Reforming Hollywood: How American Protestants Fought for Freedom at the Movies
- ISBN-10
- 0199942587
- ISBN-13
- 9780199942589
- Category
- History
- Pages
- 336
- Language
- English
- Published
- 2012-06-14
- Publisher
- Oxford University Press
- Author
- William D. Romanowski
Description
Religious Communication Association's Book of the Year Hollywood and Christianity often seem to be at war. Indeed, there is a long list of movies that have attracted religious condemnation, from Gone with the Wind with its notorious "damn," to The Life of Brian and The Last Temptation of Christ. But the reality, writes William Romanowski, has been far more complicated--and remarkable. In Reforming Hollywood, Romanowski, a leading historian of popular culture, explores the long and varied efforts of Protestants to influence the film industry. He shows how a broad spectrum of religious forces have played a role in Hollywood, from Presbyterians and Episcopalians to fundamentalists and evangelicals. Drawing on personal interviews and previously untouched sources, he describes how mainline church leaders lobbied filmmakers to promote the nation's moral health and, perhaps surprisingly, how they have by and large opposed government censorship, preferring instead self-regulation by both the industry and individual conscience. "It is this human choice," noted one Protestant leader, "that is the basis of our religion." Tensions with Catholics, too, have loomed large--many Protestant clergy feared the influence of the Legion of Decency more than Hollywood's corrupting power. Romanowski shows that the rise of the evangelical movement in the 1970s radically altered the picture, in contradictory ways. Even as born-again clergy denounced "Hollywood elites," major studios noted the emergence of a lucrative evangelical market. 20th Century-Fox formed FoxFaith to go after the "Passion dollar," and Disney took on evangelical Philip Anschutz as a partner to bring The Chronicles of Narnia to the big screen. William Romanowski is an award-winning commentator on the intersection of religion and popular culture. Reforming Hollywood is his most revealing, provocative, and groundbreaking work on this vital area of American society.
Get the book
Other editions
-
- 2012-06-26
- 336 pages
- Ebook
- Oxford University Press
-
- 2012-06-26
- 298 pages
- Paperback
- OUP USA
Similar books
-
Reforming the Heartbreaker: A Hollywood Heartbreakers' Novella
By Christine GloverWhen a scandal threatens mountain bike champion Ryder Bennett's career, he's forced to rely on a public relations makeover by a woman who doesn't want anything to do with him.
-
Reforming the Heartbreaker: A Hollywood Heartbreaker Novella
By Christine GloverWhen a scandal threatens mountain bike champion Ryder Bennett's career, he's forced to rely on a public relations makeover by a woman who doesn't want anything to do with him.
-
Eyes Wide Open: Looking for God in Popular Culture
By William D. RomanowskiOverstreet applauded Kingdom of Heaven for its inclusion of “some old-fashioned, red-blooded drama and romance,” “vast, intense, massive battles” (that many other reviewers criticized as being overly violent), with the director filling ...
-
Missionaries in the Golden Age of Hollywood: Race, Gender, and Spirituality on the Big Screen
By Douglas Carl AbramsIn the narrative, in 1917, the denomination's “discipline” forbade attendance, placing movies in the same category as gambling and dancing. His son broke the rule, but before punishing him, the pastor/ father went to see a western with ...
-
Hedda Hopper’s Hollywood: Celebrity Gossip and American Conservatism
By Jennifer Frost... Republican Convention 1964 folder, HHP; Phyllis Schlafly, “A Choice, Not an Echo,” in Gregory L. Schneider, ed., ... Michelle Nickerson, “Moral Mothers and Goldwater Girls,” in Farber and Roche, The Conservative Sixties, 58; Rymph, ...
-
Hollywood Faith: Holiness, Prosperity, and Ambition in a Los Angeles Church
By Gerardo MartiThe first book to provide an in-depth look at religion among the "creative class," Hollywood Faith will fascinate those interested in the modern evangelical movement and anyone who wants to understand how religion adapts to social change.
-
Historical Dictionary of Film Noir
By Andrew SpicerHATHAWAY, HENRY (1898–1985). A reliable and highly experienced action director, Hathaway directed several semidocumentary noirs: The House on 92nd Street (1945) and 13 Rue Madeleine (1947) produced by Louis de Rochemont, and also Call ...
-
The Hollywood Trust: Trade Associations and the Rise of the Studio System
By Kia Afra... Hollywood in the Twenties. Cranbury, NJ: A.S. Barnes, 1968. Romanowski, William D. Reforming Hollywood: How American Protestants Fought for Freedom at the Movies. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012. Rosenbloom, Nancy J. “Between Reform ...
-
Hollywood and the Law
By Paul McDonald, Emily Carman, Eric Hoyt... The Final Victim of the Blacklist: John Howard Lawson, Dean of the Hollywood Ten (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006), pp. 91–2. 20. Eric Hoyt, Hollywood Vault: Film Libraries before Home Video (Berkeley: University of ...
-
Citizen Hollywood: How the Collaboration Between LA and DC Revolutionized American Politics
By Timothy Stanley... Hollywood in Crisis, 43. (Berkeley, University of California Press, 1999), 14. M. B. B. Biskupski, Hollywood's War with Poland, 1939–1945 (Lexington, KY: University Press ofKentucky, 2010), 222. William D. Romanowski, Reforming Hollywood ...