American Masters Season 1 Episodes

Episode 1

Arthur Miller: Private Conversations

Mon, Jun 23, 198682 mins

Playwright Arthur Miller, director Volker Schlöndorff and actor Dustin Hoffman are seen creating the Roxbury Productions and Punch Productions teleplay Death of a Salesman (1985).

Episode 2

Philip Johnson, Self Portrait

Mon, Jun 30, 198648 mins

Career biography of architect Philip Johnson, largely told through conversation with arts editor/critic Rosamond Bernier. Includes scenes shot at Johnson's famous "glass house", his private painting and sculpture galleries, his studio, the garden of the Museum of Modern Art, the Four Season Restaurant in New York City, and various buildings he designed all over America. This documentary was in the first season of the WNET/PBS television series "American Masters."

Episode 3

Katherine Anne Porter: The Eye of Memory

Mon, Jul 7, 1986

When Katherine Anne Porter left her home state of Texas for New York, she brought with her the hard edge of a Western pioneer. Passionate and intelligent, it was this edge more than anything that made her name as a writer.

Episode 4

Unknown Chaplin, Episode 1

Mon, Jul 14, 1986

Charlie Chaplin was one of the greatest and widely loved silent movie stars. From "Easy Street" (1917) to "Modern Times" (1936), he made many of the funniest and most popular films of his time.

Episode 5

Unknown Chaplin, Episode 2

Mon, Jul 21, 1986

Episode 6

Unknown Chaplin, Episode 3

Mon, Jul 28, 1986

Episode 7

Billie Holiday: The Long Night of Lady Day

Mon, Aug 4, 198690 mins

Considered by many to be the greatest jazz vocalist of all time, Billie Holiday lived a tempestuous and difficult life. Her singing expressed an incredible depth of emotion that spoke of hard times and injustice as well as triumph.

Episode 8

James Levine: The Life in Music

Mon, Aug 11, 1986

The Metropolitan Opera has gone through a Renaissance under the direction of James Levine. Known internationally for his virtuoso piano playing, the breadth and depth of his conducting abilities, and his unceasing enthusiasm for opera.

Episode 9

Aaron Copland ~ About the Composer

Mon, Aug 18, 1986

Aaron Copland was one of the most respected American classical composers of the 20th century. By incorporating popular forms of American music such as jazz and folk into his compositions, he created pieces both exceptional and innovative.

Episode 10

Thomas Eakins: A Motion Portrait

Mon, Aug 25, 1986

Thomas Eakins died in 1916; he left behind a body of work unprecedented in American art. It was only after his death that a new generation of scholars and critics recognized Eakins was one of America's great painters.

Episode 11

Georgia O'Keeffe: Georgia O'Keeffe

Mon, Sep 1, 1986

Among the great American artists of the 20th-century, Georgia O'Keeffe's representations of the beauty of the American landscape were a brave counterpoint to the chaotic images embraced by the art world.

Episode 12

Eugene O'Neill: A Glory of Ghosts

Mon, Sep 8, 1986150 mins

Eugene O'Neill was one of the greatest playwrights in American history. Through his experimental and emotionally probing dramas, he addressed the difficulties of human society with a deep psychological complexity.