Directing
Renowned film critic and television/radio personality Elvis Mitchell interviews various actors and directors to find out what has influenced them and the films they made.
Bing Crosby was, without a doubt, the most popular and influential multi-media star of the first half of the twentieth century, pulling audiences in with his intimate, laid-back voice and innate charm. Narrated by Stanley Tucci and directed by Robert Trachtenberg, this film explores the life and legend of this iconic performer, revealing a personality far more complex than the image the public had only thought they'd known.
Widely thought of as “a woman’s director,” legendary film director George Cukor is profiled with the use of film clips and interviews with his friends and colleagues to provide a picture of the director’s unique accomplishments and to trace the arc of his career.
Mel Brooks: Make a Noise journeys through Brooks’ early years in the creative beginnings of live television — with Sid Caesar on Your Show of Shows — to the film genres he so successfully satirized in Young Frankenstein, Blazing Saddles, High Anxiety, and Spaceballs — to the groundbreaking Broadway musical version of his first film, The Producers. The documentary also delves into his professional and personal ups and downs — his childhood, his first wife and subsequent 41-year marriage to Anne Bancroft — capturing a never-before-heard sense of reflection and confession.
American Masters Series. Documentary on Gene Kelly that gives insight into his dancing, how he formed a style (first "blue collar dancer") and developed different cinematique techniques, such as brilliantly shot dancing sequences.
A tribute to producer Irving Thalberg.
Documentary that explores the life and career of leading man Cary Grant through film clips and interviews. Produced as S18E03 of the long running series American Masters.
For 4 decades movie funnyman Gene Wilder has been keeping audiences in stitches with his combination of over-the-top neurosis and sweet vulnerability. Gene sits down with Alec Baldwin for an intimate conversation about matters both professional and personal, including Wilder's first meeting with Mel Brooks, the time Zero Mostel kissed him on the lips just before his audition for Brooks' The Producers, and his marriage to SNL star Gilda Radner.
Filmmaker Steven Spielberg and composer John Williams sit down to discuss their four-decade friendship and working relationship in front of a class at the American Film Institute.
Dick Cavett interviews Mel Brooks in 2006.
