Tamar Jeffers McDonald Knihy

Doris Day was a major star during the 1950s and '60s. Today, forty years after her last film, the star (who was ninety in April 2012) is often still invoked as shorthand for a kind of sexuality now felt outmoded, being typecast as 'the forty year old virgin'. Close attention to the facts of Day's own life (three times married) challenges this assumption and the majority of her film roles also prove otherwise, with Day most frequently portraying a woman of maturely sexual desires. How did such pejorative labeling arise, and why has it stuck so tenaciously to Day, even now? This book addresses these questions through closely examining Day's characters and performances across her thirty-eight films and her TV work, as well as material from other popular media for the source of the virgin myth. It then focuses on contemporary popular culture contexts, using newspaper stories, articles from film, fan and lifestyle magazines, reviews and gossip to chart the developments in Day's screen 'persona' are charted, highlighting the changes in public perception of the star of Calamity Jane, Love Me Or Leave Me and Pillow Talk as aided and abetted by the media

Romantic Comedy offers an introduction to the analysis of a popular but overlooked film genre. The book provides an overview of Hollywood's romantic comedy conventions, examining iconography, narrative patterns, and ideology. Chapters discuss important subgroupings within the screwball sex comedy and the radical romantic comedy of the 1970s. A final chapter traces the lasting influence of these earlier forms within current romantic comedies. Films Pillow Talk (1959), Annie Hall (1977), and You've Got Mail (1998).

"When Harry Met Sally" (1989) revolutionized romantic comedy with its innovative use of structure, filmic devices, and music. Tamar Jeffers-McDonald examines the film's historical and social contexts, highlighting its lasting impact on the genre and popular culture, and offering insights into its enduring legacy.