Informationen zum Autor TOM HANKS has won Academy Awards for best actor for Philadelphia and Forrest Gump. He has starred in, among many other films, Big, Sleepless in Seattle, Apollo 13, Saving Private Ryan, The Green Mile, Cast Away, Catch Me If You Can, Captain Phillips, Bridge of Spies, Sully, Toy Story, The Post, and It's a Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, Vanity Fair, and The New Yorker. He is also the author of a best-selling collection of stories, Uncommon Type. R. Sikoryak is a cartoonist and an author based in New York City. His illustrations have appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times Book Review, and The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Klappentext "The story of the making of a colossal, star-studded, multimillion-dollar superhero action film ... and the humble comic book that inspired it. Part one of this story takes place in 1947. A troubled soldier, returning from the war, meets his talented five-year-old nephew, leaves an indelible impression, and then disappears for 23 years. Cut to 1970: The nephew, now drawing underground comic books in Oakland, California, reconnects with his uncle and, remembering the comic book he saw when he was five, draws a new version with his uncle as a World War II fighting hero. Cut to the present day: A commercially successful director discovers the 1970 comic book and decides to turn it into a contemporary superhero movie. Cue the cast: We meet the film's extremely difficult male star, his wonderful leading lady, the eccentric writer/director, the producer, the go-fer production assistant, and everyone else on both sides of the camera. Funny, touching, and wonderfully thought-provoking, this is a novel not only about the making of a movie, but also about the changes in America and American culture since World War II. Bonus material: Interspersed throughout are the three comic books that are featured in the story--all created by [the author] himself--including the comic book that becomes the official tie-in to this novel's 'major motion picture masterpiece'"-- Leseprobe 1 Backstory A little over five years back, I had a message on my voice mail from one Al Mac-Teerwhich I heard as Almick Tearfrom a number in the 310 area code. This no-nonsense woman asked me to call her back regarding a thin little memoir I had written called A Stairway Down to Heaven about my years of tending bar in a small subterranean club that played live music way back in the '80s. At the time, I was also, sort of, a freelance journalist in and around Pittsburgh, PA. And I wrote movie reviews. These days I teach Creative Writing, Common Literature, and Film Studies at Mount Chisholm College of the Arts in the hills of Montana. Bozeman is a gorgeous if stark drive away. I get very few voice mails from Los Angeles, California. My boss read your memoir, Ms. Mac-Teer told me. He says you write like he thinks. Your boss is brilliant, I told her, then asked, Who is your boss? When she told me she worked for Bill Johnson, that I had reached her on her cell as she was driving from her home in Santa Monica to her office in the Capitol Records Building in Hollywood for a meeting with him, I hollered, You work for Bi-Bi-Bi-Bill JOHNSON? The movie director? Prove it. Some days later, I was on the phone with Bi-Bi-Bi-Bill Johnson himself, and we were talking about his line of work, one of the subjects I teach. When I told him I'd seen his entire filmography, he accused me of blowing smoke. When I rattled off many salient points from his movies, he told me to shut up, enough already. At that time, he was noodling a screenplay about music in the transformative years of the '60s going into the '70swhen bands evolved from matching outfits and three-minute songs for AM radio to LP side-long jams and the Jimi Hendrix Experience. The stor...

Klappentext

**From the legendary actor and best-selling author: a novel about the making of a star-studded, multimillion-dollar superhero action film...and the humble comic books that inspired it. Funny, touching, and wonderfully thought-provoking, while also capturing the changes in America and American culture since World War II.

"Wild, ambitious and exceptionally enjoyable." —Matt Haig, best-selling author The Midnight Library, The Humans and Reasons to Stay Alive

Part One of this story takes place in 1947. A troubled soldier, returning from the war, meets his talented five-year-old nephew, leaves an indelible impression, and then disappears for twenty-three years.

Cut to 1970: The nephew, now drawing underground comic books in Oakland, California, reconnects with his uncle and, remembering the comic book he saw when he was five, draws a new version with his uncle as a World War II fighting hero. 

Cut to the present day: A commercially successful director discovers the 1970 comic book and decides to turn it into a contemporary superhero movie.

Cue the cast: We meet the film’s extremely difficult male star, his wonderful leading lady, the eccentric writer/director, the producer, the gofer production assistant, and everyone else on both sides of the camera.

Bonus material: Interspersed throughout are three comic books that are featured in the story—all created by Tom Hanks himself—including the comic book that becomes the official tie-in to this novel’s "major motion picture masterpiece."

Zusammenfassung
**NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER • From the legendary actor and best-selling author: a novel about the making of a star-studded, multimillion-dollar superhero action film...and the humble comic books that inspired it. Funny, touching, and wonderfully thought-provoking, while also capturing the changes in America and American culture since World War II.

"Wild, ambitious and exceptionally enjoyable." —Matt Haig, best-selling author The Midnight Library, The Humans and Reasons to Stay Alive

**Part One of this story takes place in 1947. A troubled soldier, returning from the war, meets his talented five-year-old nephew, leaves an indelible impression, and then disappears for twenty-three years.

Cut to 1970: The nephew, now drawing underground comic books in Oakland, California, reconnects with his uncle and, remembering the comic book he saw when he was five, draws a new version with his uncle as a World War II fighting hero. 

Cut to the present day: A commercially successful director discovers the 1970 comic book and decides to turn it into a contemporary superhero movie.

Cue the cast: We meet the film’s extremely difficult male star, his wonderful leading lady, the eccentric writer/director, the producer, the gofer production assistant, and everyone else on both sides of the camera.

Bonus material: Interspersed throughout are three comic books that are featured in the story—all created by Tom Hanks himself—including the comic book that becomes the official tie-in to this novel’s "major motion picture masterpiece."

Leseprobe
1  Backstory

A little over five years back, I had a message on my voice mail from one Al Mac-Teer—which I heard as Almick Tear—from a number in the 310 area code. This no-nonsense woman asked me to call her back regarding a thin little memoir I had written called A Stairway Down to Heaven about my years of tending bar in a small subterranean club that played live music way back in the ’80s. At the time, I was also, sort of, a freelance journalist in and around Pittsburgh, PA. And I wrote movie reviews. These days I teach Creative Writing, Common Literature, and Film Studies at Mount Chisholm College of the Arts in the hills of Montana. Bozeman is a gorgeous if stark drive away. I get very few voice mails from Los Angeles, California.

“My boss read your memoir,” Ms. Mac-Te…