"The life and work of motion picture director Robert Altman (1925-2006) is interpreted from a variety of perspectives in this collection of essays. Included are insights on Mr. Altman and his five decade career from actors, historians, film scholars, and cultural theorists, reflecting on the significance of music, history and genre in Altman's films"--Provided by publisher.
Introduction: "diving off the deep end" / Rick Armstrong -- Working with Robert Altman / Michael Murphy -- The hypertext of Short cuts: the jazz in Altman's Carver soup / Krin Gabbard -- "Doing some replacin'": gender, genre and the subversion of dominant ideology in the music scores / Richard R. Ness -- The company's coming: the hero, the survivor, and the victim in McCabe and Mrs. Miller / William Graebner -- Brewster McCloud and the limits of the historical imagination / Marcos Soares -- Brewster McCloud's '60s hangover / Rick Armstrong -- Hard-boiled nebbish: the Jewish Humphrey Bogart in Robert Altman's The long goodbye and Woody Allen's Play it again, Sam / Jeremy Kaye -- A cinema of plenty: Robert Altman and the multi-protagonist film / Maria del Mar Azcona -- Art and performance: consolation at the end of days / Robert T. Self.