John Wayne: American

by James S. Olson, Randy Roberts

1995 · Simon and Schuster

Based on over five years of interview and archival research, John Wayne: American explains the appeal of Wayne's abiding "Americanness" and how he became such a revered icon. No American has been more identified with his country than John Wayne. For millions of people from the heartland to the furthest corners of the earth, he simply is America. Wayne virtually defined the role of the cowboy and the soldier, unswervingly playing the gruff man of decency, the hero who would always come through when the chips were down. On-screen—and off—Wayne was larger than life. For twenty-five years he dominated at the box office. His popularity both at home and abroad remains higher than any other celebrity of his time. So why have critics and film historians refused to grant him the central importance he deserves? Why has there never before been a serious biography? The answers to these questions reveal much about both Wayne and America. He was highly regarded in the '40s and '50s. As the Cold War progressed, however, critics gradually turned away from him. By the '60s and '70s, Wayne's politics guaranteed that movies like The Green Berets would be panned, despite consistent popular success. Now, after the death of both Wayne and communism, it is high time for Randy Roberts and James Olson's reappraisal. Born in a dyed-in-the-wool Republican town in Iowa, a football star and student leader, and a scholarship boy at USC, Wayne went to Hollywood because it was the truest meritocracy in America, the one place where his lack of wealth and connections could not hurt him. After spending the first decade of his career on Poverty Row, he emerged as a star in Stagecoach. But it was during World War II that Wayne—and America—emerged as superpowers. Wayne came to politics reluctantly, joining the mainstream of America in its confrontation with communism—and maintaining his opposition ever since. At heart, however, Wayne was a nonideological conservative. He loved his freedom, his friends, his women, and his booze. He believed in simple justice and common decency, and he will always be beloved as a result. Ultimately, we cannot understand America itself without understanding John Wayne.

Encyclopedia of the Jazz Age: From the End of World War I to the Great Crash

by James Ciment

2015 · Routledge

This illustrated encyclopedia offers in-depth coverage of one of the most fascinating and widely studied periods in American history. Extending from the end of World War I in 1918 to the great Wall Street crash in 1929, the Jazz age was a time of frenetic energy and unprecedented historical developments, ranging from the League of Nations, woman suffrage, Prohibition, the Red Scare, the Ku Klux Klan, the Lindberg flight, and the Scopes trial, to the rise of organized crime, motion pictures, and celebrity culture."Encyclopedia of the Jazz Age" provides information on the politics, economics, society, and culture of the era in rich detail. The entries cover themes, personalities, institutions, ideas, events, trends, and more; and special features such as sidebars and photos help bring the era vividly to life.

Historical Dictionary of American Theater

by James Fisher, Felicia Hardison Londré

2017 · Bloomsbury Publishing USA

This book covers the history of theater as well as the literature of America from 1880-1930. The years covered by this volume features the rise of the popular stage in America from the years following the end of the Civil War to the Golden Age of Broadway, with an emphasis on its practitioners, including such diverse figures as William Gillette, Mrs. Fiske, George M. Cohan, Maude Adams, David Belasco, George Abbott, Clyde Fitch, Eugene O’Neill, Texas Guinan, Robert Edmond Jones, Jeanne Eagels, Susan Glaspell, The Adlers and the Barrymores, Tallulah Bankhead, Philip Barry, Maxwell Anderson, Mae West, Elmer Rice, Laurette Taylor, Eva Le Gallienne, and a score of others. Entries abound on plays of all kinds, from melodrama to the newly-embraced realistic style, ethnic works (Irish, Yiddish, etc.), and such diverse forms as vaudeville, circus, minstrel shows, temperance plays, etc. This second edition of Historical Dictionary of American Theater: Modernism covers the history of modernist American Theatre through a chronology, an introductory essay, and an extensive bibliography. The dictionary section has over 2,000 cross-referenced entries on actors and actresses, directors, playwrights, producers, genres, notable plays and theatres. This book is an excellent access point for students, researchers, and anyone wanting to know more about the American Theater in its greatest era.

The A to Z of American Theater

by James Fisher, Felicia Hardison Londré

2009 · Bloomsbury Publishing PLC

The 50-year period from 1880 to 1929 is the richest era for theater in American history, certainly in the great number of plays produced and artists who contributed significantly, but also in the centrality of theater in the lives of Americans. As the impact of European modernism began to gradually seep into American theater during the 1880s and quite importantly in the 1890s, more traditional forms of theater gave way to futurism, symbolism, surrealism, and expressionism. American playwrights like Eugene O'Neill, George Kelly, Elmer Rice, Philip Barry, and George S. Kaufman ushered in the Golden Age of American drama. The A to Z of American Theater: Modernism focuses on legitimate drama, both as influenced by European modernism and as impacted by the popular entertainment that also enlivened the era. This is accomplished through a chronology, an introductory essay, a bibliography, and hundreds of cross-referenced entries on plays; music; playwrights; great performers like Maude Adams, Otis Skinner, Julia Marlowe, and E.H. Sothern; producers like David Belasco, Daniel Frohman, and Florenz Ziegfeld; critics; architects; designers; and costumes.