Alan Arkin

Alan Arkin knew he was going to be an actor from the age of five. "Every film I saw, every play, every piece of music fed an unquenchable need to turn myself into something other than what I was." Following Arkin's professional journey as an actor and his personal development along the way, An Improvised Life is a revealing look into the creative mind of one of the craft's best practitioners on stage or screen.

Flagg Purdy (Alan Arkin) is a lovable but stubborn man. When he escalates a minor disagreement with his oldest friend into a legal battle, he incurs the wrath of his neighbors and friends.

Alan Arkin has starred on Broadway, TV, over sixty films, and has won almost every acting award in North America. In this, his ninth published book, with his characteristic wry humor, he digs into his long time search for meaning past the seductive glamour of show business. By the time he was in his early thirties, his career was in full bloom and he had achieved everything he'd ever thought he wanted, only to find that it was not what he had hoped...

Olive is a little girl who dreams of winning the Little Miss Sunshine contest. Her family wants her dream to come true, but they are so dysfunctional that they can barely make it through a day without some disaster befalling them. Olive's father, Richard, is unsuccessful as a motivational speaker. He is barely on speaking terms with Olive's mother. Her uncle Frank has attempted suicide following an unsuccessful romance with a male graduate student....

Growing up together, Mitch and Dave were inseparable best friends, but slowly drifted apart. While Dave is an overworked lawyer, husband and father of three, Mitch has remained a single, quasi-employed man-child. Both guys seem to think the other has it made. Following a drunken night out together, Mitch and Dave's worlds are turned upside down when they wake up in each other's bodies. The guys soon discover that each other's lives are nowhere near...

An assassin attends his 10-year high school class reunion in Grosse Pointe, Michigan, where he reconnects with his ex-girlfriend.

As one of the last "natural" beings born into a genetically engineered world, Vincent Freeman has none of the 'pre-ordered' DNA that will guarantee him success. Desperate to realize his dream of exploring space, Vincent assumes the identity of a genetically superior athlete. Avoiding detection using the athlete's genetic markers, Vincent becomes a rising star at Gattaca Aerospace, attracting the attention of a beautiful co-worker. When a flight director...

Vince Rizzo is a lifelong resident of the tiny, tradition-steeped Bronx enclave of City Island. A family man who makes his living as a corrections officer, Vince longs to become an actor. Vince would rather let his wife believe his weekly poker games are a cover for an affair than admit he is secretly taking acting classes in Manhattan. When Vince is asked to reveal his biggest secret in class, he inadvertently sets off a chaotic chain of events that...

It follows the Cooper clan as four generations of extended family come together for their annual Christmas Eve celebration. As the evening unfolds, a series of unexpected visitors and unlikely events turn the night upside down, leading them all toward a surprising rediscovery of family bonds and the spirit of the holiday. Things go awry when a family reunites for its annual Christmas Eve celebration.

A photographer unwittingly smuggles a doll stuffed with heroin into New York City. His recently blinded wife, alone in their apartment, is first terrorized by hired crooks, and then by the psychopathic Roat, in search of the doll.