title: Dagestan

text: On 21 December 1917, Ingushetia, Chechnya, Dagestan and the rest of the North Caucasus declared independence from Russia and formed a single state called the "United Mountain Dwellers of the North Caucasus" (also known as the Mountainous Republic of the Northern Caucasus).. The capital of the new state was moved to Temir-Khan-Shura. The first prime minister of the state was Tapa Chermoyev, a prominent Chechen statesman. The second prime minister was an Ingush statesman Vassan-Girey Dzhabagiev, who in 1917 also became the author of the constitution of the land, and in 1920 was re-elected for a third term. After the Bolshevik Revolution, Ottoman armies occupied Azerbaijan and Dagestan and the region became part of the short-lived Mountainous Republic of the Northern Caucasus. After more than three years of fighting the White Army and local nationalists, the Bolsheviks achieved victory and the Dagestan Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic was proclaimed on 20 January 1921. As the newly created Soviet Union was consolidating control in the region, Dagestan declared itself a republic within the Russian Soviet federation but did not follow the other ASSRs in declaring sovereignty.


title: Dagestan

text: On 7 August 1999, the Islamic International Peacekeeping Brigade (IIPB), an Islamist group from Chechnya led by warlords Shamil Basayev, Ibn Al-Khattab and Ramzan Akhmadov, launched a military invasion of Dagestan, in support of the Shura separatist rebels with the aim of creating an "independent Islamic State of Dagestan".


title: Dagestan

text: The invaders were supported by part of the local population but were driven back by the Russian military and local paramilitary groups. In response to the invasion, Russian forces subsequently reinvaded Chechnya later that year.


title: Dagestan

text: Dagestani soldiers participated in the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, many of whom were killed in action. In September, Dagestan became a center of the 2022 North Caucasian protests against mobilization.


title: Dagestan

text: The parliament of Dagestan is the People's Assembly, consisting of 72 deputies elected for a four-year term. The People's Assembly is the highest executive and legislative body of the republic.


title: Dagestan

text: The Constitution of Dagestan was adopted on 10 July 2003. According to it, the highest executive authority lies with the State Council, comprising representatives of fourteen ethnicities. The Constitutional Assembly of Dagestan appoints the members of the State Council for a term of four years. The State Council appoints the members of the Government.


title: Dagestan

text: The ethnicities represented in the State Council are Avars, Dargins, Kumyks, Lezgins, Laks, Azerbaijanis, Tabasarans, Russians, Chechens, Nogais, Aguls, Rutuls, Tsakhurs, and Tats.


title: Dagestan

text: Formerly, the Chairman of the State Council was the highest executive post in the republic, held by Magomedali Magomedovich Magomedov until 2006. On 20 February 2006, the People's Assembly passed a resolution terminating this post and disbanding the State Council. Russian president, Vladimir Putin offered the People's Assembly the candidature of Mukhu Aliyev for the newly established post of the president of the Republic of Dagestan. The People's Assembly accepted the nomination, and Mukhu Aliyev became the first president of the republic. On 20 February 2010 Aliyev was replaced by Magomedsalam Magomedov. Then the head of the republic becomes Ramazan Abdulatipov (acting until 2013 – 2017, following the resignation of Magomedov). Since 3 October 2017, the head of the Republic is appointed Vladimir Vasilyev.


title: Dagestan

text: Because its mountainous terrain impedes travel and communication, Dagestan is unusually ethnically diverse and still largely tribal. It is Russia's most heterogeneous republic. Dagestan's population is rapidly growing.


title: Dagestan

text: Dagestan has the second highest life expectancy in Russia. Higher duration of life is observed only in Ingushetia.


title: Dagestan

text: The people of Dagestan include a large variety of ethnicities. According to the 2010 Census, Northeast Caucasians (including Avars, Dargins, Lezgins, Laks, Tabasarans, and Chechens) make up almost 75% of the population of Dagestan. Turkic peoples, Kumyks, Azerbaijanis, and Nogais make up 21%, and Russians 3.6%. Other ethnicities (e.g. Tats, who are an Iranian people) each account for less than 0.4% of the total population.


title: Dagestan

text: Such groups as the Botlikh, the Andi, the Akhvakhs, the Tsez and about ten other groups were reclassified as Avars between the 1926 and 1939 censuses.


title: Dagestan

text: More than 30 local languages are commonly spoken, most belonging to the Nakh-Daghestanian language family. Russian became the principal lingua franca in Dagestan during the 20th century; Over 20 of Russia's 131 endangered languages as identified by UNESCO can be found in Dagestan. Most of these endangered languages have speakers in the mountainous region on the Dagestan-Georgia border.


title: Dagestan

text: Prior to Soviet rule, the literary lingua-franca status to some extent belonged to Classical Arabic. The northern Avar dialect of Khunzakh has also served as a lingua franca in mountainous Dagestan where Avar-related peoples lived. And throughout centuries the Kumyk language had been the lingua-franca for the bigger part of the Northern Caucasus, from Dagestan to Kabarda, until the 1930s. Kumyk also had been an official language for communication of the Russian Imperial administration with the local peoples.


title: Dagestan

text: The first Russian grammar written about a language from present-day Dagestan was for Kumyk. Author Timofey Makarov wrote:


title: Dagestan

text: According to a 2012 survey which interviewed 56,900 people, 83% of the population of Dagestan adheres to Islam, 2.4% to the Russian Orthodox Church, 2% to Caucasian folk religion and other native faiths, 1% are non-denominational Christians. In addition, 9% of the population identify as "spiritual but not religious", 2% as atheist, and 0.6% as other and no answer.


title: Dagestan

text: Dagestanis adherents of Islam are largely Sunni Muslims of the Shafii rites. On the Caspian coast, particularly in and around the port city of Derbent, the population (primarily made up of Azerbaijanis) is Shia. A Salafi minority is also present, which is often a target of official repression.


title: Dagestan

text: The appearance of Sufi mysticism in Dagestan dates back to the 14th century. The two Sufi orders that are widely spread in the North Caucasus were the Naqshbandiya and the Qadiriya. The mystic tariqas preached tolerance and coexistence between the diverse people in the region. The Communist total intolerance for any religion after the Communist Revolution of 1917 also suppressed the Sufi movements. Shaykh Said Afandi al-Chirkawi was a prominent scholar, spiritual leader, and murshid (guide) of Naqshbandi and Shadhili tariqahs in Dagestan until his death.


title: Dagestan

text: Since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, there has been an Islamic revival in the region. By 1996, Dagestan had 1,670 registered mosques, nine Islamic universities, 25 madrassas, 670 maktab, and it is estimated that "nearly one in five Dagestanis was involved in Islamic education", while of the 20,000 or so Russian pilgrims for the Hajj more than half were from Dagestan.


title: Dagestan

text: A relatively large number of native Tati-speaking Jews – the "Mountain Jews" – were also present in these same coastal areas. However, since 1991 and the collapse of the Soviet Union, many have migrated to Israel and the United States. These were an extension of much larger Azerbaijani Jewish community across the border in the Azerbaijani districts of Quba and Shamakhi.


title: Dagestan

text: The number of Christians among the non-Slavic indigenous population is very low, with estimates between 2,000 and 2,500. Most of these are Pentecostal Christians from the Lak ethnicity. The largest congregation is Osanna Evangelical Christian Church (Pentecostal) in Makhachkala, with more than 1,000 members.


title: Dagestan

text: In 2006, a genetic study of the Dagestan populations, published in Human Biology, suggested that inhabitants of Dagestan are closely related to Anatolian Turks and Cypriot Turks. Yunusbayev et al. pointed out that these findings support the theory that indigenous groups of Dagestan can trace their roots back to ancient Anatolian farming tribes who introduced early agricultural traditions.


title: Dagestan

text: The major industries in Dagestan include oil production, engineering, chemicals, machine building, textile manufacturing, food processing and timber. Oil deposits are located in the narrow coastal region. The Dagestani oil is of high quality and is delivered to other regions. Dagestan's natural gas production goes mostly to satisfy local needs. Agriculture is varied and includes grain-farming, viticulture and wine-making, sheep-farming, and dairying. The engineering and metalworking industries own 20% of the republic's industrial production assets and employ 25% of all industrial workers. Dagestan's hydroelectric power industry is developing rapidly. There are five power plants on the Sulak River providing hydroelectric power. It has been estimated that Dagestan's total potential hydroelectric power resources are 4.4 billion kW. Dagestan has a well-developed transportation system. Railways connect the capital Makhachkala to Moscow, Astrakhan, and the Azerbaijani capital, Baku. The Moscow-Baku highway also passes through Dagestan, and there are air links with major cities.


title: Dagestan

text: Conditions for economic development are favorable in Dagestan, but – – the republic's low starting level for a successful transition to market relations, in addition to rampant corruption, has made the region highly dependent on its underground economy and the subsidies coming from the central Russian government. Corruption in Dagestan is more severe than in other regions of the former Soviet Union and is coupled with a flourishing black market and clan-based economic system.


title: Dagestan

text: In 2011 Rostelecom started the implementation of WDM-based equipment on the backbone network for data transmission in the Republic of Dagestan. Due to WDM introduction, the fiber-optic communication lines bandwidth increased to 2.5 Gbit/s. Rostelecom invested about 48 million rubles in the project.


title: Dagestan

text: Epic-historical songs about the defeat of the armies of Persian Nadir Shah and various episodes of the nineteenth-century wars are popular among the Avars. Best-known are the ballads "Khochbar" and "Kamalil Bashir." In the second half of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth, Avar culture and literature grew significantly. Well-known Avar literary figures include the poets Aligaji of Inkho (who died 1875) and Chanka (1866–1909), the lyric poet Makhmud (1873–1919), the satirist Tsadasa Gamzat (1877–1951), and the celebrated poet Rasul Gamzatov (1923-2003). Among his poems was Zhuravli, which became a well-known Russian song.


title: Dagestan

text: There is a Dagestani Philharmonic Orchestra and a State Academic Dance Ensemble. Gotfrid Hasanov, who is said to be the first professional composer from Dagestan, wrote "Khochbar," the first Dagestani opera, in 1945. Dagestani folk dances include a fast-paced dance called the "lezginka". It derives its names from the Lezgin people; nevertheless, Azerbaijanis, Circassians, Abkhazians, Mountain Jews, Caucasian Avars, the Russian Kuban, and Terek Cossacks and many other tribes have their own versions.


title: Dagestan

text: "Khingal" is the Dagestan's national dish of small dumplings boiled in ram's broth. Depending on the cook's ethnicity, the dumplings can be oval or round, filled with meat or cheese, and served with a garlic or sour cream sauce. Dairy products and meat constitute a large part of the diet in the mountainous regions, while in the valley zones, vegetables and grain flour are eaten in addition to fruits, edible gourds, edible herbs, and wild grasses.


title: Dagestan

text: In recent times the region has been recognized for producing some of the world's best athletes in combat sports and produces the most MMA fighters of any region relative to population. Dagestani born Khabib Nurmagomedov was a UFC Lightweight Champion who retired undefeated.


title: Maya Angelou

text: Maya Angelou ( ; born Marguerite Annie Johnson; April 4, 1928 – May 28, 2014) was an American memoirist, popular poet, and civil rights activist. She published seven autobiographies, three books of essays, several books of poetry, and is credited with a list of plays, movies, and television shows spanning over 50 years. She received dozens of awards and more than 50 honorary degrees. Angelou is best known for her series of seven autobiographies, which focus on her childhood and early adult experiences. The first, "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings" (1969), tells of her life up to the age of 17 and brought her international recognition and acclaim.


title: Maya Angelou

text: She became a poet and writer after a string of odd jobs during her young adulthood. These included fry cook, sex worker, nightclub performer, "Porgy and Bess" cast member, Southern Christian Leadership Conference coordinator, and correspondent in Egypt and Ghana during the decolonization of Africa. She was also an actress, writer, director, and producer of plays, movies, and public television programs. In 1982, she was named the first Reynolds Professor of American Studies at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. She was active in the Civil Rights Movement and worked with Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X. Beginning in the 1990s, she made approximately 80 appearances a year on the lecture circuit, something she continued into her eighties. In 1993, Angelou recited her poem "On the Pulse of Morning" (1993) at the first inauguration of Bill Clinton, making her the first poet to make an inaugural recitation since Robert Frost at the inauguration of John F. Kennedy in 1961.


title: Maya Angelou

text: With the publication of "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings", Angelou publicly discussed aspects of her personal life. She was respected as a spokesperson for Black people and women, and her works have been considered a defense of Black culture. Her works are widely used in schools and universities worldwide, although attempts have been made to ban her books from some U.S. libraries. Angelou's most celebrated works have been labeled as autobiographical fiction, but many critics consider them to be autobiographies. She made a deliberate attempt to challenge the common structure of the autobiography by critiquing, changing and expanding the genre. Her books center on themes including racism, identity, family and travel.


title: Maya Angelou

text: Marguerite Annie Johnson was born in St. Louis, Missouri, on April 4, 1928, the second child of Bailey Johnson, a doorman and navy dietitian, and Vivian (Baxter) Johnson, a nurse and card dealer. Angelou's older brother, Bailey Jr., nicknamed Marguerite "Maya", derived from "My" or "Mya Sister". When Angelou was three and her brother four, their parents' "calamitous marriage" ended, and their father sent them to Stamps, Arkansas, alone by train, to live with their paternal grandmother, Annie Henderson. In "an astonishing exception" to the harsh economics of African Americans of the time, Angelou's grandmother prospered financially during the Great Depression and World War II because the general store she owned sold needed basic commodities and because "she made wise and honest investments".


title: Maya Angelou

text: Four years later, when Angelou was seven and her brother eight, the children's father "came to Stamps without warning" and returned them to their mother's care in St. Louis. At the age of eight, while living with her mother, Angelou was sexually abused and raped by her mother's boyfriend, a man named Freeman. She told her brother, who told the rest of their family. Freeman was found guilty but was jailed for only one day. Four days after his release, he was murdered, probably by Angelou's uncles. Angelou became mute for almost five years, believing, as she stated, "I thought, my voice killed him; I killed that man, because I told his name. And then I thought I would never speak again, because my voice would kill anyone." According to Marcia Ann Gillespie and her colleagues, who wrote a biography about Angelou, it was during this period of silence when Angelou developed her extraordinary memory, her love for books and literature, and her ability to listen and observe the world around her.


title: Maya Angelou

text: Shortly after Freeman's murder, when Angelou was eight and her brother nine, Angelou and her brother were sent back to their grandmother. She attended the Lafayette County Training School, in Stamps, a Rosenwald School. Angelou credits a teacher and friend of her family, Mrs. Bertha Flowers, with helping her speak again, challenging her by saying, "You do not love poetry, not until you speak it". Flowers introduced her to authors such as Charles Dickens, William Shakespeare, Edgar Allan Poe, Georgia Douglas Johnson, and James Weldon Johnson, authors who would affect her life and career, as well as Black female artists like Frances Harper, Anne Spencer, and Jessie Fauset.


title: Maya Angelou

text: When Angelou was fourteen and her brother fifteen, she and her brother moved in once again with their mother, who had since moved to Oakland, California. During World War II, Angelou attended the California Labor School. At the age of 16, she became the first Black female streetcar conductor in San Francisco. She wanted the job badly, admiring the uniforms of the operators—so much so that her mother referred to it as her "dream job". Her mother encouraged her to pursue the position, but warned her that she would need to arrive early and work harder than others. In 2014, Angelou received a lifetime achievement award from the Conference of Minority Transportation Officials as part of a session billed "Women Who Move the Nation".


title: Maya Angelou

text: Three weeks after completing school, at the age of seventeen, she gave birth to her son, Clyde (who later changed his name to Guy Johnson).


title: Maya Angelou

text: In 1951, Angelou married Tosh Angelos, a Greek electrician, former sailor, and aspiring musician, despite the condemnation of interracial relationships at the time and the disapproval of her mother. She took modern dance classes during this time, and met dancers and choreographers Alvin Ailey and Ruth Beckford. Ailey and Angelou formed a dance team, calling themselves "Al and Rita", and performed modern dance at fraternal Black organizations throughout San Francisco but never became successful. Angelou, her new husband, and her son moved to New York City so she could study African dance with Trinidadian dancer Pearl Primus, but they returned to San Francisco a year later.


title: Maya Angelou

text: After Angelou's marriage ended in 1954, she danced professionally in clubs around San Francisco, including the nightclub The Purple Onion, where she sang and danced to calypso music. Up to that point, she went by the name of "Marguerite Johnson", or "Rita", but at the strong suggestion of her managers and supporters at The Purple Onion, she changed her professional name to "Maya Angelou" (her nickname and former married surname). It was a "distinctive name" that set her apart and captured the feel of her calypso dance performances. During 1954 and 1955, Angelou toured Europe with a production of the opera "Porgy and Bess". She began her practice of learning the language of every country she visited, and in a few years she gained proficiency in several languages. In 1957, riding on the popularity of calypso, Angelou recorded her first album, "Miss Calypso", which was reissued as a CD in 1996. She appeared in an off-Broadway review that inspired the 1957 film "Calypso Heat Wave", in which Angelou sang and performed her own compositions.


title: Maya Angelou

text: Angelou met novelist John Oliver Killens in 1959 and, at his urging, moved to New York to concentrate on her writing career. She joined the Harlem Writers Guild, where she met several major African-American authors, including John Henrik Clarke, Rosa Guy, Paule Marshall, and Julian Mayfield, and was published for the first time. In 1960, after meeting civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. and hearing him speak, she and Killens organized "the legendary" "Cabaret for Freedom" to benefit the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), and she was named SCLC's Northern Coordinator. According to scholar Lyman B. Hagen, her contributions to civil rights as a fundraiser and SCLC organizer were successful and "eminently effective". Angelou also began her pro-Castro and anti-apartheid activism during this time. She had joined the crowd cheering for Fidel Castro when he first entered the Hotel Theresa in Harlem New York during United Nations 15th General Assembly on September 19, 1960.


title: Maya Angelou

text: In 1961, Angelou performed in Jean Genet's play "The Blacks", along with Abbey Lincoln, Roscoe Lee Brown, James Earl Jones, Louis Gossett, Godfrey Cambridge, and Cicely Tyson. Also in 1961, she met South African freedom fighter Vusumzi Make; they never officially married. She and her son Guy moved with Make to Cairo, where Angelou worked as an associate editor at the weekly English-language newspaper "The Arab Observer". In 1962, her relationship with Make ended, and she and Guy moved to Accra, Ghana, so he could attend college, but he was seriously injured in an automobile accident. Angelou remained in Accra for his recovery and ended up staying there until 1965. She became an administrator at the University of Ghana, and was active in the African-American expatriate community. She was a feature editor for "The African Review", a freelance writer for the "Ghanaian Times", wrote and broadcast for Radio Ghana, and worked and performed for Ghana's National Theatre. She performed in a revival of "The Blacks" in Geneva and Berlin.


title: Maya Angelou

text: In Accra, she became close friends with Malcolm X during his visit in the early 1960s. Angelou returned to the U.S. in 1965 to help him build a new civil rights organization, the Organization of Afro-American Unity; he was assassinated shortly afterward. Devastated and adrift, she joined her brother in Hawaii, where she resumed her singing career. She moved back to Los Angeles to focus on her writing career. Working as a market researcher in Watts, Angelou witnessed the riots in the summer of 1965. She acted in and wrote plays, and returned to New York in 1967. She met her lifelong friend Rosa Guy and renewed her friendship with James Baldwin, whom she had met in Paris in the 1950s and called "my brother", during this time. Her friend Jerry Purcell provided Angelou with a stipend to support her writing.


title: Maya Angelou

text: In 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. asked Angelou to organize a march. She agreed, but postponed again, and in what Gillespie calls "a macabre twist of fate", he was assassinated on her 40th birthday (April 4). Devastated again, she was encouraged out of her depression by her friend James Baldwin. As Gillespie states, "If 1968 was a year of great pain, loss, and sadness, it was also the year when America first witnessed the breadth and depth of Maya Angelou's spirit and creative genius". Despite having almost no experience, she wrote, produced, and narrated "Blacks, Blues, Black!", a ten-part series of documentaries about the connection between blues music and Black Americans' African heritage, and what Angelou called the "Africanisms still current in the U.S." for National Educational Television, the precursor of PBS. Also in 1968, inspired at a dinner party she attended with Baldwin, cartoonist Jules Feiffer, and his wife Judy, and challenged by Random House editor Robert Loomis, she wrote her first autobiography, "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings", published in 1969. This brought her international recognition and acclaim.


title: Maya Angelou

text: Released in 1972, Angelou's "Georgia, Georgia", produced by a Swedish film company and filmed in Sweden, was the first produced screenplay by a Black woman. She also wrote the film's soundtrack, despite having very little additional input in the filming of the movie. Angelou married Paul du Feu, a Welsh carpenter and ex-husband of writer Germaine Greer, in San Francisco in 1973. Over the next ten years, as Gillespie has stated, "She [Angelou] had accomplished more than many artists hope to achieve in a lifetime." Angelou worked as a composer, writing for singer Roberta Flack, and composing movie scores. She wrote articles, short stories, TV scripts, documentaries, autobiographies, and poetry. She produced plays and was named visiting professor at several colleges and universities. She was "a reluctant actor", and was nominated for a Tony Award in 1973 for her role in "Look Away". As a theater director, in 1988 she undertook a revival of Errol John's play "Moon on a Rainbow Shawl" at the Almeida Theatre in London.


title: Maya Angelou

text: In 1977, Angelou appeared in a supporting role in the television mini-series "Roots". She was given a multitude of awards during this period, including more than thirty honorary degrees from colleges and universities from all over the world. In the late 1970s, Angelou met Oprah Winfrey when Winfrey was a TV anchor in Baltimore, Maryland; Angelou would later become Winfrey's close friend and mentor. In 1981, Angelou and du Feu divorced.


title: Maya Angelou

text: She returned to the southern United States in 1981 because she felt she had to come to terms with her past there and, despite having no bachelor's degree, accepted the lifetime Reynolds Professorship of American Studies at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, where she was one of a few full-time African-American professors. From that point on, she considered herself "a teacher who writes". Angelou taught a variety of subjects that reflected her interests, including philosophy, ethics, theology, science, theater, and writing. "The Winston-Salem Journal "reported that even though she made many friends on campus, "she never quite lived down all of the criticism from people who thought she was more of a celebrity than an intellect ... [and] an overpaid figurehead". The last course she taught at Wake Forest was in 2011, but she was planning to teach another course in late 2014. Her final speaking engagement at the university was in late 2013. Beginning in the 1990s, Angelou actively participated in the lecture circuit in a customized tour bus, something she continued into her eighties.


title: Maya Angelou

text: In 1993, Angelou recited her poem "On the Pulse of Morning" at the presidential inauguration of Bill Clinton, becoming the first poet to make an inaugural recitation since Robert Frost at John F. Kennedy's inauguration in 1961. Her recitation resulted in more fame and recognition for her previous works, and broadened her appeal "across racial, economic, and educational boundaries". The recording of the poem won a Grammy Award. In June 1995, she delivered what Richard Long called her "second 'public' poem", entitled "A Brave and Startling Truth", which commemorated the 50th anniversary of the United Nations.


title: Maya Angelou

text: Angelou achieved her goal of directing a feature film in 1996, "Down in the Delta", which featured actors such as Alfre Woodard and Wesley Snipes. Also in 1996, she collaborated with R&B artists Ashford & Simpson on seven of the eleven tracks of their album "Been Found". The album was responsible for three of Angelou's only "Billboard" chart appearances. In 2000, she created a successful collection of products for Hallmark, including greeting cards and decorative household items. She responded to critics who charged her with being too commercial by stating that "the enterprise was perfectly in keeping with her role as 'the people's poet'". More than thirty years after Angelou began writing her life story, she completed her sixth autobiography "A Song Flung Up to Heaven", in 2002.


title: Maya Angelou

text: Angelou campaigned for the Democratic Party in the 2008 presidential primaries, giving her public support to Hillary Clinton. In the run-up to the January Democratic primary in South Carolina, the Clinton campaign ran ads featuring Angelou's endorsement. The ads were part of the campaign's efforts to rally support in the Black community; but Barack Obama won the South Carolina primary, finishing 29 points ahead of Clinton and taking 80% of the Black vote. When Clinton's campaign ended, Angelou put her support behind Obama, who went on to win the presidential election and become the first African-American president of the United States. After Obama's inauguration, she stated, "We are growing up beyond the idiocies of racism and sexism."


title: Maya Angelou

text: In late 2010, Angelou donated her personal papers and career memorabilia to the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem. They consisted of more than 340 boxes of documents that featured her handwritten notes on yellow legal pads for "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings", a 1982 telegram from Coretta Scott King, fan mail, and personal and professional correspondence from colleagues such as her editor Robert Loomis. In 2011, Angelou served as a consultant for the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial in Washington, D.C. She spoke out in opposition to a paraphrase of a quotation by King that appeared on the memorial, saying, "The quote makes Dr. Martin Luther King look like an arrogant twit", and demanded that it be changed. Eventually, the paraphrase was removed.


title: Maya Angelou

text: In 2013, at the age of 85, Angelou published the seventh volume of autobiography in her series, entitled "Mom & Me & Mom", which focuses on her relationship with her mother.


title: Maya Angelou

text: Evidence suggests that Angelou was partially descended from the Mende people of West Africa. In 2008, a DNA test revealed that among all of her African ancestors, 45 percent were from the Congo-Angola region and 55 percent were from West Africa. A 2008 PBS documentary found that Angelou's maternal great-grandmother Mary Lee, who had been emancipated after the Civil War, became pregnant by her white former owner, John Savin. Savin forced Lee to sign a false statement accusing another man of being the father of her child. After Savin was indicted for forcing Lee to commit perjury, and despite the discovery that Savin was the father, a jury found him not guilty. Lee was sent to the Clinton County poorhouse in Missouri with her daughter, Marguerite Baxter, who became Angelou's grandmother. Angelou described Lee as "that poor little black girl, physically and mentally bruised".


title: Maya Angelou

text: The details of Angelou's life described in her seven autobiographies and in numerous interviews, speeches, and articles tended to be inconsistent. Critic Mary Jane Lupton has explained that when Angelou spoke about her life, she did so eloquently but informally and "with no time chart in front of her". For example, she was married at least twice, but never clarified the number of times she had been married, "for fear of sounding frivolous"; according to her autobiographies and to Gillespie, she married Tosh Angelos in 1951 and Paul du Feu in 1974, and began her relationship with Vusumzi Make in 1961, but never formally married him. Angelou held many jobs, including some in the sex trade, working as a prostitute and madam for lesbians, as she described in her second autobiography, "Gather Together in My Name". In a 1995 interview, Angelou said,


title: Maya Angelou

text: Angelou had one son, Guy, whose birth she described in her first autobiography; one grandson, two great-grandchildren, and, according to Gillespie, a large group of friends and extended family. Angelou's mother Vivian Baxter died in 1991 and her brother Bailey Johnson Jr., died in 2000 after a series of strokes; both were important figures in her life and her books. In 1981, the mother of her grandson disappeared with him; finding him took four years.


title: Maya Angelou

text: In 2009, the gossip website TMZ erroneously reported that Angelou had been hospitalized in Los Angeles when she was alive and well in St. Louis, which resulted in rumors of her death and, according to Angelou, concern among her friends and family worldwide. She did not earn a university degree, but according to Gillespie it was Angelou's preference to be called "Dr. Angelou" by people outside of her family and close friends. She owned two homes in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, and a "lordly brownstone" in Harlem, which was purchased in 2004 and was full of her "growing library" of books she collected throughout her life, artwork collected over the span of many decades, and well-stocked kitchens. "The Guardian" writer Gary Younge reported that in Angelou's Harlem home were several African wall hangings and her collection of paintings, including ones of several jazz trumpeters, a watercolor of Rosa Parks, and a Faith Ringgold work entitled "Maya's Quilt Of Life".


title: Maya Angelou

text: According to Gillespie, she hosted several celebrations per year at her main residence in Winston-Salem; "her skill in the kitchen is the stuff of legend—from haute cuisine to down-home comfort food". "The Winston-Salem Journal" stated: "Securing an invitation to one of Angelou's Thanksgiving dinners, Christmas tree decorating parties or birthday parties was among the most coveted invitations in town." "The New York Times", describing Angelou's residence history in New York City, stated that she regularly hosted elaborate New Year's Day parties. She combined her cooking and writing skills in her 2004 book "Hallelujah! The Welcome Table", which featured 73 recipes, many of which she learned from her grandmother and mother, accompanied by 28 vignettes. She followed up in 2010 with her second cookbook, "Great Food, All Day Long: Cook Splendidly, Eat Smart", which focused on weight loss and portion control.


title: Maya Angelou

text: Beginning with "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings", Angelou used the same "writing ritual" for many years. She would wake early in the morning and check into a hotel room, where the staff was instructed to remove any pictures from the walls. She would write on legal pads while lying on the bed, with only a bottle of sherry, a deck of cards to play solitaire, "Roget's Thesaurus", and the Bible, and would leave by the early afternoon. She would average 10–12 pages of written material a day, which she edited down to three or four pages in the evening. She went through this process to "enchant" herself, and as she said in a 1989 interview with the British Broadcasting Corporation, "relive the agony, the anguish, the "Sturm und Drang"". She placed herself back in the time she wrote about, even traumatic experiences such as her rape in "Caged Bird", in order to "tell the human truth" about her life. Angelou stated that she played cards in order to get to that place of enchantment and in order to access her memories more effectively. She said, "It may take an hour to get into it, but once I'm in it—ha! It's so delicious!" She did not find the process cathartic; rather, she found relief in "telling the truth".


title: Maya Angelou

text: Angelou died on the morning of May 28, 2014, at the age 86. She was found by her nurse. Although Angelou had reportedly been in poor health and had canceled recent scheduled appearances, she was working on another book, an autobiography about her experiences with national and world leaders. During her memorial service at Wake Forest University, her son Guy Johnson stated that despite being in constant pain due to her dancing career and respiratory failure, she wrote four books during the last ten years of her life. He said, "She left this mortal plane with no loss of acuity and no loss in comprehension."


title: Maya Angelou

text: Tributes to Angelou and condolences were paid by artists, entertainers, and world leaders, including Obama, whose sister was named after Angelou, and Bill Clinton. Harold Augenbraum, from the National Book Foundation, said that Angelou's "legacy is one that all writers and readers across the world can admire and aspire to." The week after Angelou's death, "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings" rose to number 1 on Amazon.com's bestseller list.


title: Maya Angelou

text: On May 29, 2014, Mount Zion Baptist Church in Winston-Salem, of which Angelou was a member for 30 years, held a public memorial service to honor her. On June 7, a private memorial service was held at Wait Chapel on the campus of Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem. The memorial was shown live on local stations in the Winston-Salem/Triad area and streamed live on the university web site with speeches from her son, Oprah Winfrey, Michelle Obama, and Bill Clinton. On June 15, a memorial was held at Glide Memorial Church in San Francisco, where Angelou was a member for many years. Rev. Cecil Williams, Mayor Ed Lee, and former mayor Willie Brown spoke.


title: Maya Angelou

text: Angelou wrote a total of seven autobiographies. According to scholar Mary Jane Lupton, Angelou's third autobiography "Singin' and Swingin' and Gettin' Merry Like Christmas" marked the first time a well-known African-American autobiographer had written a third volume about her life. Her books "stretch over time and place", from Arkansas to Africa and back to the U.S., and take place from the beginnings of World War II to the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. In her fifth autobiography, "All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes" (1986), Angelou tells about her return to Ghana searching for the past of her tribe. She published her seventh autobiography "Mom & Me & Mom" in 2013, at the age of 85. Critics have tended to judge Angelou's subsequent autobiographies "in light of the first", with "Caged Bird" receiving the highest praise. Angelou wrote five collections of essays, which writer Hilton Als called her "wisdom books" and "homilies strung together with autobiographical texts". Angelou used the same editor throughout her writing career, Robert Loomis, an executive editor at Random House; he retired in 2011 and has been called "one of publishing's hall of fame editors." Angelou said regarding Loomis: "We have a relationship that's kind of famous among publishers."


title: Maya Angelou

text: Angelou's long and extensive career also included poetry, plays, screenplays for television and film, directing, acting, and public speaking. She was a prolific writer of poetry; her volume "Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water 'fore I Diiie" (1971) was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize, and she was chosen by U.S. president Bill Clinton to recite her poem "On the Pulse of Morning" during his inauguration in 1993.


title: Maya Angelou

text: Angelou's successful acting career included roles in numerous plays, films, and television programs, including her appearance in the television mini-series "Roots" in 1977. Her screenplay, "Georgia, Georgia" (1972), was the first original script by a Black woman to be produced, and she was the first African-American woman to direct a major motion picture, "Down in the Delta", in 1998.


title: Maya Angelou

text: When "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings" was published in 1969, Angelou was hailed as a new kind of memoirist, one of the first African-American women who were able to publicly discuss their personal lives. According to scholar Hilton Als, up to that point, Black female writers were marginalized to the point that they were unable to present themselves as central characters in the literature they wrote. Linguist John McWhorter agreed, seeing Angelou's works, which he called "tracts", as "apologetic writing". He placed Angelou in the tradition of African-American literature as a defense of Black culture, which he called "a literary manifestation of the imperative that reigned in the black scholarship of the period". Writer Julian Mayfield, who called "Caged Bird" "a work of art that eludes description", argued that Angelou's autobiographies set a precedent for not only other Black women writers, but also African-American autobiography as a whole. Als said that "Caged Bird" marked one of the first times that a Black autobiographer could, as he put it, "write about blackness from the inside, without apology or defense". Through the writing of her autobiography, Angelou became recognized and highly respected as a spokesperson for Blacks and women. It made her "without a doubt, ... America's most visible black woman autobiographer", and "a major autobiographical voice of the time". As writer Gary Younge said, "Probably more than almost any other writer alive, Angelou's life literally is her work."


title: Maya Angelou

text: Als said that "Caged Bird" helped increase Black feminist writings in the 1970s, less through its originality than "its resonance in the prevailing Zeitgeist", or the time in which it was written, at the end of the American Civil Rights Movement. Als also claimed that Angelou's writings, more interested in self-revelation than in politics or feminism, have freed other female writers to "open themselves up without shame to the eyes of the world". Angelou critic Joanne M. Braxton stated that "Caged Bird" was "perhaps the most aesthetically pleasing" autobiography written by an African-American woman in its era. Angelou's poetry has influenced the modern hip-hop music community, including artists such as Kanye West, Common, Tupac Shakur, and Nicki Minaj.


title: Maya Angelou

text: Reviewer Elsie B. Washington called Angelou "the black woman's poet laureate". Sales of the paperback version of her books and poetry rose by 300–600% the week after Angelou's recitation. Random House, which published the poem later that year, had to reprint 400,000 copies of all her books to keep up with the demand. They sold more of her books in January 1993 than they did in all of 1992, accounting for a 1,200% increase. Angelou famously said, in response to criticism regarding using the details of her life in her work, "I agree with Balzac and 19th-century writers, black and white, who say, 'I write for money'." Younge, speaking after the publication of Angelou's third book of essays, "Letter to My Daughter" (2008), has said, "For the last couple of decades she has merged her various talents into a kind of performance art—issuing a message of personal and social uplift by blending poetry, song and conversation."


title: Maya Angelou

text: Angelou's books, especially "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings", have been criticized by many parents, causing their removal from school curricula and library shelves. According to the National Coalition Against Censorship, some parents and some schools have objected to "Caged Bird"s depictions of lesbianism, premarital cohabitation, pornography, and violence. Some have been critical of the book's sexually explicit scenes, use of language, and irreverent depictions of religion. "Caged Bird" appeared third on the American Library Association (ALA) list of the 100 Most Frequently Challenged Books of 1990–2000 and sixth on the ALA's 2000–2009 list.


title: Maya Angelou

text: Angelou was honored by universities, literary organizations, government agencies, and special interest groups. Her honors included a Pulitzer Prize nomination for her book of poetry, "Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water 'fore I Diiie," a Tony Award nomination for her role in the 1973 play "Look Away", and three Grammys for her spoken word albums. She served on two presidential committees, and was awarded the Spingarn Medal in 1994, the National Medal of Arts in 2000, and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2011. Angelou was awarded more than fifty honorary degrees. In 2021, the United States Mint announced that Angelou would be among the first women depicted on the reverse of the quarter as a part of the American Women quarters series. The coins were released in January 2022. She is the first Black woman to be depicted on a quarter.


title: Maya Angelou

text: Angelou's autobiographies have been used in narrative and multicultural approaches in teacher education. Jocelyn A. Glazier, a professor at George Washington University, has trained teachers how to "talk about race" in their classrooms with "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings" and "Gather Together in My Name". According to Glazier, Angelou's use of understatement, self-mockery, humor, and irony have left readers of Angelou's autobiographies unsure of what she left out and how they should respond to the events she described. Angelou's depictions of her experiences of racism have forced white readers to either explore their feelings about race and their own "privileged status", or to avoid the discussion as a means of keeping their privilege. Glazier found that critics have focused on the way Angelou fits within the genre of African-American autobiography and on her literary techniques, but readers have tended to react to her storytelling with "surprise, particularly when [they] enter the text with certain expectations about the genre of autobiography".


title: Maya Angelou

text: Educator Daniel Challener, in his 1997 book "Stories of Resilience in Childhood", analyzed the events in "Caged Bird" to illustrate resiliency in children. He argued that Angelou's book has provided a "useful framework" for exploring the obstacles many children like Maya have faced and how their communities have helped them succeed. Psychologist Chris Boyatzis has reported using "Caged Bird" to supplement scientific theory and research in the instruction of child development topics such as the development of self-concept and self-esteem, ego resilience, industry versus inferiority, effects of abuse, parenting styles, sibling and friendship relations, gender issues, cognitive development, puberty, and identity formation in adolescence. He found "Caged Bird" a "highly effective" tool for providing real-life examples of these psychological concepts.


title: Maya Angelou

text: Angelou is best known for her seven autobiographies, but she was also a prolific and successful poet. She was called "the black woman's poet laureate", and her poems have been called the anthems of African Americans. Angelou studied and began writing poetry at a young age, and used poetry and other great literature to cope with her rape as a young girl, as described in "Caged Bird". According to scholar Yasmin Y. DeGout, literature also affected Angelou's sensibilities as the poet and writer she became, especially the "liberating discourse that would evolve in her own poetic canon".


title: Maya Angelou

text: Many critics consider Angelou's autobiographies more important than her poetry. Although all her books have been bestsellers, her poetry has not been perceived to be as serious as her prose and has been understudied. Her poems were more interesting when she recited and performed them, and many critics emphasized the public aspect of her poetry. Angelou's lack of critical acclaim has been attributed to both the public nature of many of her poems and to Angelou's popular success, and to critics' preferences for poetry as a written form rather than a verbal, performed one. Zofia Burr has countered Angelou's critics by condemning them for not taking into account Angelou's larger purposes in her writing: "to be representative rather than individual, authoritative rather than confessional".


title: Maya Angelou

text: In contrast, Harold Bloom, Professor of Literature (Yale University and New York University) and literary critic, has concluded:


title: Maya Angelou

text: Angelou's use of fiction-writing techniques such as dialogue, characterization, and development of theme, setting, plot, and language has often resulted in the placement of her books into the genre of autobiographical fiction. Angelou made a deliberate attempt in her books to challenge the common structure of the autobiography by critiquing, changing, and expanding the genre. Scholar Mary Jane Lupton argues that all of Angelou's autobiographies conform to the genre's standard structure: they are written by a single author, they are chronological, and they contain elements of character, technique, and theme. Angelou recognizes that there are fictional aspects to her books; Lupton agrees, stating that Angelou tended to "diverge from the conventional notion of autobiography as truth", which parallels the conventions of much of African-American autobiography written during the abolitionist period of U.S. history, when as both Lupton and African-American scholar Crispin Sartwell put it, the truth was censored out of the need for self-protection. Scholar Lyman B. Hagen places Angelou in the long tradition of African-American autobiography, but claims that Angelou created a unique interpretation of the autobiographical form.


title: Maya Angelou

text: According to African-American literature scholar Pierre A. Walker, the challenge for much of the history of African-American literature was that its authors have had to confirm its status as literature before they could accomplish their political goals, which was why Angelou's editor Robert Loomis was able to dare her into writing "Caged Bird" by challenging her to write an autobiography that could be considered "high art". Angelou acknowledged that she followed the slave narrative tradition of "speaking in the first-person singular talking about the first-person plural, always saying I meaning 'we'". Scholar John McWhorter calls Angelou's books "tracts" that defend African-American culture and fight negative stereotypes. According to McWhorter, Angelou structured her books, which to him seem to be written more for children than for adults, to support her defense of Black culture. McWhorter sees Angelou as she depicts herself in her autobiographies "as a kind of stand-in figure for the Black American in Troubled Times". McWhorter views Angelou's works as dated, but recognizes that "she has helped to pave the way for contemporary black writers who are able to enjoy the luxury of being merely individuals, no longer representatives of the race, only themselves". Scholar Lynn Z. Bloom compares Angelou's works to the writings of Frederick Douglass, stating that both fulfilled the same purpose: to describe Black culture and to interpret it for their wider, white audiences.


title: Maya Angelou

text: According to scholar Sondra O'Neale, Angelou's poetry can be placed within the African-American oral tradition, and her prose "follows classic technique in nonpoetic Western forms". O'Neale states that Angelou avoided using a "monolithic Black language", and accomplished, through direct dialogue, what O'Neale calls a "more expected ghetto expressiveness". McWhorter finds both the language Angelou used in her autobiographies and the people she depicted unrealistic, resulting in a separation between her and her audience. As McWhorter states, "I have never read autobiographical writing where I had such a hard time summoning a sense of how the subject talks, or a sense of who the subject really is". McWhorter asserts, for example, that key figures in Angelou's books, like herself, her son Guy, and mother Vivian do not speak as one would expect, and that their speech is "cleaned up" for her readers. Guy, for example, represents the young Black male, while Vivian represents the idealized mother figure, and the stiff language they use, as well as the language in Angelou's text, is intended to prove that Blacks can use standard English competently.


title: Maya Angelou

text: McWhorter recognizes that much of the reason for Angelou's style was the "apologetic" nature of her writing. When Angelou wrote "Caged Bird" at the end of the 1960s, one of the necessary and accepted features of literature at the time was "organic unity", and one of her goals was to create a book that satisfied that criterion. The events in her books were episodic and crafted like a series of short stories, but their arrangements did not follow a strict chronology. Instead, they were placed to emphasize the themes of her books, which include racism, identity, family, and travel. English literature scholar Valerie Sayers has asserted that "Angelou's poetry and prose are similar". They both rely on her "direct voice", which alternates steady rhythms with syncopated patterns and uses similes and metaphors (e.g., the caged bird). According to Hagen, Angelou's works were influenced by both conventional literary and the oral traditions of the African-American community. For example, she referenced more than 100 literary characters throughout her books and poetry. In addition, she used the elements of blues music, including the act of testimony when speaking of one's life and struggles, ironic understatement, and the use of natural metaphors, rhythms, and intonations. Angelou, instead of depending upon plot, used personal and historical events to shape her books.


title: Rob Schneider

text: Robert Michael Schneider (; born October 31, 1963) is an American actor, comedian, and screenwriter. A stand-up comic and veteran of the NBC sketch comedy series "Saturday Night Live", he went on to a career in feature films, including starring roles in the comedy films "" (1999) and its , "The Animal" (2001), "The Hot Chick" (2002), "The Benchwarmers" (2006), and "Big Stan" (2007). Schneider is the father of singer Elle King.


title: Rob Schneider

text: Schneider was born in San Francisco, California, and grew up in the nearby suburb of Pacifica. His parents were Pilar (née Monroe), a former kindergarten teacher and ex-school board president, and Marvin Schneider, a real estate broker. His father was Jewish and his mother was Catholic. Schneider's maternal grandmother was a Filipina who met and married his grandfather, a white American army private, while he was stationed in the Philippines. His mixed background is a common theme in his comedy acts. His older brother, John, is a producer. Schneider graduated from Terra Nova High School in 1982 and then attended San Francisco State University.


title: Rob Schneider

text: Schneider started doing stand-up comedy while still in high school, opening for San Francisco favorites Head On, a band managed by his older brother John. After high school, he played Bay Area nightclubs such as the Holy City Zoo and The Other Café, and was a regular guest on local radio programs. After opening a show by comedian Dennis Miller in 1987, Schneider won a slot on HBO's 13th Annual Young Comedians special, which was hosted by Miller. Schneider's appearance on the HBO special led to a position as a writer for the late night NBC sketch comedy series "Saturday Night Live".


title: Rob Schneider

text: Schneider was hired at "Saturday Night Live" in 1988. Schneider swiftly graduated from writer and featured player to full cast member. , he played such roles as "Tiny Elvis" and "Orgasm Guy". His best known recurring character was Richard Laymer, an office worker whose desk was stuck beside the photocopier, and who addressed each of his fellow employees with an endless stream of annoying nicknames. Schneider is featured in the video release "The Bad Boys of Saturday Night Live", along with colleagues Adam Sandler, Chris Rock, David Spade, and Chris Farley.


title: Rob Schneider

text: After leaving "SNL", Schneider played supporting roles in a series of movies including "Surf Ninjas", "Judge Dredd", "The Beverly Hillbillies", "", "Demolition Man", and "Down Periscope". He also appeared in a recurring part on the television series "Coach". In 1996, he co-starred in the NBC sitcom "Men Behaving Badly", an American take on the hit British series of the same name. The U.S. version ran for two seasons.


title: Rob Schneider

text: Schneider starred in the 1999 feature film "", a tale of a fish-tank cleaner who incurs a massive debt and is forced to become a "man-whore." This was followed by "The Animal", about a man given animal powers by a mad scientist; "The Hot Chick", wherein the body of a petty thief named Clive Maxtone (played by Schneider) is mystically switched with the body of a pretty, but mean-spirited high school cheerleader named Jessica Spencer (played by Rachel McAdams in her film debut); and the sequel "". The latter movie was not well received by critics or moviegoers, and as a result, Schneider won a 2005 Worst Actor Razzie Award for his role in the film.


title: Rob Schneider

text: In 2006, Schneider co-starred in the baseball-themed family comedy "The Benchwarmers", along with his fellow "SNL" alumnus David Spade as well as Jon Heder. Other film roles include Schneider's appearance with Jim Henson's Muppets in the 1999 film "Muppets from Space", and his role as a San Francisco hobo in the 2004 remake of "Around the World in 80 Days".


title: Rob Schneider

text: Schneider's directorial debut, the comedy "Big Stan", was released in some overseas markets during the fall of 2008, with a U.S. release in early 2009. In the film, he starred as a real estate con artist who is arrested for perpetrating real-estate scams. He is sentenced to prison, so he takes a crash-course in martial arts to survive incarceration.


title: Rob Schneider

text: Schneider has also appeared in numerous comedies starring his "SNL" comrade Adam Sandler, including 1998's "The Waterboy," 2010's "Grown Ups," and 2020's "Hubie Halloween". The comedic characters Schneider plays in these films include an overly enthusiastic Cajun man who proclaims the catch-phrase, "You can do it!"; an amiable Middle Eastern delivery boy; a prison inmate; and Sandler's one-eyed Hawaiian sidekick, Ula. Schneider has uttered the line "You can do it!" as a running gag in Sandler's films "The Waterboy", "Little Nicky", "50 First Dates", "The Longest Yard", and "Bedtime Stories", as well as in a deleted scene from "Click" (a sample of Schneider saying the phrase also turns up in the song "Original Prankster" by The Offspring). Returning the favor, Sandler appeared in a cameo to spout the same line in Schneider's "The Animal". Schneider narrated Sandler's 2002 animated movie "Eight Crazy Nights", and voiced the part of a Chinese waiter. Schneider also had an uncredited cameo as a Canadian-Japanese wedding-chapel minister in the 2007 Sandler-Kevin James comedy "I Now Pronounce You Chuck & Larry", and played a Palestinian cab driver who serves as the title character's nemesis in the 2008 Sandler film "You Don't Mess with the Zohan".


title: Rob Schneider

text: Schneider played a variety of roles in the 2005 television special "Back to Norm", starring another former "SNL" player Norm Macdonald, and appeared on episodes of the popular television shows "Seinfeld" and "Ally McBeal". Schneider hosted the "Sports Illustrated: Swimsuit '97" TV special, and the 2005 "Teen Choice Awards", and was a frequent guest on NBC's late-night variety program "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno". In Schneider's appearance with Leno on the July 24, 2007 episode of "The Tonight Show," he showed up in drag as actress Lindsay Lohan after the latter cancelled following a controversial arrest for driving under the influence.


title: Rob Schneider

text: Besides his efforts in movies and television, Schneider released his first comedy album "Registered Offender" in July 2010. "Registered Offender" is composed of audio sketches and songs, with Schneider himself doing all of the character voices on the recording. He also revived his stand-up comedy career in 2010 with an international tour of theaters, clubs, and casinos.


title: Rob Schneider

text: Schneider appeared in the music video for country singer Neal McCoy's "Billy's Got His Beer Goggles On", as the song's title character. McCoy and Schneider met while the two went on a USO tour in support of U.S. troops two months after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.


title: Rob Schneider

text: Schneider starred as the title character in the CBS sitcom "Rob", which was loosely based on his real life. The series was canceled by CBS in May 2012. In 2015, he produced, directed and starred in "Real Rob", a sitcom that follows his life and includes his real-life wife Patricia and daughter Miranda. Netflix released a season of 8 episodes, and a second season in 2017.


title: Rob Schneider

text: Schneider is the official celebrity spokesperson for the Taiwan Tourism Bureau and the Ten Ren Tea company in Taipei.


title: Rob Schneider

text: Schneider was spokesperson for State Farm Insurance, but was dropped in 2014 due to his anti-vaccination views.


title: Rob Schneider

text: In May 2016, Schneider was featured as a special guest on the Let's Play webseries "Game Grumps", alongside his wife Patricia, commentating over Midway's "Mortal Kombat Trilogy". They reappeared on the show in November 2017, then commentating over Konami's "Contra".


title: Rob Schneider

text: In 2021, Schneider competed on season six of "The Masked Singer" as the wild card contestant "Hamster". A running gag is that "Hamster" would pantomime urinating on Nick Cannon and get affectionate with him. When unmasked on the fifth week, Schneider dedicated his performance of Luis Miguel's "Sabor a Mí" to Patricia and his daughters Miranda, Madeline, and Elle. In addition, Schneider did a variation of his Townie character's "You can do it" line by quoting Hamster's final words "You can do it Masked Singer, all night long!"


title: Rob Schneider

text: In 2022, he starred, produced, and directed in "Daddy Daughter Trip", which served as his third film as a director and also starred his wife Patricia and daughter Miranda. The film will be exclusively shown in Harkins Theaters.


title: Rob Schneider

text: In 1996, Schneider established the Rob Schneider Music Foundation. The foundation returned music education to Pacifica's elementary schools by paying the teachers' salaries and providing funds for instruments and other equipment. Prior to Schneider's efforts, the school system did not have music education programs for many years.


title: Rob Schneider

text: On April 23, 2011, Schneider married television producer Patricia Azarcoya Arce, in Beverly Hills, California. Their first child, Miranda Scarlett Schneider, was born in 2012. The couple had their second daughter, Madeline Robbie Schneider, in September 2016. The family supports Mexican soccer club Tigres, which is based in Patricia's hometown of Monterrey.


title: Rob Schneider

text: In 2013, Schneider switched political parties from the Democratic Party to the Republican Party, explaining: "The state of California is a mess, and the super majority of Democrats is not working. I've been a lifelong Democrat and I have to switch over because it no longer serves the people of this great state."


title: Rob Schneider

text: That same year, Schneider endorsed Republican Assemblyman Tim Donnelly for governor in the election the following year.


title: Rob Schneider

text: In an interview on "Larry King Now" in 2017, Schneider said he was an independent but leaned more conservative.


title: Rob Schneider

text: Schneider has been an outspoken critic of childhood vaccinations. In an interview with News10 in Sacramento, Schneider opined that "The efficacy of these shots have not been proven ... And the toxicity of these things – we're having more and more side effects. We're having more and more autism." Schneider's statements have been discredited as lacking any factual basis. He also views the actions from the state to mandate vaccinations as government overreach.


title: Rob Schneider

text: Schneider has actively opposed the passage of two California laws, California Assembly Bill 2109 and California Senate Bill 277, which both intended to make childhood vaccination exemptions harder to obtain. On September 28, 2012, Schneider and California State Assemblyman Tim Donnelly spoke at the "Medical Freedom Rally", where they urged California Governor Jerry Brown to veto Assembly Bill 2109, which would have made it more difficult for parents to utilize philosophical reasons for exemptions from mandatory childhood vaccinations. While the bill was not vetoed, Governor Brown added a signing message instructing the Department of Health to add a religious exemption and to make sure the process is not overly burdensome to parents. In 2015, Schneider fought against California Senate Bill 277, which removed exemptions to mandatory vaccinations due to personal beliefs, even leaving a phone message to California state Assemblywoman and bill co-author Lorena Gonzalez saying that he would spend money against her in her next re-election. Gonzalez, in an interview with "The Washington Times", said that she found the message to be disturbing, but upon calling back, she said "he was actually much nicer to me, but let's be honest … that is 20 mins of my life I'll never get back arguing that vaccines don't cause autism with "Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo". #vaccinateyourkids."


title: After (2019 film)

text: After is a 2019 American romantic drama film directed by Jenny Gage and written by Gage, Susan McMartin and Tamara Chestna, based on the 2014 novel of the same name by Anna Todd. The film stars Josephine Langford and Hero Fiennes Tiffin and follows an inexperienced teenage girl who begins to romance a mysterious student during her first months of college. The cast includes Selma Blair, Inanna Sarkis, Shane Paul McGhie, Pia Mia, Khadijha Red Thunder, Dylan Arnold, Samuel Larsen, Jennifer Beals and Peter Gallagher in supporting roles.


title: After (2019 film)

text: "After" premiered at The Grove in Los Angeles on April 8, 2019. Despite largely negative reviews from critics, who felt its screenplay and narrative glamourized abusive relationships, it was a commercial success, grossing $69.5 million worldwide against its $14 million budget.


title: After (2019 film)

text: Tessa Young begins her freshman year of college by moving into her dorm room with the help of her mother, Carol, and her boyfriend, Noah. During this process she meets her new roommate Steph and Steph's girlfriend Tristan. The day after, Tessa shares a brief encounter with Steph's friend, Hardin Scott. The following day Steph persuades Tessa to attend a party where she meets Steph's other friends: Zed, Molly, and Jace, and meets Hardin for the second time. The group play truth or dare, which reveals Tessa's virginity; she is dared to kiss Hardin but refuses. Later on at the party Hardin attempts to kiss Tessa, but she rejects his advances and leaves.


title: After (2019 film)

text: The following day Tessa meets with Landon, a classmate she met on her first day of classes, who reveals to her that he and Hardin are soon to become stepbrothers, with his mother engaged to Hardin's father. Following a class debate Hardin again approaches Tessa and insists they start over, inviting her to a nearby lake. While they swim, Hardin kisses Tessa, saying that they cannot remain only friends. Later, the two encounter Molly and Zed at a diner, following which Tessa promises to tell her boyfriend about the kiss she shared with Hardin. Hardin tells her not to do so, saying that he does not date, disappointing Tessa. Noah surprises Tessa with a visit, and the two experience an evening together around a bonfire. In a game of 'suck and blow' at the bonfire party, Jace purposely fails in order to kiss Tessa, making Hardin jealous and leading to a physical confrontation. While Noah sleeps in Tessa's bed after the party, she leaves to check in on Hardin, who has destroyed the house in a drunken rage. She comforts him and the two kiss.


title: After (2019 film)

text: The next day Tessa returns to her dorm to check on Noah, who discovers her affair with Hardin and leaves her, heartbroken. Tessa and Hardin finally decide to date, but her mother threatens to cut her off financially if she continues the relationship, believing Hardin to be a bad influence. Hardin finds an apartment for the two to live together and they attend his father's wedding reception. Hardin reveals that his father was a drunk and that his mother was assaulted by some men his father provoked while drunk. Tessa comforts him and the two head back to their apartment to have sex (Tessa loses her virginity).


title: After (2019 film)

text: Later, Tessa grows concerned about the text messages sent to Hardin by Molly; Tessa attempts to confront him, but he dismisses her and leaves. After leaving the apartment searching for him, Tessa finds him at a diner with Molly, Zed, Steph, and Jace. Molly cruelly reveals Hardin's true intentions by showing Tessa a video from the first party they attended, telling that Hardin only pursued Tessa as a challenge, intending to make her fall in love with him before breaking her heart. Hardin attempts to convince Tessa that his intentions changed as he got to know her, but Tessa ends their relationship.


title: After (2019 film)

text: Heartbroken Tessa returns home to reconcile with her mother and Noah, who both forgive her. In the weeks that follow, Tessa cuts ties with Steph and her group of friends, eventually interviewing for an internship at Vance Publishing. Before she leaves college at the end of the semester, Tessa's lecturer hands her an essay written by Hardin, in which he confesses his love for Tessa; after reading it, Tessa returns to the lake to meet Hardin.


title: After (2019 film)

text: In 2013, author Anna Todd posted the first chapters of a fanfiction titled "After" on fanfiction- and fiction-publishing website Wattpad. The fanfiction's original storyline was based on the boyband One Direction, and featured the band's members Harry Styles, Liam Payne, Niall Horan, Louis Tomlinson and Zayn Malik, portrayed as students at Washington State University. The story followed Tessa Young, an "innocent good girl" who becomes involved in a relationship with "bad boy" Styles.


title: After (2019 film)

text: Within a month of publishing the first chapters, the story had acquired 544 million reads; Todd later landed a deal with Simon & Schuster to publish novelizations of the series, with the lead male character's name changed to Hardin Scott; the novels were subsequently released in 2014. The books gained media attention and became "New York Times" bestsellers.


title: After (2019 film)

text: In 2014, Paramount Pictures acquired the rights to adapt "After" for film; before the expiry of the company's rights to the film production in mid-2017, the project was headed by screenwriter Susan McMartin. Following this, CalMaple Media and Offspring Entertainment acquired the filming rights, with writer Tamara Chestna hired to rework McMartin's script, and director Jenny Gage overseeing the script's final revisions. McMartin, Chestna, and Gage all received final script credit. CalMaple Media's Mark Canton and Courtney Solomon, Offspring Entertainment's Jennifer Gibgot, Wattpad's Aron Levitz, Meadow Williams of Diamond Film Productions and Dennis Pelino were all credited as producers on the film, alongside Todd herself. The film was financed by CalMaple, Voltage Pictures and Diamond Film Productions, with executive production by Swen Temmel, Nicolas Charier, Jonathan Deckter, David Dinerstein, Jason Resnick, Scott Karol, Ian Brereton, Eric Lehrman, Adam Shankman, Brian Pitt and Vassal Benford. Aviron Pictures distributed the film domestically, with Voltage Pictures handling foreign distribution.


title: After (2019 film)

text: On May 8, 2018, Julia Goldani Telles and Hero Fiennes Tiffin were cast in the main roles of Tessa Young and Hardin Scott respectively. The actors were selected by the production team, including Todd herself, who was present at the castings and contributed to the casting decisions.


title: After (2019 film)

text: In July 2018, Telles announced her exit from the film due to scheduling conflicts. In the same month, Josephine Langford was announced to play Tessa Young. Todd would later state that once she saw Langford, she "knew right away that was Tessa." Pia Mia was cast in the role of Tristan, a previously male character in the books. Executive producer Swen Temmel was cast as Jace, Shane Paul McGhie and Khadijha Red Thunder were added as Landon Gibson and Steph Jones respectively, Samuel Larsen was set as Zed Evans, and Inanna Sarkis played Molly Samuels. Producer Meadow Williams was additionally cast as Professor Soto, another previously male character in the books. On July 27, Peter Gallagher and Jennifer Beals were announced to play Ken Scott and Karen Gibson, Hardin's father and Landon's mother, respectively, with Selma Blair announced for Carol Young, Tessa's mother, and Dylan Arnold announced for Noah Porter on July 30.


title: After (2019 film)

text: Principal photography was due to begin in June 2018 in Boston, Massachusetts. In early July, producer Jennifer Gibgot stated that shooting would begin on July 16, 2018, in Atlanta, Georgia shortly after Langford had been cast as Tessa. Principal photography was mainly conducted at Emory University, and production was completed on August 24 of the same year.


title: After (2019 film)

text: "After" premiered at The Grove in Los Angeles on April 8, 2019, and was released in the United States on April 12, 2019, by Aviron Pictures. The film was released in Latin America on April 10, 2019, by Diamond Films, ahead of its North American release.


title: After (2019 film)

text: "After" grossed $12.1 million in the United States and Canada and $57.6 million in other territories for a worldwide total of $69.7 million against a production budget of $14 million.


title: After (2019 film)

text: In the United States and Canada, the film was released alongside "Hellboy", "Little" and "Missing Link", and was projected to gross $3–12 million from 2,138 theaters in its opening weekend. The film earned $2.9 million on its first day, including $550,000 from Thursday night previews. It went on to debut to $6 million, finishing eighth at the box office. In its second weekend, the film dropped 58% to $2.5 million, finishing 11th.


title: After (2019 film)

text: On Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of based on reviews, with an average rating of . The site's critical consensus reads, "Tepid and tired, "After"s fun flourishes are let down by its generic story." The film has a weighted average of 30 out of 100 on Metacritic, based on eight critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews." Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B" on an A+ to F scale, while those at PostTrak gave it 2.5 out of 5 stars.


title: After (2019 film)

text: Critics found the screenplay at fault, with Owen Gleiberman of "Variety" writing that "After" was an "innocuous teen pulp soap opera that flirts with 'danger' but, in fact, keeps surprising you with how mild and safe and predictable it turns out to be." John Fink of "The Film Stage" echoed this sentiment, commenting that "the talented cast is burdened by a dead on arrival screenplay that waters down what could have been an intoxicating tale of first love," though he noted the film was "beautifully shot" and "occasionally aesthetically pleasing."


title: After (2019 film)

text: "After" won the 2019 Teen Choice Award in the category Choice Drama Movie and the 2019 E! People's Choice Award in the category The Drama Movie of 2019.


title: After (2019 film)

text: In May 2019, a sequel was announced, with both Langford and Fiennes Tiffin returning to their respective roles. "After We Collided" released September 2, 2020, with costars Dylan Sprouse, Charlie Weber, Rob Estes, Louise Lombard, Candice King, Karimah Westbrook and Max Ragone.


title: After (2019 film)

text: A second sequel, "After We Fell", released September 1, 2021. A third sequel, "After Ever Happy", has been completed and was released on September 7, 2022. Another sequel and prequel are in development.


title: After (2019 film)

text: On August 24, 2022, it was announced that a fourth sequel titled "After Everything" has finished filming. Langford and Fiennes Tiffin are both set to reprise their roles. The fifth and final installment in the "After" film series, it will be the only film to not be based on a book in the series.


title: Hayley Atwell

text: Hayley Elizabeth Atwell (born 5 April 1982) is a British and American actress. Born and raised in London, Atwell studied acting at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, and made her stage debut in a 2005 production of James Kerr's translation of the Ancient Greek tragedy "Prometheus Bound". She subsequently appeared in multiple West End productions and on television, and was recognised for her breakthrough role as Lady Elizabeth Foster in "The Duchess" (2008), for which she was nominated for a British Independent Film Award for Best Supporting Actress. Her leading performance in the miniseries "The Pillars of the Earth" (2010) earned her a nomination for the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress - Miniseries or Television Film.


title: Hayley Atwell

text: Atwell rose to international prominence with her portrayal of Agent Peggy Carter in the Marvel Cinematic Universe superhero film "" (2011), a role she reprised in the short film "Agent Carter" (2013) and the 2015–2016 television series of the same name in addition to other films and live-action and animated series. She also had roles in the war drama "Testament of Youth" (2014), the romantic fantasy "Cinderella" (2015), and the fantasy comedy-drama "Christopher Robin" (2018).


title: Hayley Atwell

text: On the stage, Atwell has received Laurence Olivier Award nominations for Best Supporting Actress, for her role in "A View from the Bridge" (2010), and for Best Actress, for her leading performances in "The Pride" (2013) and "Rosmersholm" (2020). In 2020, Atwell began hosting the podcast series "True Spies", which aims to give an insight into the world of espionage by asking listeners what they would do in real-life spy situations.


title: Hayley Atwell

text: Hayley Elizabeth Atwell was born on 5 April 1982 in London as the only child of her parents; her mother, Allison Cain, is British and her father, Grant Atwell, is an American photographer from Kansas City, Missouri, of Irish and partial Native American descent. Atwell has dual citizenship of the United Kingdom and the United States.


title: Hayley Atwell

text: After attending Sion-Manning Roman Catholic Girls' School in London, she took her A-Level at the London Oratory School.


title: Hayley Atwell

text: Atwell took two years off to travel with her father and work for a casting director. She then enrolled at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, where she trained for three years, graduating in 2005 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in acting.


title: Hayley Atwell

text: Her contemporaries at Guildhall included actress Jodie Whittaker, whom Atwell later described as a "great friend", and Michelle Dockery, with whom she later worked in "Restless".


title: Hayley Atwell

text: Atwell made her professional debut in 2005, portraying Io, a maiden exiled by Zeus, in "Prometheus Bound" at the Sound Theatre in London. The "British Theatre Guide" praised her performance, writing that Atwell "makes us respond to the anguish without for a moment inviting a chuckle at her bandaged hands". The following year, she starred as the protagonist's wife, Bianca, in "Women Beware Women" at the Royal Shakespeare Company. "The Guardian" praised Atwell for projecting "the right seductive beauty". Atwell then appeared in two productions at the Royal National Theatre, both directed by Nicholas Hytner. She portrayed Belinda, a SoHo PR worker and one of three love interests, in "Man of Mode". Atwell also starred in "Major Barbara" for which she received an Ian Charleson Commendation. In 2009, Atwell made her West End debut as Catherine, the adopted niece in a troubled household, in Lindsay Posner's "A View From the Bridge". "Variety" praised her for having an "ideal freshness" and girlishness while still able to shift into uncontrolled rage; her performance was later nominated for an Olivier Award.


title: Hayley Atwell

text: Atwell's first major on-screen television role came in 2006 with BBC Two's miniseries "The Line of Beauty". Later in the year, Atwell appeared as '415' in AMC Television's November 2009 miniseries "The Prisoner", a remake of the 1967–68 series by the same name. In 2010 Atwell appeared in Channel 4's adaptation of William Boyd's "Any Human Heart", and later that year, Ken Follett's miniseries "Pillars of the Earth", which co-starred Eddie Redmayne; for which she was nominated for a Golden Globe. In 2013, Atwell starred in BBC Two's adaptation of William Boyd's espionage novel, "Restless", before starring in "Be Right Back", an episode in Charlie Brooker's critically acclaimed science fiction television series "Black Mirror". Atwell made the transition to film roles early on, with her first major role coming in Woody Allen's 2007 film "Cassandra's Dream", playing stage actress Angela Stark. In 2008, she appeared in the film "The Duchess," which earned her a Best Supporting Actress nomination at the British Independent Film Awards. Later that year, Atwell appeared in the Miramax film "Brideshead Revisited".


title: Hayley Atwell

text: Atwell played Agent Peggy Carter in the 2011 American superhero film "". MTV Networks' NextMovie.com named her one of the "Breakout Stars to Watch for in 2011". Atwell voiced Carter in the 2011 video game "".


title: Hayley Atwell

text: Following a short break from the theatre, Atwell starred in Alexi Kaye Campbell's 2011 production of "The Faith Machine", directed by Jamie Lloyd at the Royal Court Theatre. In 2013, Atwell collaborated with Alexi Kaye Campbell and Jamie Lloyd again in a revival of "The Pride" at Trafalgar Studios; her performance gained her a second Olivier Award nomination for Best Actress. She reprised her role as Carter in the 2013 short film "".


title: Hayley Atwell

text: Atwell returned to Marvel for the 2014 film "", and in the 2015 films "" and "Ant-Man". As Carter, she appeared in two episodes of the ABC television show "Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.", and as the lead role in "Marvel's Agent Carter", which aired from 2015 to 2016. Agent Carter was cancelled by ABC on 12 May 2016. She also provided Carter's voice in "Lego Marvel's Avengers" and "Avengers: Secret Wars". In 2015, Atwell played Cinderella's mother in Disney's live action adaptation of "Cinderella" directed by Kenneth Branagh.


title: Hayley Atwell

text: In February 2016, Atwell was cast in the ABC series "Conviction". The series aired 13 episodes between October 2016 and January 2017; in May 2017, ABC announced it had been cancelled. Atwell starred as Margaret Schlegel in BBC One's 2017–2018 miniseries, "Howards End", based on the classic E.M. Forster novel and adapted by playwright Kenneth Lonergan. In 2018, she played Evelyn Robin, the wife of the titular character in Disney's live action Winnie-the-Pooh film "Christopher Robin" directed by Marc Forster and co-starring with Ewan McGregor.


title: Hayley Atwell

text: Atwell returned to the stage in 2018 in "Dry Powder" at the Hampstead Theatre and later appeared in Josie Rourke's "Measure for Measure" at the Donmar Warehouse, opposite Jack Lowden. The production gained critical acclaim, with "The Daily Telegraph" adding that it was "beautifully staged and expertly performed". As a result of positive reception, the play's run was extended.


title: Hayley Atwell

text: In 2019, Atwell starred opposite Tamara Lawrance in a three-part BBC adaptation of Andrea Levy's novel "The Long Song", about a slave on a sugar plantation in 19th-century Jamaica. She also reprised the role of Peggy Carter in "". In September 2019, it was announced that Atwell will star in "" and "", both directed by Christopher McQuarrie and scheduled to be theatrically released in the United States in 2023 and 2024, respectively. In 2021, early reviews for "" revealed Atwell as part of the film's voice cast as Mittens the cat. In 2022, Atwell partnered with "The Picturehouse" as part of the "Picturehouse Ambassador Program" as part of her


title: Hayley Atwell

text: Described as the "queen of period-drama" by "The Guardian", Atwell has been praised by directors for "the professional example she sets" and her work in period-drama films and television shows. Atwell received an Ian Charleson Commendation for her work in "Major Barbara" (2009), and has received three Laurence Olivier Award nominations, first for her work in "A View from the Bridge" (2009), then in 2011 for her work in the revival of "The Pride", and once again in 2020 for her performance as Rebecca West in "Rosmersholm". Atwell was also nominated for a WhatsOnStage Award for her role in "The Pride."


title: Hayley Atwell

text: In 2010, Atwell lived in a flat in London. In 2015, she moved to Los Angeles to be close to the production of "Agent Carter", although she still retained her personal base in London. During the filming of "" in 2010, Atwell took a three-month course in art history and haiku at the Open University.


title: Hayley Atwell

text: In October 2017, at the time of the accusations against Harvey Weinstein, a story emerged that, during filming of "Brideshead Revisited" in 2007, Weinstein had told Atwell she looked like a "fat pig" on screen and should eat less. Atwell later gave her own memory of events, saying that someone unconnected to Weinstein had suggested she lose weight to look more like a flapper. She also said that she did not believe that Weinstein was a sex addict, but a predator who should be punished for harassing women.


title: Hayley Atwell

text: In a 2015 interview, Atwell discussed how her role as Peggy Carter influenced a then-recent tweet she made to her Twitter followers about having her image digitally altered on the cover of a German magazine. When one visitor to her page asked her, "Why are you so beautiful?", she retorted, "Why am I so photoshopped?" In the interview, Atwell stated, "It's important that young girls understand what photoshop is. I do feel a certain amount of responsibility now that I'm playing Peggy."


title: Scream (1996 film)

text: Scream is a 1996 American slasher film directed by Wes Craven and written by Kevin Williamson. The film stars Neve Campbell, David Arquette, Courteney Cox, Matthew Lillard, Rose McGowan, Skeet Ulrich, Jamie Kennedy, and Drew Barrymore. Released on December 20, it follows high school student Sidney Prescott (Campbell) and her group of friends in the fictional town of Woodsboro, California, who become the targets of a mysterious killer in a Halloween costume known as Ghostface. The film satirizes the clichés of the slasher genre popularized in films such as "Halloween" (1978), "Friday the 13th" (1980) and Craven's own "A Nightmare on Elm Street" (1984). "Scream" was considered unique at the time of its release for featuring characters aware of real-world horror films who openly discussed the clichés that the film attempted to subvert.


title: Scream (1996 film)

text: Inspired by the real-life case of the Gainesville Ripper, "Scream" was influenced by Williamson's passion for horror films, especially "Halloween" (1978). The screenplay, originally titled "Scary Movie", was bought by Dimension Films and was retitled by the Weinstein brothers just before filming was complete. The production faced censorship issues with the Motion Picture Association of America and obstacles from locals while filming on location. The film received positive reviews and was a financial success, earning $173million worldwide, becoming the highest-grossing slasher film until the release of "Halloween" (2018). It still remains the highest-grossing slasher film in adjusted dollars. It received several awards and award nominations. The soundtrack by Marco Beltrami was also acclaimed, and was cited as "[one] of the most intriguing horror scores composed in years". The score has since earned "cult status". "Scream" marked a change in the genre as it cast already-established and successful actors, which was considered to have helped it find a wider audience, including a significant female viewership.


title: Scream (1996 film)

text: "Scream" was credited with revitalizing the slasher genre in the 1990s, which was considered to be almost dead following an influx of direct-to-video titles and numerous sequels to established horror franchises of the 1970s and 1980s. "Scream"s success spawned a series of sequels.


title: Scream (1996 film)

text: High school student Casey Becker is home alone when she receives a phone call from an unknown person, during which they discuss horror films. The caller turns sadistic, refusing to leave Casey alone and threatening her life. He reveals that her boyfriend Steve is bound and gagged outside on her patio and demands she answer questions about horror films if she wants him to live. After Casey answers a question about "Friday the 13th" incorrectly, Steve is murdered in front of her. Casey attempts to escape, but is cornered by someone wearing a "Ghostface" costume, who kills her before her parents arrive home to find her disemboweled corpse hanging from a tree.


title: Scream (1996 film)

text: News media descend on the town in the wake of the murders and a police investigation begins. Teenager Sidney Prescott struggles with the first anniversary of her mother Maureen's rape and murder, while a news reporter, Gale Weathers, who Sidney vehemently despises, arrives among the media. Gale was responsible for spreading rumors and conspiracy theories about Maureen's death, insinuating that the imprisoned Cotton Weary, who was tried and convicted of Maureen's rape and murder, was not responsible for her assault and killing. That night, while waiting at home for her best friend Tatum Riley to arrive, Sidney gets a taunting phone call and is attacked by Ghostface. Sidney's boyfriend Billy Loomis arrives immediately after. When he drops his cell phone, Sidney suspects him of making the call and flees. Billy is arrested and questioned, but later, at Tatum's house, Sidney receives another ominous call.


title: Scream (1996 film)

text: The next day, Billy is released and suspicion shifts to Sidney's father Neil Prescott, due to the ominous phone calls having been traced to his phone. After school is suspended in wake of the murders, Ghostface ambushes Principal Arthur Himbry and stabs him to death. Tatum's boyfriend and Billy's best friend, Stu Macher, throws a party to celebrate the school's closure. Gale attends uninvited, as she expects the killer to strike again. Tatum's older brother, Deputy Sheriff Dewey Riley, also looks out for the murderer at the party. Tatum goes out to the garage and is cornered by Ghostface, who crushes her neck with the garage door when she attempts to escape through the pet door. Many party attendees are drawn away after hearing of Himbry's death, leaving only Sidney, Billy, their friend Randy Meeks, Stu, and Gale's cameraman Kenny.


title: Scream (1996 film)

text: After having sex, Sidney and Billy are confronted by Ghostface, who stabs Billy. Sidney escapes from the house and seeks help from Kenny, but he is killed by Ghostface. Gale crashes her van while escaping and Dewey is stabbed in the back while investigating in the house, with Sidney taking his gun for protection. Randy and Stu show up and accuse each other of being the killer, but Sidney retreats back into the house where she finds a wounded Billy. After they let Randy inside, Sidney gives Billy the gun, who in turn shoots Randy, revealing himself to be the killer; Stu is revealed to be his accomplice by talking into a voice changer.


title: Scream (1996 film)

text: Billy and Stu corner Sidney in the kitchen and discuss their plan to kill her and pin the murder spree on her father, whom they have taken hostage. They also reveal that they murdered her mother and framed Cotton for it, as she was having an affair with Billy's father, which drove his mother away. Gale intervenes, enabling Sidney to escape and turn the tables on the killers, taunting them with a phone call and donning the Ghostface costume, before knocking Billy out and killing Stu by dropping a television set on his head. An enraged Billy awakens and attacks Sidney, but Gale shoots him. Randy, wounded but alive, remarks that the killer always resurfaces for one last scare. As Billy rises, Sidney shoots Billy in the head, finally killing him. As police arrive, Dewey, badly injured, is taken away by ambulance as Gale makes an impromptu news report about the night's events.


title: Scream (1996 film)

text: "Scream" was originally developed under the title "Scary Movie" by Kevin Williamson, an aspiring screenwriter. Influenced by a news story he was watching about a series of grisly murders by the Gainesville Ripper, Williamson became concerned about intruders upon finding an open window in the house where he was staying. He was inspired to draft an 18-page script treatment about a young woman, alone in a house, who is taunted over the phone and then attacked by a masked killer. The treatment remained as a short story while Williamson worked on another script, "Teaching Mrs. Tingle", a thriller that he would eventually sell but that would languish in development hell for many years. Struggling to pay his bills, Williamson secluded himself in Palm Springs and focused on the development of his "Scary Movie" treatment, hoping for a quick sale to meet his financial needs. Over the course of three days, Williamson developed a full-length script as well as two separate five-page outlines for potential sequels—"Scary Movie 2" and "Scary Movie 3". He hoped to entice buyers with the potential for a franchise. In an interview, Williamson said that one reason he focused on the "Scary Movie" script was because it was a film he wanted to watch, born of his childhood love of horror films such as "Halloween", but "nobody else [was] making it". His appreciation for previous horror films became evident in the script, which was inspired by and references films such as "Halloween" (1978), "When a Stranger Calls" (1979), "Friday the 13th" (1980), "Prom Night" (1980), and "A Nightmare on Elm Street" (1984). Williamson listened to the soundtrack of "Halloween" for inspiration while writing the script. Excerpts from the soundtrack appear in the film.


title: Scream (1996 film)

text: By June 1995 Williamson brought the "Scary Movie" script to his agent, Rob Paris, to put out for sale. Paris warned him that the level of violence and gore in his script would make it "impossible" to sell. Following the script's purchase by Miramax, Williamson was required to remove much of the gorier content, such as graphic depictions of the internal organs of gutted murder victims "rolling" down their legs. However, once Craven was secured as director, he was able to bring much of the excised content back. Williamson was going to remove a scene in the school bathroom featuring Sidney, as he felt it was awkward and out of place in the film. Craven insisted the scene should remain, as he felt it developed the character and her relationship with her deceased mother. Williamson later confirmed that he was glad that Craven proved him wrong about the scene.


title: Scream (1996 film)

text: Dimension Films head Bob Weinstein realized while reviewing the script that there were thirty pages (approximately thirty on-screen minutes) without a murder, so he instructed Williamson to have another character killed. Williamson included the death of the character Principal Himbry (Winkler) based on this input and in doing so inadvertently resolved a problem in the script's finale. Williamson had struggled to find a reason for several extraneous characters to leave a party scene so that the killer could attack, finally determining that the announcement of the discovery of Himbry's corpse would serve to remove the non-essential characters, who decide to take a look at the corpse and leave the party before (and enabling) the start of the murders. Concerning the killers' motives, Williamson felt it was essential for the audience to learn why the antagonists had become killers, but he also felt it was potentially scarier if they had no motivation. Opinions at the studio were split between those who believed a motive was needed for resolution and those who felt the action was scarier without one. As there were two killers, Williamson decided to do both: Billy Loomis had the motive of maternal abandonment, while the second killer, Stu Macher, jokingly suggests "peer pressure" as his motive when prompted.


title: Scream (1996 film)

text: The script for what was then known as "Scary Movie" went on sale on a Friday in June 1995, but received no bids. By the following Monday, the script had become the subject of a significant bidding war among a host of established studios, including Paramount Pictures, Universal Pictures, and Morgan Creek Productions. Producer Cathy Konrad read the script and felt it was exactly what the Weinstein brothers of the fledgling Dimension Filmsthen a part of Miramaxwere looking for. Dimension had previously released several horror films and intended to focus on that genre. Konrad brought the script to Bob Weinstein's assistant, Richard Potter. Believing it had potential, he brought it to Weinstein's attention. Studios began to drop out of the bidding as the price of the script increased, and the final two bidders were Oliver Stone, who was at the time working under Cinergi Pictures, and the Weinsteins of Dimension Films. Williamson agreed to a bid of $400,000 from Miramax, plus a contract for two sequels and a possible fourth unrelated film. Williamson said he chose Dimension because he believed they would produce "Scary Movie" immediately and without significantly censoring the violence in the script. Craven read the script before he became involved in the production, and considered convincing a studio to buy it for him to direct. However, by the time Craven read the script, it had already been sold.