Introduction: the way Hollywood told it
The frenzy of five fat years; Interlude: Spring 1940: lessons from our town
Time and time again; Interlude: Kitty and Lydia, Julia and Nancy
Plots: the menu; Interlude: Schema and revision, between rounds
Slices, strands, and chunks; Interlude: Mankiewicz: modularity and polyphony
What they didn't know was; Interlude: identity thieves and tangled networks
Voices out of the dark; Interlude: Remaking middlebrow modernism
Call it psychology; Interlude: Innovation by misadventure
From the Naked City to Bedford Falls
I love a mystery; Interlude: Sturges, or showing the puppet strings
Artifice in excelsis; Interlude: Hitchcock and Welles: The lessons of the masters
Conclusion: the way Hollywood keeps telling it.
