Adaptation, Intermediality and the British Celebrity Biopic

Márta Minier is Lecturer in Drama at the University of South Wales, UK, and Maddalena Pennacchia is Senior Lecturer in English Literature at Roma Tre University, Italy.

• Introduction Interdisciplinary Perspectives on the Biopic: An Introduction, Márta Minier, Maddalena Pennacchia; Chapter 1 Culturally British Bio(e)pics: From Elizabeth to The King’s Speech, Maddalena Pennacchia; Chapter 2 Life and Death in the Media Spotlight: The People’s Princess as Royal Celebrity, Alessandra Ruggiero; Chapter 3 Reframing the Royal Performance: Helen Mirren’s ‘Transformative Acting’ and Celebrity Self-presentation in The Queen, Isobel Johnstone; Chapter 4 Joining History to Celebiography and Heritage to Documentary on the Small Screen: Spotlight on the Content of the Form in the Metamediatic Royal Bio-docudrama The Queen, Márta Minier; Chapter 5 Shakespeare’s life on Film and Television: Shakespeare in Love and A Waste of Shame, Paul J.C.M. Franssen; Chapter 6 Austenmania, or the Female Biopic as Literary Heritage, Margarida Esteves Pereira; Chapter 7 Beyond ‘Sex and Drugs and Lyrical Ballads’: High In/fidelity in Julien Temple’s Pandaemonium, Liz Jones; Chapter 8 ‘Screening’ the Dandy: Beau Brummell between History and Glamour, Matteo Fabbris; Chapter 9 Straightening the Skein: Art, Biography and Gender Politics in Christopher Hampton’s Carrington, Monika Pietrzak-Franger; Chapter 10 “The child is father of the man…” – and the Author: Screening the Lives of Children’s Authors, Anja Müller; Chapter 11 Nowhere Boy, A Portrait of John Lennon as a Young Man, Lucia Esposito;

'The triple focus on adaptation, intermediality, and celebrity studies (and its contact areas) makes for a coherent and productive combination of methodological approaches - perfectly illustrated in the interdisciplinary introduction to the volume - to look at contemporary (mostly 2000s) developments in a genre that has become a staple in British cinema and television.' Adaptation