Product Description

JACK PIERCE - THE MAN BEHIND THE MONSTERS chronicles the career exploits of Universal's classic monster creator, Jack Pierce, who was with the studio during their horror heyday of 1928-1947. After freelancing in Hollywood's earliest days as an actor, stuntman and assistant director, Pierce flourished in makeup in the 1910s and 1920s, first making himself into any variety of movie extras called for on fledgling studio lots. Then, from 1930-1947, Pierce created some of cinema history's most distinguishable icons of fright, including Frankenstein's Monster, The Mummy, The Bride of Frankenstein, Ygor, The Wolf Man, and The Phantom of the Opera among his many classic creations. Contained in this unique publication are detailed text and photos from every significant film of Pierce's career, spanning the mid-1910s to the mid-1960s.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #240840 in Books
• Published on: 2000-06-17
• Released on: 2000-06-17
• Format: Deluxe Edition
• Binding: Paperback
• 48 pages

About the Author
Since the mid-1980s, Scott Essman has been writing and producing projects about motion picture craftsmanship and Hollywood history. In the past six years specifically, he has published over 250 articles as a freelancer for outlets including The Los Angeles Times, Entertainment Design, Cinefex, Creative Screenwriting, Directed By: The Cinema Quarterly, plus several Internet sites dealing with filmmaking. He has also produced twenty publicity projects for Universal Studios Home Entertainment where he made video documentaries about moviemakers and wrote publicity materials and interviewed movie craftspeople, including Peter Jackson (KING KONG), Zack Snyder (300), and David Twohy (RIDDICK). He published his first book, FREELANCE WRITING FOR HOLLYWOOD, for Michael Wiese in 2000.

Customer Reviews

Jack Pierce: the Man Behind the Monsters
Jack Pierce and his work are worthy of extensive review; this thin book isn't it. Pierce, as the creative genius heading the Universal studios make-up department during the era of Frankenstein, Dracula, the Wolf Man and the Mummy, deserves the kind of exhaustive, scholarly examination currently enjoyed by Ray Harryhausen.

At $20, "Man Behind the Monsters" is little more than a 48-page collection of previously-published photos. I suppose it will have to do until a more serious effort is produced. In short, something is better than nothing.