The Actress: Hollywood Acting and the Female Star investigates the contemporary film actress both as an artist and as an ideological construct. Divided into two sections, The Actress first examines the major issues in studying film acting, stardom, and the Hollywood actress. Part Two examines five case studies: Meryl Streep, Susan Sarandon, Jodie Foster, Angela Basset, and Gwyneth Paltrow, each of whose careers exemplify key issues in the creation of film stardom, the function of acting style, and the creation of celebrity.
Combining theories of screen acting and of film stardom, The Actress presents a synthesis of methodologies and offers the student and scholar a new approach to these two subjects of study.
Throughout the book, Hollinger emphasizes the craft of acting, a dimension of the subject often given less attention than other elements in the study of female stardom.