Docudrama on European Television [electronic resource] : A Selective Survey /
Ebbrecht-Hartmann, Tobias.editor.
Paget, Derek.editor.
This book explores docudrama as a creative response to troubled times. With generic characteristics formed via traditions in theatre as well as film, and with claims to fact underscored by investigative journalism, television docudrama examines key events and personalities in unfolding national histories. Post-Fall of the Berlin Wall, docudrama has become a means for nations to work through traumatic experiences both within national borders and Europe-wide. In this regard, it is an important genre for television networks as they attempt to make sense of complex current events. These authors offer a template for further study, and point towards ways in which European television cultures beyond those discussed here might be considered in the future.
Notes on Contributors; Chapter 1: Introduction: A New Europe, the Post-Documentary Turn and Docudrama ; A Genre Made for New Times ; The 'Selective Survey' ; Our Approach: An Academic Backstory ; The Chapters ; What Next? ; Chapter 2: German Docudrama: Aligning the Fragments and Accessing the Past ; Introduction; Traditions and Phases: Evolution and€Influences; Entanglement: Docudrama in East and West; Memory and Identity: Docudrama After Unification; Historical Event Television: Topics and€Narratives; Conclusion.
Chapter 3: Polish Docudrama: Finding a Balance Between Difficult and Easy Pleasures Post-1989 Polish Television: Challenge for€Reality?; The Background: 'Television Lies'; The 'Unrepresented World' in€the€Polish Documentary Tradition; An Early Example of Docudrama; Tragic Heroism: Dramatizing the Warsaw Uprising; Conclusion: A Silent Ghost of Reality?; Chapter 4: Italian Docudrama: From the Experimental Moment to Biography as Text of Identity ; A Neglected Form of€Storytelling; The Turn to€Reality; A Period of€Intense Experimentation; The Rise of Biographical Docudrama; The Return to the Past.
The Perlasca Case and the Memory of the Shoah Biographical Docudrama as a Text of Identity: Perlasca. An Italian Hero; Chapter 5: French Docudrama: 'Patrimony Television' and 'Embedded Biopic' ; Introduction: The French Television Ecology and Docudrama; A New Dispensation; Patrimony Television: The History of Crimes/The Crimes of History; Treatments of Politics or Hagiography?; Le Promeneur du Champ de Mars As Embedded Biopic; Chapter 6: Spanish Docudrama: Of Heroes and Celebrities ; Introduction: Narratives of Consent; Exemplary Lives: The Representation of Noteworthy Individuals.
Fourth-Phase Swedish Docudramas-Towards a Political and effective Docudrama -- Conclusion-'demands for realism'; Chapter 8: British Docudrama: New Directions in Reflexivity ; Introduction: Britain's Television Ecology and the Docudrama; 'A Real But Half-Remembered Place': Television's Television Biopics; The Cursed Comedians: Entertainer Docudramas; 'It Wasn't a case of If': Conditional Tense Docudrama; Chapter 9: Conclusion: 'Unity in Diversity'? ; Television, Docudrama, and€Europe; The Emergence of European Docudrama'?; Select Filmography and bibliography
Includes bibliographical references and index.
This book explores docudrama as a creative response to troubled times. With generic characteristics formed via traditions in theatre as well as film, and with claims to fact underscored by investigative journalism, television docudrama examines key events and personalities in unfolding national histories. Post-Fall of the Berlin Wall, docudrama has become a means for nations to work through traumatic experiences both within national borders and Europe-wide. In this regard, it is an important genre for television networks as they attempt to make sense of complex current events. These authors offer a template for further study, and point towards ways in which European television cultures beyond those discussed here might be considered in the future.
Motion pictures and television.
Ethnology-Europe.
Journalism.
Screen Studies.
European Culture.
Journalism.