Matthew Kennedy (author)
Encyclopedia
Matthew Kennedy is an American author, film historian, and anthropologist.
, attended Shasta High School
, and the University of California, Los Angeles
, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in theater arts in 1979. Moving to San Francisco, he studied and performed with the Margaret Jenkins
Dance Company, before moving to New York to study with choreographer Merce Cunningham
and perform with Jonathon Apples + Company. After serving on the executive staff of the California Arts Council, he pursued graduate studies in anthropology at the University of California, Davis
, where he was awarded a Fulbright research grant. Graduating with a Masters of Arts in 1992, the following year he joined the faculty in anthropology at City College of San Francisco
, where he continues to teach. He now lives in San Francisco with his partner Jeffrey Reid.
Kennedy's books include Marie Dressler
: A Biography (1999), Edmund Goulding
’s Dark Victory: Hollywood’s Genius Bad Boy (2004) with a foreword by Kevin Brownlow
, and Joan Blondell
: A Life between Takes (2007). He is currently writing Roadshow! The Fall of Film Musicals in the 1960s to be published by Oxford University Press in 2013.
Kennedy’s books on film have received praise. In reviewing Joan Blondell, film critic and historian Leonard Maltin
wrote, “Kennedy is a genuinely good writer who knows the language as well as he does vintage Hollywood movies. This book gets my highest recommendation.” The National Board of Review found Edmund Goulding’s Dark Victory to be “a fascinating read,” and linguist and political commentator John McWhorter
reviewed Marie Dressler with “Bullseye! ... this book finally does this fabulous star justice with comprehensive research on her now-obscured early life; loving, intelligent coverage of all her extand films; savvy, well-written documentation of her stage career, and endlessly perceptive reconstruction of what Dressler was like as a human being.... Truly a bravura performance - Dressler lives again.”
Kennedy began teaching film history in 2004 at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music
. He has written extensively about film in a number of publications, including The Gay & Lesbian Review Worldwide
, Bay Area Reporter
, San Francisco Chronicle
, Performing Arts, the San Francisco Silent Film Festival
program book, and the popular Bright Lights Film Journal
. Honors include a Cable Car Award for Outstanding Critic and for his teaching has been named in Who’s Who Among America’s Teachers and Honors Faculty of the Year by the Northern California Bay Consortium. Kennedy was a contributing researcher for George Lucas
’ Blockbusting, a film reference book published in 2010. He has been a guest speaker at the Museum of Modern Art
, Pacific Film Archive, the San Francisco Mechanics Institute CinemaLit series, and has been interviewed for a number of documentaries, blogs, and podcasts, including Queer Icon: The Cult of Bette Davis (2009).
Biography
Kennedy was born in Redding, CaliforniaRedding, California
Redding is a city in far-Northern California. It is the county seat of Shasta County, California, USA. With a population of 89,861, according to the 2010 Census...
, attended Shasta High School
Shasta High School
Shasta High School is an American public high school located in Redding, California. With an enrollment of over 1600 students, it is the largest high school in Shasta County, California...
, and the University of California, Los Angeles
University of California, Los Angeles
The University of California, Los Angeles is a public research university located in the Westwood neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, USA. It was founded in 1919 as the "Southern Branch" of the University of California and is the second oldest of the ten campuses...
, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in theater arts in 1979. Moving to San Francisco, he studied and performed with the Margaret Jenkins
Margaret Jenkins
Margaret Jenkins is a postmodern choreographer based in San Francisco, California. She was a Guggenheim Fellow in 1980 and in 2003, San Francisco mayor, Willie Brown, declared April 24 to be Margaret Jenkins Day.-Biography:...
Dance Company, before moving to New York to study with choreographer Merce Cunningham
Merce Cunningham
Mercier "Merce" Philip Cunningham was an American dancer and choreographer who was at the forefront of the American avant-garde for more than 50 years. Throughout much of his life, Cunningham was considered one of the greatest creative forces in American dance...
and perform with Jonathon Apples + Company. After serving on the executive staff of the California Arts Council, he pursued graduate studies in anthropology at the University of California, Davis
University of California, Davis
The University of California, Davis is a public teaching and research university established in 1905 and located in Davis, California, USA. Spanning over , the campus is the largest within the University of California system and third largest by enrollment...
, where he was awarded a Fulbright research grant. Graduating with a Masters of Arts in 1992, the following year he joined the faculty in anthropology at City College of San Francisco
City College of San Francisco
City College of San Francisco, or CCSF, is a two-year community college in San Francisco, California. The Ocean Avenue campus, in the Ingleside neighborhood, is the college's primary location...
, where he continues to teach. He now lives in San Francisco with his partner Jeffrey Reid.
Kennedy's books include Marie Dressler
Marie Dressler
Marie Dressler was a Canadian-American actress and Depression-era film star. She won the Academy Award for Best Actress in 1930-31 in Min and Bill.-Early life and stage career:...
: A Biography (1999), Edmund Goulding
Edmund Goulding
Edmund Goulding was a British film writer and director. As an actor early in his career he was one of the 'Ghosts' in the 1922 British made Paramount silent Three Live Ghosts alongside Norman Kerry and Cyril Chadwick. Also in the early 20s he wrote several screenplays for star Mae Murray and...
’s Dark Victory: Hollywood’s Genius Bad Boy (2004) with a foreword by Kevin Brownlow
Kevin Brownlow
Kevin Brownlow is a filmmaker, film historian, television documentary-maker, author, and Academy Award recipient. Brownlow is best known for his work documenting the history of the silent era. Brownlow became interested in silent film at the age of eleven. This interest grew into a career spent...
, and Joan Blondell
Joan Blondell
Rose Joan Blondell was an American actress who performed in movies and on television for five decades as Joan Blondell.After winning a beauty pageant, Blondell embarked upon a film career...
: A Life between Takes (2007). He is currently writing Roadshow! The Fall of Film Musicals in the 1960s to be published by Oxford University Press in 2013.
Kennedy’s books on film have received praise. In reviewing Joan Blondell, film critic and historian Leonard Maltin
Leonard Maltin
Leonard Maltin is an American film and animated film critic and historian, author of several mainstream books on cinema, focusing on nostalgic, celebratory narratives.-Personal life:...
wrote, “Kennedy is a genuinely good writer who knows the language as well as he does vintage Hollywood movies. This book gets my highest recommendation.” The National Board of Review found Edmund Goulding’s Dark Victory to be “a fascinating read,” and linguist and political commentator John McWhorter
John McWhorter
John Hamilton McWhorter V is an American linguist and political commentator. He is the author of a number of books on language and on race relations. His linguistic specialty is creole and the process through which it forms.-Early life:...
reviewed Marie Dressler with “Bullseye! ... this book finally does this fabulous star justice with comprehensive research on her now-obscured early life; loving, intelligent coverage of all her extand films; savvy, well-written documentation of her stage career, and endlessly perceptive reconstruction of what Dressler was like as a human being.... Truly a bravura performance - Dressler lives again.”
Kennedy began teaching film history in 2004 at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music
San Francisco Conservatory of Music
San Francisco Conservatory of Music, formerly the California Conservatory of Music, founded in 1917, is a music school, with an enrollment of about 400 students. It was launched by Ada Clement and Lillian Hodgehead in the remodeled home of Lillian's parents on Sacramento Street. It was called the...
. He has written extensively about film in a number of publications, including The Gay & Lesbian Review Worldwide
The Gay & Lesbian Review Worldwide
The Gay & Lesbian Review Worldwide is a bimonthly, nationally distributed journal of history, culture, and politics for GLBT people and their allies who are interested in the gamut of social, scientific, and cultural issues raised by same-sex sexuality...
, Bay Area Reporter
Bay Area Reporter
The Bay Area Reporter is a free weekly newspaper serving the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered communities in the San Francisco Bay Area; it is the oldest-continuously published, and one of the largest LGBT newspapers in the United States....
, San Francisco Chronicle
San Francisco Chronicle
thumb|right|upright|The Chronicle Building following the [[1906 San Francisco earthquake|1906 earthquake]] and fireThe San Francisco Chronicle is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of the U.S. state of California, but distributed throughout Northern and Central California,...
, Performing Arts, the San Francisco Silent Film Festival
San Francisco Silent Film Festival
The San Francisco Silent Film Festival is a film festival first held in 1996 and presented annually every July at the Castro Theatre in San Francisco, California, USA...
program book, and the popular Bright Lights Film Journal
Bright Lights Film Journal
Bright Lights Film Journal is an online popular-academic film magazine, with a left-leaning critical orientation, based in Portland, Oregon, United States. It is edited and published by Gary Morris....
. Honors include a Cable Car Award for Outstanding Critic and for his teaching has been named in Who’s Who Among America’s Teachers and Honors Faculty of the Year by the Northern California Bay Consortium. Kennedy was a contributing researcher for George Lucas
George Lucas
George Walton Lucas, Jr. is an American film producer, screenwriter, and director, and entrepreneur. He is the founder, chairman and chief executive of Lucasfilm. He is best known as the creator of the space opera franchise Star Wars and the archaeologist-adventurer character Indiana Jones...
’ Blockbusting, a film reference book published in 2010. He has been a guest speaker at the Museum of Modern Art
Museum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art is an art museum in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, on 53rd Street, between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It has been important in developing and collecting modernist art, and is often identified as the most influential museum of modern art in the world...
, Pacific Film Archive, the San Francisco Mechanics Institute CinemaLit series, and has been interviewed for a number of documentaries, blogs, and podcasts, including Queer Icon: The Cult of Bette Davis (2009).
Selected Bibliography
- Marie Dressler: A Biography (1999)
- Strategies in Teaching Anthropology (first edition contributor) (2000)
- Edmund Goulding’s Dark Victory: Hollywood’s Genius Bad Boy (2004)
- The Queer Encyclopedia of Music, Dance & Musical Theater (contributor) (2004)
- The Queer Encyclopedia of Film and Television (contributor) (2005)
- Strategies in Teaching Anthropology (fourth edition contributor) (2006)
- Joan Blondell: A Life between Takes (2007)
- Roadshow! The Fall of the Film Musical in the 1960s (forthcoming)
External links
- Matthew Kennedy's Official website
- http://www.imdb.com/name/nm3337899/
- http://www.ccsf.edu/mkennedy
- http://sfcm.edu/faculty/kennedy.aspx
- http://brightlightsfilm.com/authors/kennedy.php
- Interview with Leonard LopateLeonard LopateLeonard Lopate is host of the public radio talk show The Leonard Lopate Show, broadcast on WNYC. He first broadcast on WKCR, the college radio station of Columbia University—where his brother Phillip was a student—then later at WBAI, before ultimately moving to WNYC. -Biography:Lopate came to...
- Interview in The Evening Class