Historical inaccuracies in The Chaperone - the new Louise Brooks-inspired film from PBS Masterpiece

The new film from PBS Masterpiece, The Chaperone, is an enjoyable period piece which all fans of Louise Brooks will want to see. I like it, and you may too.

Based on Laura Moriarty’s 2012 novel of the same name, which in turn is based on real incidents in  Brooks’ life, The Chaperone focuses on the fictional story of the woman (played by Elizabeth McGovern) who accompanied the teenage Brooks (played by Haley Lu Richardson) to New York City in the summer of 1922. As most fans know, the future film star left her home in Wichita, Kansas to study dance with Denishawn.

As might be expected of an historical drama from PBS, this production gets a lot of the details right -- especially in regards to costuming and the film's Jazz Age ambiance (vintage cars, vintage interiors, and even vintage attitudes). The film also gets things right in regards to its nuanced depiction of Denishawn,  no doubt due to the guidance of dance historian Suzanne Shelton, author of the excellent Divine Dancer: A Biography of Ruth St. Denis, who is listed in the credits.

However, the film stumbles in regards to certain aspects of Brooks and film history. The Chaperone begins and ends with a scene (twenty years later) where McGovern's character visits her now older friend, who is up in her room licking her wounds after her film career has collapsed. As McGovern's character climbs the stairs to the room where the fallen star is hiding out, the camera glimpses walls covered with framed magazine covers, portraits, stills and film posters highlighting Brooks’ meteoric career. According to the film, these were items collected by Brooks’ mother.

Perhaps for the sake of visual consistency, the filmmakers have inserted Haley Lu Richardson’s likeness in place of Brooks - each item nevertheless corresponds to recognizable magazine covers, photographic portraits and film poster from Brooks' career. However, this is where The Chaperone gets it wrong, in that two of the posters shown date from decades later. Those two posters are shown below.

The poster for Pandora’s Box is a nifty fan creation, and is less than ten years old. The French poster for Diary of a Lost Girl (Le Journal d'une fille perdue) dates from the 1980s or 1990s, when the film was revived for the first time.

What’s more, even if they weren't historical anomalies, Brooks’ mother would not have been able to acquire posters of these two films. As most film buffs know, Pandora’s Box was a German release with a troubled history. It was largely considered a flop, received mostly negative reviews, and suffered only limited distribution in the United States. In fact, it was shown on less than ten occasions in the United States, and was certainly not shown in Wichita or anywhere near Kansas until at least four or five decades later, well after this scene takes place. The same goes for Diary of a Lost Girl, an even more problematic release which didn't debut in the United States until the late 1950s. It too did not show in Wichita until many years later.

In that same closing scene, McGovern's character tells Louise not to make light of her accomplishments as an actress, saying “As for the German films, Pandora’s Box haunted me for weeks.” Again, this is an historical little white lie meant to advance the story-line. The chaperone could not have seen either of Brooks' German films -- unless she had traveled to Taliesin, the home of Frank Lloyd Wright in southwestern Wisconsin, in May of 1934. That's the closest Pandora’s Box ever came to Kansas back in the day.

The Chaperone's heart is in the right place. It is an otherwise well intended and historically correct tribute to Brooks. One lovely bit that pleased me is the clip of Brooks’ shown dancing a Denishawn routine in Pandora’s Box as The Chaperone credits are set to roll. It’s an appropriate touch.

Go see The Chaperone. And let us know what you think. Here is a slightly different trailer for the film. For information about the film can be found at www.thechaperonefilm.com.

Lulu in America : the Lost History of Louise Brooks and Pandora's Box

I have written a long article for Film International focusing on the little documented exhibition history of Pandora's Box in the United States (in the 1930s and 1940s). This lost history includes censorship, wholesale cuts, damning reviews, "thrilling sound effects", adults only screenings, and ads which scream "Sin Lust Evil !" The architect Frank Lloyd Wright, the Little Theater movement, Iris Barry and the NY Museum of Modern Art, Marlene Dietrich, Charlie Chaplin's FBI file, and others also figure in this story.

My article, “'Sin Lust Evil' in America: Louise Brooks and the Exhibition History of Pandora’s Box (1929)", can be found at https://filmint.nu/louise-brooks-and-the-exhibition-history-of-pandoras-box-1929-thomas-gladysz/

This groundbreaking article overturns a couple of long held beliefs: one is that Pandora's Box wasn't shown in the United States following its NYC debut in 1929 until James Card screened it in Rochester, NY in the late 1950s. The second is that G.W. Pabst choose Louise Brooks for the role of Lulu after seeing her in Howard Hawks A Girl in Every Port (1928).

A reminder.  Pandora's Box starring Louise Brooks, will be shown at the Paramount theater in Oakland, California on Saturday, May 6. More about that special screening, which will feature live musical accompaniment, can be found HERE.

THE LEGAL STUFF: The Louise Brooks Society™ blog is authored by Thomas Gladysz, Director of the Louise Brooks Society  (www.pandorasbox.com). Original contents copyright © 2023. Further unauthorized use prohibited. 

Another post-1929 Pandora's Box screening is found!

When I wrote in my last post that I hoped the record of additional post-1929 screenings of Pandora's Box would be found one-day, I didn't suspect another would be found so soon.

The 1929 Louise Brooks film debuted in Germany at the beginning of the year, and eventually made its way to the United states by the end of the year.

As I noted in that previous post, "The Lost History of Pandora's Box in the United States," newspapers didn't list every film showing every day, and some theaters -- especially smaller theaters -- didn't advertise every day or even at all. Accordingly, exhibition records, which are often incomplete and inexact, sometimes need to be pieced together through various sources.

What I found was the record of another showing of Pandora's Box in New York City which, in all likelihood, could be the first post-1929 screening in NYC. I found the record of its happening in an unlikely publication, which all things considered, makes perfect sense. That publication was New Yorker Volkszeitung, a German language newspaper serving the city. This screening took place at the Acme Theater on Times Square on May 10, 11, and 12, 1930.

Here is the advertisement, and the "proof" of yet another post-1929 / pre-1958 screening of Pandora's Box.

p.s. I emailed the staff of Frank Lloyd Wright's Taliesin house asking about the screening of films there in the 1930s, in particular their 1934 screening of Pandora's Box. They emailed back saying they would look into it!

The Lost History of Pandora's Box in the United States

It is widely believed that Pandora's Box was first shown in the United States at the 55th Street playhouse in December of 1929. It is also long been believed that the first post-1929 American screening of the Louise Brooks' film took place on June 9, 1958 at the Eastman House in Rochester, New York.

The long, almost 30 year gap in the film's American exhibition record is explained by a couple of widely held assumptions. One is that the film was poorly received when it debuted in New York City in late 1929, and, with sound films dominating American screens at the time, there was little if any demand for silent films from Germany. The second is that prior to 1960 the Eastman House had the only known American print of the film.*

Both assumptions are incorrect.

Just a few days ago I uncovered new information which adds a number of previously unknown details to the film's otherwise sparse exhibition history in America.

My first discovery was a clipping and a listing for what could be or was the first screening of Pandora's Box in the United States. A brief item in the Jersey Journal on November 1, 1929 states the film would open the following day, on Saturday, November 2 at the 55th Street Playhouse in New York City. That's nearly a month before it was believed to have opened. I also came across a November 3 listing (shown below) in the New York Daily News, suggesting the film, under the title Box of Pandora, was playing that day.

But then the records stopped, as if the film had stopped showing after just a day or two (if it did in fact show at all). The 55th Street Playhouse -- an art house which specialized in foreign films -- replaced Pandora's Box with Secrets of Nature, second series, an UFA Production.

In all likelihood, the reason Box of Pandora stopped showing just after it had reportedly opened was censorship. As is well known and documented elsewhere, this once controversial film was subject to censorship not only in Europe, but also in the United States. By the time the film (re)premiered on November 30th (or December 1 or 2 -- I have found newspaper clippings suggesting each date as the probable new opening date), nearly a third of it, by various accounts, was missing. The 55th Street Playhouse, the theater that debuted and widely advertised the film (including to NYC's non-English speaking population), projected a statement lamenting the film had been cut. The theater also apologized for the “added saccharine ending” in which Lulu joins the Salvation Army.

Nevertheless, Pandora's Box, or Box of Pandora as it was sometimes titled in advertisements and listing from the time, enjoyed an extended run. Despite its incomplete state and the generally poor reviews, the film did well, so much so the New York Sun reported Pandora’s Box “ . . . has smashed the Fifty-fifth Street Playhouse’s box office records. It will therefore be held for another week.” In fact, the film played about two weeks (at a time most films only played one), with the last known screening taking place on December 13, 1929, according to a listing in the Brooklyn Standard Union. (As newspapers didn't list every film showing every day, and some theaters -- especially smaller theaters -- didn't advertise every day, these records may not be exact, and exhibition records sometimes need to be pieced together through various sources.)

After that, it has long been believed, Pandora’s Box fell into obscurity and was not shown again in the United States until James Card screened the film in 1958 at the Eastman House's Dryden Theater  in Rochester, New York.

Some ten or so years ago, and quite by chance, I stumbled across a few clippings related to a 1931 screening of Pandora's Box in Newark, New Jersey. I had been scrolling through microfilm looking for material on It Pays to Advertise or God's Gift to Women (both 1931 releases) when I came across a brief article and a couple of advertisements for a screening of the G.W. Pabst film at Newark's Little theater, starting May 16.

These two advertisements contain some interesting details. They note, for instance, that the film was shown with English titles and with synchronized, "thrilling sound effects"! While the nature of these sub-titles and sound effects is unknown - they suggest there was at least one print prepared sometime after 1929 for American exhibition. Just as interesting is the fact that the film was advertised for “Adults Only.” Like the 55th Street Playhouse in NYC, the Little theatre in Newark was a rep-house or art house which typically showed foreign films and travel films, but, it was not above showing what some considered sensational fair.

As mentioned earlier, a few days ago I found three more instances of the exhibition of Pandora's Box in the United States. One predates the 1931 Newark screening mentioned above, while the other two follow it.

On January 26, 1930, as Box of Pandora, the film opened at another Little Theater, this one in  Baltimore, Maryland. The film, a silent version which was promoted as an "Ultra-Sophisticated Drama," ran for one week, until February 1, 1930. In writing about the film, a critic for one of the Baltimore newspapers thought it worthwhile and well handled, though felt it suffered from cuts made by the Maryland Board of Motion Picture Censors. (Does anyone know if the records of the Maryland Board are extant or accessible?)

Four years after it debuted in New York City, Box of Pandora returned to the Big Apple, this time to the 5th Ave. Theater (Broadway at 28th St.) starting on December 5, 1933. Again billed as an "adults only" film and tagged with the words "Sin Lust Evil!" -- it ran (continuously between 9:30 am to 11:00 pm) for three days, through December 7. This time (see below), the film, seemingly, has fallen into near exploitation fair. And notably, neither Brooks' not Pabst's names are mentioned.

The third instance of a screening of Pandora's Box which I recently came across is one of the most fascinating! I didn't find an advertisement, only this passing reference in the Wisconsin State Journal, which was published in Madison.

Remarkably, this Sunday playhouse program took place on May 6, 1934 at Taliesin, the one-time home, studio, school, and country estate of Frank Lloyd Wright. Built by the famed architect and located in southwestern Wisconsin near Spring Green (about 50 miles from Madison), Taliesin served as Wright's home at the time, with its playhouse acting as a local rep-house which showed foreign and art films. (I found listings for other movies having shown there in 1934, but no mention as to whether or not Wright attended these screenings.) This version of the Pabst film, termed "an outstanding German production," was shown with English subtitles.

Evidently, from the newly uncovered records noted above, there was one or possibly two or more prints of Pandora's Box (one silent with English subtitles, another with synchronized sound effects?) in circulation in the United States in the early 1930s. If I were to guess, I would suggest that this print or these prints were likely circulated by a distributor which served the art-house or rep-house circuit. (One such distributor was Moviegraphs -- the exchange that handled distribution of Pandora’s Box in New York state in 1929; in 1932, it applied for a new exhibition license for the film.)

Admittedly, there was little interest in Pandora's Box in the United States in the 1930s. The four exhibition records I have uncovered so far may be the only instances of the film having been shown in the United States in the 1930s. Or there may be others, like a one-off screening at a University. Maybe other records will be found one day, and the remarkable, lost history of Pandora's Box in the United States will be further revealed.

*  (This assumption, that there was only one print of Pandora's Box in the United States prior to 1960, begs the question as to what happened to the copy of the film which Iris Barry deemed of little value and infamously rejected adding to the collection of the New York Museum of Modern Art in 1943.)