The Playhouse + Sherlock Jr.

Buster Keaton Celebration w/ Imogen Sara Smith+ David Weir
Trailer Review Orpheum Cinema Tickets

Orpheum・Saugerties

Sunday, October 11: 2:00 PM

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We are celebrating TWO birthdays—Buster Keaton’s 131st, and five years of Upstate Films at the Orpheum Theatre!
Two of Buster Keaton’s silent films + A discussion by film scholars David Weir and Imogen Sara Smith.

The Playhouse is about vaudeville, selected because of the historic connection of the Orpheum to vaudeville performance. This is why the screenings will be held in the old part of the theatre that includes the stage where “high-class acts” were presented. David Weir, our resident expert, has been researching the history of the Orpheum to teach us more about the early years of vaudeville, as well as early silents, not to mention the hand-cranked projectors used to screen them.

“The greatest of the silent clowns is Buster Keaton, not only because of what he did, but because of how he did it. In films that combined comedy with extraordinary physical risks, Buster Keaton played a brave spirit who took the universe on its own terms, and gave no quarter.” —Roger Ebert

The films will be introduced and discussed afterwards by Upstate’s favorite film scholars, David Weir & Imogen Sara Smith.
 
David Weir: Professor Emeritus of Comparative Literature at the Cooper Union in New York City, where he taught literature, linguistics, and cinema. He has published books on Jean Vigo, James Joyce, William Blake, orientalism, anarchism, and decadence, as well as two books in the BFI Film Classics series, one on Ernst Lubitsch’s Trouble in Paradise and one on Luchino Visconti’s Il gattopardo (The Leopard).
 
Imogen Sara Smith: The author of In Lonely Places: Film Noir Beyond the City and Buster Keaton: The Persistence of Comedy. Her writing has appeared in Film Comment, Sight & Sound, Cineaste, Reverse Shot, and Current, the online magazine of the Criterion Channel. She also makes frequent appearances on Criterion’s streaming service as an expert on pre-code Hollywood, film noir, Japanese cinema, and other topics. Imogen’s book, Buster Keaton: The Persistence of Comedy, will be on sale at the event. 
 
 

Upstate Films programs are made possible with funds from the New York State Legislature and administered by Arts Mid Hudson, Dutchess Tourism and by Dutchess County Community Grants Fund of the Community Foundations of the Hudson Valley. This project is made possible with funds from the New York State Legislature and administered by Arts Mid-Hudson.