Elena Rainn

KRKY Y

Kyrsten Iris

Fede Bonino

_ eshago@uw.edu

Watashi Wa Jigabudesu

Roman Bryzhatiy

Karl Halmos-Westram

Timothy Galvin

Ljsly Bernard

Ruby Brown

Dimitri Nuri

Second only to Slaughterhouse-Five of Vonnegut's canon in its prominence and influence, God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater (1965) presents Eliot Rosewater, an itinerant, semi-crazed millionaire wandering the country in search of heritage and philanthropic outcome, introducing the science fiction writer Kilgore Trout to the world and Vonnegut to the collegiate audience which would soon make him a cult writer.Trout, modeled according to Vonnegut on the science fiction writer Theodore Sturgeon (with whom Vonnegut had an occasional relationship) is a desperate, impoverished but visionary hack writer who functions for Eliot Rosewater as both conscience and horrid example. Rosewater, seeking to put his inheritance to some meaningful use (his father was an entrepreneur), tries to do good within the context of almost illimitable cynicism and corruption.It is in this novel that Rosewater wanders into a science fiction conference--an actual annual event in Milford, Pennsylvania--and at the motel delivers his famous monologue evoked by science fiction writers and critics for almost half a century: "None of you can write for sour apples... but you're the only people trying to come to terms with the really terrific things which are happening today." Money does not drive Mr. Rosewater (or the corrupt lawyer who tries to shape the Rosewater fortune) so much as outrage at the human condition. The novel was adapted for a 1979 Alan Menken musical. The novel is told mostly thru a collection of short stories dealing with Eliot's interactions with the citizens of Rosewater County, usually with the last sentence serving as a punch line. The antagonist's tale, Mushari's, is told in a similar short essay fashion. The stories reveal different hypocrisies of humankind in a darkly humorous fashion.

Set in Los Angeles in the early 1980's, this coolly mesmerizing novel is a raw, powerful portrait of a lost generation who have experienced sex, drugs, and disaffection at too early an age, in a world shaped by casual nihilism, passivity, and too much money a place devoid of feeling or hope.Clay comes home for Christmas vacation from his Eastern college and re-enters a landscape of limitless privilege and absolute moral entropy, where everyone drives Porches, dines at Spago, and snorts mountains of cocaine. He tries to renew feelings for his girlfriend, Blair, and for his best friend from high school, Julian, who is careering into hustling and heroin. Clay's holiday turns into a dizzying spiral of desperation that takes him through the relentless parties in glitzy mansions, seedy bars, and underground rock clubs and also into the seamy world of L.A. after dark.

Ghost World has become a cultural and generational touchstone, and continues to enthrall and inspire readers over a decade after its original release as a graphic novel. Originally serialized in the pages of the seminal comic book Eightball throughout the mid-1990s, this quasi-autobiographical story (the name of one of the protagonists is famously an anagram of the author's name) follows the adventures of two teenage girls, Enid and Becky, two best friends facing the prospect of growing up, and more importantly, apart. Daniel Clowes is one of the most respected cartoonists of his generation, and Ghost World is his magnum opus. Adapted into a major motion picture directed by Terry Zwigoff (director of the acclaimed documentary Crumb), which was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. This graphic novel is a must for any self-respecting comics fan's library.

Middlesex tells the breathtaking story of Calliope Stephanides, and three generations of the Greek-American Stephanides family, who travel from a tiny village overlooking Mount Olympus in Asia Minor to Prohibition-era Detroit, witnessing its glory days as the Motor City and the race riots of 1967 before moving out to the tree-lined streets of suburban Grosse Pointe, Michigan. To understand why Calliope is not like other girls, she has to uncover a guilty family secret, and the astonishing genetic history that turns Callie into Cal, one of the most audacious and wondrous narrators in contemporary fiction. Lyrical and thrilling, Middlesex is an exhilarating reinvention of the American epic.

I bought this book cause I was walking through a bookstore with a friend of mine... a friend I adore more than newborn puppies and tiny rabbits hopping in fields of grass, and she said, "MIRANDA JULY! I love her. She made the movie You, Me, and Everyone We Know." I hadn't seen the movie, but I remember seeing an ad in the paper and thinking, "I want to see that movie."And it was because of that, and because I adore this girl more than newborn puppies, and rabbits hopping in fields of grass, and moonlit nights, and sundrenched mornings, that I bought two copies of the book (one for her, and one for me. One could say "Jeff: Nice boy." One has said, "Jeff: Helpless romanitc sucker." I loath both definitions.A book of short stories. Most are delicate. Like something you'd find in your grandmother's junk drawer. Not the one in her kitchen. The one that's the top drawer of her dresser. The one that's filled with pearl buttons, and half knitted doilies, and old black and white photos with a younger version of your grandmother, and complete strangers. You wonder who those people were? What kind of double life did your grandmother lead? Are these people still alive? Does she keep in contact with them? It's a whole world of possibility. You start to see your grandmother in a wholey different light. She's no longer this older woman who is constantly trying to feed or, or berating you for not wearing shoes or not having a job befitting of a college graduate. She's a real person now, with half knitted doilies, and pictures of random people. Old patches that look as if they were ripped off a G.I. uniform. It would break your heart if you asked, and your Grandmother said, "Oh, look at that. You found that in my drawer? No, I have no idea what that is."So you just let your imagination run wild. Some stories fall flat. Like opening your grandmother's junk drawer and finding nail clippers. But at least they're sharp nail clippers... not the kind that break your nails when you try to use them. And sometimes, that's enough to get you through the day.

Jitterbug Perfume is an epic, which is to say, it begins in the forests of ancient Bohemia and doesn't conclude until nine o'clock tonight [Paris time]. It is a saga, as well. A saga must have a hero, and the hero of this one is a janitor with a missing bottle. The bottle is blue, very, very old, and embossed with the image of a goat-horned god. If the liquid in the bottle is actually is the secret essence of the universe, as some folks seem to think, it had better be discovered soon because it is leaking and there is only a drop or two left.

Now hailed as an American classic Tropic of Cancer, Henry Miller’s masterpiece, was banned as obscene in this country for twenty-seven years after its first publication in Paris in 1934. Only a historic court ruling that changed American censorship standards, ushering in a new era of freedom and frankness in modern literature, permitted the publication of this first volume of Miller’s famed mixture of memoir and fiction, which chronicles with unapologetic gusto the bawdy adventures of a young expatriate writer, his friends, and the characters they meet in Paris in the 1930s. Tropic of Cancer is now considered, as Norman Mailer said, "one of the ten or twenty great novels of our century."

I can't think of any other book I've read very recently that left my mind as thoroughly blown as Skinny Legs and All. I'd only read one other Tom Robbins book -- Still Life With Woodpecker -- so I was prepared for his playfulness, humor, intricate (but goofy) language, and overall trippy feel that all come with just about everything he rights.But I was not prepared for Skinny Legs. This book is so dense with literary magnificence that you could chew it like you had a whole mouth full of sticky bubble gum. I dog-eared more pages and marked more passages in this book than any other I've ever read by a long shot.Skinny Legs deals with so many topics, many of which are classical in nature: love, sex, family, art, compassion, work, religion. But it all revolves around a more specific point of the conflicts in the Middle East, primarily between Jews and Arabs. There's lots of history, spirituality, and ridiculousness all spun together -- about the Middle East especially but also about everything else surrounding it (both geographically and more abstractly). Were I a teacher of Middle East studies or any subject that dealt with the Judaism/Islam conflict specifically, this book would be required reading if for no other reason than to lighten the tension -- but hopefully also to open some minds and spark a more creative and intelligent dialogue built not on dogma but on critical thinking and compassion.The book says great things about all the topics it touches on, but to the topic of the Middle East specifically it is blazingly relevant and even prophetic in its own right. Even now, with the book being 18 years old, it hasn't lost a lick of power or shown its age. Nothing in the writing itself ever gave me the impression that the book was written any earlier than yesterday.Anyway, I'm mostly just spitting out tidbits -- let me try to formulate something more concrete. It was very, very good. Long and complex, but good. Robbins is a master of language and imagery. He gives the impression of writing with very reckless abandon. It's like he scribbled down every single thing that came to his mind while writing the story, omitting nothing and not even considering apologizing for such craziness. And yet, it works. The madness all comes together without ever seeming structured hardly at all. As if there's not a method to the madness, but that the method IS the madness.In fact I wish my review of the book could be half as perfectly cohesive as the novel itself managed to be in the end. I could rant and ramble about this fantastic book for hours on end (and probably will to my poor unfortunate friends and acquaintances), but I'll just start wrapping up and say that this one is indeed highly recommended. It's not the quickest read in the world because you have to use your brain, sense of humor, and imagination rather extensively and mostly constantly -- but it's very, very worth it.I'm not normally quite this scatterbrained in my reviewing of a book, but it really was that good!

Still Life with Woodpecker is a sort of a love story that takes place inside a pack of Camel cigarettes. It reveals the purpose of the moon, explains the difference between criminals and outlaws, examines the conflict between social activism and romantic individualism, and paints a portrait of contemporary society that includes powerful Arabs, exiled royalty, and pregnant cheerleaders. It also deals with the problem of redheads.

This collection of Vonnegut's short masterpieces share his audacious sense of humor and extraordinary creative vision. Includes the stories "Where I Live," "Harrison Bergeron," "Who Am I This Time?," "Welcome to the Monkey House," "Long Walk to Forever," "The Foster Portfolio," "Miss Temptation," "All the King's Horses," "Tom Edison's Shaggy Dog," "New Dictionary," "Next Door," "More Stately Mansions," "The Hyannis Port Story," and "D.P."

Known for his meaty seriocomic novels, Tom Robbins’s shorter work has appeared in publications ranging from Esquire to Harper’s, from Playboy to the New York Times. Collected here for the first time in paperback, the essays, articles, observations—and even some untypical country-music lyrics—offer a rare overview of the eclectic sensibility of an American original. Whether rocking with the Doors, depoliticizing Picasso’s Guernica, lamenting the angst-ridden state of contemporary literature, or drooling over tomato sandwiches and a species of womanhood he calls “the genius waitress,” Tom Robbins’s briefer writings exhibit the five traits that perhaps best characterize his novels: an imaginative wit, a cheerfully brash disregard for convention, a sweetly nasty eroticism, a mystical but keenly observant eye, and an irrepressible love of language. Embedded in this primarily journalistic compilation are brand-new short stories, a sheaf of largely unpublished poems, and an offbeat assessment of our divided nation. Wherever you open Wild Ducks Flying Backward, you’ll encounter the serious playfulness that percolates from the mind of a self-described “romantic Zen hedonist” and “stray dog in the banquet halls of culture.”

"An anthology in which Vonnegut freely quotes himself on everything from art and architecture to madness and mass murder...Uncompromising."--Los Angeles Times "Honest and scarily funny, and it offers a rare insight into an author who has customarily hidden his heart."--New York TimesHere we have a collection of essays and speeches by me, with breezy autobiographical commentary serving as connective tissue and splints and bandages. Here we go again with real life and opinions made to look like one big, preposterous animal not unlike an invention by Dr. Seuss...--Kurt Vonnegut, from Fates Worse Than Death 

1991 collection of essays, speeches, and other previously uncollected writings by author Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

 A Children's Book About Beer?   Yes, believe it or not—but B Is for Beer is also a book for adults, and bear in mind that it's the work of maverick bestselling novelist Tom Robbins, inter-nationally known for his ability to both seriously illuminate and comically entertain.   Once upon a time (right about now) there was a planet (how about this one?) whose inhabitants consumed thirty-six billion gallons of beer each year (it's a fact, you can Google it). Among those affected, each in his or her own way, by all the bubbles, burps, and foam, was a smart, wide-eyed, adventurous kindergartner named Gracie; her distracted mommy; her insensitive dad; her non-conformist uncle; and a magical, butt-kicking intruder from a world within our world.   Populated by the aforementioned characters—and as charming as it may be subversive—B Is for Beer involves readers, young and old, in a surprising, far-reaching investigation into the limits of reality, the transformative powers of children, and, of course, the ultimate meaning of a tall, cold brewski. 

For more than forty years Miles Davis has been in the front rank of American music. Universally acclaimed as a musical genius, Miles is one of the most important and influential musicians in the world. The subject of several biographies, now Miles speaks out himself about his extraordinary life.Miles: The Autobiography, like Miles himself, holds nothing back. For the first time Miles talks about his five-year silence. He speaks frankly and openly about his drug problem and how he overcame it. He condemns the racism he has encountered in the music business and in American society generally. And he discusses the women in his life. But above all, Miles talks about music and musicians, including the legends he has played with over the years: Bird, Dizzy, Monk, Trane, Mingus, and many others.The man who has given us some of the most exciting music of the past few decades has now given us a compelling and fascinating autobiography, featuring a concise discography and thirty-two pages of photographs.

As the first decade of the new century was getting underway, Spalding Gray worried that the joy he'd finally found with his wife, stepdaughter, and two sons would fail to fuel his work as a theatrical monologist the way anxiety, conflict, doubt, and various crises once had. Before he got the chance to find out, however, an automobile accident in Ireland left him with the lasting wounds of body and spirit that ultimately led him to take his own life. But as his dear friend novelist Francine Prose notes in this volume's foreword, "Even when his depression became so severe that he was barely able to hold a simple conversation, he was, miraculously, able to perform."As was always his method, Gray began to fashion a new monologue in various workshop settings that would tell the story of the accident and its aftermath. Originally titled Black Spot--for what the locals called the section of highway where Gray's accident occurred--it began as a series of workshops at P.S. 122 in New York City and eventually became Life Interrupted.Gray died in early 2004, and though never completed, Life Interrupted is rich with brave self-revelation, masterfully acute observations of wonderfully peculiar people, penetrating wit and genuine humor, an irresolvable fascination with life and death, and all the other attributes of Gray's singular and unmistakable voice.In the final performance of Life Interrupted, Gray read two additional pieces: a short story about a day he spent with his son Theo at the carousel in Central Park and a brief, poignant love letter to New York City that he wrote after the terrorist attacks in 2001. This volume includes these pieces as well as many of the eulogies that were delivered by his friends and family at memorial services held at Lincoln Center and in Sag Harbor.[If you had to reduce all of Spalding's work to its essence, its core, if you wanted to locate the subject to which, no matter what else he talked about, he kept returning, I suppose you could say that his work was a profoundly metaphysical inquiry into how we manage to live despite the knowledge that we are someday going to die. . . .If there is a consolation, it's what he left behind: the children whom he so loved and, of course, his work. Reading the unfinished pieces in this volume . . . we hear his voice again and feel the happiness we felt when he sat on stage behind his wooden desk, took a sip from his water glass, transformed the raw material of his life into art, and the crowd applauded each brilliant, beautiful sentence.] --Francine Prose, from the ForewordAlso available as an eBook

Having detailed the agonies of writing a book in his monologue Monster in a Box, Spalding Gray now gives us the monster itself: a convulsively funny, unexpectedly moving novel about a man eternally searching for a moment of protected pleasure even as he is permanently incapable of finding it.Brewster North witnesses his mother's madness but misses her suicide; searches frantically for enlightenment in the Poconos and zipless sex in India; suffers family ennui in Rhode Island and a nervous breakdown in Amsterdam. In the process he emerges as a hilariously complex everyman. And as Gray narrates his hero's free fall, he confirms his own stature as one of our funniest, most eccentric, and most engaging storytellers.

With My Education: A Book of Dreams William S. Burroughs pushes on into new territory, once again committing the unspeakable crime of questioning the reality structure. Dreams have always been a rich source of imagery in Burroughs' work. In this book they are a direct and powerful force. Hundreds of dreams - intense, vivid, visionary - form the spiraling core of a unique and haunting journey into perception. Exploring and embodying Burroughs' provocative ideas on writing, painting, consciousness and creativity, My Education is profoundly personal, and may be as close to a memoir as we will see.

From Bill Zehme, renowned journalist and author of the "New York Times" bestseller The Way You Wear Your Hat: Frank Sinatra and the Lost Art of Livin', comes this masterful biography of the late comic genius Andy Kaufman. Based on six years of research, Andy's own unpublished, never-before-seen writings, and hundreds of interviews with family members, friends, and colleagues, Lost in the Funhouse takes us through the maze of Kaufman's mind to see, firsthand, the fanciful landscape that was his life. Andy Kaufman was often a mystery even to his closest friends. Remote, aloof, impossible to know, his internal world was a kaleidoscope of characters fighting for time on the outside. He was as much Andy Kaufman as he was Foreign Man (tenk you veddy much), who became the lovably dithering Latka on the hit TV series "Taxi." He was a contradiction, a paradox on every level, an artist in every sense of the word. In Lost in the Funhouse, Bill Zehme sorts through a life of misinformation put forth by a master of deception to uncover the man behind the legend. Magically entertaining, it is a singular biography matched only by its singular subject.

This is a collection of some of Gray’s early (and best) monologues. These are the yarns that made his reputation as a story-teller in the 1980s: Sex and Death to the Age 14; Booze, Cars, and College Girls; 47 Beds, Nobody Wanted to Sit Behind a Desk, Travels through New England, and Terrors of Pleasure: the House. At his best, Gray brings together several tendencies in American narrative arts – the good-old down east yarn, contemporary New York theatre, and modern “warts and all” confession. He is the cheery wiseacre sitting by a pot-bellied stove on a snowy day, sipping cocoa and telling stories – but he is not talking about catching fish or kids playing with dogs; he is talking about sex, both straight and gay, relationships, obsessions, excessive alcohol consumption, being a peripatetic artist in the free-wheeling 1970s, and being a kid in 1950s Rhode Island.  I remember going to see him at the Performing Garage in Soho, and he was a revelation. He sat at a table and sipped a glass of water, and just told his apparently true tales (this was the Sex and Death monologue, I believe) to an audience of around 50 people. Later on he became famous and did one successful filmed monologue (Swimming to Cambodia) and a less successful one (Monster in a Box). He also wrote a so-so novel, which covers some of the same ground as the monologues, and acted in plays and movies. But this book contains his best stuff, the stuff that made me a fan of his. The first two monologues are classic youthful reminiscences, simultaneously subversive and wholesome. 47 Beds, Nobody Wanted to Sit Behind a Desk, and Travels Through New England recount some of his wanderings in America and Europe, characters he encountered and experiences he had. The last monologue, about buying a troublesome country cabin, is the weakest. He was a terrific story-teller with only one weakness – he could only write about himself. There is no one else like him, and he is missed - but you can see his influence all around, in all the first person monologues and stories that are around these days, and in events like The Moth series.

Swimming Underground is Mary Woronov's blazing memoir about her near lethal experiences in Andy Warhol's Factory in the late '60s. Woronov takes us on a surreal trip through this infamous circle -- including Ondine, Lou Reed, Gerard Malanga, International Velvet, Rotten Rita, and Billy Name -- shooting up speed, starring in Chelsea Girls, living with the Mole people, spinning out of control.

A documentary on the extremes to which workers will go to earn a living.

2005 Austrian-German documentary film directed by Michael Glawogger

Renowned cult film director John Waters narrates this quirky exploration of the Salton Sea, the massive Southern California lake that was created by accident a century ago, became a popular desert resort and has since developed into a refuge for a community of oddballs.

A compilation of 1960's films about what to do in case of a Nuclear attack and the effects of radiation, also footage of troop tests of the exposure to an atomic bomb.

1982 film by Kevin Rafferty, Jayne Loader, Pierce Rafferty

This controversial documentary about the stand-off between an unorthodox Christian group - the Branch Davidians, under the leadership of the young, charismatic David Koresh - and the FBI and ATF in Waco, Texas, from February to April 1993 presents a different spin on the events from that of the United States government, which held that the Branch Davidians set the fire that destroyed their compound, and killed the vast majority of them, on April 19, 1993. Using footage from the 51 day siege, from the congressional hearings afterwards, from people involved in all aspects of the siege, and from experts technical, psychological, and religious, the movie suggests that the Branch Davidians were not a cult, but a valid religious group practicing under First Amendment freedoms who fell victim to first the ineptitude of an ATF raid designed to garner the agency positive attention and later the cruel, methodical work of the FBI, who over-saw the murder of the Davidians and then quickly covered it up.

In the late 1960s and early 1970s polarization of American political situation was becoming acute, with the Vietnam War abroad and civil rights at home being the most pressing issues. For the youth political movement, seemingly ineffectual methods of peaceful protest and resistance led to the rise of a faction that wanted a more extreme approach that the government could not ignore. One particular group, the Weather Underground, attempted to team up with the Black Panthers to violently confront the US government. They began with participation in street riots, and escalated their efforts to include the bombing of specific targets associated with the government or local power structures. Through archival footage and interviews of participants on both sides of this conflict, this film covers the Weather Underground's campaign of violence through this period, the FBI's strategies and tactics to apprehend them (including some deemed unethical or illegal), until changing times and disillusionment brought their activities to an end.

The plot of this movie, like smoke, drifts and swirls ethereally. Characters and subplots are deftly woven into a tapestry of stories and pictures which only slowly emerges to our view. This movie tries to convince us that reality doesn't matter so much as aesthetic satisfaction. In Auggie Wren's (Harvey Keitel's) New York City smoke shop, day by day passes, seemingly unchanging until he teaches us to notice the little details of life. Paul Benjamin (William Hurt), a disheartened and broken writer, has a brush with death that is pivotal and sets up an unlikely series of events that afford him a novel glimpse into the life on the street which he saw, but did not truly perceive, every day. Finally, it's Auggie's turn to spin a tale.

Michael Laemie (played by Brian Madorsky) is a young boy living in a typical 1950's suburbanite home... except for his bizarre and horrific nightmares, and continued unease around his parents. Especially his father, Nick Laemie (played by Randy Quaid). Young Michael begins to suspect his parents are cooking more than just hamburgers on the grill outside, but has trouble explaining his fears to his new-found friend Sheila, or the school's social worker.

Bill, a wealthy businessman, confronts his junkie daughter's drug-dealing boyfriend; in the ensuing argument, Bill kills him. Panic-stricken, he wanders the streets and eventually stops at a bar. There he runs into a drunken factory worker named Joe, who hates hippies, blacks, and anyone who is "different", and would like to kill one himself. The two start talking, and Bill reveals his secret to Joe. Complications ensue.

The Egyptian vampire lady Miriam (Catherine Deneuve) subsists upon the blood of her lovers. In return, the guys or girls don't age until Miriam has had enough of them. Unfortunately that's currently the case with John (David Bowie), so his life expectancy is less than 24 hours. Desperately he seeks help from, the famous, Dr. Sarah Roberts (Susan Sarandon). She doesn't really believe his story, but becomes curious and contacts Miriam . . . and gets caught in her spell, too.

Desiring to start their family, young Catholic homemaker Rosemary Woodhouse and her struggling-actor husband Guy move into The Bramford: New York City's iconic building that brims with unpleasant stories of obscure dwellers and ghastly occurrences. The young couple is soon befriended by their eccentric next-door neighbors, Roman and Minnie and Castevet; shortly afterward, Rosemary gets pregnant. However, little by little--as the inexperienced mother becomes systematically cut off from her circle of friends--alarming hints of a sinister, well-planned conspiracy start to emerge, enfolding timid Rosemary in a shroud of suspicion and mental agony. Why is everyone so conveniently eager to help? And why is Guy allowing it?

1968 American psychological horror film directed by Roman Polanski

Barely escaping an avalanche during a family ski vacation in the Alps, a married couple is thrown into disarray as they are forced to reevaluate their lives and how they feel about each other. Inspired by the motion picture FORCE MAJEURE by Ruben Östlund.

2020 film directed by Nat Faxon and Jim Rash

Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood visits 1969 Los Angeles, where everything is changing, as TV star Rick Dalton (Leonardo DiCaprio) and his longtime stunt double Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt) make their way around an industry they hardly recognize anymore. The ninth film from the writer-director features a large ensemble cast and multiple storylines in a tribute to the final moments of Hollywood's golden age.

Based on the runaway bestseller, Where'd You Go, Bernadette is an inspiring comedy about Bernadette Fox "Academy Award winner Cate Blanchett", a loving mom who becomes compelled to reconnect with her creative passions after years of sacrificing herself for her family. Bernadette's leap of faith takes her on an epic adventure that jump-starts her life and leads to her triumphant rediscovery.

In Texas in the fall of 1980, college freshman Jake Bradford, a hotshot pitcher in high school, moves into an off-campus house with other members of the college baseball team. He meets several teammates, including his roommate Billy, who has been nicknamed "Beuter" because of his Deep Southern accent. He joins Finnegan, Roper, Dale, and Plummer cruising the campus by car, looking for women..

An estranged family gathers together in New York City for an event celebrating the artistic work of their father.

The novel charts the journey of teenager Johanna Morrigan (Beanie Feldstein), who reinvents herself as Dolly Wilde: fast-talking, lady sex-adventurer, moves to London, and gets a job as music critic in the hope of saving her poverty stricken family in Wolverhampton.

All it took was one long, passionate, late-night kiss on the lips to make novelist and mother-of-two Laura suspicious of her career-driven, high-reaching husband, Dean. Now, as the uncomfortable feelings of doubt and mistrust start creeping up on her, fanned by the horrible idea that the love of her life may be cheating on her, Laura reluctantly enlists the help of the impeccably dressed, semi-retired art dealer, Felix: her suave, mischievous, and effortlessly charming philanderer father. But, even though it is sometimes exhausting, we all want to be loved, and amid a persistent writer's block, Felix's innocent flirts with random women, Martini-fuelled lunches, and high-speed car chases in Manhattan's neon-lit streets, Laura needs to know. Is her life falling apart?

When Miss Stevens chaperones three of her students - Billy, Margot and Sam - on a weekend trip to a drama competition, she discovers that coming of age stories aren't just for teenagers. Exploring the fine line between being a grown up and being a kid, MISS STEVENS looks at the moment you realize maybe you're the responsible adult in the room, and what comes after you find out you're not who you thought you'd be.

This movie follows a teenager named Stevie growing up in Los Angeles. He's struggling with his family, including his co-dependent single mom and his abusive older brother, and at school, where his richer friends seem to overlook him. When Stevie befriends a crew of skateboarders, he learns some tough lessons about class, race, and privilege.

Love, life, and the struggles of a mother bringing up a son in the late 70's. The ignorance of a free spirit against the needs of a young man trying to find his true character and beliefs. Living in a bohemian household shared with three like minded spirited people to help pay the rent, his mother tries to establish bonds that he cannot deal with. She cannot deal with his inability to talk, and enlists the help of other females in his life to share the burden of his upbringing. Slowly life unravels for them all without understanding how. In spite of their perceived struggles, they all go on to live defined lives without any serious consequences.

English singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist

Canadian poet and singer-songwriter (1934–2016)

American singer-songwriter and actor (born 1949)

actor, dramatist, playwright, screenwriter (1941-2004)

American underground comic book writer, music critic, and media personality (1939-2010)

film maker and cartoonist from Los Angeles

American cartoonist, illustrator, painter, novelist

In 1969 London, the editor of an underground magazine and his friends get into wacky situations.

BBC comedy series parodying the works of Charles Dickens and heavily influenced by a similar, long-running radio series. A respectable shopkeeper, Jedrington Secret-Past, (unsurprisingly) discovers that he has a secret past.

Comedy exploring the lives of young people in modern rural Britain, focusing on cousins Kerry and Kurtan and their lives in the Cotswolds.

The comic daily lives of three misfits who share a London flat. Beautiful, intelligent blonde Mandy can't seem to keep a job or keep the wrong men from falling in love with her; Matthew owns that flat but can't step outside yet still manages to live out some bizarre fantasies much to his flatmates' chagrin; and red-haired dreamer Martin can't seem to find the right woman but while he looks he has an on/off relationship with Clare.

BBC sitcom broadcast between 1995 and 1998

Cornwall, early 19th century. A recently orphaned young woman by the name of Mary arrives to live with her aunt and uncle after the death of her widowed mother. It isn't long before Mary learns that her aunt's husband, Joss, leads a band of criminals who cause shipwrecks for profit. Coming closer to the truth of everything will cause Mary to fear for her life.

British drama created by Jimmy McGovern. The seven-part serial is inspired by events in the eighteenth century when Britain established a penal colony in Australia.

Margaret Wells struggles to reconcile her roles as brothel owner and mother to her daughters. When her business comes under attack from a rival madam with a ruthless streak, Margaret must fight back even if it means losing her family and possibly her life.

Period drama set in London about the rise of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood.

Z is a biography series based on the life of Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald, the brilliant, beautiful and talented Southern Belle who becomes the original flapper and icon of the wild, flamboyant Jazz Age in the 20s. Starring Christina Ricci (Monster) as Zelda Fitzgerald, Z starts before she meets the unpublished writer F. Scott Fitzgerald (David Hoflin), and moves through their passionate, turbulent love affair and their marriage-made in heaven, lived out in hell as the celebrity couple of their time. The series travels through the wild parties, the wicked jazz, the dissolute artists of the era, as well as the alcoholism, adultery and struggle with dashed dreams and mental illness that characterizes their later years.

In the wake of the Fronde in 1667, the French nobility have begun to defy and disobey the monarchy. Young King Louis XIV decides to move the court from the Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye near Paris to his father's former hunting lodge near the hamlet of Versailles as a means to force their submission. As Louis renovates and expands his new Palace of Versailles, the nobles-displaced from their usual surroundings but compelled to surround the king-become embroiled in increasingly dangerous intrigues.

2010s historical fiction television series

As the Russian conflict with Napoleon reaches its peak, five aristocratic families face the possibility of their lives being changed forever.

Executive Producer and Writer Gwyneth Hughes' adaptation of William Makepeace Thackeray's literary classic is set against the backdrop of the Napoleonic Wars, and follows Becky Sharp (Olivia Cooke) as she attempts to claw her way out of poverty and scale the heights of English Society. Her story of "villainy, crime, merriment, lovemaking, jilting, laughing, cheating, fighting, and dancing", takes her all the way to the court of King George IV, via the Battle of Waterloo, breaking hearts and losing fortunes as she goes.

Rome, 1973. John Paul Getty III, the heir and younger member of an oil tycoons' saga, is kidnapped by the Italian mafia in order to get a ransom. On the face of it, his grandfather seems not interested at all in having him back, but he gives his reasons, for better or for worse.

"American Experience" combines dramatic re-enactments with commentary by historians and authors to present an absorbing look at the personalities, events and resources that have had a profound impact on the shaping of America's past and present.

UK comedians relate their favourite historical stories while drunk.

A portrayal of one of the most dramatic and turbulent times in English history. A story of love and lust, seduction and deception, betrayal and murder, it is uniquely told through the perspective of three different, yet equally relentless women - Elizabeth Woodville, Margaret Beaufort and Anne Neville. In their quest for power, they will scheme, manipulate and seduce their way onto the English throne. The year is 1464, before the Tudor dynasty ruled the country, and war has been ravaging throughout England over who is the rightful King. It is a bitter dispute between two sides of the same family, The House of York and The House of Lancaster. The House of York's young and handsome Edward IV is crowned King of England with the help of the master manipulator, Lord Warwick "The Kingmaker." But when Edward falls in love with a beautiful Lancastrian commoner, Elizabeth Woodville, Warwick's plan to control the throne comes crashing down. A violent, high-stakes struggle ensues between Elizabeth, her most fierce adversary, Lancastrian Margaret Beaufort, and Anne Neville, the pawn in her father's power game - each woman vying for the crown.

British historical drama television series

A royal woman living in rural Russia during the 18th century is forced to choose between her own personal happiness and the future of Russia, when she marries an Emperor.

2020 British-American comedy series on Hulu

The final months of Boleyn's life, her struggle with Tudor England's patriarchal society, her desire to secure a future for her daughter, Elizabeth, and the brutal reality of her failure to provide Henry with a male heir.

Adapted from Philippa Gregory's best-selling novel and part of The Cousins' War book series, The White Princess sees England ostensibly united by the marriage of Elizabeth of York and King Henry VII, but their personal and political rift runs deep and the war that rages between them threatens to tear the kingdom apart once again.

British-American historical fiction television series, based on Philippa Gregory's 2013 novel of the same name

1619, Virginia: on what feels like the edge of the world sits the first British colony of Jamestown. For 12 years, it has been populated only by men, but the settlement is shaken up when the first women, including Alice, Verity and Jocelyn, land in this breathtaking wilderness. The new arrivals make an immediate impact and are thrust into a new world of love, desire, power and survival. While love triangles, bitter rivalries and fierce competition cause conflict for the residents, ultimately they are bound together by their resolute will to survive and thrive in their new lives.

bob beilz

 LISA HALE

Two teenagers, both newcomers to London, forge an unlikely friendship over the course of a hot summer. Tomo is a runaway from Nottingham; Marek lives in the district of Somers Town, between King's Cross and Euston stations, where his dad is working on a new rail link. The boys are both infatuated with the same girl, and pass their days bickering over which of them loves her the most. Finding himself homeless, Tomo surreptitiously moves into Marek's bedroom - but it's only a matter of time before Marek's dad discovers what's going on...

A girl with insomnia who works in a coffee house has impossibly high standards for her love and fears she will never meet a worthy man. Then in walks a new employee and they click - until she discovers he has a girlfriend. Undaunted, she moves to L.A. with a friend sure that he will dump the girlfriend and follow her. She puts all her faith in fate and hopes for the best.

Glasgow, summer, 1973. Dustmen are striking; bags of garbage add to the blight of council flats and a fetid canal. Ryan, who's about 12, drowns during a play fight with his neighbor, the jug-eared James. James runs home, a flat where he lives with his often-drunk da, his ma, and sisters, who live in hope of moving to newly-built council flats. The slice-of-life, coming-of-age story follows James as he tags along with the older lads; has a friendship with his quirky wee rodent-loving neighbor, Kenny; spends time with Margaret Anne, myopic, slightly older, the local sexual punching bag; and, has a moment or two of joy. The strike may end, but is there any way out for James?

Young Native American man Thomas is a nerd in his reservation, wearing oversize glasses and telling everyone stories no-one wants to hear. His parents died in a fire in 1976, and Thomas was saved by Arnold. Arnold soon left his family (and his tough son Victor), and Victor hasn't seen his father for 10 years. When Victor hears Arnold has died, Thomas offers him funding for the trip to get Arnold's remains, but only if Thomas can also go with him. Thomas and Victor hit the road.

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