the grueling, nearly catastrophic location shoot in Tunisia and the subsequent breakneck dash at Elstree Studios in London • the who’s who of young film rebels who pitched in to help—including Francis Ford Coppola, Steven Spielberg, and Brian DePalma But perhaps most exciting, and rarest of all, are the interviews conducted before and during production and immediately after the release of Star Wars—in which George Lucas, Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, Sir Alec Guinness, Anthony Daniels, composer John Williams, effects masters Dennis Muren, Richard Edlund, and John Dykstra, Phil Tippett, Rick Baker, legendary production designer John Barry, and a host of others share their fascinating tales from the trenches and candid opinions of the film that would ultimately change their lives. No matter how you view the spectrum of this phenomenon, The Making of Star Wars stands as a crucial document—rich in fascination and revelation—of a genuine cinematic and cultural touchstone. *Video may not play on all readers. Please check your user manual for details.
It was the golden age of baseball, and all over the country teams gathered on town fields in front of throngs of fans to compete for local glory. In Rawlins, Wyoming, residents lined up for tickets to see slugger Joseph Seng and the rest of the Wyoming Penitentiary Death Row All Stars as they took on all comers in baseball games with considerably more at stake. Teams came from Reno, Nevada; Klamath Falls, Oregon; Bodie, California; and throughout the west to take on the murderers who made up the line-up. This is a fun and wildly dramatic and suspenseful look at the game of baseball and at the thrilling events that unfolded at a prison in the wide-open Wyoming frontier in pursuit of wins on the diamond.
“With its fascinating personalities that only Rinzler could describe, All Up can’t be put down.”—David Mandel, Veep executive producer All Up plunges its readers into the cloak-and-dagger espionage and blitzkrieg battles of World War II that swirled around rocketry; it introduces them to extraterrestrial phenomena, secret organizations, and the nail-biting missions launched from Cape Canaveral—as well as the secrets and unknown history behind Apollo 11’s legendary trip to the Moon. All Up tells the incredible true story of Nazi Germany’s Wernher von Braun, Soviet Russia’s Sergei Korolev, and America’s Robert Goddard as they work feverishly to fulfill their countries’ technological, military, and geopolitical objectives while satisfying their own personal obsessions. Alongside the Space Age history is the strange but well-documented trail of UFOs—one that leads to a desperate struggle in the highest corridors of power. Who will control the alien technology for their hidden agendas during the Cold War? Secret services compete worldwide in that ruthless game—and no one is a more deadly player than the mysterious agent named Rachel, hot on the trail of war criminal, former SS Brigadeführer Hans Kammler.
Was Arizona Donnie Clark, AKA Kate “Ma” Barker the mastermind behind the Barker gang terrorizing the Midwest during the early years of the great Depression? Or was she a terrible mother who urged her sons to criminal behavior for her own financial gain? Or does the truth lie somewhere in between. This lively retelling of the legend of Ma Barker and her boys is full of action, intrigue, and the answers to mysteries that have lingered for more than 70 years.
