The Hollywood Studios
House Style in the Golden Age of the Movies
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Narrated by:
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Barrett Whitener
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By:
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Ethan Mordden
About this listen
These are the questions Ethan Mordden answers, with breezy erudition and irrepressible enthusiasm, in this fascinating and wonderfully readable book. Mordden illuminates how the style of each studio was primarily dictated by the personality, philosophy, and attitudes of its presiding mogul - and how all these factors affected the work and careers of individual actors, directors, writers, and technicians, and the success of the studio in general.
©1988 Ethan Mordden (P)1996 Blackstone Audio, Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...
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One of the top box-office draws of the 1960s and '70s with now-classics such as The Magnificent Seven, The Great Escape, The Thomas Crown Affair, and Bullit, Steve McQueen is renowned as one of the most exciting actors ever to come out of Hollywood. Now, in Steve McQueen: A Biography, best-selling author Marc Eliot gives unique insight into McQueen's life, from his films to his three marriages, many affairs, and struggles with addictions.
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Snooze
- By Cill on 10-27-11
By: Marc Eliot
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Shock Value
- How a Few Eccentric Outsiders Gave Us Nightmares, Conquered Hollywood, and Invented Modern Horror
- By: Jason Zinoman
- Narrated by: Pete Larkin
- Length: 8 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Much has been written about the storied New Hollywood of the 1970s, but while Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, and Francis Ford Coppola were making their first classic movies, a parallel universe of directors gave birth to the modern horror film - aggressive, raw, and utterly original. Based on unprecedented access to the genre's major players, New York Times critic Jason Zinoman's Shock Value delivers the first definitive account of horror's golden age.
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A good listen, but narrow in scope
- By Billy on 01-31-13
By: Jason Zinoman
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Something Wonderful
- Rodgers and Hammerstein's Broadway Revolution
- By: Todd S. Purdum
- Narrated by: Todd S. Purdum
- Length: 10 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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They stand at the apex of the great age of songwriting, the creators of the classic Broadway musicals Oklahoma!, Carousel, South Pacific, The King and I, and The Sound of Music, whose songs have never lost their popularity or emotional power. Even before they joined forces, Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II had written dozens of Broadway shows, but together they pioneered a new art form: the serious musical play.
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Fabulous book about Rodgers & Hammerstein!!!
- By BigWally on 06-27-18
By: Todd S. Purdum
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Best. Movie. Year. Ever.
- How 1999 Blew Up the Big Screen
- By: Brian Raftery
- Narrated by: George Newbern
- Length: 10 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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From a veteran culture writer and modern movie expert, a celebration and analysis of the movies of 1999 - arguably the most groundbreaking year in American cinematic history.
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Like talking about movies with a friend
- By Shawn Inmon on 05-30-19
By: Brian Raftery
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High Society
- The Life of Grace Kelly
- By: Donald Spoto
- Narrated by: George K Wilson
- Length: 9 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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In just seven years---from 1950 through 1956---Grace Kelly embarked on a whirlwind career that included roles in 11 movies. From the principled Amy Fowler Kane in High Noon to the thrill-seeking Frances Stevens of To Catch a Thief, Grace established herself as one of Hollywood's most talented actresses and iconic beauties.
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Find a better Grace Kelly biography, I'd skip this
- By Daniel on 08-20-12
By: Donald Spoto
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Mary and Lou and Rhoda and Ted
- And All the Brilliant Minds Who Made the Mary Tyler Moore Show a Classic
- By: Jennifer Armstrong
- Narrated by: Amy Landon
- Length: 11 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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Mary Tyler Moore made her name as Dick Van Dyke's wife on the eponymous show; she was a cute, unassuming housewife that audiences loved. But when screenwriters James Brooks and Allan Burnes dreamed up an edgy show about a divorced woman with a career, network executives replied: "Americans won't watch television about New York City, divorcées, men with mustaches, or Jews." But Moore and her team were committed, and when the show finally aired, in spite of tepid reviews, fans loved it.
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An Interesting Story That Never Quite Gets Told
- By S. Blythe on 07-26-13
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You Couldn't Ignore Me If You Tried
- The Brat Pack, John Hughes, and Their Impact on a Generation
- By: Susannah Gora
- Narrated by: Kelli Tager
- Length: 15 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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The landscape that the Brat Pack memorialized is rich with cultural themes and significance, and has influenced an entire generation who still believe that life always turns out like an '80s movie. You Couldn't Ignore Me If You Tried takes us back to that era, through Susannah Gora's interviews with key players such as Molly Ringwald, Anthony Michael Hall, Judd Nelson, Andrew McCarthy, and John Cusack, and mines all the material from the movies to the music to the way the films were made to show how they helped shape our visions for romance, friendship, society, and success.
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Brings me back to my teenage years! Fantastic Narration! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
- By Amazmama on 06-24-22
By: Susannah Gora
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Robin Williams
- By: Emily Herbert
- Narrated by: Marston York
- Length: 6 hrs and 21 mins
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Through roles in cherished films such as Mrs. Doubtfire, Jumanji, Aladdin and Hook, he became the genial face of family comedy. His childlike enthusiasm was infectious, sweeping viewers away. Allied to his lightning-quick improvisation and ability to riff lewdly off any cue thrown at him, Robin was that rare thing - a true comic genius who appealed to adults and children equally. He could also play it straight, and empathetic depth came to him naturally.
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Good... but too many quotes
- By DDub on 11-09-18
By: Emily Herbert
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Another Nice Mess
- The Laurel & Hardy Story
- By: Raymond Valinoti
- Narrated by: Jack de Golia
- Length: 2 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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Arguably the greatest comedy duo in show business history, Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy delighted filmgoers and theatregoers for over 30 years. The public not only found Laurel's serene simpleton and Hardy's pompous buffoon hilarious, but they also thought of them as friends. Laurel and Hardy may have been nitwits, but they were loveable nitwits.
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Two Hours + of Biography
- By Jim on 05-13-15
By: Raymond Valinoti
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Seinfeldia
- How a Show About Nothing Changed Everything
- By: Jennifer Keishin Armstrong
- Narrated by: Christina Delaine
- Length: 9 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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Comedians Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld never thought anyone would watch their silly little sitcom about a New York comedian sitting around talking to his friends. NBC executives didn't think anyone would watch either, but they bought it anyway, hiding it away in the TV dead zone of summer. But against all odds, viewers began to watch, first a few and then many, until nine years later nearly 40 million Americans were tuning in weekly.
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This bad narration is making me thirsty...
- By Audio Gra Gra on 10-06-16
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Orson Welles's Last Movie
- The Making of The Other Side of the Wind
- By: Josh Karp
- Narrated by: Keith Szarabajka
- Length: 8 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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In the summer of 1970, legendary but self-destructive director Orson Welles returned to Hollywood from years of self-imposed exile in Europe and decided it was time to make a comeback movie. It was about a legendary self-destructive director who returns to Hollywood from years of self-imposed exile in Europe. Welles swore it wasn't autobiographical.
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Engaging and human portrait of Welles
- By TrevorTrujillo on 06-20-20
By: Josh Karp
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Homey Don't Play That!
- The Story of In Living Color and the Black Comedy Revolution
- By: David Peisner
- Narrated by: JD Jackson
- Length: 13 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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Few television shows revolutionized comedy as profoundly or have had such an enormous and continued impact on our culture as In Living Color. Inspired by Richard Pryor, Carol Burnett, and Eddie Murphy, Keenen Ivory Wayans created a television series unlike any that had come before it. In Living Color shaped American culture in ways both seen and unseen. Now, Homey Don't Play That! reveals the complete, captivating story of how In Living Color overcame enormous odds to become a major, zeitgeist-seizing hit.
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Wow, that sucked......
- By Just W on 10-11-18
By: David Peisner
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What listeners say about The Hollywood Studios
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall
- Whyprsnapr
- 06-15-11
Very Entertaining and Informative
We often hear of the major directors and producers who shaped American cinema: Griffith, DeMille, Hawks, Ford, Houston, etc., in the former camp, Selznick, Thalberg, Goldwyn, etc, in the latter--but this is a lively and quite informative look at how the major studios each had a style and production system of their own. It provides discussions of several key films, notes how similar material was differently shaped in competing studios, and you end up with a nice list of "Must See" films from the Golden Age. A great read for those with more than a passing interest in films, especially given the poverty of audiobook titles of similar subject matter.
The author is opinionated (he dismisses Douglas Sirk out of hand and obviously prefers the musical over other genres, the latter more a problem as studios such as Universal and Warner Brothers were primarily known for other genres, the horror and gangster film respectively. Still, this is a good way to get a feeling for how each studio's style emerged and was refined, and the opinions take back seat to the films and personalities that characterize each studio's distinctive output.
I was disappointed by the brevity of the chapter on RKO, and some of the author's insights seem not to come so much from having viewed the films in question, but rather from documentaries about the era (his discussion of the early talkies is, in part, straight from the old HBO series, HOLLYWOOD, END OF AN ERA. These a minor quibbles, and I highly recommend this book as a starting point.
The reader is first rate. He has been attacked elsewhere, but I found him wonderful company during a long automobile trip just ended. Give the sample a listen and decide for yourself.
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- Bruce Balick
- 11-18-21
A Droll History of Hollywood's Studio System
I was put off at first by the flat narration, BUT the narrator improves as the book goes on AND a deadpan read seems to work for Mordden's style - he has a dry wit that invites the listener to pick up the jokes on his/her own. We visit Paramount, MGM, Warner Bros., RKO and other studios in Hollywood's Golden Age. Mordden is an opinionated writer - I can't imagine any reader would agree with everything he writes but that's part of what makes him so fun. I think he is so right on about RKO's Stage Door and Bringing Up Baby and ridiculously critical of MGM's Freed Unit but I don't expect you (or Mordden) to necessarily agree with me. All the greats are here. A sampling: Katherine Hepburn, George Cukor, Astaire and Rogers, Gloria Swanson, John Ford, Judy Garland - a small taste of what lies in store for the listener. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and think it's mandatory reading for TCM fans and anyone who wants a taste of Golden Age Hollywood. The book's span is from the earliest silent pictures through 1948, the year the Studios were, in a sense, broken up by the Government. (It's much more complicated then that and frankly I still don't understand what exactly happened.). I can't think of a more fun time and place to be than here in black-and-white/Technicolor land. Give it a listen.
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- Kindle Customer
- 04-07-21
Interesting book, bland reader
I love the subject of the studio system and the movies that were made. And while the narrator did mispronounce certain words and names that didn't bother Me as much as the overall blandness in which he read it. especially when he was quoting someone. It was passable I guess because I do like the subject matter.
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- Gary Maloney
- 04-12-21
Rare Audible offering of an Ethan Mordden book
should be a lot more of these available
Mordden is one of our great cultural historians
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Overall
- Eleanor
- 07-20-09
The reader falls quite short of the book
I very much enjoyed the book - but the reader is flat terrible. If someone is going to read a book about the movies, it behooves him to learn to pronounce names properly. It was AWFUL to listen to the mispronunciation of Paul Muni's name - over and over again. And this is just one example in a list of many. There are even words he doesn't pronounce properly, e.g., "acumen" - as if it were chili spice. Painful!
This same reader read another book - Picture a Revolution and had the same problem. Many of the names he mispronounces are quite famous and central to some of the passages. It truly drove me nuts. I will look to see if this reader has any more books and will not order them.
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Overall
- Chris
- 03-20-10
Informative and opinionated
The title of this review should have read "Informative and opinionated--not that there's anything wrong with that."
Ethan Mordden's THE HOLLYWOOD STUDIOS is an interesting book. Mordden describes the house style for each studio effectively, and he has some surprisingly good insights into some of the movies. Paramount's stock in trade in the 1930s, for example, was its European directors (not just Lubitsch but others) and the theme of "sex as theft" in its films. MGM relied on style rather than distinguished directors; Twentieth Century-Fox was "nineteenth-century Fox" for its folksy rural dramas, etc.
If Mordden doesn't like a movie, though, look out: he'll pick at anything--a minor factual error in a headline in a newspaper montage, for example--to trash it.
The narration is all right except for some mispronunciations, and it's an interesting listen.
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- Diana
- 08-20-12
Great book, bad reader
Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?
Maybe, because the book is terrific, but maybe not because the performance is terrible.
What didn’t you like about Barrett Whitener’s performance?
His ignorance of the subject matter is apparent in his routine mispronunciation of names and titles. Also, his performance is poor. Please get Mordden to read his own books!
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6 people found this helpful
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Performance
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Story
- Edward C. Foley
- 05-06-12
Fun Read
Would you consider the audio edition of The Hollywood Studios to be better than the print version?
Even though the book interested me I would never made time to read it. Fortunately I ordered the audio. It was great! It is encyclopedic yet never dry. The narrator was very good and obviously relished the book as much as I did.
What did you like best about this story?
The humor and witticisms. There was much I wanted to remember and quote
What about Barrett Whitener’s performance did you like?
See above
If you were to make a film of this book, what would be the tag line be?
Hollywood Answers
Any additional comments?
More Mordden please.
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3 people found this helpful
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
- Peggy
- 08-01-15
Interesting and imformative
Would you listen to The Hollywood Studios again? Why?
I never listen to or read the same book more than once
What did you like best about this story?
That it was true
Have you listened to any of Barrett Whitener’s other performances before? How does this one compare?
no
Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?
no, just interesting listen
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1 person found this helpful
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- Gary S. Arkell
- 02-23-22
Great Historical book about Hollywood
It is a shame I did not get to finish this audiobook. It is a great historical book about movies and Hollywood. I almost wish I could have finished this book and listen to it again. But for some reason it is unavailable now
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