Difficult Men
Behind the Scenes of a Creative Revolution
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4.4 • 52 Ratings
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
The 10th anniversary edition, now with a new preface by the author
"A wonderfully smart, lively, and culturally astute survey." - The New York Times Book Review
"Grand entertainment...fascinating for anyone curious about the perplexing miracles of how great television comes to be." - The Wall Street Journal
"I love this book...It's the kind of thing I wish I'd been able to read in film school, back before such books existed." - Vince Gilligan, creator of Breaking Bad and co-creator of Better Call Saul
In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the landscape of television began an unprecedented transformation. While the networks continued to chase the lowest common denominator, a wave of new shows on cable channels dramatically stretched television’s narrative inventiveness, emotional resonance, and creative ambition. Combining deep reportage with critical analysis and historical context, Brett Martin recounts the rise and inner workings of this artistic watershed - a golden age of TV that continues to transform America's cultural landscape. Difficult Men features extensive interviews with all the major players - including David Chase (The Sopranos), David Simon and Ed Burns (The Wire), David Milch (NYPD Blue, Deadwood), Alan Ball (Six Feet Under), and Vince Gilligan (Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul) - and reveals how television became a truly significant and influential part of our culture.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Martin (The Sopranos: The Book) names the period spanning 1999 to 2013 "the third golden age of television," after those of the 1950s and the 1980s, and shows how it was made possible by a unique moment in entertainment history. The 1980s saw premium cable services with their shorter seasons and the advent of the VCR. The new landscape encouraged developing original programming to help fill 168 hours a week and taking chances with serialized narrative, as opposed to the syndication-friendly stand-alone episodes common in broadcast television. A little later, shows like The Wire, The Sopranos, and Mad Men subverted network formulas to present flawed, even nihilistic antiheros wrestling with inner demons. Over the course of a dozen episodes a season, each show explored such dark themes as addiction, psychotherapy, and failure, and this boundary pushing made them as revolutionary as the very idea of "good television." Martin's book recognizes the small-screen auteurs that made it all possible including Grant Tinker, a television executive whose high regard for writers made the most creative ones flock to him; Steve Bochco, who established the role of autonomous writer/show runner; and frustrated screenwriter David Chase, a TV scribe with a scathing disregard for the medium. Martin deftly traces TV's evolution from an elitist technology in a handful of homes, to an entertainment wasteland reflecting viewers' anomie, to "the signature American art form of the first decade of the twenty-first century."
Customer Reviews
Recommended for any writer
The passages on Weiner, Chase and Gilligan alone are worth it. The sagging middle, with too much detail about lesser shows, can easily be skimmed. Highly recommended for anyone interested in how this era's unique intersection of art and commerce resulted in some of our finest contemporary stories and artists.
Absolutely loved it.
A very insightful look at the people behind one of the greatest creative eras. The book celebrates their genius while also shining light on their problematic tendencies. It’s honest, informative, and the perfect read for casual fans, TV writer hopefuls, and any execs who wanna know how to do it right.
Fantastic read .
Excellent book! Loved it.