New Beverly Cinema

New 35 mm prints of both Pandora's Box and Diary of a Lost Girl were screened at the New Beverly Theater in Los Angeles, California. Did anyone attend this double-bill?

Happy Holidays

Happy Holidays from the Louise Brooks Society (www.pandorasbox.com). Its been a great year for all things Louise Brooks. (I will be away from this blog for a few days, but shall return with some notes and images from my recent trip to Detroit and Rochester.)

Pandora's Box makes the Top 10

Pandora's Box was listed among the top 10 DVD's of 2006 by Jeremy Osgood in the Chattanooga Pulse, (the alternative weekly serving Chattanooga, Tennessee). The Pulse noted, "Louise Brooks is utterly seductive as Lulu in this film from 1929, proving you don’t need sound to be sexy." This disc has sure been getting a lot of reviews.

I have also heard from an individual that the two copies of the DVD that he bought on-line were defective. Has anyone had a similar problem ?

Audiophile Audition

A review of the new Criterion DVD of Pandora's Box has appeared on the Audiophile Audition website. The review can be found here. The review starts by noting that G.W. Pabst's masterpiece of sexual suggestion "May be both most important film of the black-helmeted screen vixen as well as the most important German silent film."

A couple of unusual images

A couple of unusual images featuring Louise Brooks have shown up on eBay. One is of Brooks on the cover of the Feb 23, 1929 issue of the Police Gazette. This publication was something like today's National Enquirer.

The other is a publicity pic featuring Brooks, Gary Cooper, and Thelma Todd. This is the first image I've ever seen which shows Brooks and Cooper together. (Cooper was then, like Brooks, a Paramount player.) I'm not sure who the others in the pic are.

Peter Cowie's book

Dennis Drabelle's short write-up of Peter Cowie's new book, Louise Brooks: Lulu Forever, appears in tomorrow'sWashington Post.

Louise Brooks looked so relentlessly modern. Still does, in fact: Photos of the movie star in her prime show an androgynous beauty with coal-black hair cut into both forehead and sidewall bangs, along with features that diverge not a centimeter from classic lines. Her career was short (1925-38) but varied (she starred in G.W. Pabst's German silent "Pandora's Box" and an American talkie called "The Canary Murder Case"). More than anything else, she was a symbol of no-nonsense sex appeal laced with intelligence.

Peter Cowie, who knew Brooks at the end of her life (she died in 1985), has told her story and assembled hundreds of photos of her in Louise Brooks: Lulu Forever (Rizzoli, $55). "I had to run away from the world of celebrities," she explained regarding the implosion of her career. "For years it was a terrible life in limbo without friends or security or approval." But her luck turned when film historian James Card persuaded her to move to Rochester, N.Y. -- "this darling little town," she called it -- where he revived her movies and made much of her. She became a film historian herself, writing articles and memoirs and showing a facility for the well-turned phrase. Here is how she summed up Humphrey Bogart: "When a woman appealed to him, he waited for her the way the flame waits for the moth."

A short cut to stardom

A long article on Louise Brooks appears in Sunday's Telegraph, the UK newspaper.

Louise Brooks was hailed as 'the greatest actress in the history of moving pictures', and yet her career lasted only as long as her famous bob. In the centenary of Brooks's birth, Anne Billson explains what became of her.

Check it out here.

Lulu returns to Chicago

Through December 23rd, the Silent Theater company will stage their version of Lulu (the Wedekind plays staged as a silent film a la Louise Brooks in Pandora's Box) at the Chicago Center for the Performing Arts in Chicago, Illinois. Showtime is 8 pm daily - with an added show at 10:30 on December 16 and December 23.  If you haven't already seen this exceptional production in San Francisco, Chicago or New York City - here is your last chance to do so in 2006. It's received rave reviews everywhere it's played. Click here for more info. 

The Motor City

Just a brief entry, as I am about to take off for the City of Detroit where I will be visiting family and, over the course of the weekend, introducing Pandora's Box when it's shown at the Detroit Institute of the Arts. If you live in the area, please stop by and say hello and show your love of Lulu. I will be the nervous looking fellow near the front of the auditorium. For more info or tickets see http://www.dia.org/dft/item.asp?webitemid=868  ( An article about these screenings appeared in the Metro Times, the alternative weekly for the Detroit area. The illustration for the article is nifty. Check it out.)  Coincedently, there is a new book out on the historic movie theaters of downtown Detroit, some of which showed Louise Brooks films when they first played in town. . . . . After Detroit, I will be making a quick stop in Rochester, New York where I will be visiting the George Eastman House to see the Louise Brooks exhibit and do a little research, both at the GEH and the Rochester public library. See you all on the other side.

RadioLulu updates & stats

Yesterday, I added a half-dozen new tracks to RadioLulu. (I just bought a bunch of mp3 files of interesting and obscure tunes - mostly contemporary music. There's the Clan of Xymox, a rock song about Clara Bow, an instrumental piece inspired by Kevin Brownlow's The Parade's Gone By, etc....) Please tune in and give a listen. Otherwise, here's a recap of the station's November stats:

Total Listening Hours
Last Month: 853
This Month: 1155

Total Station Launches
Last Month: 1400
This Month: 1480

Station Presets
Last Month: 1097
This Month: 1136

Favorite Station Designations
Last Month: 26
This Month: 26

Detroit, MI: Pandora's Box

"Pandora's Box" (Germany / 1929), starring Louise Brooks as Lulu, will be shown at the historic Detroit Film Theatre, which is located in the Detroit Institute of the Arts in downtown Detroit. The film will be screened December 8, 9, 10.

From the D.I.A. website: "A cause for celebration is this newly restored print of the classic that New York Times critic A.O. Scott recently called “a tour-de-force of cinematic eroticism.” The legendary Louise Brooks stars as Lulu, the singular “earthly being” who, though endowed with irresistible animal beauty, lacks all moral sense. While devoid of outright malevolence, Lulu, in her pursuit of pleasure, does evil unconsciously, bringing men—and women—to their knees. In the course of the film, Scott writes, Lulu is “a music hall performer and a rich man's bride, a murderess and a victim, a fugitive from justice and an object of desire. The mercurial nature of the sexual appetite is explored in set pieces that are at once frenzied and meticulously controlled. Brooks's performance has rarely, if ever, been matched on screen.” (110 min.) Fri. & Sat. at 7:00, Sun. at 4:00"

Thomas Gladysz, Director of the Louise Brooks Society (www.pandorasbox.com), will introduce the film. Gladysz will also speak about the actress, her centenary, and her connections to the Detroit area.  For more info or tickets see http://www.dia.org/dft/item.asp?webitemid=868

Additional information on the history of the the 1927 theater can be found at http://www.dia.org/dft/history.asp

Wichita Eagle articles

There is an article about Louise Brooks in the current issue of the Wichita Eagle. The article, "Late actress still shockingly modern," focusses on Peter Cowie's new book, Louise Brooks: Lulu Forever. The article can be found atwww.kansas.com/mld/kansas/entertainment/movies/16150398.htm?source=rss&channel=kansas_movies   There is also a second, shorter piece on the upcoming mini-festival of Brooks' film in Wichita. That piece can be found atwww.kansas.com/mld/kansas/entertainment/16150399.htm?source=rss&channel=kansas_entertainment

Chicago (1927)

Tonight I saw Chicago - the silent version from 1927 starring Phyllis Haver as Roxie Hart - and let me tell you, IT WAS TERRIFIC. Haver was really, really good. She played a kind of American Lulu. And, interestingly, this film was actually directed by Cecil D. DeMille. (It is generally creditted to Frank Urson.) The director gave up his screen credit because he was also then directing King of Kings and was concerned that Christian groups would boycott that film if it was known that he had also directed the rather racy Chicago. If you should ever have the chance to see this Jazz Age morality tale - check it out.

BBC radio program on Louise Brooks

A ten minute BBC radio program about Louise Brooks, "Louise Brooks: Silent Film Star and 20th Century Icon" aired on the BBC today. The program features a discussion between British actor and Louise Brooks fan Paul McGann and Erica Carter, the curator of a month-long retrospective of Brooks films at the National Film Theatre. The BBC website has a page about the program at http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/womanshour/01/2006_48_fri.shtml  

The archived radio program can be listened to at
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/womanshour/ram/2006_48_fri_01.ram

More about the Brooks "season" at the NFT can be found at http://www.bfi.org.uk/incinemas/nft/seasons/brooks/   Interestingly, one of the films being shown is The Street of Forgotten Men (1925). Brooks' first screen role was in this once thought lost minor masterpiece directed by Herbert Brenon.

Lulu heading to Iowa

The Silent Theater company will stage their version of Lulu at the North Scott High School Theatre in Eldridge, Iowa.  The company of young actors - many of whom I had the great pleasure of meeting - is currently making their way back home to Chicago on their unique Pandora's Bus. They had been in San Francisco, where they enjoyed a three month run at the Victoria Theater.

HAVE YOU SEEN THIS VEHICLE ON AN AMERICAN HIGHWAY? 

Once they return to Chicago, the company will stage Lulu at the Chicago Center for the Performing Arts on December 11 - 23. Visit this link for more info.