Australia’s Silent Film Festival: Shakespeare’s 400th Anniversary Celebration Silent Films With Live Music
Date: 15 April, 2016
Time: 5:30 pm-6:15 pm (drinks and nibbles in Dixson Room)
Venue: Dixson Room, State Library of NSW. The Shakespeare Room will also be open.
Tickets: $30/ $25 Online www.ozsilentfilmfestival.com.au or call T 0419 267 318
More info: www.ozsilentfilmfestival.com.au/cms/uploads/2016_programs/state_lib_apr.pdf
Digital restorations of:
The Life and Death of Richard III (1912) 59 minutes USA Director James Keane and starring Frederick Warde Preserved by the American Film Institute
“An astounding rediscovery of the cinema, Richard III is the earliest surviving American feature film, newly discovered and restored to its original brilliance through the American Film Institute…… Produced as a vehicle for Frederick Warde, a legendary stage actor of the 19th Century, Richard III was the most ambitious Shakespearean adaptation to date. The film not only attempts to honour the intricacies of the original play, it flavours the drama with spectacular crowd scenes and rich colour tints. Richard III offers a fresh glimpse at a time when Shakespeare wasn’t strictly the domain of scholars but was a source of popular entertainment, “when Americans didn’t have to be spoon-fed a great dramatist but were united in their passion for one who gave them characters who mirrored their own complex humanity, not to mention sublime poetry, along with requisite doses of sex and violence.” (Frank Rich, the New York Times)
Bromo and Juliet (1926) 24 minutes USA With Charley Chase and Oliver Hardy
“In this short the wonderful comic, Charley Chase, stages a play as a fund raiser but has to keep an eye on his drunken father and deal with a rascal cab driver, Oliver Hardy. What play? The Bard’s greatest tragic romance. Why do this play? Well, he is way out of his depth as a young businessman who plays Romeo as a promise to his sweetheart who wishes to play Juliet. Plenty of chases, drinks, mad cap all round and back to the play at the film’s end!”
Accompanist: Kaine Hayward
Kaine is in demand as a piano accompanist and has worked as for companies including The Australian Ballet, The Paris Opera Ballet, Sydney Dance Company and The Sydney Conservatorium of Music. As a singer, he has performed at both The Sydney Opera House and Hamer Hall, performed lead roles for Opera Australia, toured internationally and maintains a busy concert schedule.
The Shakespeare Room located on the ground floor of the Mitchell wing commemorates the Three Hundredth Anniversary of the death of William Shakespeare. Arthur G Benfield’s stained glass window, the Seven Ages of Man, depicts a scene from As You Like It.
Mr William Shakespeares Comedies, histories & tragedies, published according to the true originall copies, also known as The First Folio, was published in 1623. It was produced only eight years after Shakespeare’s death on 23 April 1616. Apart from the bible, this volume is now considered the most influential book ever published in the English language. A facsimile copy of the first folio is displayed in the Shakespeare room.
