Tashlinesque

The Hollywood Comedies of Frank Tashlin

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by Ethan de Seife

Type: Studies
Subject: Director > Frank Tashlin
Keywords: Frank Tashlin, director, comedy
Publishing date: 2012
Publisher: Wesleyan University Press
Collection: Wesleyan Film
Language: English

Relative size

Physical desc.

Hardcover • 272 pages
6 ¼ x 9 ½ inches (16 x 24 cm)

ISBN

978-0-8195-7240-0

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Book Presentation:
The long-overdue study of an important American filmmaker

Frank Tashlin (1913-1972) was a supremely gifted satirist and visual stylist who made an indelible mark on 1950s Hollywood and American popular culture--first as a talented animator working on Looney Tunes cartoons, then as muse to film stars Jerry Lewis, Bob Hope, and Jayne Mansfield. Yet his name is not especially well known today. Long regarded as an anomaly or curiosity, Tashlin is finally given his due in this career-spanning survey. Tashlinesque considers the director's films in the contexts of Hollywood censorship, animation history, and the development of the genre of comedy in American film, with particular emphasis on the sex, satire, and visual flair that comprised Tashlin's distinctive artistic and comedic style. Through close readings and pointed analyses of Tashlin's large and fascinating body of work, Ethan de Seife offers fresh insights into such classic films as Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?, The Girl Can't Help It, Artists and Models, The Disorderly Orderly, and Son of Paleface, as well as numerous Warner Bros. cartoons starring Porky Pig, among others. This is an important rediscovery of a highly unusual and truly hilarious American artist. Includes a complete filmography.

About the Author:
ETHAN DE SEIFE is an assistant professor of film studies at Hofstra University. He is the author of This Is Spinal Tap.

Press Reviews:
“Frank Tashlin's career is staggering in its scope: He was a comic-book artist for the Los Angeles Times, an animator at Warner Bros. and Disney, a screenwriter, director and producer at Fox, Columbia, and Paramount, and a children's book author. … De Seife's clear, conversational, jargon-free prose style makes this scholarly study accessible for nonacademic readers, and between the stretches of textual analysis are vivid passages of historical narrative.”—Leah Churner, Austin Chronicle

“De Seife presents the reader with a logically structured and lucidly written text which constantly demonstrates author’s erudition and enthusiasm for the subject. Without a single doubt it counts among the best “directorial monographs” I’ve read recently. The text is complemented by many illustrations, a detailed filmography and an index.”—Milan Hain, 25fps

“De Seife moves appreciatively and thoroughly through all phases of the director’s art and career. …(A) very much needed close study of Tashlin’s great contribution to the Hollywood comedy.” —Marilyn Moss, Times Literary Supplement

“The wild and wacky films of Frank Tashlin epitomized a comic experience of the movies. Now, with trenchant insight, Ethan de Seife gives Tashlin’s zany, imaginative universe the sharp analysis it deserves, proving Tashlin’s centrality to the history of entertainment cinema. A great study of a key director!”—Dana Polan, cinema studies, New York University

“Well, it’s about time! Frank Tashlin, one of America’s greatest yet unheralded comedy geniuses, is rescued from comparative obscurity by Tashlinesque, an admiring chronicle of his influential work from animated cartoons to live action comedy classics.”—Joe Dante, director

See the publisher website: Wesleyan University Press

See the complete filmography of Frank Tashlin on the website: IMDB ...

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