In the town of Fairview there's a street called Wisteria Lane; a peaceful cul-de-sac with manicured lawns and beautiful houses. It's a place where you know all your neighbors and your neighbors know all about you. It's the perfect suburban fantasy. But, behind every picket fence there are secrets. And, in every seemingly happy home, you'll find jealousy, lust, passion, and sometimes…murder. It's always hot on Wisteria Lane. These women have it all: friendship, fun, love, sex, excitement, d...

About this book:Heart of Darkness (1899), by Joseph Conrad, is a short novel about Charles Marlow’s job as an ivory transporter down the Congo River in Central Africa. This river is described to be “... a mighty big river, that you could see on the map, resembling an immense snake uncoiled, with its head in the sea, its body at rest curving afar over a vast country, and its tail lost in the depths of the land.” In the course of his commercial-agent work in Africa, ...

The full scripts of award-winning Downton Abbey , Season Two, including previously unseen commentary from Julian FellowesOpening in 1916, as the First World War rages across Europe, Season Two is the next dramatic installment of the much-loved, award-winning drama. The Crawley family and their servants play their parts on the front line and back at home as their lives are intensified by the strains of war.The shoo...

The best jokes, gags and scenes from a true British comedy classic.‘They don't like it up 'em!’'People shout the "Don't tell him, Pike!" line at me regularly – and I didn't even say it!’ Philip Madoc.In the annals of British television, no finer example of classic comedy exists than in the shape of Dad's Army, the Home Guard-based sitcom written by veteran writers Jimmy Perry and David Croft. Although they penned many other sterling programmes, including Hi-De-Hi! a...

In the mid-1950s, Swiss-born New Yorker Robert Frank embarked on a ten-thousand-mile road trip across America, capturing thousands of photographs of all levels of a rapidly changing society. The resultant photo book, The Americans, represents a seminal moment in both photography and in America's understanding of itself. To mark the book’s fiftieth anniversary, Jonathan Day revisits this pivotal work and contributes a thoughtful and revealing critical commentary. Though the importa...

Dive into the multi-award-winning drama with the full script of Season Three—including previously unseen dialogue and two eight-page color photo inserts.Downton Abbey fever is stronger than ever!The most successful British drama of our time continues to captivate viewers with its riveting storylines, stunning costumes, and unforgettable performances by its cast. With Downton Abbey's script from Season Three—which was the most dramatic yet—...

Governments around the world spend millions on art and cultural institutions, evidence of a basic human need for what the author refers to as 'creating aesthetic significance.' Yet what function or purpose does art satisfy in today’s society? In this thorough and accessible text, Hickman rejects the current vogue for social and cultural accounts of the nature of art-making in favor of a largely psychological approach aimed at addressing contemporary developmental issues in art education. B...

This book is the first written by a film specialist to consider Stephen King’s television work in its own right, and rejects previous attempts to make the films and books fit rigid thematic categories. Browning examines what makes a written or visual text successful at evoking fear on a case-by-case basis, in a highly readable and engaging way. He also considers the relationship between the big and small screen. Why, for instance, are some TV versions more effective than movie adaptations ...

Once regarded as a system in decline, public service broadcasters have acquired renewed legitimacy in the digital environment, as drivers of digital take-up, innovators and trusted brands. Exploring this remarkable transformation, Reinventing Public Service Television for the Digital Future engages with the new opportunities and challenges facing public service media, outlining the ways in which interactive technologies are now expanding the delivery of diverse goals and enhancing...

Feminism and Popular Culture maps the fraught and often unpredictable relationship between popular culture, feminism and postfeminism. From the shadowy city spaces of Mad Men and Homeland to the dystopic suburbia of The Stepford Wives and American Horror Story, the authors trace the maniacal career women, hysterical housewives and amnesiac daughters who roam the postfeminist landscape. Through recourse to these figures, they illuminate postfeminism's obsessive resuscitation of seemingly an...

Media Governance today is shifting media rules and regulations from national government policies to local, regional, national, multinational and international ones and away from exclusively governmental domains to others, such as market, professional and public interest/pressure groups. Many media-related civil society organisations are based in Brussels, operate at a European level and influence exactly the part of Media Governance that has escaped the national shackles of the member stat...

Horror is a universally popular, pervasive TV genre, with shows like True Blood, Being Human, The Walking Dead and American Horror Story making a bloody splash across our television screens. This complete, utterly accessible, sometimes scary new book is the definitive work on TV horror. It shows how this most adaptable of genres has continued to be a part of the broadcast landscape, unsettling audiences and pushing the boundaries of acceptability. The authors demonstrate how TV Horror cont...