Personal letters of Samuel Goldwyn's personal secretary provides an inside look at life as a young professional in 1920's Los Angeles.

Histories of women in Hollywood usually recount the contributions of female directors, screenwriters, designers, actresses, and other creative personnel whose names loom large in the credits. Yet, from its inception, the American film industry relied on the labor of thousands more women, workers whose vital contributions often went unrecognized. Never Done introduces generations of women who worked behind the scenes in the film industry—from the employees’ wives who hand-colored the Edison Company’s films frame-by-frame, to the female immigrants who toiled in MGM’s backrooms to produce beautifully beaded and embroidered costumes. Challenging the dismissive characterization of these women as merely menial workers, media historian Erin Hill shows how their labor was essential to the industry and required considerable technical and interpersonal skills. Sketching a history of how Hollywood came to define certain occupations as lower-paid “women’s work,” or “feminized labor,” Hill also reveals how enterprising women eventually gained a foothold in more prestigious divisions like casting and publicity. Poring through rare archives and integrating the firsthand accounts of women employed in the film industry, the book gives a voice to women whose work was indispensable yet largely invisible. As it traces this long history of women in Hollywood, Never Done reveals the persistence of sexist assumptions that, even today, leave women in the media industry underpraised and underpaid. For more information: http://erinhill.squarespace.com

A real-life, behind-the-scenes glimpse of Hollywood in the 1920s is revealed in letters by Sam Goldwyn's secretary.

Studies of "Classic Hollywood" typically treat Hollywood films released from 1930 to 1960 as a single interpretive mass. Veronica Pravadelli complicates this idea. Focusing on dominant tendencies in box office hits and Oscar-recognized classics, she breaks down the so-called classic period into six distinct phases that follow Hollywood's amazingly diverse offerings from the emancipated females of the "Transition Era" and the traditional men and women of the conservative 1930s that replaced it to the fantastical Fifties movie musicals that arose after anti-classic genres like film noir and women's films. Pravadelli sets her analysis apart by paying particular attention to the gendered desires and identities exemplified in the films. Availing herself of the significant advances in film theory and modernity studies that have taken place since similar surveys first saw publication, she views Hollywood through strategies as varied as close textural analysis, feminism, psychoanalysis, film style and study of cinematic imagery, revealing the inconsistencies and antithetical traits lurking beneath Classic Hollywood's supposed transparency.

"This biography details Fischer's life and career, examining not only her work in front of the camera but also the broader issues which informed her personal and professional decisions. It follows her sometimes difficult marriage to fellow performer Harry Pollard and examines her work with Pollard Picture Plays, a production company founded by the couple"--Provided by publisher.

Joseph P. Kennedy’s reputation as a savvy businessman, diplomat, and sly political patriarch is well-documented. But his years as a Hollywood mogul have never been fully explored until now. In Joseph P. Kennedy Presents, Cari Beauchamp brilliantly explores this unknown chapter in Kennedy’s biography. Between 1926 and 1930, Kennedy positioned himself as a major Hollywood player. In two short years, he was running three studios simultaneously and then, in a bold move, he merged his studios with David Sarnoff to form the legendary RKO Studio. Beauchamp also tells the story of Kennedy’s affair with Gloria Swanson; how he masterminded the mergers that created the blueprint for contemporary Hollywood; and made the fortune that became the foundation of his empire.

The sensational, lurid, and wickedly entertaining true story of the brothers who invented Hollywood to become the godfathers of cinema - movie moguls Nicholas and Joseph Schenck - studded with glamorous stars, scandals, mobsters, murders, and one legendary blond bombshell. . . Groundbreaking pioneers of the Hollywood Dream Factory, Joseph and Nicholas Schenck may not have been household names like the Warner brothers or Louis B. Mayer, but they were infinitely more powerful, influential—and ruthless. A pair of Russian immigrants with giant ambitions, the Schencks turned their small nickelodeon business in New York’s Bowery into a partnership with Loew’s movie theaters and a controlling interest in three major studios: MGM, 20th Century Fox, and United Artists. They painted the silver screen silver, laid the foundations for the all-powerful studio system, and ruled a global movie empire from their Gatsby-sized mansions on the East and West coasts. The Schencks had become moguls. Their story is the stuff of legends—and their scandals are among the greatest stories Hollywood never told. This riveting, behind-the-scenes account reveals the suprising truth about: The union-busting mob deal that landed Joe Schenck in federal prison for four years—on tax evasion charges including deductions for a menage a trois. The cutthroat and merciless political maneuvering that defined the Hollywood studio heads. The lurid murder charges against silent film star “Fatty” Arbuckle—whose legal defense was paid for by Joe Schenck. Joe’s secret infatuation with Marilyn Monroe, even though Marilyn’s mother named her Norma after Joe’s wife! The brothers’ ingenious creation of the Academy of Motion Pictures and the Oscars—and indomitable control over the entire film industry. From the earliest days of silent films and the swinging era of the Roaring Twenties, through the Golden Age of the studio system and the patriotic call of WWII, to the Red Scare paranoia of the McCarthy years, the history of the Schenck brothers is the story of Hollywood itself—and the endurng power of the American Dream. Moguls is a must-read for film fans, history buffs, and anyone who loves the movies.