Melissa Newman is a vocalist, teacher, writer and artist who works primarily in porcelain and stoneware. She has shown work in galleries around the Northeast. After enjoying a lucrative jingle career she continues to perform frequently with her jazz trio. Melissa spent almost 20 years volunteering and working with the inspiring women at Bedford Hills correctional facility, teaching visual and performing arts there and in other communities. She recently co-edited and designed a coffee table book about her parents, Joanne Woodward and Paul Newman, Head Over Heels, a Love Affair in Words and Pictures published by Little Brown.

On the heels of the HBO Max docuseries The Last Movie Stars on Paul Newman and his wife, Joanne Woodward,comes an extraordinary and deeply personal new look inside their private life, affectionately curated by their daughter Melissa Newman. In the lush, illustrated book, HEAD OVER HEELS: Joanne Woodward & Paul Newman: A Love Affair in Words and Pictures (Little, Brown Voracious; October 10, 2023; Hardcover), we are offered a fresh perspective on these storied legends, putting their relationship front and center.

Joanne Woodward and Paul Newman became not only movie stars and stage actors, but also artistic collaborators, political activists, and philanthropists whose legacies are expansive and enduringly modern. They are one of America's most indelibly iconic couples and while their love story wasn’t always a fairytale, it is the stuff of Hollywood legend.

With over 280 photos, including many that have never been published, and text by the book's subjects, all compiled in a luxurious 10”x12” hardcover, the book will be the perfect gift for anyone interested in Hollywood, or in simply celebrating the enduring power of love. Melissa Newman, who purchased her childhood home from her parents, writes in her preface: “In every closet are bags and boxes, layers of ephemera stretching back to the Cretaceous era. Theirs, mine, a sea of words and images.” The book is chock full of handwritten love notes, snapshots and letters; family treasures that have never been released They offer an intimate view of these towering figures in American public life.

Along with photographs taken of each other there are well over two hundred taken by some of the most celebrated photographers of our time: Richard Avedon, Sid Avery, Ralph Crane, Bruce Davidson, John Engstead, Leo Fuchs, Milton H. Greene, Philippe Halsman, John R. Hamilton, Leonard McCombe, Gordon Parks, Sanford Roth, Roy Schatt, Lawrence Schiller, Sam Shaw, Bradley Smith, and David Sutton—and family snapshots capturing candid and telling moments. The photos beautifully illuminate the connection between two complex, passionate artists who opened their hearts and minds to each other for over half a century.Not only will lifelong fans of Paul and Joanne have their love affair with the couple rekindled, but a whole new generation of fans are poised to be drawn into a love affair with Hollywood’s golden couple. This book is Melissa's heartfelt gift to her parents—and to all of us.