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HISTORY OF FILM AND TELEVISION

On April 23, 1896 crowds walking up Broadway and across Herald Square
were coming to see the first public exhibition of Thomas Edisons latest
invention, the Vitascope, a machine that projected moving pictures into a
screen large enough for everybody in the theatre to view them at once. The first
half of the program consisted of skits and songs by the European singer Albert
Chevalier. But the real star of the evening was hidden under blue brocade in the
second balcony of the theatre. Resembling he gun turret on a destroyer, the projection
booth housed two Vitascopes (one was a spare), loaded with film and ready to run. When
the vaudeville stopped, attention was focused on a screen in the middle of the stage. The
projectors started whirring, sending forty-six frames of film past the lens every second, and
immediately the audience was enthralled. Two young dancers in pink and blue dresses
(each frame of film had been tinted by hand) performed an umbrella dance. Next, scenes of
surf breaking on the beach amazed the spectators. A comic boxing match, a vaudeville skit,
and another dance routine quickly followed. The audience cheered and cheered. A reviewer
for the New York Times called the presentation wonderfully real and singularly
exhilarating. The movies had arrived.
Koster and Bials Music Hall is gone now, replaced by Macys Department Store. But even
today, if you walk the streets of New York, or any town across the country on balmy spring
evening, you are likely to see people standing in line, waiting to see moving pictures on a
screen.
Motion pictures and television both integrate sight and sound in their presentations.
Their histories at first seem to be separate, but on closer examination the two media have
much in common. Both depend on the same perceptual mechanism to achieve the illusion
of motion; their economics are intertwined; directors and stars from one medium cross
over into the other; and, in the future, new technologies will further erase the differences
between them.

1) Find in the text synonyms of:
Big, huge: __________
Enchanted, captivated: __________
Exciting, thrilling: __________
Pleasant, temperate: __________
Twisted, knotted: __________

2) Match the underlined words in the text with their corresponding meaning:
1. __________: the large, flat surface that films/movies or pictures are shown on.
2. __________: a person who is watching an event, especially a sports event.
3. __________: a short piece of humorous writing or a performance that makes fun of somebody
or something by copying them.
4. __________: photographs that a film or video is made of.
5. __________: the ability to see.
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6. __________: what you can hear coming form a television, radio, etc, or as part of a
film/movie.
7. __________: the act or process of moving or the way something moves.

3) Read the text again and answer these questions:
1) How did the Vitascope work?
2) Who was Albert Chevalier?
3) How are television and cinema connected?

4) Read this biography and fill in the blanks with the verbs in brackets with the past simple or
present perfect.
Clint Eastwood __________ (be) a major film star for more than fifty years. In this
time he __________ (become) one of the most respected Hollywood actors and he
__________ (start) a successful career in film directing, as well.
Eastwood __________ (be born) in San Francisco in 1930, but he __________ (move)
very often as his father __________ (work) at a great variety of jobs along the West
Coast. He __________ (complete) his studies in Seattle, and he __________ (begin) his career in
1954.
He __________ (appear) in more than fifty-five films, and he __________ (direct) films for more
than thirty years. Eastwood _________ (receive) multiple awards and nominations for his work
throughout his career.

5) Using the following information, write about Johnny Depp.
Born: John Christopher Depp II, Owensboro, Kentucky, on June 9, 1963
Occupation: Actor, screenwriter, director, producer, musician
Family:
Siblings: one brother and two sisters
Spouse: Lori Anne Allison (19831986)
Partners: Sherilyn Fenn (19851988), Winona Ryder (19891993), Kate Moss (19941998),
Vanessa Paradis (1998present)
Children: Lily-Rose Melody Depp (born 1999), John Christopher "Jack" Depp III (born 2002)
Career: (from 1984 present)
1984: first important film: A Nightmare on Elm Street
1986: Platoon
1990: Edward Scissorhands
2003: Pirates of the Caribbean
2005: Charlie and the Chocolate Factory