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| Jessica Alba |
Jessica Alba]]
Jessica Marie Alba (born April 28, 1981) is an American actress. She is known for her roles in movies such as Idle Hands, and her starring role in the TV series Dark Angel. She got her first starring movie role in Honey, and went on to appear in prominent roles in Sin City and Fantastic Four.
Early life
Alba was born in Pomona, California to Mark Alba (a Mexican mestizo of Spanish and Native Mexican descent) and Cathy Jensen (whose father was Danish and whose Canadian mother was of French, Italian and English descent). Alba was raised in a military family, living with her parents, her brother Joshua, and her grandparents until she was sixteen. She grew up a sports fanatic and terrorized teachers and grandparents alike with her rebellious behavior. Her father's navy career took the family to Biloxi, Mississippi, and Del Rio, Texas, before they settled back in California when she was nine. Alba's early life was marked by a multitude of physical maladies, as she suffered collapsed lungs twice, had pneumonia 4-5 times a year, and suffered a burst appendix, a cyst on her tonsils, asthma, anorexia, and a kidney infection. This served to isolate her from other children at school because, as she claims, she was in the hospital so often that no one knew her well enough to befriend her. She also revealed on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno that she suffered from Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder as a child. Her health improved, however, when her family moved to California.
Acting career
Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder]]
Alba had expressed interest in becoming an actress since the age of five, took her first acting class at age twelve, and was signed by an agent nine months later.
Alba's first appearance in film was a small role in the 1994 feature Camp Nowhere, as Gail. She was originally hired for two weeks but her role soon turned into a two month job when the actress in one of the more prominent roles in the film dropped out, and Alba was picked to replace her because her hair matched that of the original actress.
Alba appeared in two national TV commercials for Nintendo and J.C. Penney, and later was featured in several independent films. She branched out into TV in 1994 with a recurring role as insufferable young snob Jessica in three episodes of the popular Nickelodeon comedy series The Secret World of Alex Mack. She then won the role of Maya in the first two seasons of the TV series Flipper. Under the tutelage of her lifeguard mother, Alba had learned to swim before she could walk, and was a PADI-certified scuba diver, skills which were put to good use on the show, which was filmed in Australia. In 1995 she appeared in the film Venus Rising as Young Eve.
After graduating from high school at age sixteen, Alba studied acting with William H. Macy and his wife, Felicity Huffman, at the Atlantic Theater Company, which was developed by Macy and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright and film director David Mamet.
In 1998 she appeared as Melissa Hauer in a first-season episode of the Steven Bochco crime-drama Brooklyn South, as Leanne in two episodes of Beverly Hills 90210, and as Layla in an episode of The Love Boat: The Next Wave. In 1999 she appeared in the Randy Quaid comedy feature P.U.N.K.S..
Alba rose to greater prominence in Hollywood in 1999 after appearing as a member of a snobby high school clique in the Drew Barrymore romantic comedy Never Been Kissed, and as the female lead in the 1999 comedy-horror film Idle Hands, opposite Devon Sawa. Her big break may have been as the star of the popular Fox sci-fi TV series Dark Angel, which was co-created by writer/director James Cameron, who picked Alba from a pool of 1,200 candidates for the role of genetically-engineered super soldier Max Guevera. The show ran for two seasons before being cancelled in 2002. Since then her most notable roles have been as an aspiring dancer/choreographer in Honey, the stripper Nancy Callahan in Sin City, and as the classic Marvel Comics character Invisible Woman in Fantastic Four.
Alba's most serious award nomination to date is that of a Golden Globe for "Lead Actress in a Drama Series" during the first season of Dark Angel. She did not win.
She has stated that despite being an extremely ambitious actress who desires the level of fame enjoyed by stars like Tom Cruise, she once told James Cameron during filming on Dark Angel that she did not want to direct because it appeared to be too difficult an undertaking, but that he responded with the prediction that she would end up directing sooner than she expected.
Personal life
Alba was engaged to her Dark Angel co-star Michael Weatherly for a year. In January 2005 she began dating Cash Warren, a director's assistant on Fantastic Four, whom she met when filming that movie.
Regarding children, Jessica has stated:
I'm really girly when it comes to kids. I've been surrounded by kids my whole life because I'm the oldest of 15 cousins - I've been changing diapers since I was six. I want to have a couple, for sure.
She announced on the UK teen site "Teen Today" in 2005, prior to the birth of her brother's child, that she was beginning a children's clothing line:
"About four of my girlfriends have babies so they have no time for me. I figure if I can do baby clothes maybe they'll have more time to hang out!" [http://www.teentoday.co.uk/gossip/gossipstory417.shtml]
She is a self-professed animal lover (although she dislikes reptiles and rodents) who owns two pugs named Sid and Nancy.
Religion
During an interview with GQ magazine, Alba said that in her teen years she became a born-again Christian in rebellion against her parents, but later abandoned this. She explained:
One of the reasons why I chose not to be (a devout Christian) is because a lot of people gave me a lot of grief for just being a woman and made me feel ashamed for having a body because it tempted men.
I didn't understand what that meant because I was like, 'God created this...' That was a hard time in my life. [http://www.contactmusic.com/new/xmlfeed.nsf/mndwebpages/alba%20turns%20her%20back%20on%20christian%20pals%20who%20made%20her%20feel%20ashamed]
As the daughter of conservative parents, Alba, whose grandparents did not even allow her to wear a bathing suit around the house, maintains a no-nudity clause in her contract, though she has claimed she had been willing to be nude in Sin City. She remarked of a GQ shoot in which she was scantily-clad:
"They didn't want me to wear the granny panties but I said, 'If I'm gonna be topless I need to wear granny panties."
Trivia
- Her brother Joshua appeared with her in "And Jesus Brought a Casserole," the first season finale of Dark Angel, in which he played Krit, one of her X-5 brothers who wanted to help destroy Manticore.
- She has a tattoo of a daisy with a ladybug on it on the back of her neck, and one of a butterfly just above her anal cleft. [http://www.thesuperficial.com/archives/003260.html]
- According to an interview with Rolling Stone magazine, her measurements are 34-24-34. [http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0004695/bio]
- Jessica Alba revealed that she envisions a much older man as her ideal partner, having stated, "Morgan Freeman, Sean Connery, Robert Redford, Michael Caine I have this thing for older men. They've been around and know so much." [http://www.thesuperficial.com/archives/2005/08/23/jessica_alba_li.html]
- Jessica is presently Tiger Beer's new face in commercials.
References
- Interview in Hollywood Life magazine; September/October 2005 Pages 44-49; 106.
- Interview on Access Hollywood September 21, 2005
- OK! magazine; October 3, 2005; Pages 34-39
- Interview on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno; September 26, 2005
Filmography
- Camp Nowhere (1994)
- Venus Rising (1995)
- Flipper (cast member from 1995-1996) (TV series)
- Too Soon for Jeff (1996) (TV series)
- P.U.N.K.S. (1999)
- Never Been Kissed (1999)
- Idle Hands (1999)
- Paranoid (2000)
- Dark Angel (2000-2002) (TV series)
- The Sleeping Dictionary (2003)
- Honey (2003)
- Sin City (2005)
- Fantastic Four (2005)
- Into the Blue (2005)
- A Dream of Color in Black and White (2005) (currently in post-production)
- Sonic (2006) (currently announced start of production) (also executive producer)
External links
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- [http://www.askmen.com/women/actress_60/61_jessica_alba.html Ask Men: Jessica Alba]
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ja:ジェシカ・アルバ
simple:Jessica Alba
April 28
April 28 is the 118th day of the year (119th in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 247 days remaining.
Events
- 1253 - Nichiren, a Japanese Buddhist monk, propounds Nam Myoho Renge Kyo for the first time and declares it to be the essence of Buddhism, in effect founding Nichiren Buddhism.
- 1788 - Maryland becomes the 7th state to ratify the Constitution of the United States.
- 1789 - Mutiny on the HMS Bounty. Captain William Bligh and 18 sailors are set adrift and the rebel crew sets sail for Pitcairn Island.
- 1796 - The Armistice of Cherasco is signed by Napoleon Bonaparte and Vittorio Amedeo III, the King of Sardinia, expanding French territory along the Mediterranean coast.
- 1862 - American Civil War: Admiral David Farragut captures New Orleans, Louisiana.
- 1920 - Azerbaijan is added to the Soviet Union.
- 1930 - The first night game in organized baseball history takes place in Independence, Kansas.
- 1932 - A vaccine for yellow fever is announced for use on humans.
- 1945 - Benito Mussolini and his mistress Clara Petacci are executed by members of the Italian resistance movement.
- 1947 - Thor Heyerdahl and five crewmates set out from Peru on the Kon-Tiki to prove that Peruvian natives could have settled Polynesia.
- 1950 - King of Thailand, Bhumibol Adulyadej, got married with his queen,Queen Sirikit, after their quiet engagement in Lausanne, Switzerland on July 19, 1949.
- 1952 - Dwight D. Eisenhower resigns as Supreme Commander of NATO in order to run for President of the United States.
- 1952 - Occupied Japan: The United States occupation of Japan ends.
- 1965 - United States troops land in the Dominican Republic to "forestall establishment of a Communist dictatorship" and to evacuate U.S. citizens.
- 1967 - Expo 67 opens in Montréal, Québec, Canada
- 1969 - Charles de Gaulle resigns as President of France.
- 1970 - Vietnam War: U.S. President Richard M. Nixon formally authorizes American combat troops to fight communist sanctuaries in Cambodia.
- 1977 - The Red Army Faction trial ends, with Andreas Baader, Gudrun Ensslin and Jan-Carl Raspe found guilty of four counts of murder and more than 30 counts of attempted murder.
- 1977 - The Budapest Treaty on the International Recognition of the Deposit of Microorganisms for the Purposes of Patent Procedure is signed.
- 1978 - President of Afghanistan Mohammed Daoud Khan is overthrown and assassinated in a coup led by pro-communist rebels.
- 1981 - Galician current Statute of Autonomy
- 1987 - U.S. engineer Ben Linder is killed in an ambush by US-funded Contras in northern Nicaragua.
- 1988 - Near Maui, Hawaii, a flight attendant is sucked out of Aloha Flight 243, a Boeing 737, and falls to her death when an upper part of the plane's cabin area rips off in mid-flight. Metal fatigue is later found to be the cause of the failure.
- 1990 - After 6,237 performances, the Broadway musical A Chorus Line closes.
- 1994 - Former Central Intelligence Agency official Aldrich Ames pleads guilty to giving U.S. secrets to the Soviet Union and later Russia.
- 1996 - Whitewater scandal: President Bill Clinton gives 4 1/2 hour videotaped testimony for the defense.
- 1996 - Port Arthur massacre: Martin Bryant kills 35 people and wounds another 18 in Tasmania, Australia.
- 1997 - The 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention goes into effect. Russia, Iraq and North Korea were notable nations who had not ratified the treaty.
- 2001 - Millionnaire Dennis Tito becomes the world's first space tourist.
- 2003 - Apple Computer's iTunes Music Store launches, selling 1 million songs in its first week.
- 2003 - Iraq, 15 unarmed teenagers were killed by american forces in front of a school during a demostration; marking the beginning of the Falluja riots that took place during April 2003.
- 2004 - Pictures of abuse and torture of prisoners by U.S. armed forces at Abu Ghraib prison are first shown on 60 minutes.
- 2005 - The Patent Law Treaty goes into effect.
Births
- 1442 - King Edward IV of England (d. 1483)
- 1630 - Charles Cotton, English poet (d. 1687)
- 1686 - Michael Brokoff, Czech sculptor (d. 1721)
- 1715 - Franz Sparry, composer (d. 1767)
- 1758 - James Monroe, 5th President of the United States (d. 1831)
- 1819 - Ezra Abbot, American Bible scholar (d. 1884)
- 1838 - Tobias Michael Carel Asser, Dutch jurist, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (d. 1913)
- 1874 - Karl Kraus, Austrian journalist and author (d. 1936)
- 1878 - Lionel Barrymore, American actor (d. 1954)
- 1886 - Ğabdulla Tuqay, Russian poet (d. 1913)
- 1889 - António de Oliveira Salazar, dictator of Portugal (d. 1970)
- 1900 - Jan Oort, Dutch astronomer (d. 1992)
- 1903 - Johan Borgen, Norwegian author (d. 1979)
- 1906 - Kurt Gödel, Austrian mathematician (d. 1978)
- 1906 - Paul Sacher, Swiss conductor (d. 1999)
- 1908 - Oskar Schindler, Austrian businessman (d. 1974)
- 1912 - Odette Sansom, French spy (d. 1995)
- 1916 - Ferruccio Lamborghini, Italian automobile manufacturer (d. 1993)
- 1921 - Rowland Evans, American journalist and commentator (d. 2001)
- 1924 - Kenneth Kaunda, President of Zambia
- 1926 - Harper Lee, American author
- 1928 - Yves Klein, French painter (d. 1962)
- 1928 - Eugene M. Shoemaker, American planetary scientist (d. 1997)
- 1930 - James Baker, American politician
- 1930 - Carolyn Jones, American actress (d. 1983)
- 1937 - Saddam Hussein, former leader of Iraq
- 1938 - Madge Sinclair, Jamaican actress (d. 1995)
- 1941 - Ann-Margret, Swedish-born actress
- 1941 - K. Barry Sharpless, American chemist, Nobel Prize laureate
- 1943 - Jacques Dutronc, French singer and actor
- 1944 - Jean-Claude Van Cauwenberghe, Belgian politician
- 1948 - Terry Pratchett, English author
- 1948 - Marcia Strassman, American actress
- 1950 - Jay Leno, American comedian and television host
- 1952 - Mary McDonnell, American actress
- 1953 - Kim Gordon, American musician (Sonic Youth)
- 1955 - Paul Guilfoyle, American actor
- 1956 - Jimmy Barnes, Scottish-born singer
- 1958 - Hal Sutton, American golfer
- 1960 - John Cerutti, baseball player and announcer (d. 2004)
- 1966 - John Daly, American golfer
- 1966 - Too $hort, American rapper
- 1970 - Nicklas Lidström, Swedish Hockey player
- 1970 - Diego Simeone, Argentine footballer
- 1973 - Elisabeth Röhm, American actress
- 1974 - Penélope Cruz, Spanish actress
- 1974 - Richel Hersisia, Dutch boxer
- 1979 - Jorge Garcia, American actor
- 1981 - Jessica Alba, American actress
Deaths
- 1192 - Conrad of Montferrat, King of Jerusalem
- 1498 - Henry Percy, 4th Earl of Northumberland, English politician (killed in battle)
- 1533 - Nicholas West, English bishop and diplomat (b. 1461)
- 1695 - Henry Vaughan, Welsh poet (b. 1621)
- 1710 - Thomas Betterton, English actor
- 1726 - Thomas Pitt, British Governor of Madras (b. 1653)
- 1772 - Johann Friedrich Struensee, physician of Christian VII of Denmark (b. 1737)
- 1781 - Cornelius Harnett, American delegate to the Continental Congress]] (b. 1723)
- 1813 - Mikhail Illarionovich Kutuzov, Russian field marshal (b. 1745)
- 1816 - Johann Heinrich Abicht, German philosopher (b. 1862)
- 1841 - Peter Chanel, French saint (b. 1803)
- 1853 - Ludwig Tieck, German writer (b. 1773)
- 1858 - Johannes Peter Müller, German physiologist (b. 1801)
- 1905 - Fitzhugh Lee, American Confederate general (b. 1835)
- 1926 - Zip the Pinhead, American freak show performer (b. 1857)
- 1945 - Benito Mussolini, Italian fascist dictator (b. 1882)
- 1945 - Clara Petacci, Italian mistress of Benito Mussolini (shot) (b. 1912)
- 1945 - Roberto Farinacci, Italian fascist (b. 1892)
- 1954 - Léon Jouhaux, French labor leader, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (b. 1879)
- 1973 - Clas Thunberg, Finnish speed skater (d. 1893)
- 1978 - Sardar Mohammed Daoud, President of Afghanistan (shot) (b. 1909)
- 1970 - Ed Begley, American actor (b. 1901)
- 1992 - Francis Bacon, Anglo-Irish painter (b. 1909)
- 1992 - Iceberg Slim, American writer (b. 1918)
- 1993 - Jim Valvano, American basketball coach (b. 1946)
- 1999 - Rory Calhoun, American actor (b. 1922)
- 1999 - Arthur Leonard Schawlow, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1921)
- 2000 - Penelope Fitzgerald, English writer (b. 1916)
- 2002 - Alexander Lebed, Russian general (b. 1950)
- 2002 - Lou Thesz, American wrestler (b. 1916)
- 2005 - Chris Candido, professional wrestler (b. 1972)
Holidays and observances
- Roman Empire - first day of the Floralia in honor of Flora
- Bahá'í Faith - Feast of Jamál (Beauty) - First day of the third month of the Bahá'í Calendar
- [http://www.ilo.org/public/english/protection/safework/worldday/ World Day for Safety and Health at Work]
- Feast day of the following saints in the Roman Catholic Church:
- Saints Theodora and Didymus
- Arthemius
- Saints Vitalis and Valeria
- Patritius
- Luchesius
- Louis Marie Grignon of Montfort
- Peter Chanel
External links
- [http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/april/28 BBC: On This Day]
----
April 27 - April 29 - March 28 - May 28 – listing of all days
ko:4월 28일
ms:28 April
ja:4月28日
simple:April 28
th:28 เมษายน
United States:For alternative meanings, see the disambiguation page for US, USA, United States, or American.
The United States of America is a federal democratic republic situated primarily in central North America. It comprises 50 states and one federal district, and has several territories. It is also referred to, with varying formality, as the United States, the U.S., the U.S.A., the States, or simply and most commonly, America.
The official founding date of the United States is July 4, 1776, when the Second Continental Congress—representing thirteen British colonies—adopted the Declaration of Independence. However, the structure of the government was profoundly changed in 1788, when the states replaced the Articles of Confederation with the United States Constitution. The date on which each of the fifty states adopted the Constitution is typically regarded as the date that state "entered the Union" (became part of the United States). Since the mid-20th century, following World War II, the United States has emerged as a dominant global influence in economic, political, military, scientific, technological, and cultural affairs.
Geography and climate
The United States shares land borders with Canada (to the north) and Mexico (to the south), and territorial water boundaries with Canada, Russia, the Bahamas, and numerous smaller nations. It is otherwise bounded by the Pacific Ocean and the Bering Sea, in the west; the Arctic Ocean, in the northernmost areas; and the Atlantic Ocean, the Gulf of Mexico, and the Caribbean Sea, in the eastern and southeastern areas.
Forty-eight of the states are in the single region between Canada and Mexico; this group is referred to, with varying precision and formality, as the continental or contiguous United States, sometimes abbreviated CONUS, and as the Lower 48. Alaska, which is not included in the term contiguous United States, is at the northwestern end of North America, separated from the Lower 48 by Canada. The archipelago of Hawaii is in the Pacific Ocean. The capital city, Washington, District of Columbia is a federal district located on land donated by the state of Maryland. (Virginia also donated land, but it was returned in 1847.) The United States also has overseas territories with varying levels of independence and organization.
When inland water is included in the total area, only Russia and Canada are larger than the United States; if inland water is excluded, China ranks third and the U.S. ranks fourth. The United States' total area is 3,718,711 square miles (9,631,418 km²), of which land makes up 3,537,438 square miles (9,161,923 km²) and water makes up 181,273 square miles (469,495 km²).
The United States' landscape is one of the most varied among those of the world's nations: among its many features are temperate forestland and rolling hills, on the east coast; mangrove, in Florida; the Great Plains, in the center of the country; the Mississippi–Missouri river system; the Great Lakes, four of the five of which are shared with Canada; the Rocky Mountains, west of the Great Plains; deserts and temperate coastal zones, west of the Rocky Mountains; and temperate rain forests, in the Pacific northwest. Alaska's tundra, and the volcanic, tropical islands of Hawaii add to the geographic diversity.
Hawaii
The climate varies along with the landscape, from tropical in Hawaii and southern Florida to tundra in Alaska and atop some of the highest mountains. Most of the North and East experience a temperate continental climate, with warm summers and cold winters. Most of the South experiences a subtropical humid climate with mild winters and long, hot, humid summers. Rainfall decreases markedly from the humid forests of the Eastern Great Plains to the semi-arid shortgrass prairies on the high plains abutting the Rocky Mountains. Arid deserts, including the Mojave, extend through the lowlands and valleys of the southwest, from westernmost Texas to California and northward throughout much of Nevada. Some parts of California have a Mediterranean climate. Rainforests line the windward mountains of the Pacific Northwest from Oregon to Alaska.
History
American history started with the migration of people from Asia across the Bering land bridge approximately 12,000 years ago following large animals that they hunted into the Americas. These Native Americans left evidence of their presence in petroglyphs, burial mounds, and other artifacts. It is estimated that 2-9 million people lived in the territory now occupied by the U.S. before European contact, and the subsequent introduction of foreign diseases such as small pox that greatly diminished the native populations. Some advanced societies were the Anasazi of the southwest, who inhabited Chaco Canyon, and the Woodland Indians, who built Cahokia, located near present-day St Louis, a city with a population of 40,000 at its peak in AD 1200.
Vikings first visited North America around 1000, but did not settle permanently. Following the discovery voyages of Christopher Columbus around 1492, other Europeans began to explore and settle there.
During the 1500s and 1600s, the Spanish settled parts of the present-day Southwest and Florida, founding St. Augustine, Florida in 1565 and Santa Fe (in what is now New Mexico) in 1607. The first successful English settlement was at Jamestown, Virginia, also in 1607. Within the next two decades, several Dutch settlements, including New Amsterdam (the predecessor to New York City), were established in what are now the states of New York and New Jersey. In 1637, Sweden established a colony at Fort Christina (in what is now Delaware), but lost the settlement to the Dutch in 1655.
This was followed by extensive British settlement of the east coast. The British colonists remained relatively undisturbed by their home country until after the French and Indian War, when France ceded Canada and the Great Lakes region to Britain. Britain then imposed taxes on the 13 colonies, widely regarded by the colonists as unfair because they were denied representation in the British Parliament. Tensions between Britain and the colonists increased, and the thirteen colonies eventually rebelled against British rule.
British Parliament, George Washington (1789-1797).]]
In 1776, the 13 colonies split from Great Britain and formed the United States, the world's first constitutional and democratic federal republic, after their Declaration of Independence of that year, and the Revolutionary War (1775 to 1783). The original political structure was a confederation in 1777, ratified in 1781 as the Articles of Confederation. After long debate, this was supplanted by the Constitution in 1789, forming a more centralized federal government. Prior to all these was the Albany Congress in 1754, in which a union was first seriously proposed.
From early colonial times, there was a shortage of labor, which encouraged unfree labor, particularly indentured servitude and slavery. In the mid-19th century, a major division occurred in the United States over the issue of states' rights and the expansion of slavery. The northern states had become opposed to slavery, while the southern states saw it as necessary for the continued success of southern agriculture and wanted it expanded to the territories. Several federal laws were passed in an attempt to settle the dispute, including the Missouri Compromise and the Compromise of 1850. The dispute reached a crisis in 1861, when seven southern states seceded1 from the Union and formed the Confederate States of America, leading to the Civil War. Soon after the war began, four more southern states seceded. During the war, Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, mandating the freedom of all slaves in states in rebellion, though full emancipation did not take place until after the end of the war in 1865, the dissolution of the Confederacy, and the Thirteenth Amendment took effect. The Civil War effectively ended the question of a state's right to secede, and is widely accepted as a major turning point after which the federal government became more powerful than state governments.
Thirteenth Amendment). The title of the painting, from a 1726 poem by Bishop Berkeley, was a phrase often quoted in the era of Manifest Destiny, expressing a widely held belief that civilization had steadily moved westward throughout history. [http://americanart.si.edu/t2go/1lw/1931.6.1.html (more)] ]]
During the 19th century, many new states were added to the original 13 as the nation expanded across the continent. Manifest Destiny was a philosophy that encouraged westward expansion in the United States. As the population of the Eastern states grew and as a steady increase of immigrants entered the country, settlers moved steadily westward across North America. In the process, the U.S. displaced most American Indian nations. This displacement of American Indians continues to be a matter of contention in the U.S. with many tribes attempting to assert their original claims to various lands. In some areas American Indian populations were reduced by foreign diseases contracted through contact with European settlers, and US settlers acquired those emptied lands. In other instances American Indians were removed from their traditional lands by force. Though some would say the U.S. was not a colonial power until the Spanish-American War when it acquired Puerto Rico, Guam and the Philippines, the dominion exercised over land in North America the United States claimed is essentially colonial. The Philippines became independent in 1946.
During this period, the nation also became an industrial power. This continued into the 20th century, which has been termed "the American Century" because of the nation's overriding influence on the world. The US became a center for innovation and technological development; major technologies that America either developed or was greatly involved in improving include the telephone, television, computer, the Internet, nuclear weapons, nuclear power, aviation, and aeronautics.
In addition to the Civil War, another major traumatic experience for the nation was the Great Depression (1929 to 1939). The nation has also taken part in several major foreign wars, including World War I and World War II (in both of which the US later joined the Allies). During the Cold War, the US was a major player in the Korean War and Vietnam War, and, along with the Soviet Union, was considered one of the world's two "superpowers". With the collapse of the Soviet Union, the US emerged as the world's leading economic and military power. Beginning in the 1990s, the United States became very involved in police actions and peacekeeping, including actions in Kosovo, Haiti, Somalia and Liberia, and the first Persian Gulf War driving Iraq out of Kuwait. After attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on September 11, 2001, the United States and other allied nations found themselves involved in what has come to be called the "War on Terrorism," which has primarily encompassed military actions in both Afghanistan and Iraq.
Government
Iraq of the United States.]]
Republic and suffrage
The United States is an example of a constitutional republic, with a government composed of and operating through a set of limited powers imposed by its design and enumerated in the United States Constitution. Specifically, the nation operates as a presidential democracy. There are three levels of government: federal, state, and local. Officials of each of these levels are either elected by eligible voters via secret ballot or appointed by other elected officials. Americans enjoy almost universal suffrage from the age of 18 regardless of race, sex, or wealth. There are some limits, however: felons are disenfranchised and in some states former felons are likewise. Furthermore, the national representation of territories and the federal district of Washington, DC in Congress is limited: residents of the District of Columbia are subject to federal laws and federal taxes but their only Congressional representative is a non-voting delegate.
Federal government
The federal government is the national government, comprising the Legislative Branch (led by Congress), the Executive Branch (led by the President), and the Judicial Branch (led by the Supreme Court). These three branches were designed to apply checks and balances on each other. The Constitution limits the powers of the federal government to defense, foreign affairs, the issuing and management of currency, the management of trade and relations between the states, and the protection of human rights. In addition to these explicitly stated powers, the federal government—with the assistance of the Supreme Court—has gradually extended these powers into such areas as welfare and education, on the basis of the "necessary and proper" clause of the Constitution.
The Congress
necessary and proper
The Congress of the United States is the legislative branch of the federal government of the United States. It is bicameral, comprising the House of Representatives and the Senate. The House of Representatives consists of 435 members, each of whom represents a congressional district and serves for a two-year term. House seats are apportioned among the states by population; in contrast, each state has two Senators, regardless of population. There are a total of 100 senators, who serve six-year terms. The powers of Congress are limited to those enumerated in the Constitution; all other powers are reserved to the states and the people. The Constitution also includes the necessary-and-proper clause, which grants Congress the power to "make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers."
The President
necessary-and-proper clause
At the top level of the executive branch is the President of the United States. The President and Vice-President are elected as 'running mates' for four-year terms by the Electoral College, for which each state, as well as the District of Columbia, is allocated a number of seats based on its representation (or ostensible representation, in the case of D. C.) in both houses of Congress (see U.S. Electoral College). The relationship between the President and the Congress reflects that between the English monarchy and parliament at the time of the framing of the United States Constitution. Congress can legislate to constrain the President's executive power, even with respect to his or her command of the armed forces; however, this power is used only very rarely—a notable example was the constraint placed on President Richard Nixon's strategy of bombing Cambodia during the Vietnam War. The President cannot directly propose legislation, and must rely on supporters in Congress to promote his or her legislative agenda. The President's signature is required to turn congressional bills into law; in this respect, the President has the power—only occasionally used—to veto congressional legislation. Congress can override a presidential veto with a two-thirds majority vote in both houses. The ultimate power of Congress over the President is that of impeachment or removal of the elected President through a House vote, a Senate trial, and a Senate vote. The threat of using this power has had major political ramifications in the cases of Presidents Andrew Johnson, Richard Nixon, and Bill Clinton.
The President makes around 2,000 executive appointments, including members of the Cabinet and ambassadors, which must be approved by the Senate; the President can also issue executive orders and pardons, and has other Constitutional duties, among them the requirement to give a State of the Union address to Congress once a year. Although the President's constitutional role may appear to be constrained, in practice, the office carries enormous prestige that typically eclipses the power of Congress: the Presidency has justifiably been referred to as 'the most powerful office in the world'. The Vice President is first in the line of succession, and is the President of the Senate ex officio, with the ability to cast a tie-breaking vote. The members of the President's Cabinet are responsible for administering the various departments of state, including the Department of Defense, the Justice Department, and the State Department. These departments and department heads have considerable regulatory and political power, and it is they who are responsible for executing federal laws and regulations. George W. Bush is the 43rd President, currently serving his second term.
The Courts
George W. Bush
The highest court is the Supreme Court, which consists of nine justices. The court deals with federal and constitutional matters, and can declare legislation made at any level of the government as unconstitutional, nullifying the law and creating precedent for future law and decisions. Below the Supreme Court are the courts of appeals, and below them in turn are the district courts, which are the general trial courts for federal law.
Separate from, but not entirely independent of, this federal court system are the individual court systems of each state, each dealing with its own laws and having its own judicial rules and procedures. A case may be appealed from a state court to a federal court only if there is a federal question; the supreme court of each state is the final authority on the interpretation of that state's laws and constitution.
State and local governments
supreme court of each state. Note that Alaska and Hawaii are shown at different scales, and that the Aleutian Islands and the uninhabited Northwestern Hawaiian Islands are omitted from this map.]]
The state governments have the greatest influence over people's daily lives. Each state has its own written constitution and has different laws. There are sometimes great differences in law and procedure between the different states, concerning issues such as property, crime, health, and education. The highest elected official of each state is the Governor. Each state also has an elected legislature (bicameral in every state except Nebraska), whose members represent the different parts of the state. Of note is the New Hampshire legislature, which is the third-largest legislative body in the English-speaking world, and has one representative for every 3,000 people. Each state maintains its own judiciary, with the lowest level typically being county courts, and culminating in each state supreme court, though sometimes named differently. In some states, supreme and lower court justices are elected by the people; in others, they are appointed, as they are in the federal system.
The institutions that are responsible for local government are typically town, city, or county boards, making laws that affect their particular area. These laws concern issues such as traffic, the sale of alcohol, and keeping animals. The highest elected official of a town or city is usually the mayor. In New England, towns operate directly democratically, and in some states, such as Rhode Island and Connecticut, counties have little or no power, existing only as geographic distinctions. In other areas, county governments have more power, such as to collect taxes and maintain law enforcement agencies.
Political divisions
With the Declaration of Independence, the thirteen colonies proclaimed themselves to be nation states modeled after the European states of the time. Although considered as sovereigns initially, under the Articles of Confederation of 1781 they entered into a "Perpetual Union" and created a fully sovereign federal state, delegating certain powers to the national Congress, including the right to engage in diplomatic relations and to levy war, while each retaining their individual sovereignty, freedom and independence. But the national government proved too ineffective, so the administrative structure of the government was vastly reorganized with the United States Constitution of 1789. Under this new union, the continued status of the individual states as sovereign nation states fell into dispute in 1861, as several states attempted to secede from the union; in response, then-President Abraham Lincoln claimed that such secession was illegal, and the result was the American Civil War. Since the Union victory in 1865, the independent status of the individual states has not been broached again by any state, and the status of each state within the union has been deemed by mainstream officials and academics to be settled as being subordinate to the union as a whole.
In subsequent years, the number of states grew steadily due to western expansion, the purchase of lands by the national government from other nation states, and the subdivision of existing states, resulting in the current total of 50. The states are generally divided into smaller administrative regions, including counties, cities and townships.
The United States–Canadian border is the longest undefended political boundary in the world. The U.S. is divided into three distinct sections:
- the "continental United States," also known as "the Lower 48" and more accurately termed the conterminous, coterminous or contiguous United States
- Alaska, which is physically connected only to Canada
- the archipelago of Hawaii, in the central Pacific Ocean.
The United States also holds several other territories, districts, and possessions, notably the federal district of the District of Columbia, which is the nation's capital, and several overseas insular areas, the most significant of which are American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, and the United States Virgin Islands. The Palmyra Atoll is the United States' only incorporated territory; it is unorganized and uninhabited.
The United States Navy has held a base at a portion of Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, since 1898. The United States government possesses a lease to this land, which only mutual agreement or United States abandonment of the area can terminate. The present Cuban government of Fidel Castro disputes this arrangement, claiming Cuba was not truly sovereign at the time of the signing. The United States argues this point moot because Cuba apparently ratified the lease post-revolution, and with full sovereignty, when it cashed one rent check in accordance with the disputed treaty.
Foreign relations and military
sovereign]
The immense military and economic dominance of the United States has made foreign relations an especially important topic in its politics, with considerable concern about the image of the United States throughout the world. Reactions towards the United States by other nationalities are often strong, ranging from uninhibited admiration and mimicking of all things American to anti-Americanism. US foreign policy has swung about several times over the course of its history between the poles of strict isolationism and imperialism and everywhere in between.
Three of the nation's four military branches are administered by the Department of Defense: the Army, the Navy (including the Marine Corps), and the Air Force. The Coast Guard falls under the jurisdiction of the Department of Homeland Security in peacetime, but is placed under the Department of the Navy in time of war.
The combined United States armed forces consist of 1.4 million active duty personnel, along with several hundred thousand each in the Reserves and the National Guard. Military conscription ended in 1973. The United States Armed forces are considered to be the most powerful military (of any sort) on Earth and their force projection capabilities are unrivaled by any other nation.
The 2005 defense budget amounted to $401.7 billion, which is an increase of 4% over 2004 and of 35% since 2001. Over 50% of that number is spent in research & development.
(For comparison, in 2004 the European Union (considered as the second-largest military force) had a combined total of 1.6 million troops, and a defense budget of €160 billion, with less than 10% of that being spent on R&D.)
Largest cities
The United States has dozens of major cities, including 11 of the 55 global cities of all types — with three "alpha" global cities: New York City, Los Angeles, and Chicago.
The figures expressed below are for populations within city limits. A different ranking is evident when considering U.S. metro area populations, although the top three would be unchanged.
Note that some cities not listed (such as Atlanta, Boston, Las Vegas, Miami, Nashville, New Orleans, Seattle, and Washington, D.C.) are still considered important on the basis of other factors and issues, including culture, economics, heritage, and politics.
The twenty largest cities, based on the United States Census Bureau's 2004 estimates, are as follows:
Economy
The United States has the largest single-country economy in the world, with a per-capita gross domestic product of $40,100. In this market-oriented economy, private individuals and business firms make most of the decisions, and the federal and state governments buy needed goods and services predominantly in the private marketplace.
gross domestic product
The largest industry of the U.S. is now service, which employs roughly three quarters of the U.S. work force. The United States has many natural resources, including oil and gas, metals, and such minerals as gold, soda ash, and zinc. In agriculture, the U.S. is a top producer of, among other crops, corn, soy beans, and wheat; the United States is a net exporter of food. The U.S. manufacturing sector produces goods such as, cars, airplanes, steel, and electronics, among many others.
Economic activity varies greatly from one part of the country to another, with many industries being largely dependent on a certain city or region; New York City is the center of the American financial, publishing, broadcasting, and advertising industries; Silicon Valley is the country’s primary location for high-technology companies, while Los Angeles is the most important center for film production. The Midwest is known for its reliance on manufacturing and heavy industry, with Detroit, Michigan, serving as the center of the American automotive industry; the Great Plains are known as the "breadbasket" of America for their tremendous agricultural output; the intermountain region serves as a mining hub and natural gas resource; the Pacific Northwest for fish and timber, while Texas is largely associated with the oil industry; the Southeast is a major hub for both medical research and the textiles industry.
Several countries continue to link their currency to the dollar or even use it as a currency (such as Ecuador), although this practice has subsided since the collapse of the Bretton Woods system. Many markets are also quoted in dollars, such as those of oil and gold. The dollar is also the predominant reserve currency in the world, and more than half of global reserves are in dollars.
The largest trading partner of the United States is Canada (19%), followed by China (12%), Mexico (11%), and Japan (8%). More than 50% of total trade is with these four countries.
In 2003, the United States was ranked as the third most visited tourist destination in the world; its 40,400,000 visitors ranked behind France's 75,000,000 and Spain's 52,500,000.
Labor unions have existed since the 19th century, and grew large and powerful from the 1930s to the 1950s. See Labor history of the United States. Since 1970 they have shrunk in the private sector and now cover fewer than 8% of the workers. However union membership has grown rapidly in the public sector, especially among teachers, nurses, police, postal workers, and municipal clerks. There have been few strikes in recent years.
The United States' imports exceed exports by 80%, leading to an annual trade deficit of $700,000,000,000, or 6% of gross domestic product. It is the largest debtor nation in the world, with total gross foreign debt of over $13,000,000,000,000 (2005 estimate); and it absorbs more than 50% of global savings annually.
Since the 1980s, the U.S. has increased the use of neoliberal economic policies that reduce government intervention and reduce the size of the welfare state, backing away from the more interventionist Keynsian economic policies that had been in favor since the Great Depression. As a result, the United States provides fewer government-delivered social welfare services than most industrialized nations, choosing instead to keep its tax burden lower and relying more heavily on the free market and private charities.
Sixteen states and the District of Columbia have minimum wages higher than the national level ($5.15 per-hour), including the highest, Washington State at $7.35. Twenty-six states are the same as the federal level; two--Ohio and Kansas--are below; and six do not have state laws.
America's wealth is relatively highly concentrated. The average C.E.O. earns 500 times the typical amount a worker grosses, this is up from 25 times in the late 1970s. In terms of wealth the top 1% of Americans own 40% of all assets and 50.1% of the country's income goes to the top twenty percent of households. Average wages for the majority of employees have been largely stagnating since the 1970s.
America's poverty line defined as a family of four earning less than $19,157 is at 12.7% of the general population. Approximately one out of every five children in the United States grows up below the official poverty line. Among racial groups; African Americans have the lowest median income while Asians had the highest. Regionally, the southern states had the lowest median incomes while the West Coast and New England had the highest. The current Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan remarked that the U.S.’s growing income inequality since the 1970s is, "not the type of thing which a democratic society - a capitalist democratic society - can really accept without addressing."[http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0614/p01s03-usec.html?s=itm] However, Greenspan also noted, "...you can look at the system and say it's got a lot of problems to it, and sure it does. It always has. But you can't get around the fact that this is the most extraordinarily successful economy in history."
Transportation
Alan Greenspan ]]
Because the United States is a relatively young nation, most of the development of U.S. cities has taken place since the invention of the automobile. To link its vast territory, the United States built a network of high-capacity, high-speed highways, of which the most important element is the Interstate Highway system, commissioned in the 1950s by President Dwight D. Eisenhower and modeled after the German Autobahn. The United States also has a transcontinental rail system, which is used for moving freight across the lower forty-eight states. Passenger rail service is provided by Amtrak, which serves forty-six of the lower forty-eight states.
Many cities in the United States have extensive mass-transit systems. New York City operates one of the world's largest and most heavily used subway systems. The regional rail and bus networks that extend into Long Island, New Jersey, Upstate New York, and Connecticut are among the most heavily used in the world.
Air travel is often preferred for destinations over 300 miles (500 kilometers) away. In terms of passengers, seventeen of the world's thirty busiest airports in 2004 were in the U.S., including the world's busiest, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport; in terms of cargo, in the same year, twelve of the world's thirty busiest airports were in the U.S., including the world's busiest, Memphis International Airport. There are several major seaports in the United States; the three busiest are the Port of Los Angeles, California; the Port of Long Beach, California; and the Port of New York and New Jersey. Others include Houston, Texas; Charleston, South Carolina; Savannah, Georgia; Miami, Florida; Portland, Oregon; San Francisco, California; Boston, Massachusetts; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; and Seattle, Washington; plus, outside the contiguous forty-eight states, Anchorage, Alaska, and Honolulu, Hawaii.
Society
Demographics
Hawaii
The mean center of the U.S. population continues to drift farther west and south. The fastest growing region is the western United States followed by the southern portion. According to Census 2000, the states that saw the greatest increases from 1990 were: Nevada (66.3%), Arizona (40%), Colorado (30.6%), Utah (29.6%), Idaho (28.5%), Georgia (26.4%), Florida (23.5%), Texas (22.8%), North Carolina (21.4%), and Washington (21.1%). [http://www.census.gov/population/cen2000/phc-t2/tab03.pdf]
Ethnicity and race
:Main article: Racial demographics of the United States
The United States is a very racially diverse country. According to the 2000 census, it has 31 ethnic groups with at least one million members each, and numerous others represented in smaller amounts.
The majority of Americans descend from white European immigrants who arrived at the establishment of the first colonies (most after Reconstruction). This majority--69.1% in 2000--decreases each year, and is expected to become a plurality within a few decades. The most frequently stated European ancestries are German (15.2%), Irish (10.8%), English (8.7%), Italian (5.6%) and Scandinavian (3.7%). Many immigrants also hail from Slavic countries such as Poland and Russia. Other significant immigrant populations came from eastern and southern Europe and French Canada.
Russia
Hispanics from Mexico and South and Central America are the largest minority group in the country, comprising 12.5% of the population (2000 census). People of Mexican descent made up 7.3% of the population in the 2000 census, and this proportion is expected to increase significantly in the coming decades.
About 12.3% (2000 census) of the American people are African Americans (Blacks). African Americans are spread throughout the country, but their presence is largest in the South.
Asian Americans--including Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders--are a third significant minority (3.7% of the population in 2000). Most Asian Americans are concentrated on the West Coast and Hawaii. The largest groups are immigrants or descendants of emigrants from the Philippines, China, India, Vietnam, South Korea, and Japan.
Indigenous peoples in the United States, such as American Indians and Inuit, make up 0.9% of the population (2000 census). About 35% live on Indian reservations.
Religion
Polls estimate that just under 80 percent of Americans are Christians of various denominations. The other 20 percent comprises other religions such as Hinduism, Judaism, Islam, and Buddhism, other various faiths, and those without a specific religion.
The United States is noteworthy among developed nations for its relatively high level of religiosity. According to a 2004 Gallup poll, about 44% of Americans attend a religious service at least once a week. However, this rate is not uniform across the country; attendance is more common in the Bible Belt—composed largely of Southern and Midwestern states—than in the Northeast and West Coast. In the Southern states, Baptists are the largest group, followed by Methodists; Roman Catholics are dominant in the Northeast and in large parts of the Midwest due to their being settled by descendants of Catholic immigrants from Europe (such as Germany, Ireland, Italy, and Poland) or other parts of North America (mainly Quebec and Puerto Rico). The rest of the country for the most part has a complex mixture of various Christian groups.
Education
West Coast's home at Monticello and the University of Virginia (library building shown above, and designed by Jefferson), the only collegiate campus on the list. Both sites are located in Charlottesville, Virginia.]]
In the United States, education is a state, not federal, responsibility, and the laws and standards vary considerably. However, the federal government, through the Department of Education, is involved with funding of some programs and exerts some influence through its ability to control funding. In most states, all students must attend mandatory schooling starting with kindergarten, which children normally enter at age 5, and following through 12th grade, which is normally completed at age 18
Idle HandsIdle Hands is a 1999 comedy/horror movie starring Devon Sawa, Seth Green, and Jessica Alba. It follows the life of a teen whose hand becomes possessed and goes on a killing spree, even after being cut off from his arm.
Cast
- Devon Sawa - Anton Tobias
- Seth Green - Mick
- Elden Henson - Pnub
- Jessica Alba - Molly
- Vivica A. Fox - Debi LeCure
- Christopher Hart - The Hand
- Jack Noseworthy - Randy
- Katie Wright - Tanya
- Sean Whalen - McMacy
- Nicholas Sadler - Ruck
- Fred Willard - Dad Tobias
- Connie Ray - Mom Tobias
- Steve Van Wormer - Curtis
- Kelly Monaco - Tiffany
- Timothy Stack - Principal Tidwell
Plot
Anton Tobias (Sawa) is your average lazy, stoner teenager. He has two caring parents (Willard and Ray) and two cool best friends, Pnub (Henson) and Mick (Green). He also has a crush on Molly, the beautiful girl across the street (Alba).
Everything is going fine until a string of murders plagues the town. Then, when Anton's parents wind up dead, all the clues point to Anton. After killing his two best friends, he learns that his right hand has become possesed. Pnub and Mick decide not to go to heaven and instead return to their former bodies. With their help, Anton must stop his possessed hand before it can get to Molly.
External links
- [http://imdb.com/title/tt0138510/ Idle Hands] at IMDb
Category:1999 films
Category:Comedy films
Category:Horror films
Category:Teen films
TV series
A television program is the content of television broadcasting. The content of an individual broadcast may be referred to as a television program (U.S., Canada, and Australia), television programme (UK, NZ, Ireland and South Africa) or television show. A program may be a one-off broadcast or, more usually, part of a periodically returning television series. A television series that is intended to air a finite number of episodes is usually called a miniseries. Americans call a short run lasting less than a year a season; Europeans call this a series. This season or series usually consists of 10–24 installments of the series. A single instance of a program is called an episode, although this is sometimes also called a "show" or "program." A one-off broadcast may be called a "special." A television movie is a movie that is initially aired on television rather than being released in cinemas or direct-to-video, although many successful television movies are later released on video.
What television programming is
The content of television programs may be factual, as in documentaries, news, and reality television, or fictional as in comedy and drama. It may be topical as in the case of news and some made-for-television movies or historical as in the case of such documentaries or fictional series. It may be primarily instructional as in the case of educational programming, or entertaining as is the case in situation comedy, reality TV, and variety shows.
A drama program usually features a set of actors in a somewhat familiar setting. The program follows their lives and their adventures. Many shows, especially before the 1980s, maintained a status quo where the main characters and the premise changed little. If some change happened to the characters lives during the episode, it was usually undone by the end. (Because of this, the episodes could usually be watched in any order.) Since the 1980s, there are many series that feature progressive change to the plot, the characters, or both.
Common TV program periods include regular broadcasts (like TV news), TV series (usually seasonal and ongoing with a duration of only a few episodes to many seasons), or TV miniseries which is an extended film, usually with a small pre-determined number of episodes and a set plot and timeline. Miniseries usually range from about 3 to 10 hours in length, though critics often complain when programs hit the short end of that range and are still marketed as "minis." In the UK, the term "miniseries" is only usually used in references to imported programmes, and such short-run series are usually called "serials" there. In the United States, most regular television series have 22 episodes per year. In general, dramas usually last 44 minutes (an hour with commercials), while comedies last 22 (30 with commercials). However, with the rise of cable networks, especially pay ones, series and episode lengths have been changing. Cable networks usually feature series lasting thirteen episodes. Many British series have significantly shorter yearly runs.
Old television shows begin with a title sequence, show opening credits at the bottom of the screen over the beginning of the show, and include closing credits at the end of the show. However, in the 1990s shows began cold opening with a "teaser" (a short beginning to the episode, designed to catch the viewer's attention), followed by a title sequence, and a commercial break. More plot-driven shows begin with a "previously" (a short introduction to past major plot events through excerpts), even before the teaser. And, to save time, some shows omit the title sequence altogether, folding the names normally featured there into the opening credits.
While television series appearing in TV networks are usually commissioned by the networks themselves, the real revenue for the producers is typically when the product is sold into syndication. However, with the rise of the DVD home video format, box sets containing entire seasons or the complete run have become a significant revenue source as well.
How programs are made
:What follows is the standard procedure for shows on network television in the United States.
Someone (called the show "creator") comes up with the idea for a new television series. This consists of the concept, the characters, usually some crew, and sometimes some big-name actors. They "pitch" it to the various television networks, hoping to find one that's interested. If a network is interested, they will "order" a pilot (a prototype first episode of the series).
To create the pilot, the structure and team of the whole series needs to be put together. If the network likes the pilot, they will "pick up" the show for their next season (UK: series). Sometimes they'll save it for "midseason" or request re-writes and further review (know in the industry as "Development hell"). And other times they'll pass entirely, leaving the show's creator forced to "shop it around"' to other networks. Many shows never make it past the pilot stage.
If the show is picked up, a "run" of episodes is ordered. Usually only 13 episodes are ordered at first, although a series will typically last for at least 22 episodes (the last nine episodes sometimes being known as the "back nine", borrowing a term from golf).
The show hires a "stable" of writers, who usually work in parallel: the first writer works on the first episode, the second on the second episode, and so forth. When all of the writers have been used, the assignment of episodes continues starting with the first writer again. On other shows, however, the writers work as a team. Sometimes they will develop story ideas individually, and pitch them to the show's creator, who then folds them together into a script and rewrites them.
The executive producer, often the show's creator, is in charge of running the show. They pick crew and cast (subject to approval by the network), approve and often write series plots, and sometimes write and direct major episodes. A whole host of other producers of various names work under him or her, to make sure the show is always running smoothly.
Once the script for a show is written, a director is found for the episodes. The director's job is to turn the words of the script into film. They decide how scenes should be "staged" and where the cameras should be placed; they also often coach the actors, including any guest stars who may be in the particular episode. On television shows, directors are often interchangeable, mainly serving the dictates of the writer.
A director of photography takes care of making the show look good, doing things with lighting and so on.
Finally, an editor cuts the various pieces of film together, adds the musical score, and assembles the completed show.
The show is then turned over to the network, which sends it out to its affiliates, which air it in the specified timeslot. If the Nielsen Ratings are good, the show is kept alive as long as possible. If not, the show is usually cancelled. The show's creators are then left to shop around remaining episodes, and the possibility of future episodes, to other networks. On especially successful series, the producers sometimes call a halt to a series on their own like M
- A
- S
- H and end it with a concluding episode which sometimes is a big production called a series finale.
If the show is popular or lucrative, and a number of episodes (usually 100 episodes or more) are made, it goes into syndication where broadcast rights are then resold.
Common genres
- TV comedy (typically situation comedy or sketch comedy)
- TV documentary
- TV drama (including dramedy)
- TV talk shows
- TV news
- TV current affairs shows
- TV cartoons
- TV infomercials
- TV miniseries
- Game shows
- Soap operas
- Reality TV
See also
- Alphabetical list of television programs
- Continuity
- Dead air
- List of television program categories
- TV series (China)
ja:テレビ番組
Dark Angel (TV series)Dark Angel (2000-2002) was a cyberpunk science fiction television series, created by | | |
