Born on this day – Allen Holubar:

Allen Holubar

Actor

Director

Writer

August 3, 1890 – November 20, 1923

Credits:

20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1916); A Double Fire Deception (1916); A Gentleman of Art (1915); A Soul for Sale (1918); A Wolf Among Lambs (1913); Any Youth (1916); Ashes of Remembrance (1916); Behind Life's Stage (1916); Behind the Curtain (1916); Broken Chains (1922); Conscience (1915); Courtmartialed (1915); Fear Not (1917); Heart Strings (1917); Hurricane's Gal (1922); Into the North (1913); Man-Woman-Marriage (1921); Midnight (1917); Once to Every Woman (1920); Paid in Advance (1919); Seeing Stars (1922); Sirens of the Sea (1917); Slander the Woman (1923); Stronger Than Steel (1916); The Black Pearl (1915); The Bombay Buddha (1915); The Double-Topped Trunk (1917); The Eleventh Dimension (1915); The Field of Honor (1917); The Grip of Love (1917); The Health Road (1916); The Heart of Humanity (1918); The Heart Punch (1915); The House of Fear (1915); The Human Mill (1923); The Mortgaged Wife (1918); The Old Toymaker (1917); The Phone Message (1916); The Prodigal Daughter (1916); The Prophecy (1913); The Pursuit Eternal (1915); The Reed Case (1917); The Right to Happiness (1919); The Shadow (1916); The Son of His Father (1915); The Story the Clock Told (1914); The Taint of Fear (1916); The Talk of the Town (1918); The War Waif (1917); The White Terror (1915); The Wrong Label (1915); Treason (1917); Two Social Calls (1913); Where Glory Waits (1917).

Recommended reading - The Origins of the American Detective Story (2006):

The Origins of the American Detective Story

By LeRoy Lad Panek.

Published by McFarland.

Paperback.

Published 2006.

ISBN-10: 0786427760

ISBN-13: 978-0786427765

Description:

Edgar Allan Poe essentially invented the detective story in 1841 with Murders in the Rue Morgue. In the years that followed, however, detective fiction in America saw no significant progress as a literary genre. Much to the dismay of moral crusaders like Anthony Comstock, dime novels and other sensationalist publications satisfied the public's hunger for a yarn. Things changed as the century waned, and eventually the detective was reborn as a figure of American literature. In part these changes were due to a combination of social conditions, including the rise and decline of the police as an institution; the parallel development of private detectives; the birth of the crusading newspaper reporter; and the beginnings of forensic science. Influential, too, was the new role model offered by a wildly popular British import named Sherlock Holmes.

Focusing on the late 19th century and early 20th, this volume covers the formative years of American detective fiction.

Jhumpa Lahiri, on writing:

When I sit down to write, I don't think about writing about an idea or a given message.

I just try to write a story which is hard enough.

- Jhumpa Lahiri.

On this day in movie history - Signs (2002):

Signs

directed and written by M. Night Shyamalan,

was released in the United States on August 2, 2002.
Music by James Newton Howard.

Cast:

Mel Gibson, Joaquin Phoenix, Rory Culkin, Abigail Breslin, Cherry Jones, M. Night Shyamalan, Patricia Kalember, Ted Sutton, Merritt Wever, Lanny Flaherty, Marion McCorry, Michael Showalter, Kevin Pires, Clifford David, Rhonda Overby, Greg Wood, Paul L. Nolan, Ukee Washington, Babita Hariani, Adam Way, Angela Eckert, Jose L. Rodriguez, Paul Wilson, Thomas Griffin, Mark Falvo, Derek Mears, Chuck Pressler, Samantha Steffen.

On this day in music history - Diesel and Dust, by Midnight Oil (1987):

Diesel and Dust

Album by Midnight Oil,

released August 2, 1987.

Track list:

Beds Are Burning; Put Down That Weapon; Dreamworld; Arctic World; Warakurna; The Dead Heart; Whoah; Bullroarer; Sell My Soul; Sometimes; Gunbarrel Highway.

On this day in movie history - In the Heat of the Night (1967 movie & novel):

In the Heat of the Night

directed by Norman Jewison,

written by Stirling Silliphant,

based on the novel by John Ball,

was released in the United States on August 2, 1967.
Music by Quincy Jones.
Theme song In the Heat of the Night written by Alan Bergman and Marilyn Bergman.
Sung by Ray Charles.

Cast:

Sidney Poitier, Rod Steiger, Warren Oates, Lee Grant, Larry Gates, James Patterson, William Schallert, Beah Richards, Peter Whitney, Kermit Murdock, Larry D. Mann, Matt Clark, Arthur Malet, Fred Stewart, Quentin Dean, Scott Wilson, Timothy Scott, William C. Watson, Eldon Quick, Stuart Nisbet, Khalil Bezaleel, Peter Masterson, Jester Hairston, Phil Adams, Nikita Knatz, Sam Reese, Anthony James, Clegg Hoyt, Alan Oppenheimer, Buzz Barton.

Recommended reading:

In the Heat of the Night

By John Ball.

Foreword by John Ridley.

Published by Penguin Classics.

First published 1965.

ISBN-10: 0143107747

ISBN-13: 978-0143107743

Description:

“They call me Mr. Tibbs” was the line immortalized by Sidney Poitier in the 1967 Oscar-winning movie adaptation of In the Heat of the Night, which won the Edgar Award for Best First Novel and the Crime Writers’ Association Gold Dagger Award and was named one of the 100 Favorite Mysteries of the 20th Century by the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association. Now fans of classic crime can rediscover this suspense-filled novel whose hero paved the way for James Patterson’s Alex Cross, George Pelecanos’s Derek Strange, and other African American detectives.

A small southern town in the 1960s. A musician found dead on the highway. It’s no surprise when white detectives arrest a black man for the murder. What is a surprise is that the black man – Virgil Tibbs – is not the killer but a skilled homicide detective, passing through racially tense Wells, South Carolina, on his way back to California. Even more surprising, Wells’s new police chief recruits Tibbs to help with the investigation. But Tibbs’s presence in town rubs some of the locals the wrong way, and it won’t be long before the martial arts–trained detective has to fight not just for justice, but also for his own safety.

On this day in movie history – Black Angel (1946 movie & novel):

Black Angel

directed by Roy William Neill,

written by Roy Chanslor,

based on the novel The Black Angel by Cornell Woolrich,

released in the United States on August 2, 1946.

Music by Frank Skinner.

Cast: Dan Duryea, June Vincent, Peter Lorre, Broderick Crawford, Constance Dowling, Wallace Ford, Hobart Cavanaugh, Freddie Steele, John Phillips, Ben Bard, Junius Matthews, Marion Martin, Archie Twitchell, Maurice St. Clair, Vilova, Robert Williams. #Noir

Recommended reading:

The Black Angel

By Cornell Woolrich.

Filmed as Black Angel (1946), directed by Roy William Neill.

Published by Pegasus Crime.

First published 1943.

ISBN-10: 1605983551

ISBN-13: 9781605983554

Description:

Nothing beats a tale of fatalistic dread by the supreme master of suspense, Cornell Woolrich, whose novels and short stories define the essence of noir nihilism. – Marilyn Stasio, New York Times Book Review.

Along with Raymond Chandler, Cornell Woolrich practically invented the genre of noir. – Newsday.

Woolrich devised and used instruments of psychological torture―his stories. – Time.

Woolrich was a master of the form. – Tom Nolan, Wall Street Journal.

You can palpably feel the agony in Woolrich and his work. – James Ellroy.

A classic is back in print! This hypnotic thriller, by one of the originators of the noir form, exposes its heroine to a waking nightmare.

In this classic crime novel, a panic-stricken young wife races against time to prove that her convicted husband did not murder his mistress. Writing in first person from the wife’s viewpoint, Woolrich evokes her love and anguish and, finally, desperation as she becomes an avenging angel in her attempt to rescue her husband from execution.