At The Movies for Wednesday 7 June 2023
AT THE MOVIES #925 HOLLYWOOD THE ORAL HISTORY
Hollywood - the Dream Factory, the home of “more stars than there are in the heavens” and the sort of movies they don’t make any more…
At a time when some of the top people in movies – directors, producers, writers, even critics – are wondering whether movies are finally on their way out, a book comes out to remind us why we love them.
It’s called Hollywood The Oral History, written by Sam Wasson and Jeanine Basinger. And it’s the story of the movie business from the first western and custard-pie fight to the final multi-million dollar blockbuster.
It’s told entirely by the people who made “Hollywood” a noun, a verb, an adjective - from D W Griffith to James Cameron.
Simon Morris talks to Sam Wasson, one of the two people who waded through hours and hours of interviews to boil them down to a mere 800 pages.
Hollywood The Oral History is published by Harper Collins.