Hollywood's Tennessee: The Williams Films and Postwar America - Softcover

Palmer, R. Barton; Bray, William Robert

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0292723040 ISBN 13: 9780292723047

Publisher: University of Texas Press, 2009

Synopsis

No American dramatist has had more plays adapted than Tennessee Williams, and few modern dramatists have witnessed as much controversy during the adaptation process. His Hollywood legacy, captured in such screen adaptations as A Streetcar Named Desire, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, and Suddenly, Last Summer, reflects the sea change in American culture in the mid-twentieth century. Placing this body of work within relevant contexts ranging from gender and sexuality to censorship, modernism, art cinema, and the Southern Renaissance, Hollywood's Tennessee draws on rarely examined archival research to recast Williams's significance. Providing not only cultural context, the authors also bring to light the details of the arduous screenwriting process Williams experienced, with special emphasis on the Production Code Administration-the powerful censorship office that drew high-profile criticism during the 1950s-and Williams's innovative efforts to bend the code. Going well beyond the scripts themselves, Hollywood's Tennessee showcases findings culled from poster and billboard art, pressbooks, and other production and advertising material. The result is a sweeping account of how Williams's adapted plays were crafted, marketed, and received, as well as the lasting implications of this history for commercial filmmakers and their audiences.

About this title

Review:

In this rich, compelling, well-researched volume, Palmer and Bray show exactly how Hollywood dealt with Tennessee Williams and, in turn, how he often subverted the very authorities that sought (in vain) to keep him in check.--G. A. Foster, University of Nebraska--Lincoln"Choice" (07/01/2009)

About the Author:

R. Barton Palmer is Calhoun Lemon Professor of Literature at Clemson University in Clemson, South Carolina, and author or editor of many books, including Hollywood's Tennessee: The Williams Films and Postwar America and After Hitchcock: Influence, Imitation, and Intertextuality. WILLIAM ROBERT BRAY is Professor of English at Middle Tennessee State University in Murfreesboro and is the founding editor of The Tennessee Williams Annual Review.

About this edition

• Publisher: University of Texas Press
• Publication date: 2009
• ISBN 10: 0292723040
• ISBN 13: 9780292723047
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 371