"If you want to make a indie film fast and on a budget then you need to read this book." ~ Alex Ferrari (Indie Film Hustle)Improvisation is a form of performance in which the players have no script. Free of conventional methods and constraints, improv gives filmmakers and actors complete freedom to explore characters and relationships in depth and capture genuine authenticity on camera.It has played a large part in the filmmaking process for many legendary ...

We (Russian: Мы, romanized: My) is a dystopian novel by Russian writer Yevgeny Zamyatin, written 1920–1921.The novel was first published as an English translation by Gregory Zilboorg in 1924 by E. P. Dutton in New York. The novel describes a world of harmony and conformity within a united totalitarian state. It is believed that the novel had a huge influence on the works of Orwell and Huxley, as well as on the emergence of the genre of dystopia.A few hundred years after the...

"The Little Match Girl" is a literary fairy tale by Danish poet and author Hans Christian Andersen. The story, about a dying child's dreams and hope, was first published in 1845.On a freezing New Year's Eve a poor young girl, shivering and barefoot, tries to sell matches in the street. Afraid to go home because her father will beat her for failing to sell any matches, she huddles in the angle between two houses and lights matches to warm herself.In the flame of the matches sh...

In 1902, self-taught British philosopher and author James Allen published this inspirational essay based on the Bible verse "As a Man thinketh in his heart, so is he." This slender volume (only 68 pages) has been a popular classic ever since. Allen preached the importance of people taking responsibility for themselves and their actions as well as using determination to improve the mind.The most frequently quoted lines from the book include: "Men do not attract what they want, but w...

The Cat is an odd story about a young man who suffers a severe shock reaction to the unexpected ending of his engagement. Initially he is thrown into a deep depression which lasts several months, but then all of a sudden something snaps in his brain and he undergoes a phenomenal transformation. Not only does his depression leave him, but he becomes suddenly upbeat and sees the world in richer colours and with greater clarity. Moreover, he develops an unprecedented genius for portrait paint...

"From the Earth to the Moon" is a science fiction adventure novel by the French writer Jules Verne, published in 1865.It tells the story of the Baltimore Gun Club, a post-American Civil War society of weapons enthusiasts, and their attempts to build an enormous Columbiad space gun and launch three people — the Gun Club's president, his Philadelphian armor-making rival, and a French poet — in a projectile with the goal of a Moon landing.Five years later, Verne wrote a sequel c...

"Little Bun Rabbit" is the twenty-second and final tale in L. Frank Baum's 1897 collection Mother Goose in Prose.Dorothy is a farm girl who is allowed to roam the local meadows and woods and play to her heart's content. She has the rare ability to understand and speak the language of the animals. The kind-hearted child makes friends with Bun Rabbit, and learns about his life and experiences. Bun Rabbit once modeled for Santa Claus, so that Santa could make stuffed bunnies for "the b...

The Collected Tales of Nikolai Gogol includes the works of the famous writer Nikolai Gogol:The ViyA May NightMemoirs of a MadmanThe NoseThe CloakChristmas Eve

The story relates the plight of a nine-year-old orphan boy, Vanka, who has been apprenticed to a cobbler in Moscow. He writes a letter to his grandfather in the countryside, begging to be rescued from his cruel master. "Vanka" was published in 1886.

As part of her collection "Christ Legends" Selma Lagerlöf wrote the story "The Holy Night," a Christmas-themed tale first published in sometime in the early 1900s but before her death in 1940. It tells the story of the author at five years old who experienced a great sadness when her grandmother passed which made her recall a story the old woman used to tell about the Holy Night.The story the grandmother tells is about a poor man who wanders around the village asking people for a si...

Christmas Eve—the night of joy, wonder, and magic. But what if the heart of Christmas itself was stolen? In this enchanting yet unexpected tale, L. Frank Baum dares to ask: what happens when Santa Claus disappears? Hidden away in his ice-bound Laughing Valley, Santa has made it his life's work to bring happiness to children across the world. But not everyone welcomes his kindness. Dark forces lurk beyond the cheerful glow of Christmas, and when Santa is taken captive, the very spirit of th...

"Christmas Eve" is the first story in the second volume of the collection Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka by Nikolai Gogol.The story opens with a description of the winter scenery of Dikanka, Ukraine, a witch flying across the night sky and the devil stealing the moon and hiding it in his pocket, first playing with it in the sky, which no one in the village notices. Since it is the night before Christmas, the devil is free to roam around and torment people as he pleases, so he decid...