AMERICAN ENTERTAINMENT -Billboard - Film/TV/Stage/Music

A perfect gift for anyone interested in America's remarkable Entertainment History!

FROM MY PERSONAL BOOK COLLECTION: Book is LIKE NEW (never been read, as I just don't have the time anymore but I have occasionally used it fro references), oversized at 9 x 12, and has over 1,000 illustrations.

Book has its bookcover and slight shelfware from sitting in my library for 3 decades.

No picture is provided as I don't own a digital camera.

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AMERICAN ENTERTAINMENT: A Unique History of Popular Show Business by Joseph Csida and June Bundy Csida.

Here for the first time in one comprehensive volume, is a history of popular show business in America-told through a thoroughly researched text, a comprehensive chronology and hundreds of articles, advertisements and photographs reproduced from the pages of BILLBOARD, America's oldest entertainment publication.

PART ONE covers the entertainment which existed in the period from before the Revolutionary War until after the Civil War. Although BILLBOARD was not published until 1894, the early issues carried many articles about showmen and their activities in pre-Colonial and Colonial times.

In PART TWO (1894-1904), the nation;s tremendous growth is flamboyantly mirroed in the many types of entertainment that travelled the country- such as the first theatrical troupes, circuses, early vaudeville and minstrel shows, wild west spectaculars, carnivals, and other attractions which played at parks and fairs.

PART THREE (1905-1918) deals with the struggles for control of vaudville, theatre and motion pictures by powerful trusts-and the remarkable effects these conflicts had on creating the stars of the era, such as Mary Pickford and Charlie Chaplin. The period also witnessed the emergence of movies from the one-and two-reel infancy into multiple-reel features, and the record industry's own first war-the battle for dominance between Thomas Edison's cylinder and Emile Berliner's flat disk. At the end of the era, radio was about to be lauched as a new, major mechanical force in show business.

PART FOUR (1919-1946) describes the growth of radio from the first stations and "cat's whiskers" receivers to the development of the networks. It tells how Ed Wynn, Jack Benny, George Burns and Gracie Allen, Fibber McGee and Molly, Bing Crosby, Kate Smith and other stars attracted millions of listeners and created radio's golden age. The story of radio's devastating initial impact on the record industry (and its gradual impact on motion pictures, until Al Jolson's JAZZ SINGER brought in the talkies era) is dramatically told. Another fascinating development in this era was the hayday of the Big Bands and their soon-to-be-star vocalists, such as Frank Sinatra, Dinah Shore, Peggy Lee, Perry Como and many others.

 PART FIVE (1947-1977) tells the complex story of the modern era of American entertainment-the incredible technological advances: the mushrooming of billion dollar conglomerates: the development of the greatest number of stars and superstars show business had ever seen. The strange evolution of television, from its early 'ice age' to its present dominance and its impact on all other areas of American show business, is detailed-from the time of the original action/adventure shows such as MAN AGAINST CRIME, and variety hits such as Milton Berle's TEXACO STAR THEATRE, to Alex Haley's ROOTS and Fonzie's HAPPY DAYS.

PART SIX is a coda; a special endin to the story of American Entertainment, outlining the fascinating part music has played in every area of popular show business from the very beginning to the present day.

448 Pages.

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Other books on Entertainment that I'm offering on EBAY include:

ON CUKOR (George Cukor)

ETHEL MERMAN

THE COEN BROTHERS (book) and BARTON FINK (shooting script)

CINEMA SEQUELS AND REMAKES: 1903-1987

FILMED TELEVISION DRAMA: 1952-1958

DISNEY WAR

RONALD REAGAN IN HOLLYWOOD

EARLY REAGAN

HAL WALLIS (Producer at Paramount and Warner Brothers Studios)

KING ARTHUR ON FILM AND TELEVISION

THE DeMILLES

CINEMA ARTHURIANA (20 Essays on King Arthur on Film)

HEROES, ANTIHEROES AND DOLTS (Masculinity in Popular American Films)

GRACIE: A LOVE STORY by George Burns

RADICAL HOLLYWOOD

SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE

COLUMBIA PICTURES

 THE BIG SCREEN COMEDIES OF MEL BROOKS

MR. & MRS. HOLLYWOOD (Lew Wasserman, MCA and Universal Pictures)

BERGMAN ON BERGMAN (Ingmar Bergman)

CINEMA BOREALIS: INGMAR BERGMAN AND THE SWEDISH ETHOS

JEAN RENOIR by Penelope Gilliatt

EUGENE LOURIE: My Work in Films

THE MAKING OF THE BEVERLY HILLBILLIES