Showing posts with label All Days Are Nights: Songs for Lulu. Show all posts
Showing posts with label All Days Are Nights: Songs for Lulu. Show all posts

Friday, August 6, 2010

Rufus Rufus Rufus on Lulu Lulu Lulu

Yesterday, I posted an article to the Huffington Post website about Rufus Wainwright and his quite understandable interest in Louise Brooks. I recently had the chance the interview Rufus about the actress and his new CD, All Days Are Nights: Songs for Lulu. He is on tour in support of the new record.


I plan on posting another article / interview sometime next week which will be more of a general interest piece. The current article, headlined " 'I am the victim of such a lascivious beauty': Rufus Wainwright on Louise Brooks" includes Wainwright's comments on the silent film star. Check it out at www.huffingtonpost.com/thomas-gladysz/i-am-the-victim-of-such-a_b_672089.html

[Photo above courtesy of Kevin Westenberg / www.rufuswainwright.com ]

Wednesday, February 24, 2010

San Francisco origins of Lulu

On Monday, I wrote a piece for examiner.com about researching local history online. My local library, the San Francisco Public Library, recently announced on one of its blogs that a number of city directories and other old books and records had been uploaded to the wonderful Internet Archive.

To see a list of these newly available documents and other content scanned from the San Francisco Public Library, follow the link http://www.archive.org/details/sfpl.

These newly available documents join a number of other works of interest at the Internet Archive. As one can guess, these directories are a great source of historical and genealogical information. Looking around as I love to do, I came across some interesting and obscure informations regarding the origins of "Lulu."

Did you know that the German playwright Frank Wedekind has San Francisco roots? Wedekind, of course, is the author of both Spring Awakening (the basis for the popular Broadway rock musical) and Pandora’s Box (the basis for both the 1929 Louise Brooks silent film, as well as Alban Berg’s 1937 opera).

During the early years of his life, Wedekind's father served as physician. A progressive democrat, he also participated in the 1848 Revolution, and next year escaped to America, where he made a fortune in land speculation. In San Francisco he married Emilie Kammerer, a singer and actress twenty-three years his junior. (Some scholars have speculated that this relationship might have served as a kind of model for the relationship between Lulu and Dr. Schon in Pandora’s Box.)

A search of the newly available city directories for 1858, 1860, and 1862 reveals that the future playwright’s Father, Friedrich Wilhelm Wedekind, had a medical practice at 136 and later 524 Montgomery Street in San Francisco. Doctor Wedekind was also a prominent member of the local German General Benevolent Society as well as President of the local German Club.

Friedrich Wilhelm Wedekind and Emilie Kammerer’s second child – the future writer, was conceived in San Francisco - though born in Hanover, Germany. Early in the pregnancy, the patriotic couple decided to return to their native land. And that’s where Benjamin Franklin Wedekind (named for the free-thinking American revolutionary - and later known simply as Frank) was born in 1864.

I was able to find additional information about the Wedekind's San Francisco sojourn utilizing these newly available online documents. Thank you SFPL. Thank you Internet Archive.

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Pandora's Box anniversary

It was 81 years ago tomorrow that the first reviews of Pandora's Box began to appear in Berlin newspapers. The G.W. Pabst-directed film, starring Louise Brooks as Lulu, premiered at the Gloria–Palast theatre in Berlin on February 9, 1929. On the 11th of the month, articles appeared in Berliner Tageblatt, Berliner Morgenpost, Die Welt, Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, Neue Berliner Zeitung / Das 12 Uhr Blatt and numerous other publications. (Boy oh boy did they have a lot of newspapers back then.) More articles appeared on the 12th. 

Over the years, I have collected a thick portfolio of vintage German articles, reviews and other clippings documenting the making of the film and its subsequent release in Germany. I have also compiled a multi-page bibliography of material about the film. All of this material will end up in a book someday, I promise.

And as well, I've also collected photocopies of vintage German newspaper advertisements from around the time of its debut. In honor of the anniversary of its premiere, I have included a scan of one of these glorious advertisements.

In the years since its release, Pandora's Box has been shown not just in Germany but all around the world. One of my ongoing projects has been to track the exhibition of the film over the course of time and in different countries. To me, its interesting to find out what others from around the world (and in past decades) have said about this classic work.

One of my more unusual finds was a 1929 advertisement for the film in a Jewish newspaper published in Warsaw, Poland. (See below). It's interesting to note that the actress' name in the ad is given as "Luiza Brooks." 

Advertisements can tell us a lot. What I learned from another Polish newspaper advertisement is that the film opened at the Casino Theatre, and that Adam Furmanskiego led an orchestra at the Polish premier. [Unless I am mistaken, this is the same Adam Furmanski (1883-1943) who founded and led a Jewish Orchestra in the Warsaw Ghetto around 1940. Furmanski died there.]

The film has been advertised or written about under various titles, and even sometimes under two different names in the same country. So far, I have documented the film having been shown as جعبه‌ی پاندور (Arabic countries); La caja de Pandora (Argentina); Lulu (Argentina); Le boîte de Pandore (Belgium); Loulou (Belgium); A caixa de Pandora (Brazil); La caja de Pandora (Chile); Lulu (Chile); Pandorina skrínka (Czechoslovakia); Umrít Büchse der Pandoru (Czechoslovakia); Pandoras æske (Denmark); Pandora laegas (Estonia); Pandoran lipas (Finland); Loulou (France); Le boîte de Pandore (France); Λούλου (Greece); Lulu- το κουτί της Πανδώρας (Greece); Pandóra szelencéje (Hungary); תיבת פנדורה (Israel); Lulu (Italy); Il vaso di Pandora (Italy); Jack lo Sventratore (Italy); Pandoras lade (Latvia); Pandoros skrynia (Lithuania); La caja de Pandora (Mexico); De doos van Pandora (Netherlands); Pandoras eske (Norway); Puszka Pandory (Poland); A bocéta de Pandora (Portugal); A caixa de Pandora (Portugal); Cutia Pandorei (Romania); Pandorina skrinjica (Slovenia); La caja de Pandora (Spain); Pandoras ask (Sweden); Pandora’nýn Kutusuö (Turkey); Pandora's Box (United States); La caja de Pandora (Uruguay); Lulu (Uruguay); Lulu (U.S.S.R.), Ящик Пандорьі (U.S.S.R.); Лулу (U.S.S.R.); and La caja de Pandora (Venezula).


Certainly, there are other listings to be found. I should probably stop blabbering and look for more. (If you, dear reader, live in a country not noted here and know of a contemporary or historic screening of the film, please send me an email telling all . . . . )

Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Rufus Wainwright records "All Days Are Nights: Songs for Lulu"

The big news of late in Lulu-land is that acclaimed singer / songwriter Rufus Wainwright has recorded a new album - his sixth studio work (due in March) called All Days Are Nights: Songs for Lulu. That's according to an article on the Orange County Register website.

The article by Ben Wener notes, "Songs for Lulu, as a concept, was inspired by, as he put it, 'any kind of reckless woman in your life, in your imagination … or in yourself.' For Rufus, that figure is the great silent-film actress Louise Brooks, as seen in G.W. Pabst’s 1929 film Pandora’s Box. In his mind, she’s wandering the streets of Berlin singing his songs, while Fred Astaire dances nearby. It’s a compelling setting –- I look forward to sinking into it when the record arrives."

Not much else is known about this tantalizing project.

However, there's already a Wikipedia page devoted to the forthcoming album, though it doesn't reveal much. The Wikipedia page states "The first part of the title, "All Days Are Nights", comes from the final couplet of William Shakespeare's "Sonnet 43" ("All days are nights to see till I see thee..."). When asked about the reference to "Lulu", which appears in the second part of the album's title, Wainwright stated in a November 2009 interview that Lulu is a "dark, brooding, dangerous woman that lives within all of us", similar to the Dark Lady character in Shakespeare's sonnets. Wainwright claimed that his Lulu was Louise Brooks in the 1929 movie Pandora's Box."

The interview the Wikipedia entry refers to is one that took place with the musician last November on radio station KUT in Austin, Texas. That interview can be heard on this page. I've listened to it and during the interview Wainwright briefly mentions Brooks and the album. Like Andy McCluskey of Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark (OMD) and Mike Doughty of Soul Coughing (among other rock/pop musicians), Wainwright has turned his passion for Louise Brooks into music.

The Wikipedia entry also notes that in order to promote the album, Wainwright will begin a tour in April, 2010 with a series of 10 concerts throughout the United Kingdom and Ireland. There are no indication as yet if Wainwright will tour the United States.

However, the singer's website at http://www.rufuswainwright.com/ reveals that on February 12 of this year he will be performing at the Bardavon Opera House in Poughkeepsie, New York.

That is the same historic venue where on January 15, 1923 Louise Brooks herself performed as a member of the Denishawn Dance Company. Still a teenager, Brooks danced alongside company members Martha Graham, Ted Shawn and Ruth St. Denis. And in the audience on that special occasion was a lovely young Poughkeepsie teenage girl, Lee Miller - the future Surrealist photographer.

Wainwright's February 12th concert in Poughkeepsie will bring things full circle - as artist meets muse on the stage of history and inspiration. [The Louse Brooks Society blog will bring its readers additional details as this story develops.]
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