Category Archives: Books

Books

Joshua Hammer hatches a brilliant new book chronicling a globe-trotting smuggler

On May 3, 2010, an Irish national named Jeffrey Lendrum was apprehended at Britain’s Birmingham International Airport with a suspicious parcel strapped to his stomach. Inside were fourteen rare peregrine falcon eggs snatched from a remote cliffside in Wales.

So begins a tale almost too bizarre to believe, following the parallel lives of a globe-trotting smuggler who spent two decades capturing endangered raptors worth millions of dollars as race champions—and Detective Andy McWilliam of the United Kingdom’s National Wildlife Crime Unit, who’s hell bent on protecting the world’s birds of prey.book cover

From the volcanoes of Patagonia to Zimbabwe’s Matobo National Park, and from the frigid tundra near the Arctic Circle to luxurious aviaries in the deserts of Dubai, The Falcon Thief: A True Tale of Adventure, Treachery, and the Hunt for the Perfect Bird (Simon & Schuster, $26), tails a man who is reckless, arrogant, and gripped by a destructive compulsion to make the most beautiful creatures in nature his own.

It’s a story that’s part true-crime narrative, part epic adventure—and wholly unputdownable until the very last page. Another great book  that’s been hatched by Joshua Hammer, the best-selling author of The Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu. 

Books

Master storyteller Jerry Mitchell’s new book reopens the unsolved murder cases of the Civil Rights era

The book is so important that John Grisham states: “For almost two decades, investigative journalist Jerry Mitchell doggedly pursued the Klansmen responsible for some of the most notorious murders of the civil rights movement. This book is his amazing story. Thanks to him, and to courageous prosecutors, witnesses, and FBI agents, justice finally prevailed.”

Indeed.

Jerry Mitchell has been called “a loose cannon,” “a pain in the ass” and a “white traitor.” He’s also one of the most decorated investigative journalists in the nation, having won more than 30 national awards—including a MacArthur “Genius Grant,” Columbia’s John Chancellor Award, the Sidney Hillman Prize and the George Polk Award as well as a Pulitzer Prize finalist. Whatever he’s been called, he has never given up in his quest to bring unpunished killers to justice.

book cover

Since 1989, the investigative journalist for The Clarion-Ledger in Jackson, Mississippi, has unearthed documents, cajoled suspects and witnesses, and quietly pursued evidence in some of the nation’s most notorious killings. Race Against Time: A Reporter Reopens the Unsolved Murder Cases of the Civil Rights Era (Simon & Schuster, $28) documents the work that led to the re-openings and re-prosecutions of some of the nation’s most notorious murders, including the 1963 assassination of NAACP leader Medgar Evers; the 1963 bombing of the Sixteenth Street Baptist church in Birmingham that killed four girls; the 1966 firebombing of Vernon Dahmer; and the 1964 killings of three civil rights workers (commonly known as the “Mississippi Burning” case). These four cases were landmarks in the civil rights movement, and since then, we’ve seen an all-time high of hate crimes in America. As Mitchell writes: “We must remember, to point our compass toward justice. We must remember, and then act.”

With Race Against Time, readers get an unputdownable suspense story about a chapter in American history. It’s unbelievable that killers had been walking around in broad daylight, their crimes unpunished. Like reading a nonfiction version of a John Grisham novel, the book is filled with courtroom twists and heart-pounding one-on-one confrontations with killers. Mitchell’s investigations of unpunished killings by the KKK have hardly been popular. Some readers of his stories complained bitterly in letters to the editor. Others cancelled their subscriptions. Klansmen have repeatedly threatened him. In addition to his reporting on these cases, he has exposed injustices, incompetence and corruption, helping lead to investigations, exonerations, firings and reforms of state agencies. The book also reveals the courage of those involved in the civil rights movement.  And this book shows the power of the press in a nation that desperately needs accountability

Books

Hoarding old Martha Stewart mags? The domestic doyenne proves decluttering is possible in “Martha Stewart’s Organizing” 

Some consider her a madcap maven who seems to have a perfect life: She knows how to braise a pork loin, prune her bush, befriend  animals and Snoop Dogg, give up real fur, trade stocks, even once going to jail for five months at a jail whose grounds were almost as lavish as Cantitoe Corners, one of her multi-million dollar estates. This home sits on 153 acres of prime real estate in Bedford, New York; the insignia of the home, er mansion, is that of a sycamore tree.
The prolific (and very very very very very rich) 78-yearold is also an author, and we must admit her really like her latest: Martha Stewart’s Organizing: The Manual for Bringing Order to Your Life, Home & Routines. (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $30).

The tome is just the thing for people who are cluttered and, frankly, overwhelmed by junk they refuse to toss.
Yes, we know even a cursory glance at amazon proves that there are many “how to” guides on the topic of organizing, but Martha knows the subject of bringing order to one’s life is so much more than simply discarding what doesn’t please you.
“I’m a big proponent of keeping a calendar and populating it with every task, appointment and event, big and small–down to staking the peonies, grooming my dogs, sharpening my kitchen knives, setting up my grandchildren’s sailing lessons and ordering the Thanksgiving turkey,” she coos.
The book is crammed with her own monthly calendars as templates. The calendars are easy to personalize, so anyone can achieve Martha’s level of organizational success. Through big picture advice and smaller step-by-step projects–a culmination of decades of research gathered for Martha Stewart Living, her TV shows and online videos–she helps readers craft (and stick to) a deliberate approach to organizing with clear rules, pre-set schedules and to-do lists informed by their unique lifestyles.
The manual is split into three sections (Organize Your Year, Organize Your Home, Organize Your Routine) and topics include:

  • Room-by-room strategies to make spaces more hardworking and rewarding (i.e. how to sort office paperwork, when to purge the garage or attic, and ways to store perishables in the fridge or freezer for maximum shelf life.)
  • Seasonal advice like when to swap out bedding and clothing and how to put away holiday decorations. For example, in January, Stewart sets days to establish healthy habits, review your financial plan for the year, clean your pantry, and make and freeze soups to get you through the cold winter months.
  • Day-by-day or week-by-week plans for projects such as de-cluttering, house cleaning, creating a filing system and overhauling the closet.And for this, we thank Martha as we butterfly some shrimp.
Books

JJ Smith’s book offers miracles and marvels of apple cider vinegar

Heard about the miracles and marvels that apple cider vinegar delivers? JJ Smith, certified weight loss expert, nutritionist and author of the No. 1 New York Times bestseller 10-Day Green Smoothie Cleanse, has. And he provides an all-new and accessible cleanse to help readers lose weight and jumpstart a healthy lifestyle.
The 7-Day Apple Cider Vinegar Cleanse (Simon & Schuster, $16.99) is a revolutionary detox system that taps into the time-tested benefits of apple cider vinegar to support the body’s natural detoxification process, promote fat loss, improve digestion and overall gut health and gain renewed energy and mental focus.
Included in this book are 25 specific recipes for long-term weight loss, step-by-step instructions for completing the seven day cleanse, and a catalog of all the benefits of apple cider vinegar—from acne reduction to sunburn and sore throat relief.

Books

Fred Kaplan unwinds the secret (and scary) history of nuclear war in “The Bomb”

Nuclear war is scary stuff.
And The Bomb: Presidents, Generals, and the Secret History of Nuclear War (Simon & Schuster, $30) is even scarier. And we mean that only in the most enlightening way.
From Fred Kaplan, author of the classic The Wizards of Armageddon and Pulitzer Prize finalist, comes the definitive history of American policy on nuclear war—and Presidents’ actions in nuclear crises—from Truman to Trump.  Kaplan, hailed by The New York Times as “a rare combination of defense intellectual and pugnacious reporter,” takes us into the White House Situation Room, the Joint Chiefs of Staff’s “Tank” in the Pentagon and the vast chambers of Strategic Command to bring us the untold stories—based on exclusive interviews and previously classified documents—of how America’s presidents and generals have thought about, threatened, broached and just barely avoided nuclear war from the dawn of the atomic age until today.book cover

Kaplan’s historical research and deep reporting will stand as the permanent record of politics, and Kirkus Reviews agrees, calling The Bomb a “detailed, incisive picture of how U.S. presidents have thought about their most troubling responsibility: pushing ‘the button’ that could end civilization . . . a well-written, exhaustively researched history of American leaders’ efforts to manage their nuclear arsenal. . .  a comprehensive review of American nuclear policy from the Truman administration to the present.”
Discussing theories that have dominated nightmare scenarios from Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Kaplan presents the unthinkable in terms of mass destruction and demonstrates how the nuclear war reality will not go away, regardless of the dire consequences.
Be afraid.

Books

“Bubble in the Sun” takes a riveting look into the ’20s boom in Florida, and How It Brought on the Great Depression”

Florida was once much more than Goofy and the goofy scumbag who likes to pull women’s pussies.
In Bubble in the Sun: The Florida Boom of the 1920s and How It Brought on the Great Depression (Simon & Schuster, $30), Christopher Knowlton takes an in-depth look at the spectacular Florida land boom of the ’20s and shows how it led directly to the Great Depression.
That decade was a time of incredible excess, immense wealth and precipitous collapse. The decade there produced the largest human migration in American history, far exceeding the settlement of the West, as millions flocked to the grand hotels and the new cities that rose rapidly from the teeming wetlands. The boom spawned a new subdivision civilization—and the most egregious large-scale assault on the environment in the name of “progress.”
book coverNowhere was the glitz and froth of the Roaring Twenties more excessive than in Florida. Here was Vegas before there was a Vegas: gambling was condoned and so was drinking, since prohibition was not enforced. Tycoons, crooks, and celebrities arrived en masse to promote or exploit this new and dazzling American frontier in the sunshine. Yet, the import and deep impact of these historical events have never been explored thoroughly.
Until now.
Knowlton examines the grand artistic and entrepreneurial visions behind Coral Gables, Boca Raton, Miami Beach and other storied sites, as well as the darker side of the frenzy. For while giant fortunes were being made and lost and the nightlife raged more raucously than anywhere else, the pure beauty of the Everglades suffered wanton ruination and the workers, mostly black, who built and maintained the boom, endured grievous abuses. Knowlton breathes dynamic life into the forces that made and wrecked Florida during the decade: the real estate moguls Carl Fisher, George Merrick and Addison Mizner, and the once-in-a-century hurricane whose aftermath triggered the stock market crash.
This essential account is a revelatory—and riveting—history of an era that still affects our country today. We think of it as an important cautionary tale.

Books, Celebrity Chatter, Movies

Finally, the true and inside story of Hollywood’s forgotten force (and Garbo’s lover), Salka Viertel

Salka Viertel was once the highest paid writer on the MGM lot. She was also Greta Garbo’s lover, for whom she wrote five films.  A side note: So close were they that Viertel  bought a house next door to Garbo; when in 1969 Viertel  published her “autobiography” The Kindness of Strangers, she revealed their true relationship. Garbo never spoke to her again, avoiding her on the streets of New York City.

Garbo’s on the left

For the scores of wartime refugees fleeing persecution under Hitler she opened her doors to, Viertel was a lifeline. A courageous woman with a fascinating life and an incalculable impact on the lives of others, she has been long overdue for her moment in the spotlight.

So we can thank Donna Rifkind, whose biography, The Sun and Her Stars: Salka Viertel and Hitler’s Exiles in the Golden Age of Hollywood(Other Press, $30) shines a light on this remarkable story.

Actress-turned-screenwriter (Viertel declared herself  “neither beautiful nor young enough” to be a movie star), she left Berlin for Hollywood in 1928, bringing with her the bohemian spirit of the Weimar era. She would work with the luminaries of Hollywood’s Golden Age, including George Cukor, Irving Thalberg and David O. Selznick. At her house in Santa Monica she opened her door on Sunday afternoons to scores of European émigrés who had fled from Hitler—such as Thomas Mann, Bertolt Brecht and Arnold Schoenberg—along with every kind of Hollywood star, from Charlie Chaplin to Shelley Winters. In the living room (the only one in town with comfortable armchairs, said one Hollywood insider), countless cinematic, theatrical, and musical partnerships were born. As Nazi domination grew in Europe, Viertel poured herself into the refugee cause, arranging for jobs and affidavits for Jews and anti-fascists seeking safety in America.

Garbo in perhaps her greatest film, “Queen Christina” (1933). Her lover wrote five film for her. Viertel co-wrote the film with Harold Marsh Harwood. She also co-wrote(with Clemence Dane) the 1935 classic “Anna Karenina”, a snatch seen below.

If Viertel’s name has been largely forgotten in America, it is because too few people believed what she accomplished was important. Now, alongside our current moment’s interest  in recovering historically-overlooked women’s creative contributions, investigating women’s ability to survive and flourish in sexist Hollywood, and considering the moral obligations of Americans to displaced people in a world undergoing a vast refugee crisis, the questions Salka asked herself in the ’30s and ’40s about how one should live—and the answers her life exemplified—are as vital as ever.

It’s impossible to understand the true history of Hollywood without knowing the story of the dramatic, courageous figure of Salka Viertel and her rescue mission.

Books, Kiddie Fun, Kids' Books

Three new books, two for Young Adults; one for the young and young-at-heart

Sometimes the holiday season goes so fast, perhaps faster than Santa at his maximum speed, that good things fall aside.

And so we have picked them up.

Think of this as a sprinkle of great news.
Kate Stempel has written her first children’s picture book, entitled Sprinkles, that was published by FriesenPress, Canada’s largest publishing services provider, at the end of September.  They say the book is meant for those ages 7 to 11, but I say it’s for everyone young and young-at-heart. Kurt Hershey has done the whimsical illustrations.

Sprinkles is a feel good story about Sky, a young baker extraordinaire (modeled after the author’s own daughter), who is selling her famous cupcakes (think yummies with double chocolate and marshmallow frosting; graham cracker sprinkles; and caramel drizzle) to raise money for the local animal shelter where she found her beloved dog, Cocoa. Everyone is crazy about Sky’s cupcakes . . . everyone, that is, except Mr. Conway.

So Sky and her mom begin mission impossible as they try to help a lonely elderly man find a reason to smile again. Join Sky, her mom and Cocoa as they explore how the smallest gestures in life–such as mini cupcakes, mini trees and mini moments of humanity–can sometimes have the greatest impact, and how friendship and responsibility come in all shapes and sizes and how such actions give back to a community. Sprinkles will delight girls and boys by teaching them to imagine, smile and show compassion. Just ask Mr. Conway.

Interested in more about the book? Visit sprinklesthebook.com.
One thing you will learn is that 10% of book sales are donated to Citymeals on Wheels, a New York City and area organization that delivers food to the homebound elderly,  ensuring they never go a day without a nutritious meal and a warm visit.
Another chapter you must begin: Castle of Concrete: A Novel (Young Europe Book) by debut YA author Katia Raina.

Through vivid imagery and compelling characters, debut author Raina creates a vision of Soviet Russia in the early ‘90s—a time of political upheaval, demonstrations, and divisive prejudice against Jews. In the midst of this turmoil, Sonya Solovay, a timid Jewish girl, leaves her babushka in Siberia to reunite with her once-dissident mother now living near Moscow, and to begin her New Life. When Sonya starts school, she finds herself drawn to Ruslan Valentinov, a mysterious muddy-eyed boy who may be an anti-Semite.

Castle of Concrete is a stunning debut novel with powerful messages and a vibrant narrative that combine to paint a picture of a different time and place. But ultimately, it’s Sonya Solovay’s own story that fascinates.

Visit katiaraina.com for more information.

And there’s a virus you just might want to catch: In C.B. Lyall’s debut YA fantasy The Virus of Beauty (Austin Macauley Publishers), 15-year-old soccer star Wilf Gilvary, living in present-day Hong Kong, wants nothing to do with magic despite his stern wizard father’s efforts to make his son use his gifts.

After his father’s sudden death, Wilf still refuses to explore his powers when his 20-year-old stepsister, Myra, insists that they leave the normal world for new lives in the Magical Realm. A visit from a repulsively ugly and desperate witch forces Wilf to reluctantly accept that he is indeed a wizard.

An engaging fantasy and just think: This is Book One!

Find more information @ cblyall.com

2019 Gift Guide, DVDs, Movies

Petrucelli Picks: 2019 Gift Guide: The Year’s Best from the Cohen Film Collection

We like to think of the Cohen Film Collection as competition to the Criterion Collection; Cohen 2K and/or 4K restorations are stunning; they usually add fascinating bonus tracks and keeps their prices at amounts the average person can afford.
This year, the marvels we considered Cohen’s Best of the Year . . .

At the very top of the list moves that silence remains golden. Buster Keaton, one of the most important and highly-regarded comedians of Hollywood history, is celebrated in three volumes.  Comedian? Also  film director, producer, screenwriter and stunt performer.
The Great Stoneface’s brilliance is seen in three essential restored Blu-ray volumes.
The Buster Keaton Collection: Volume 1 features The General and Steamboat Bill, Jr.)
The Buster Keaton CollectionThe General is considered to be the last great comedy of the silent era, and it consistently ranks as one of the greatest films of all time on international critics’ polls. Orson Welles called the film the greatest comedy, the greatest Civil War movie, even the greatest film of all time.
Set during the Civil War and based on a true incident, the film is an authentic-looking period piece that brings the scope and realism of Matthew Brady-like images to brilliant life.

Keaton portrays engineer Johnnie Gray, rejected by the Confederate Army and thought a coward by his girlfriend (the so-underrated silent icon Marion Mack). When a band of Union soldiers penetrate Confederate lines to steal his locomotive, Johnnie Gray sets off in pursuit. In Steamboat Bill, Jr., as the son of a steamboat captain, Buster falls in love with the daughter of a rival steamboat owner. When a cyclone rages, Buster proves himself a hero by rescuing his love and her father from a watery grave.

The Buster Keaton Collection: Volume 2 features Sherlock Jr.  and The Navigator. In Sherlock Jr., Buster plays a movie projectionist who daydreams himself into the movies he is showing and merges with the figures and the backgrounds on the screen. While dreaming he is Conan Doyle’s master detective, he snoops out brilliant discoveries.

The Buster Keaton Collection - Volume 2 (Sherlock Jr. / The Navigator) [Blu-ray]And in another hilarious comedy, Keaton and his sweetheart are cast adrift on a deserted ocean liner. The ship finally runs aground on a desert island where the two unfortunates are chased by cannibals. A box office success, The Navigator is also one of Keaton’s most revered films.

The Buster Keaton Collection: Volume 3 features Seven Chances and Battling Butler.  In Seven Chances, Buster gets word that if he can be married by seven o’clock that evening he will inherit $7,000,000. When his sweetheart refuses, he proposes to everyone in skirts, including a Scotsman.
The Buster Keaton Collection: Volume 3 (Seven Chances / Battling Butler) Hopeful still, he advertises for a bride and is horrified to discover 500 would-be-brides hot on his trail in a hilarious chase to the finish. Keaton remarked on occasion that Battling Butler was his favorite of all his films. Based on a Broadway play, the story revolves around a case of mistaken identity between two Alfred Butlers, one an effete millionaire (Keaton), the other the heavyweight champion of the world (the marvelous Francis McDonald).

Coincidence brings them to the same backwoods Kentucky neighborhood, where Butler-the-flop finds love with a mountain girl, but not before antagonizing Butler-the-brute into a Madison Square Garden grudge match.

A classic of French cinema, Joan of Maid is Jaques Rivette’s ambitious two-part historical epic starring Sandrine Bonnaire.  For Joan the Maid: The Battles, the first installment of his powerful yet restrained two-part study, director and co-screenwriter Rivette surveys the revelatory period where Joan met with royalty, joined the army and led the French into battle against the English.
Joan the Maid [Blu-ray]As Joan,  Bonnaire gets at the reality behind the legend, showing the matter-of-fact courage of a teenage girl. Joan the Maid: The Prisons, the second part of Rivette’s diptych, brought leading lady Bonnaire a César Award nomination for her powerful performance, as she plays out windows in the final two years of Joan’s life, from the battlefield victory, to prison life, to the stake.

The Return of Martin Guerre is one of the most stunning, beautifully filmed atmospheric movies of all time. One critic said “it literally looks like it was painted by Camille Pissarro”.
A thought-provoking story, indeed: In medieval France, some villagers challenge a man’s claim of identity when he (as he says) returns home from some time in the army.

So how do you prove that you are who you say you are, hundreds of years before fingerprinting and DNA? The village dentist is dragged out, as is the midwife who delivered him and the shoemaker who brings a wooden last he made of the husband’s foot before he went off to war.
Gérard Depardieu and Nathalie Baye, who has the difficult job of playing either his wife or his co-conspirator, depending on what’s actually going on, offer solid, riveting performances.

Gérard Depardieu also stars in the lovely Get Out Your Hankerchiefs, a  complex, funny, sad, uncomfortaable and very French look at love and sexual dynamics. Depardieu plays a man who truly loves his wife, but is so bothered by his wife ‘s depression that he decides to ask a stranger to be her lover.
No luck, and now the two men are bewitched and
befuddled.Get Out Your Handkerchiefs
What does work is her love affair with a precocious 13-year-old boy who, in many ways, is the most mature character in the film. And she wants his baby!
This is an unconventional comedy  that charmed and shocked the Oscars and went on to become one of the most talked-about French films of the decade.

Starting in 1999, Claude Lanzmann made several films that could be considered satellites of Shoah, the 9 1/2 hour documentary of the Holocaust he made without using a single frame of archival footage. Shoah: Four Sisters is a continuation of Shoah, comprised of interviews conducted in the ’70s that didn’t make it into his completed monumental work. In the last years of the late director’s life, he decided to devote a film to four women from four different areas of Eastern Europe with four different destinies, each finding herself improbably alive after war’s end: Ruth Elias from Ostravia, Czechoslovakia; Paula Biren from Lodz, Poland; Ada Lichtman from further south in Krakow; and Hannah Marton from Cluj, or Kolozsva’r, in Transylvania.

Survivors of unimaginable Nazi horrors during the Holocaust, they tell their individual stories and become crucial witnesses to the barbarism they experienced. Each possesses a vivid intelligence and a commitment to candor that make their accounts of what they suffered through both searing and unforgettable. The frankness of their words, their intensely scrutinized faces, and their bravery as they revisit unimaginable experiences will make them lasting presences in the moral universe of younger generations. Lanzmann’s films remarkably stay within the immediate present tense, where the absolute horror of the Shoah is always happening.

Between the Lines, the sophomore 1977 film by trailblazing writer/director Joan Micklin Silver, marked her second independent production and theatrical follow up to the acclaimed Hester Street. Some consider this an adult version of The Front Page. At the offices of a Boston alternative newspaper, the staff members enjoy a positive and open-minded work environment.
Between the Lines Music critic Max (the brilliant Jeff Goldblum) uses his influence to score dates, while news reporter Harry (the brilliant John Heard) is dating the lovely Abbie (the brilliant Lindsay Crouse), the publication’s lead photographer. However, it seems as though their relatively carefree days are numbered when the owner of a major publishing company buys the paper, leading to more money, but even more changes.
Keep your eyes peeled for Michael J. Pollard, Marilu Henner, Lewis J. Stadlen, Joe Morton, Lane Smith, Jill Eikenberry and a slew of mother big and small-screen faves.

 

2019 Gift Guide, DVDs, Movies, Music, TV

PETRUCELLI PICKS: THE MUST-HAVE PBS DISTRIBUTION GEMS OF 2019

PBS Distribution tops the list (yet again) for its must-see, must-have programs, specials, miniseries and documentaries. These are just a small sleighfull, dozens of others can be found at shoppbs.org.

The best of the best: Ken Burns: Country Music.
Ken Burns: Country Music DVDThis eight-part, 16-hour documentary series chronicles the history of a uniquely American art form, focusing on the biographies of the fascinating characters who created it. More than eight years in the making, the film follows the evolution of country music from its diverse and humble origins as it emerged, by the end of the twentieth century, into a worldwide phenomenon. Filled with memorable musical moments, interviews with more than 80 country music artists, and evocative footage and photographs, Country Music weaves an unforgettable story that is both intimate and sweeping.

Other top choices:
The bitter, partisan battle that played out during monster and deviant  Brett Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court confirmation hearings reflected deep divisions in Washington that may seem unique to America’s current political and social moment. But as the FRONTLINE investigation Supreme Revenge reveals, the intense politicization on display during the Supreme Court confirmation process, and the transformation of the Court itself, has been a shift decades in the making.
FRONTLINE: Supreme Revenge DVDOffering both critical context on the state of America’s judicial system and a gripping political narrative, Supreme Revenge is a must-watch look at the battle for control of America’s highest court.

Trace the improbable journey of Robert Shaw’s life and career, from his childhood as a preacher’s son in rural California through his meteoric rise as a star of popular music during the Great Depression, with Robert Shaw: Man of Many Voices.
An early champion of civil rights, his chorales were among the first to break the color barrier in the American South. Shaw performed the music of Bach in the Soviet Union during the Cuban Missile Crisis, and, with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, brought audiences to tears in East Berlin in the darkest days of the Cold War.
American Masters: Robert Shaw: Man of Many Voices DVDShaw believed great music could have a profound influence, whether in individual lives or in bringing communities together. His eventful journey is brought to life in the film by interviews with legendary musicians including Yo-Yo Ma, Sylvia McNair, Alice Parker, Marietta Simpson, and Florence Kopleff, among others.

It’s 1969, and things have taken a darker turn for the old Cowley team. With Endeavour, Thursday and the gang now scattered across Oxfordshire, it takes a series of brutal crimes–including the death of a young schoolgirl, a fatal act of sabotage,
Masterpiece Mystery!: Endeavour, Season 6 DVD a deadly campaign of gossip and rumor in a picturesque village and a murder at the Bodleian Library–to reunite them. Welcome to the riveting Masterpiece Mystery!: Endeavour, Season 6.

In iconic settings such as the First Ancient Theatre of Larissa, the historic Church of Pammegiston Taxiarchon at Pelion and the newly opened Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center in Athens, the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center performs works by Bach, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Debussy, Ravel and the contemporary Greek-American composer George Tsontakis.
ODYSSEY: The Chamber Music Society In Greece Odyssey: The Great Music Society in Greece also offers a sumptuous taste of Greece itself, exploring the history, mythology and ideas that have inspired classical music for centuries.

We all know the riddle: What came first, the chicken or the egg? The Egg: Life’s Perfect Invention takes a fascinating look at what is perhaps nature’s most perfect life support system. These remarkable structures nurture new life; protecting it from the outside world at the same time as allowing it to breathe.
NATURE: The Egg: Life's Perfect Invention DVD They are strong enough to withstand the full weight of an incubating parent and weak enough for a hatchling to break free. But how is an egg made? Why are they the shape they are? And perhaps most importantly, why lay an egg at all? Step by step as the egg hatches, host David Attenborough reveals the wonder behind these incredible miracles of nature.

Words from a Bear takes audiences on a journey through the expansive landscapes of the West, when N. Scott Momaday’s Kiowa ancestry roamed the Great Plains with herds of buffalo, to the sand-painted valleys of Jemez Pueblo, New Mexico where he showed superior writing skills as a young mission student.
American Masters: N. Scott Momaday: Words from a Bear DVD The biography gives a thorough survey of Momaday’s most prolific years as a doctorate fellow at Stanford University, his achievement of the Pulitzer Prize for Literature in 1969, and his later works that solidified his place as the founding member of the “Native American Renaissance” in art and literature, influencing a generation of Native American artists, scholars, and political activists.
Historical photos and original animation will complement captivating interviews with Robert Redford, Jeff Bridges, Beau Bridges, James Earle Jones, and Joy Harjo to bring audiences inside the creative core of this American Master.

Enjoy all five seasons of the outstanding historical family saga Poldark, here in Poldark: The Complete Collection. Set against the spectacular landscapes of the Cornish coast, Poldark is full of unforgettable characters, captivating storytelling and fiery romance.
Poldark: Seasons 1-5 Complete Collection (Masterpiece)In the more than 150 minutes of bonuses, go behind the scenes with cast and crew in special featurettes from all five seasons; meet the skilled people who design the vivid scenery and create the lavish costumes and hear from the actors who bring to life the compelling heroes, heroines and villains of Cornwall.

Louise Brooks, the ’20s silver screen sensation who never met a rule she didn’t break, epitomized the restless, reckless spirit of the Jazz Age. But, just a few years earlier, she was a 15-year-old student in Wichita, Kansas, for whom fame and fortune were only dreams. When the opportunity arises for her to go to New York to study with a leading dance troupe, her mother insists there be The Chaperone. Norma Carlisle, a local society matron who never broke a rule in her life, impulsively volunteers to accompany Louise to New York for the summer.
Masterpiece: The ChaperoneWhy does this utterly conventional woman do this? What happens to her when she lands in Manhattan with an unusually rebellious teenager as her ward? And, which of the two women is stronger, the uptight wife-and-mother or the irrepressible free spirit? It’s a story full of surprises . . . about who these women really are, and who they eventually become.