Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Actors and Filmmakers

The New project

Hello everyone and welcome to the new project Actors and Filmmakers!!!!! ♦ Sir Blofeld ♦ ^{"Expecting you" Contribs} 16:16, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Glad this has come to life. I'm very sorry I will not be able to help that much (other than occasional article writing) as I already have an overload of work in several areas in Wikipedia and in real life. Good luck! —Anas ^talk? 16:47, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Looking forward to doing some work on this project, particularly with tagging articles. — WiseKwai 17:43, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Do we need to create a new banner with the class, importance, and other requirements or are we just staying with separate film and bio banners? With a new banner, we can keep better track of all of the related film people and make it easier in assessing. --Nehrams2020 18:32, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

I think this has the potential to be huge Wikipedia project and quite important at that too. It is very difficult to get in and edit the main bio banner so I strongly suggest we create our own banner and all of the project categories for each medium e.g start-class film directro articles etc etc for each medium actors through to score composers. THe banner would naturally place aricles in the biography category too. But I would like this project to function more on its own rather than just a minor work group of biography much like WP Films does in WP Entertainment ♦ Sir Blofeld ♦ ^{"Expecting you" Contribs} 02:08, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

Here is the new banner whihc needs the categories modifying: Template:Filmbio

I'd like very much for the Lumiere Brothers pioneers pic to be the iconic image for the project and uses on the banner. Its a good choice I think ♦ Sir Blofeld ♦ ^{"Expecting you" Contribs} 02:11, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

It makes more sense to submit the project to be added to {{WPBiography}}, since many of the elements are shared. --PhantomS 19:07, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

If it is a new WikiProject, shouldn't it have its own banner such as the one made above? I didn't see the rest of the discussion at the proposal of the project, is it a standalone project or is it a work group/department combination for WP:Film and WP:Bio? If this is a new project, a new individual banner would probably be best to organize all of the articles under the project itself. --Nehrams2020 22:55, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

It is more of a biography project workgroup. By the way, this shows our work group in the WPBiography template:

--PhantomS 23:36, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Filmography table: not always preferable

The project page now suggests that Filmography lists should be in tables. I just want to register my dissent. I feel that tables take up a lot of space on the page; lists are more compact. Additionally, not all actors appear only in films. Some appear in features, shorts, videos, TV shows and plays. Putting all of that in one table is rather unwieldy; I prefer separate, more compact lists in one Stage and Screen Roles section. I'm all for working toward consensus on a list format, but I'm not pro-table in all cases. Anyone with me? --Melty girl 01:00, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm with you, but I'm not part of this wikiproject. Specifically, I feel that filmographies aren't always a good substitute for templates, whose purpose is not to be articles in and of themselves but to provide an easy and quick method to link together articles which have a strong connecting element. Esn (talk) 09:14, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Actually, I'm not pro-template. I'm pro-list, as in a simple text list, as opposed to a table. I'm absolutely pro-filmography. --Melty girl (talk) 16:57, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

"Tables," oh my God! I'm definately anti-tables and generally change a cast list in tables to a simple "character as" list! If I see an actor with a filmography in a table, I generally stay away from that article and don't add to it. Tables make the article look terrible. Luigibob (talk) 19:00, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Length of filmography?

Out of interest, what is the Project's policy on the size of filmographies (if any) for actors? I tend to go on "selected credits" -- parts with major coverage and/or awards -- but should I be including all roles instead? Brad (talk) 13:32, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

Personally, I feel a filmography list/table should be exhaustive. While not every project deserves mention in the prose, I think a filmography list should be as complete as is possible. I think the "selected credits" concept is more appropriate for magazine articles, whereas we should be encyclopedic, as in the definition of the word, comprehending a wide variety of information; comprehensive.--Melty girl (talk) 18:25, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree with you on this, Melty girl. As I've been working on filmography tables, I've expanded the ones that curiously omit some films - in some cases, rather important films at that. Wildhartlivie (talk) 19:39, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

I suppose that's a good point about listing all roles and prosing the major ones. It's just size I'm worried about—the James Nesbitt article is close to 40kb and about 8kb of that is the lengthy credits section. Brad (talk) 14:34, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

If you'll check WP:Article size, you'll see that this isn't an issue. That page suggests that readers may tire of reading pages over 30 to 50 KB of readable prose, but doesn't specify a dead end page length. For stylistic purposes, readable prose excludes: External links, Further reading, References, Footnotes, See also, and similar sections; Table of contents, tables, list-like sections, and similar content; and markup, interwiki links, URLs and similar formatting. Since one of the goals of this project is to introduce a table format to filmographies, this makes it acceptable to include full filmographies. Wildhartlivie (talk) 15:41, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Filmography tables

I've been working diligently to get filmographies tabled. I started work on the film actors tab, and under that, the award winners. Some of them already had completed filmographies, a great many didn't. I have completed filmographies on the Academy Award winners, with only the following to go. It would be helpful to check the ones that are in list form for any film omissions. Some omissions I've come across were a little puzzling. Please jump in and work on the tables as possible. If you do complete one, please strike through the name. Thanks!

* - indicates there is no filmography at all

Academy Award for Best Actor to table

Wallace Beery
Bing Crosby
Humphrey Bogart
Ernest Borgnine
Marlon Brando
Yul Brynner
Ronald Colman
Gary Cooper

Broderick Crawford
Rex Harrison
Charlton Heston
Burt Lancaster
Charles Laughton
Jack Lemmon
Paul Lukas
Fredric March

Lee Marvin
Ray Milland
David Niven
Gregory Peck
Maximilian Schell
Rod Steiger
Spencer Tracy

Academy Award for Best Actress to table

Ginger Rogers
Jane Wyman

Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor to table

Don Ameche
Martin Balsam *
Walter Brennan
George Burns
Charles Coburn
James Coburn
Donald Crisp *
Melvyn Douglas
Barry Fitzgerald *

John Gielgud
Hugh Griffith
Edmund Gwenn
Van Heflin
Walter Huston
Burl Ives
Dean Jagger *
Ben Johnson (actor) *
Jack Lemmon
Karl Malden

Walter Matthau
John Mills
Thomas Mitchell (actor)
Edmond O'Brien
Jack Palance
Anthony Quinn *
Jason Robards
George Sanders (actor)
Joseph Schildkraut *
Peter Ustinov

Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress to table

Peggy Ashcroft
Ethel Barrymore *
Anne Baxter
Alice Brady
Jane Darwell *
Eileen Heckart

Celeste Holm *
Shirley Jones
Cloris Leachman
Dorothy Malone
Hattie McDaniel
Estelle Parsons *

Vanessa Redgrave
Donna Reed
Eva Marie Saint
Claire Trevor
Jo Van Fleet *
Shelley Winters

Thanks again to anyone who feels compelled to jump in!!! Wildhartlivie (talk) 17:08, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Filmography table discussion

Sounds like a good thing, and I'm willing to help, in fact I started working on the first name on the list, Wallace Beery but his complete filmography is huge and in table format is completely overwhelming. Before I go any further, I would like to clarify - should we be aiming for a complete filmography? I believe we should, as a partial filmography is biased and against our NPOV policy. But in some cases a complete filmography is way too big, and Beery is a good example. His article is quite short, and with a full filmography, it looks completely unbalanced. In this case, do you think splitting the filmography to its own article, would be appropriate? Rossrs (talk) 06:51, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

There's a funny story about this. Well, no, not really, but I started out going through the list alphabetically, and wound up skipping the actors with the huge filmographies, simply because I was wanting more intrinsic reward for my work, which wasn't coming fast enough in a big task like that. :)

I do believe we should be aiming for a complete filmography. I've come across some so far, where there were maybe 30-50 films selected, and I've wondered on what basis that was determined. In a few cases, films were omitted when the actor won a fairly major acting award (Oscar, BAFTA, Golden Globe). There are a handful of filmographies that are beauties to behold, and I'll get back to you on which ones I thought were stellar examples of what we should be doing. One thing in particular concerning the Beery page - only one of his Sweedie films was mentioned, yet that serial was largely what established him as a star.

I think that in the case of someone with an extensive list of serial, short and silent films, perhaps 2 columns of filmography in table form with only year, title and role columns might work. It would cut the length in half on the page, look more tidy and leave room for the bigger table with the feature length films. I suppose I could refer you to the List of stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for a two column table, since I'm drawing a blank on a filmography page right now. It was a one column page and I decided one night to make it more concise. Shirley Temple has an abbreviated sort of columnar table and the Clark Gable filmography has some good points visually, but when I looked at the raw edit page, I had some shudders. Personally, I support breaking a long and extensive filmography into its own page.

I try to go through and do a bit of reference clean-up and the like when I'm starting a new actor page. A tip if you're going to delve in: transfer the character names onto the opened edit page before you dive into the tabling. Once the table is done, you can go back through and add the awards to the table, or other notes. It goes a lot quicker. I try to always include Academy Awards, BAFTA Awards, Golden Globes and Emmy Awards in that. I hope I don't sound bossy. I don't intend to, but I've done close to 100 of these now and I keep finding short cuts. If I can be of any help, let me know. Wildhartlivie (talk) 09:47, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Funny that you mention List of stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. I added Elizabeth Montgomery earlier today, and thought how much better the table looked, since last time I visited the page - and that was you! Well done, I must say. I hadn't looked at the Clark Gable filmography before, and it is quite good visually. I like the two-column Shirley Temple example - very good for relatively short filmographies. A couple that I broke off into seperate articles are Bette Davis chronology of film and television performances and Vivien Leigh chronology of stage and film performances which I think are OK. They lend themselves to a fair bit of additional info such as directors, costars etc, which I quite like, but on the other hand they look rather bulky and wouldn't be very appealing on the article page. I guess one issue is that there is no consistency (even the few that I've created have been somewhat different). Maybe it would be a good start to agree on breaking off filmographies that are quite large. Rossrs (talk) 15:22, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the kudo. Yes, I am willing to agree to move filmographies when they pass a certain level of size and complexity. Now all we have to do is figure out what that is. I'm off for a while for now. Wildhartlivie (talk) 15:34, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

I was thinking that now the list is growing smaller it might be a good idea to flag what we're working on so that we don't waste time on a list that someone's already working on. I've added a note after Mary Pickford. Rossrs (talk) 11:42, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Sure, we can do that, although I think it's just the two of us who are working on these at the moment. In the several weeks I've worked on this, off and on, I can't recall having bumped heads with anyone, but then, eventually, it will happen. I can get through a few everyday if the rest of the article is in good shape, but then I find ones that need an infobox, or references, or clean up, or... TEXT, for that matter. I will note George Chakiris, as I've started that already. Wildhartlivie (talk) 12:14, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I'm pretty sure it's just the two of us, but as the list gets smaller the chances of us bumping into each other increases. Rossrs (talk) 12:19, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Table (sortable?) vs bullet list

Two Points:
1) I've noticed that it seems common in these tables to have the year span multiple rows for film from said year. However it makes the table harder for others to edit later. it also means that we cannot make the tables sortable (which is great for longer Filmographys).
2) For filmographys that do not have extensive notes for each role; a table takes more space, and is more complicated than, a simple list. Such a list is still suggested at Manual of Style (lists of works): Filmographies and I think should still be the default approach for lists that do not have notes about the various roles.
At the very least the two Filmography guidelines should match. —MJBurrage^(T•C) 19:02, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

Sienna Miller filmography

An editor cut the the filmography from Sienna Miller on the basis that it was unnecessary since there was a link to IMdB. I don't normally edit film articles so, rather than get into a revert war, I've copied it on to Talk:Sienna_Miller#Filmography and asked for statements of support for its re-inclusion, or not. Your attention is appreciated. Wwwhatsup (talk) 21:55, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Claudette Colbert

Just to draw attention to the Claudette Colbert article, which is in need of improvement. Any contributions would be welcome. On this subject - I wonder if there would be any value in maintaining a list here of articles that are particularly below standard in the hope of generating a wide clean-up brigade from this project. I was thinking that rather than having random messages on this talk page, perhaps a section could be added to the project page. I'd be interested to hear any opinions. Perhaps it would be a way of concentrating efforts onto a deserving or needy article with the hope of adding it to the list of GAs and FAs. Rossrs (talk) 13:19, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

I think the idea is fantastic. I would like to see some language though that encourages people to only include subjects of high importance. Otherwise, the list could get unwieldy. Or maybe they could be segregated by priority. --Melty girl (talk) 19:09, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree that there is a danger of creating an unwieldy list, and I would be very unhappy if that was the result. On the other hand, I think we'd be creating a minefield of possible NPOV accusations if we tried to enforce an importance criteria. Working on the philosophy that any article that qualifies for inclusion on Wikipedia, should be of the highest possible quality, I would hope that the articles for even minor or obscure individuals could be targetted for improvement if necessary. Maybe a better way would be to keep an article listed for an agreed period of time (a month?), after which it is moved from the project page to the talk page, or even to an archive. It could then be readded, if an editor was sufficiently motivated to do so, but this would clear out the "deadwood". The "cleanup" tag, for example, creates exactly the sort of "deadwood" that I think we should be avoiding here. What do you think? Rossrs (talk) 05:50, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

We do ascribe low, medium, high and top importance/priority to subject matter, so I don't see how it would be harmful to list articles under those category headers. I think it would be helpful to note that the Claudette Colbert article has more important subject matter than, say, the Valerie Bertinelli article, yet both are in need of improvement. Also, given the low level of activity here, I wonder if a time limit would end up being ineffective. --Melty girl (talk) 08:03, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

I guess to a degree it's a case of "wait and see". Whatever we try may come up with a result that nobody expects. I did misread part of your earlier comment. Segregation by priority is fine - somehow I focussed just on "only include subjects of high important" - so, my apologies. As for the low level activity vs. time limit - agreed. Perhaps it would be better to have it on a subpage, and then remove from the list (or move to an archive page) when any participants agree that the article has been raised to a suitable standard. Rossrs (talk) 08:27, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

A subpage/archive sounds good to me. --Melty girl (talk) 21:47, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

How to handle minor awards

I've been monitoring the Brad Renfro page recently, in lieu of his death and making sure things stay under control and accurate. Recently I have twice reverted (removed) an overly long list of apparently very minor awards he won as a child. They take up way too much of the actor's page and the awards seem less than notable. Considering it would be easy to find tons of minor awards for almost any actor, how should these award lists be handled. I am currently opting to remove them. This is less of a question about lists format and more about how to decide what awards are notable and which aren't.Gwynand (talk) 21:02, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

I think it should be limited to awards that meet Wikipedia's own notability criteria. ie the award is notable enough to have its own WP article. The list you've removed looks like a shopping list, but it's just a list of names without any meaning or context. For example, "Young Star Award" - there's no way of knowing who awarded it, what was the selection criteria, whether it's an award with any widespread signficance or if it's a two-bit award given out, for example, by a magazine. So my take on it would be : if the award is not notable enough to have a WP article - out it goes. Rossrs (talk) 21:10, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

I tend to agree with Rossrs. Be that as it may, there is a brief article on Young Star Awards, although it tells very little. If the awards are notable, then they can certainly be entered on the filmography table under notes. Personally, I don't much care for the plain list of awards as a stand-alone when there is a table present. Perhaps one thing to keep in mind is that when someone dies like this, there is going to be a bunch of fancruft showing up and rather than battle it out too much, it can always be removed later, when "passions" die down. :) Wildhartlivie (talk) 21:26, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Judy Garland, Reese Witherspoon FACs

The articles on Reese Witherspoon and, even more significantly, Judy Garland have been nominated for FAC; both are in need of more decisive reviews, particularly Judy Garland, which has been peculiarly ignored. Both reviews are in danger of being archived, and it's been requested that we weigh in. Please take a look if you can. --Melty girl (talk) 22:18, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

An opinion please

Hi. I was wondering if someone could take a quick look at User:Refsworldlee/Oliver Golding, and let me know whether it would pass being introduced into mainspace, on grounds of notability (the subject may have given up acting, at least for now, and does not yet play tennis to the very highest standard, being a minor) or any other criteria you think may fit. This would be appreciated. Thanks. Ref ^(chew)(do) 13:54, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Not to worry, it's gone to mainspace now. Thanks. Ref ^(chew)(do) 23:00, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Nonagaye.jpg

Thanks for uploading or contributing to Image:Nonagaye.jpg. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is not a suitable explanation or rationale as to why each specific use in Wikipedia constitutes fair use. Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale.

If you have uploaded other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on those pages too. You can find a list of 'image' pages you have edited by clicking on the "my contributions" link (it is located at the very top of any Wikipedia page when you are logged in), and then selecting "Image" from the dropdown box. Note that any non-free media lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

It appears the uploader has been blocked.--Rockfang (talk) 19:01, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Close the assessment department?

It seems like whoever opened the assessment department has departed. Articles no longer seem to get assessed after being requested.

Should we note that it's inactive at the moment? Close it down? Or make a new guideline that encourages people to simply ask a specific, uninvolved editor to use the criteria to assess rather than waiting for the assessment department to respond to official requests? --Melty girl (talk) 20:53, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

I would think that the assessment department would have an important function. I think that an impartial editor could be approached. Wildhartlivie (talk) 23:19, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

Priority ratings revisited

I know that to a certain extent, a priority rating is subjective, so excuse me, BUT - in what world is Haylie Duff (rated high priority) a higher actor/filmmaker priority than Daniel-Day Lewis, Johnny Depp, Boris Karloff, Chico Marx or Jack Benny who were all assessed as mid priority? Is it just me? (By the way, I've changed those, I just wanted to raise awareness of this.) Wildhartlivie (talk) 02:53, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

Haylie who? And who exactly is Rhoda Griffis? Last time I looked at the top priority list there were about 100 names on it and now there are less than 20. Are there any criteria or benchmarks for determining who gets which priority? (No it's not just you). Rossrs (talk) 07:11, 18 February 2008 (UTC) - Forgive me, I am obviously hallucinating. I was looking at the wrong page - "top" rather than "high". Rossrs (talk) 07:17, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

Yes, there are guidelines for assessing priority, and while they still require making some subjective decisions, I wouldn't think that TOO many people would disagree wildly on where a given person would fall, but then I'm finding some exceptions that make me wonder. Perhaps some of it is bias on the part of different editors in relationship to the subject of the article. Maybe Hillary Duff assessed Haylie's? Wildhartlivie (talk) 09:09, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

Hmm. Maybe Hillary Duff needs to stay away from Wikipedia and stick to what she knows!! Rossrs (talk) 09:24, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

Are Playboy Playmates considered porn stars?

I am currently working through Category:American actors and moving the articles into subcategories, mostly by medium. There are a number of Playboy Playmates listed in this category. Some of them, such as Rebekka Armstrong, have appeared in numerous Playboy videos. Are Playmates considered porn stars or should they just be marked as film actors? Or just female adult models? They are already marked as Playboy Playmates so their film career may be assumed by that, but I'd rather not just remove their actor category without making sure.

I asked this question last week in Category talk:American porn stars, but got no response. I am also asking on Talk:Playmate. I am not an expert on this topic, so would appreciate any input. Thanks! -- KathrynLybarger (talk) 16:15, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

My opinion is that it depends on the Playmate involved and her history of work. By virtue of being a Playboy Playmate does not deem one a porn star, nor is every Playmate an actress. For example, I don't think you could classify Marilyn Monroe or Jayne Mansfield as a porn star by any stretch of the imagination. I don't think the Wikipedia article concerning pornographic actors is very clear, since it contradicts the discussion of pornography (the actor article doesn't differentiate between film actors and live sex shows while the pornography article distinctly separates them). The freedictionary.com defines porn as "creative activity (writing or pictures or films etc.) of no literary or artistic value other than to stimulate sexual desire." I'm fairly certain Hugh Hefner would argue that the pictorials in Playboy have artistic merit. Be careful not to overcategorize. Hope that helps. Wildhartlivie (talk) 17:57, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

women screenwriters

Since there is no one to play with over at WikiProject Screenwriters, I guess I will post here. I have begun working on the articles for women screenwriters. But there are more stubs than I will ever get to, would anyone like to join me? I'd start a wikiproject, but I suspect I will be alone. Screenwriters aren't 'sexy' enough, everyone wants to work on Actors or Directors. I just spent a week on Jay Presson Allen, though it's still only a first draft. I am going to go back and do a second pass on [[Anita Loos[[, and have Lenore Coffee in my batter's box. If anyone would like to play with me, it might be fun. EraserGirl (talk) 03:33, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

Still looking for someone to play with me. Finished a first draft of Fay Kanin And gave a once over to Clara Beranger, Dorothy Kingsley and Doris Schroeder though they are still sadly lacking in substantive material. But they are now on my list of folks to research while I am researching other things. I have my eye on a few more women to work on. BTW I am putting together a bibliography on my subpage and I am desperate for more titles to add. EraserGirl (talk) 16:38, 5 March 2008 (UTC)