It’s a sustained three-minute shot of three people, just sitting, listening to a singer, for a nearly three minutes before the joke has a payoff. That’s how Ernie Kovacs opened one of his prime time shows for NBC in the… Read More »Ernie Kovacs Meets Florence Foster Jenkins
I hadn’t any more use for my 16mm print of Making a Stetson, so I sold it on eBay. I’d won it there in the first place. It seemed to be a lost film, but then a 35mm print turned… Read More »A Stetson Hat Boomerangs Back
The Ninety and Nine was one of a handful of stage properties that were very popular and which toured a lot in the early 1900s. Like a few other of its type — such as Ben Hur, East Lynne and… Read More »A Racing Locomotive, a Town on Fire and Colleen Moore
There’s a pleasant little moment in Sunrise (1927), after the couple has rescued a runaway pig from an arcade game. The dance band strikes up a peasant tune and asks the couple to dance. There’s even a close-up of the… Read More »Playing the Music On Screen When It’s Not a Match
Kevin Brownlow mailed me an item from “Variety” when I was beginning my research on silent film projection and filming speeds. What struck me is that it was yet another clue that silent era filmmakers had an expectation of what… Read More »A Slightly Faster Sunrise
One of the reasons a majority of people associate the piano with silent film, as opposed to theatre organ or orchestra, is that it had been the type of accompaniment utilized the most on a majority of home video editions of… Read More »The Sounds of the Silents — Theatre Organ on DVD
Ernie Kovacs played one version of “Captain Buzzkill” or another in most of the movies he made for Columbia. He was being cast for what he looked like, his “type”. Kovacs made two attempts to upend this: one we know… Read More »Eugene: The Movie!
On paper, when you look at it, the word “accompanist” is easy to read. And yet, half the time or maybe more, when I am introduced at a show, the word comes out with an extra syllable. It probably happens… Read More »Is Accompanist a Five-Syllable Word?
When I meet people from other parts of the country and tell them I’m a silent film accompanist , they are often surprised when I tell them there are (currently) no theater organs in Manhattan. There are instruments around the… Read More »The Sounds of the Silents — Theatre Organ Accompaniment in NYC, part 3
I usually avoid recognizable music if I can help it, as it’s a distraction to the viewer unless there’s someone playing a record or piece of sheet music shown in a close-up. With this particular 1905 film, I needed to… Read More »The Spirit of ’76 Circa 1905