Bambi Vs. Godzilla ─ On the Nature, Purpose, and Practice of the Movie Business

From the Academy Award-nominated screenwriter and playwright: an exhilaratingly subversive inside look at Hollywood from a filmmaker who’s always played by his own rules.

Who really reads the scripts at the film studios? How is a screenplay like a personals ad? Why are there so many producers listed in movie credits? And what on earth do those producers do anyway? Refreshingly unafraid to offend, Mamet provides hilarious, surprising, and refreshingly forthright answers to these and other questions about every aspect of filmmaking from concept to script to screen. A bracing, no-holds-barred examination of the strange contradictions of Tinseltown, Bambi vs. Godzilla dissects the movies with Mamet’s signature style and wit.

David Mamet’s work includes the Oscar-nominated films The Verdict and Wag the Dog. He has taught at the Yale School of Drama, New York University, and Goddard College, and he is a founding member of the Atlantic Theater Company in New York City.


From the Hardcover edition.