Monday, December 7, 2015

Snapshots from Louise Brooks' Rochester, NY (part 3)

I recently had the pleasure of visiting Rochester, New York in order to conduct some research on Louise Brooks at the George Eastman House Museum. During my four day visit, I had the chance to meet friends, talk on the radio, and walk the streets of a city Louise Brooks once called home. I also spent two and a half days reading through Brooks' notebooks. (More on that at a later date.)

While I was in Rochester, I had the chance to visit a few sites of interest to fans of Louise Brooks. My thanks to Rochester resident Tim Moore who was my valued guide. All of the snapshots below were taken by myself, unless otherwise noted. Here are yet more of them, in no particular order.

No doubt Louise Brooks read this inscription on the front of the Rochester Public Library more than once. After reading
her notebooks which record her intellectual journey, I believe she held this notion close to her heart.
 
The entrance of the old Sibley department store building, where Louise Brooks once encountered two-time
co-star Richard Arlen (Rolled Stockings and Beggars of Life).
Another view of the George Eastman House. No doubt, Brooks walked the path past the house many times.
Brooks' grave in Rochester. The small picture of the actress was left by an earlier visitor.
Thanks to Tim and Cathy for driving to the grave on a cold, rainy day. (Photo by Tim Moore.)
Tim and Cathy provided the wreath. They were generous guides and are great fans.

Sunday, December 6, 2015

Snapshots from Louise Brooks' Rochester, NY (part 2)

I recently had the pleasure of visiting Rochester, New York in order to conduct some research on Louise Brooks at the George Eastman House Museum. During my four day visit, I had the chance to meet friends, talk on the radio, and walk the streets of a city Louise Brooks once called home. I also spent two and a half days reading through Brooks' notebooks. (More on that at a later date.)

While I was in Rochester, I had the chance to visit a few sites of interest to fans of Louise Brooks. My thanks to Rochester resident Tim Moore who was my valued guide. All of the snapshots below were taken by myself, unless otherwise noted. Here are more of them, in no particular order.

The curtain at the Dryden Theater, where I saw the Marion Davies' film "Show People," with musical accompaniment by
the great Philip Carli. (Later we went out out drinks and a bite to eat.) Louise Brooks saw more than a few movies here.
Inside the Dryden with my new friend Emily Freitag. What a treat it was to meet here after being internet friends for years!
We sat in seats bearing plaques for James Card and his wife. (Photo by Tim Moore.)


A plaque outside the Dryden honoring James Card, founding curator of film at the Eastman Museum
(and Louise Brooks friend and champion).
A selection of books in the Eastman Museum gift shop.
Out to dinner with Rochester film critic and Brooks' longtime friend Jack Garner. He signed my copy of Louise Brooks: Lulu Forever - for which he wrote the intro. (My copy is also signed by author Peter Cowie.) Jack told me many stories of his long friendship with Brooks. (Photo by a young waitress who is interested in LB.)
Inside another local restaurant with a wall honoring local hero Louise Brooks. (Photo by Tim Moore.)
The wall of honor (though oops the top left image is of Clara Bow)
 



My trusted guide Tim Moore. Few know as much about Brooks' time in Rochester as he does.

One afternoon, we had lunch at Starry Nights. Much earlier, it was a liqueur store where
Louise Brooks may have got her gin. (Photo by Tim Moore.)


To be continued ......

Saturday, December 5, 2015

Snapshots from Louise Brooks' Rochester, NY (part 1)

I recently had the pleasure of visiting Rochester, New York in order to conduct some research on Louise Brooks at the George Eastman House Museum. During my four day visit, I had the chance to meet friends, talk on the radio, and walk the streets of a city Louise Brooks once called home. I also spent two and a half days reading through Brooks' notebooks. (More on that at a later date.)

While I was in Rochester, I had the chance to visit a few sites of interest to fans of Louise Brooks. My thanks to Rochester resident Tim Moore who was my valued guide. All of the snapshots below were taken by myself, unless otherwise noted. Here they are, in no particular order.

Rochester Public Library, which Louise Brooks visited many times.


The one-time site of the Regent Theater, the first theater to show a Brooks' film in Rochester.







Under a different name, this is the restaurant where Brooks and Kenneth Tynan once ate.
(Photo by Tim Moore)

Outside the Eastman Theater, where Louise Brooks danced as a member of the Denishawn Dance Co.
(Photo by Tim Moore)

Inside the Eastman Theater. Brooks danced upon that very stage!





Outside Brooks' longtime Rochester apartment on North Goodman street, which is not far from the GEH.
(Photo by Tim Moore)



Another view of Brooks' apartment building in Rochester.

Outside the newly renamed George Eastman Museum.
At my work station inside the George Eastman Museum, where I spent 2 1/2 days reading Brooks' notebooks.
(Photo by Tim Moore)
The Dryden Theater is attached to the Eastman Museum. Most all of Brooks surviving films
have been shown there, and the actress herself watched movies there.

To be continued ......

Friday, December 4, 2015

San Francisco Silent Film Festival Presents Day of Silents

With its many festivals devoted to so many different aspects of film, festivals goers in San Francisco are especially fortunate in their opportunity to take in movies others may have only heard or read about.

Take, for example, the upcoming San Francisco Silent Film Festival "Day of Silents" on December 5th. The event features a rare thriller starring the legendary escape artist Harry Houdini, a more than century old travelogue from China, a silent era pirate film in Technicolor, and more—including the not-to-be-missed masterpiece starring the sublime Anna May Wong.

And what's more, each film features live musical accompaniment in the confines of the historic Castro Theatre. For complete details, visit silentfilm.org.

THE BLACK PIRATE - 11:00 am

The day starts with The Black Pirate (1926), starring Douglas Fairbanks and featuring the lovely Billie Dove. The film's many spectacular feats of derring-do include swordplay and underwater scenes—all in dazzling two-color Technicolor (one of its earliest uses). In this classic, Fairbanks plays a nobleman who takes the identity of a pirate to infiltrate and take revenge on the cutthroats responsible for his father's death. Fairbanks biographer Jeffrey Vance writes, "Fairbanks is resplendent as the bold buccaneer and buoyed by a production brimming with rip-roaring adventure and spiced with exceptional stunts and swordplay, including the celebrated 'sliding down the sails' sequence." Author and Fairbanks expert Tracey Goessel will introduce the film; live musical accompaniment by the Alloy Orchestra.

AROUND CHINA WITH A MOVIE CAMERA - 1:00 pm


This compilation program takes viewers back to the days of the late Qing dynasty in Imperial China with a program of rarely-seen short films including travelogues and newsreels. See bustling and cosmopolitan Shanghai in 1900, visit Imperial Beijing in 1910, and cruise the picturesque canals of Hangzhou in 1925. Recently compiled from the collections of the BFI National Archive, the footage was shot by a diverse group of British and French filmmakers—some professionals, but mostly amateurs, including tourists, expatriates, and missionaries. Live musical accompaniment by Donald Sosin.

THE GRIM GAME - 3:00 pm

The Grim Game (1919) is the second of master escape artist and magician Harry Houdini's five silent films, and the first of two he made for Paramount. It has long been unavailable, as the studio retained only one five-minute sequence featuring the film's famous mid-air plane collision. However, thanks to a print held by a longtime Houdini fan, audiences can now see a restoration of the complete film. The Grim Game casts Houdini as a newspaper reporter who fakes his uncle’s murder so he can be convicted of it, only to have villains kill the man and kidnap the reporter's fiancée. Of course, it's all a pretext for a series of daredevil escapes, from Houdini’s breaking out of prison to his getting out of a straitjacket suspended from the top of a skyscraper. The Grim Game restorer Rick Schmidlin will introduce the film; live musical accompaniment by Donald Sosin.

THE INHUMAN WOMAN (L’INHUMAINE) - 6:30 pm

Famous singer Claire Lescot (played by soprano Georgette Leblanc) is the "inhuman woman" of the title of Marcel L’Herbier’s elaborate 1924 fantasy. Lescot lives on the outskirts of Paris, where she draws men to her like moths to a flame. She is aloof, always. When it seems that Lescot is the cause of a suicide, her fans desert her. The filming of a concert where she's raucously booed is a bit of cinema history: among the attendees were Pablo Picasso, Man Ray, Erik Satie, James Joyce, and Ezra Pound! The director's conception for the film's sets were no less ambitious. Painter Fernand Léger and filmmakers Alberto Cavalcanti and Claude Autant-Lara had parts in the design. The film was recently restored by Lobster Films, who commissioned a new score to be performed by Alloy Orchestra.




PICCADILLY - 9:15 pm

After years of being typecast in Hollywood, Anna May Wong left for Europe in search of better roles. In British director E.A. Dupont’s Piccadilly (1929), Wong is mesmerizing as Shosho, a scullery maid who becomes a dance sensation and an object of desire for all who see her. In Piccadilly, Wong displays the cold ambition and manipulative sexuality of the classic femme fatale, while revealing—occasionally—the vulnerability of a young woman. This is hot stuff for 1929, especially the film's inter-racial romance: American censors cut a kiss. Gilda Gray and Charles Laughton round out the cast of the film, some of whose scenes were filmed inside London's famous Cafe de Paris (where Louise Brooks was the first person to dance the Charleston). Live musical accompaniment by Donald Sosin.

Besides the special guests on hand to introduce films, a handful of authors will also be on hand to sign books between screenings. They include Tracey Goessel (The First King of Hollywood: The Life of Douglas Fairbanks), Karie Bible (Hollywood Celebrates the Holidays: 1920-1970), and Thomas Gladysz (the "Louise Brooks edition" of Diary of a Lost Girl).

The San Francisco Silent Film Festival "Day of Silents" will take place at the Castro Theatre on Saturday, December 5. For more information and to purchase tickets and passes, visit silentfilm.org.

Thursday, December 3, 2015

A ballet of Frank Wedekind's Lulu

If you are near the Oper Halle (Saale), Germany on December 4, 2015 you might want to check out the premiere of Lulu, a ballet enacted by Jochen Ulrich & the Tanzfonds Erbe, based on Frank  Wedekind's Büchse der Pandora and Erdgeist.

There are performances on Dec. 30th 2015; Jan. 23rd & 31st, Feb. 26th, March 4th and June 25th 2016. For more information see http://buehnen-halle.de/lulu


Gefördert von TANZFONDS ERBE – eine Initiative der Kulturstiftung des Bundes
Mit der Premiere des Balletts »Lulu« des 2012 verstorbenen Choreografen Jochen Ulrich, einem der entscheidendsten Wegbereiter des Modernen Tanzes in Deutschland, knüpft das Ballett Rossa an die erfolgreiche Vertanzung von dessen »Anna Karenina« an. Auch bei diesem Handlungsballett nach der gesellschaftskritischen Doppeltragödie »Erdgeist« und »Die Büchse der Pandora« des deutschen Schriftstellers und Dramatikers Frank Wedekind steht eine der faszinierendsten Frauenfiguren der Weltliteratur im Mittelpunkt. Als musikalische Grundlage dienen Kompositionen des Italieners Nino Rota zu den zwischen 1952 und 1970 entstandenen Filmen »Rocco und seine Brüder« und »Der Leopard« von Visconti sowie »Der weiße Scheich«, »La Strada«, »8 ½« und »Die Clowns« von Fellini, die sowohl groteske als auch dekadent neo-roman- tische Züge tragen. Hierzu erzählt Jochen Ulrich seine »Lulu« mit seinem unverwechselbaren ausdrucksstarken Tanzstil als Geschichte einer selbstbewusst mit ihrer erotischen Anziehungskraft spielenden Frau aus einfachsten Verhältnissen. Alle Männer, die ihr begegnen, erliegen ihren Verführungs- künsten. Indem Lulu deren Fantasien befriedigt, bringt sie ihre Liebhaber um den Verstand und treibt sie in den Tod. Auf der Flucht vor der Polizei landet sie in London, wo sie sich – inzwischen selbst emotional ausgebeutet – im finstersten Milieu prostituiert und die Begegnung mit dem Freier Jack the Ripper tragisch endet.

Musikalische Leitung Hilary Griffiths

Musikalische Leitung Robbert van Steijn

Inszenierung und Choreografie Jochen Ulrich †

Inszenierung und Choroegrafie Darie Cardyn

Bühne Katrin Kegler-Fritsch

Kostüme Marie-Therese Cramer

Dramaturgie Manfred Weber

Dr. Schön Michal Sedláček

Eduard Schwarz Johan Plaitano

Lulu Yuliya Gerbyna

Dr. Goll Martin Zanotti

Schigolch Dalier Burchanow

Ballett Rossa

Statisterie der Oper Halle

Staatskapelle Halle

Wednesday, December 2, 2015

Louise Brooks Society director Thomas Gladysz on NPR affiliate WXXI in Rochester, NY

Thomas Gladysz, Director of the Louise Brooks Society, will be talking about the actress and silent film star on NPR affiliate WXXI (Rochester, NY) at 1:00 pm (EST). The program can be heard on the radio in the greater Finger Lakes area of New York State. It also streams over the internet. Follow this link for more information and to tune in - http://interactive.wxxi.org/

Tuesday, December 1, 2015

Prix de beauté with Louise Brooks screens in Istanbul

Prix de beauté, starring Louise Brooks, will be shown at the upcoming 2nd International Istanbul Silent Cinema Days, running December 3 - 6, in Istanbul, Turkey. Organized by Kino Istanbul and hosted by Istanbul Modern, Pera Museum and the French Cultural Center, the festival will present pioneering examples of cinema. Each screening will be accompanied by live music.

More information about Sessiz Sinema Günleri / Silent Cinema Days can be found on its website or Facebook page.


Prix de beauté, a French produced film from 1930, will be shown as part of a series devoted to Divas. According to an article in Daily Sabah, "Louise Brooks's groundbreaking film Prix de Beauté (Beauty Prize) will also be screened as a part of the Diva Films section. Famous for her iconic haircut, the film focuses on individual freedom and it is about the turbulent events that women experience after winning a beauty competition."

Here is what the Sessiz Sinema Günleri website says about the film


Güzellik Ödülü – Prix de Beauté – Miss Europe / AUGUSTO GENINA / 1930 / Fransa – France / 113’ / Siyah beyaz – Black & white / DCP / Restorasyon – Restoration: Cineteca di Bologna
Müzisyen / Musician: Stephen Horne

Daktilograf olarak çalışan ve Andre adlı bir gazeteciyle ilişkisi olan Lucienne “Lulu” Garnier, The Globe gazetesinin açtığı güzellik yarışmasına katılır, birinciliği kazanacağı kesinleşir, ancak kıskanç Andre’nin itirazları üzerine vazgeçip evine geri döner. Lucienne’in peşini bırakmazlar, bu sefer bir film teklifi alır. Baştan reddedip, sözleşmeyi yırtar ama sonra Andre’yi bırakıp, yıldız olmaya giden yola adımını atar. Prix de Beauté, Louise Brooks’un Avrupa’da bilinen en son filmi. Avrupalı yönetmen Augusto Genina tarafindan çekilen filmin hikayesi, yine Avrupalı iki yönetmene ait: Fransız René Clair ve Avusturyalı Wilhelm Pabst.

Nezih Erdoğan


The Louise Brooks Society archives holds little in the way of clippings or advertisements for Brooks' film in Turkey. One of the few items we do have is this newspaper notice for Prix de beauté from 1931.



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