History of Film and Television, Part 0.5

[Cheynem]

This is an announcement for a side event, inspired by a commissioning by Mike Bentley.

It will focus on the "history," broadly speaking, of film and television. What this means is there will be very few questions that involve cluing of specific film or TV show plot points, characters, shots, etc. It will primarily focus on things like the reception of film/TV, key historical events in those industries, behind the scenes production clues, and film/TV personalities beyond their specific roles and performances (biographical but ideally not trivial, if that makes sense). Certainly if you've seen film or TV you'd get a boost, but this really rewards I guess knowledge of the overall culture of film and television.

Some caveats:

-My knowledge base is mostly American, so most of the questions will deal with American films and TV shows. Not all.
-I would imagine most of the material to span from the 20th century. It becomes a little more difficult to pick out the key historical moments and reception of stuff beyond that, although obviously you can and they will appear.
-There's going to be some quirkiness to this. It does not pretend to actually represent the most important or seminal moments in film or TV history.

Packets will have 20 tossups.
Rough Distribution:

3 tossups on the "film business," broadly speaking. Questions on the history of film, studios, important moments, etc. Think of the College History Bowl tossup on the premiere of Gone with the Wind.
3 tossups on the "TV business," broadly speaking.
3 tossups on "film people" that focus more on their biography and impact. Think of the Festivus tossup on the life of Bruce Lee.
2 tossups on "TV people." Expect most of these to focus more on non-actors, like newspeople, talk show hosts, showrunners, etc.
3 tossups on films that are more about their production and reception.
2 tossups on TV shows that are about their production and reception.
1 tossup on film/TV advertising--everything from marketing campaigns, gimmicks, promotions, TV commercials. Will try and avoid just being a list of funny commercials.
1 common link tossup in the vein of Acro-Demia (an academic answerline based only on clues from film/TV).
1 tossup that heavily clues books about film or TV (don't have to be academic). Obviously late or giveaway clues might involve more straightforward things.
1 tossup that heavily clues award show clues (Oscars, Emmys, Golden Globes, etc.). Might not be the whole tossup.

I don't anticipate this being finished before the summer at the earliest and maybe not until late summer/fall.