"This follow-up to M.F. Steen's previous collection (2003) reproduces in full 169 of the death certificates of the entertainment industry's dearly departed. Brief biographical notes are included, listing birth and professional name as well as notable film, TV and entertainment credits"--Provided by publisher.

Celebrity confers burdens as well as blessings on those it touches, but often the two are indistinguishable. The trappings of celebrity - the relentless exposure, vast wealth, devoted admirers, a license to outrage - can have a dark side, providing a fertile ground for the obsessions, greed, and envy that sometimes drag the famous, and those around them, down to murder. In each case, the powerful magnet of celebrity drew the players together as if on a stage; in the last act, violence shattered their seemingly privileged. lives, and tragedy unfolded.

Literally the last word for Hollywood trivia buffs, a celebrity death certificate is also strangely compelling. Its matter-of-fact reportage makes the famous ordinary, illuminating previously well-lit profiles with the unfiltered light of the everyday. A death certificate may also reveal information that stars concealed, such as actual birthdates. In California, death certificates are a matter of public record--a real mine of information. This follow-up to M.F. Steen's previous two collections (2003 and 2005) reproduces in full 226 death certificates. Brief biographical notes are included, listing birth and professional name as well as notable film, television and entertainment credits.

In this thriller in the #1 New York Times bestselling In Death series, Lieutenant Eve Dallas must solve the murder of an actress whose final role was to die for... Lieutenant Eve Dallas is no party girl, but she’s managing to have a reasonably good time at the celebrity-packed bash celebrating The Icove Agenda, a film based on one of her famous cases. It’s a little spooky seeing the actress playing her, who looks as though she could be her long-lost twin. Not as unsettling, though, as seeing the actress who plays Peabody—drowned in the lap pool on the roof of the director’s luxury building. Talented but rude and widely disliked, K.T. Harris made an embarrassing scene during dinner. Now she’s at the center of a crime scene—and Eve is more than ready to get out of her high heels and strap on her holster to step into the role she was born to play: cop.

Profiled on ABC's The View, Good Morning America, and dozens of other national outlets, The Last Days of Dead Celebrities captured our imagination with its intelligent, intimate reporting. John Lennon, Lucille Ball, Orson Welles, Ted Williams, John Denver -- these are just a few of the fifteen celebrities profiled here, each passing in a way that was as unique and distinctive as the life of the individual. Some slipped quietly into the night -- Welles died peacefully in bed with his typewriter still balanced on his stomach -- while others met a more shocking and violent end, as did Lennon and Tupac Shakur. Working with an extraordinary level of access, exclusive material, and the cooperation of the stars family and friends, Mitchell Fink sets the record straight on these very human, very vulnerable public figures.

With intense and violent portrayals of death becoming ever more common on television and in cinema and the growth of death-centric movies, series, texts, songs, and video clips attracting a wide and enthusiastic global reception, we might well ask whether death has ceased to be a taboo. What makes thanatic themes so desirable in popular culture? Do representations of the macabre and gore perpetuate or sublimate violent desires? Has contemporary popular culture removed our unease with death? Can social media help us cope with our mortality, or can music and art present death as an aesthetic phenomenon? This volume adopts an interdisciplinary approach to the discussion of the social, cultural, aesthetic, and theoretical aspects of the ways in which popular culture understands, represents, and manages death, bringing together contributions from around the world focused on television, cinema, popular literature, social media and the internet, art, music, and advertising.

Ours is the age of celebrity. An inescapable aspect of daily life in our media-saturated societies of the twenty-first century, celebrity is celebrated for its infinite plasticity and glossy seductions. But there is also a darker side. Celebrity culture is littered from end to end with addictions, pathologies, neuroses, even suicides. Why, as a society, are we held in thrall to celebrity? What is the power of celebrity in a world of increasing consumerism, individualism and globalization? Routledge Handbook of Celebrity Studies, edited by acclaimed social theorist Anthony Elliott, offers a remarkably clear overview of the analysis of celebrity in the social sciences and humanities, and in so doing seeks to develop a new agenda for celebrity studies. The key theories of celebrity, ranging from classical sociological accounts to critical theory, and from media studies to postmodern approaches, are drawn together and critically appraised. There are substantive chapters looking at fame, renown and celebrity in terms of the media industries, pop music, the makeover industries, soap stars, fans and fandom as well as the rise of non-Western forms of celebrity. The Handbook also explores in detail the institutional aspects of celebrity, and especially new forms of mediated action and interaction. From Web 3.0 to social media, the culture of celebrity is fast redefining the public political sphere. Throughout this volume, there is a strong emphasis on interdisciplinarity with chapters covering sociology, cultural studies, psychology, politics and history. Written in a clear and direct style, this handbook will appeal to a wide undergraduate audience. The extensive references and sources will direct students to areas of further study.