Brazilian article

Just back from a few days away for the holidays. . . . This long article on Louise Brooks in a Brazilian publication was brought to my attention. Check it out here. Embedded in the piece is a nifty video clip (featuring video from Pandora's Box and music by Clan of Xymox) from youtube.com. The music reminded me of Joy Division. Check it out.

Still keeping busy

Despite all that is going on lately in the world of Louise Brooks, I have been able to make it to the library pretty much every week over the course of the last month . . . as I am trying to keep up with my research. I am still requesting inter-library loans - and microfilm still arrives for me to look through. Lately, I have secured Louise Brooks-Denishawn material from the Sharon Herald(from Sharon, PA.) and Knickerbocker Press (from Albany, New York). I figure I have acquired material on about 95% of the Denishawn engagements with which Brooks was involved. Striving towards completion, I still have a couple dozen New York and Pennsylvannia dates to acquire

I also recently looked through the Atlanta Georgian (a Hearst newspaper), Knoxville Journal, Tulsa Daily World, Capitol Times (from Madison, Wisconsin),  and Waterbury American (from Conneticut). And in each of these newspapers I found a few more film reviews and advertisements. The pile grows. Slowly, I am also finishing up my gathering of film-related material from major American cities and towns. My goal has been to gather articles and reviews from the 30 or 40 biggest urban centers, as well as material from every region and state. To that end, I also recently looked at microfilm of the Arizona Republican (from Phoenix) and Santa Fe New Mexican, but I found nothing in either of those papers. Phoenix and Santa Fe were pretty small towns back then - and didn't seem to support much of a movie culture.

The most interesting material I came across concerned the Better Films Committee of Atlanta, Georgia. In the review I found for A Girl in Every Port (1928), the journalist reported that the local committee gave the film a rating of "A - G," which basically means it was deemed "very good" but for an "adult" audience. This was not a "general audience" rating that some of the other films playing in town received. I guess "A - G" might be the equivalent of today's "R" rating. Apparently, the local committee back then found the theme of "flirtation, fighting and friendship" a bit strong.

And, while looking through September issues of the Capitol Times for material on The Street of Forgotten Men (1925), I happened to notice the paper's radio guide included a listing for a live broadcast of the Atlantic City beauty contest. Wow - I never knew! That was the same contest which served as the backdrop for The American Venus (1926), Brooks' second film. I wonder if Brooks herself was there? Certainly, Paramount film crews were, as was Brooks' friend and fellow Ziegfeld Follies performer Dorothy Knapp. One can only wonder.

These are the sort of interesting things I find on occassion, and that's why I keep on looking. To be continued . . . .

Leaving things for fans

Lately, during my weekly research trips to the San Francisco Public Library, I have been paying a quick visit to the Louise Brooks exhibit which I organized and which is on display at the SFPL (on the 4th floor). The exhibit is titled "Homage to Lulu: 100 Years of Louise Brooks." It will remain on display through January 5, 2007. (See this LJ entry  for pictures, and this entry for a short description.)

And what I have taken to doing every week is leaving things for fans to pick up: so far, I have left a few Louise Brooks Society pinback buttons, programs to the Lulu play currently in town, a LB "Further Reading" handout, and some of the reproduction movie heralds created for the Peter Cowie event here in San Francisco. In the coming weeks, I will leave some more buttons, as well as Louise Brooks crossword and word search puzzles, as well as whatever else I have extra of or will create just to give away. Everything I leave will be on the comment book stand, so please do check out this little exhibit if you live in the San Francisco Bay Area.

I had also rubber stamped the comment book with the Rick Geary images of Louise Brooks and Buster Keaton, and somebody responded with a little drawing of LB. Very cool!  And somebody else wrote that they had visited the show while visiting from Pittsburgh, PA. Thank you all for stopping by.

Long live Lulu - Lulu Forever.

Wichita screenings

Four of Louise Brooks'  films will be screened in Wichita, Kansas in early December. The Louise C. Murdock Center has announced that they will be showing Diary of a Lost Girl (on December 7), Pandora's Box (on December 8), and The Show Off and Prix de Beaute (on December 9).

The 20th Century Center, incorporating the Louise C. Murdock Theatre, is located at 536 N. Broadway in Wichita, just one block north of Central on Broadway. More info can be found at http://www.murdocktheatre.com/

Love em and Leave em

A FREE EVENT: Tuesday - November 21st in San Francisco - A screening of the rarely shown 1926 Louise Brooks flapper comedy, "Love 'Em and Leave 'Em,'' at 6 p.m. at the San Francisco Public Library (Koret Auditorium), 100 Larkin Street in San Francisco. More info at (415) 557-4400 or http://sfpl4.sfpl.org.  And while you are there, take in the Louise Brooks exhibit, "Homage to Lulu: 100 Years of Louise Brooks," which is currently on display on the 4th floor.

Pandora's Box in Milwaukee

This is how the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel describes tonight's free screening of Pandora's Box on the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee campus. So succinct!

German classic: Selfish behavior leads to tragic consequences in G.W. Pabst's 1929 silent film "Pandora's Box" starring Louise Brooks. 7 p.m. UWM Union Theatre, 2200 E. Kenwood Blvd. Free.

Wedekind's Spring Awakening

Following the successful adaption of Frank Wedekind's "Lulu" by the Silent Theater company of Chicago comes a new musical adaption of Wedekind's "Spring Awakening."  Though one of the first expressionist writers, Wedekind's sometimes akward, sometimes scandalous work has fallen between the cracks of literary history. Nevertheless, we are seeing something of a revival of interest in the United States. There is a big article about the new production, which opens December 10th, in today's New York Times.

“SPRING AWAKENING,” the new Broadway musical in previews at the Eugene O’Neill Theater, covers nearly all the hurly-burly that can rattle, confuse and capsize the teenage years: sexual confusion, abuse, death. A bit like “The History Boys” with a rock score and a lot more angst.

The candid portrayal of such subjects may disquiet some of today’s viewers, but the original 1891 German drama by Frank Wedekind on which the musical is based caused a scandal. The play wasn’t produced in Germany until 1906, 15 years after it was written, and then only in an abridged form. In New York City the commissioner of licenses tried to shut down its English-language American premiere in 1917. A court injunction permitted the production, which ran for a single matinee and closed.

Wedekind — probably best known for the Lulu plays, the source of Alban Berg’s famous opera — was not unaccustomed to such dust-ups. He lived in Munich, a center of the literary avant-garde, and often contributed poems and stories to the satirical magazine Simplizissimus. One that ridiculed Kaiser Wilhelm II (better known for his megalomania than his sense of humor) landed him in jail for several months in 1899 on charges of treason. He was continually at odds with the censors until his death in 1918.

Thanks to Rob Carver for pointing this out.

In the news, again

There is a long, illustrated interview with Peter Cowie about Louise Brooks on the PopMatters website. It can be found atwww.popmatters.com/pm/features/article/7690/louise-brooks-at-100-interview-with-peter-cowie/

----------------

LBS member Gregor Arlt tipped me off to these recent illustrated articles on Louise Brooks in various German language publications. (Not only have there been major film retropsectives in Berlin and Vienna, but there is a new book on Louise Brooks published by the Austrian Film Archive, Louise Brooks. Rebellin, Ikone, Legende. Peter Cowie's book, Louise Brooks: Lulu Forever, has also been published in Germany.)

Film-Dienst,  Nov. 2006
"Das Leben ist ein Scherz: Erinnerungen an Louise Brooks" by Claudia Siefen
http://film-dienst.kim-info.de/artikel.php?nr=152313&dest=frei&pos=artikel

Neue Zürcher Zeitung,  Nov. 4, 2006
"Lächeln und Los der Lulu" by Jürgen Kasten
http://www.nzz.ch/2006/11/04/li/articleEMAVD.html

Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung,  Nov. 9, 2006
"Louise Brooks: Die Rebellin von Hollywood" by Verena Lueken
http://www.faz.net/s/Rub8A25A66CA9514B9892E0074EDE4E5AFA/Doc~E5902139EF4DD444FABADE08D52EB8663~ATpl~Ecommon~Sspezial.html

Süddeutsche Zeitung,  Nov. 13, 2006
"Die Chiffre des Lichtspiels" by Hans Schifferle
http://www.sueddeutsche.de/kultur/artikel/487/91396/

------------------

I had a great time at Tuesday evening's Louise Brooks Birthday Bash at the Victoria Theater. We all sang "Happy Birthday" to Louise. There was cake and something to drink. And, it was fun to meet the cast of "Lulu" and other members of the Louise Brooks Society, some of whom had come from as far away as Los Angeles! Here are a few snapshots taken that evening.

A bit blurry, but here's a pic of yours truly and Kyla Louise Webb, the talented young actress who plays Lulu.
If there is anyone who could play Louise Brooks in a film, it is this terrific Chicago-based actress!



LBS members Scott Bradley and Amy Wallace, with whom I had a very nice chat!
 (Amy, the daughter of novelist Irving Wallace, is the co-author of such bestsellers
as The Book of Lists and The People's Almanac, etc....)

That evening, I also met photographer Nili Yosha, who is producing a book of photographs of the Lulu cast and play. I am looking forward to it, I plan to get a copy of what promises to be a rather cool keepsake.

In the news

There was a "Pop Candy" column about Louise Brooks in yesterday's USA Today. The article, by Whitney Matheson, can be found at http://blogs.usatoday.com/popcandy/2006/11/happy_birthday_.html  The article mentions the Louise Brooks Society and this blog. How cool!

-------------

Thanx to Amanda, who noticed that the current issue of TIME magazine has a long article on Louise Brooks by Richard Corliss. The article can be found on-line at http://www.time.com/time/arts/article/0,8599,1559304,00.html

--------------

Paul Doherty sent me some snapshots of the Louise Brooks event in Rochester, New York on November 14th. Paul said I could share these with all of you. Thank you Paul.

Before the show



A bit of the exhibit at the George Eastman House



Jack Garner (sitting) and Peter Cowie (standing). Cowie authored Louise Brooks: Lulu Forever for which Garner wrote the forward. Cowie is wearing a Louise Brooks Society button which I had given him in Sunday in San Francisco.