FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
(Chatham, NY—September 26, 2024)—The Crandell Theatre in Chatham, NY, will go back to its roots on Friday, October 4 at 7 pm and screen the silent horror classic Nosferatu, directed by film pioneer F.W. Murnau (Sunrise, Faust). Musician and silent film historian Ben Model will accompany the film on theater organ, brought in for one very special night, allowing the audience to experience the film just as it sounded upon its original release in 1922.
Nosferatu is an Expressionist fever dream full of looming shadows and emerging film techniques Murnau used to great effect. Unlike other silent film directors of the era, Murnau shot this unauthorized and freely adapted version of Bram Stoker’s Dracula on location, in the Carpathian mountains. He also used negative exposure, stop-motion and low-angle camera positions, to give his sinister, taloned vampire Graf Orlok an altogether otherworldly presence on the big screen.
Ben Model is one of the nation’s leading silent film accompanists, and performs on both piano and theater organ. Over the past four decades, he has created and performed thousands of live scores for several hundred silent films, carrying on a tradition he learned from silent film organist Lee Erwin (1919 – 2000). He is a resident film accompanist at the Museum of Modern Art (NY) and at the Library of Congress’ Packard Campus Theatre, is a regular at festivals such as the TCM Classic Film Festival, Capitolfest and the Kansas Silent Film Festival, and performs regularly at historic theaters, museums, schools and other venues around the US and internationally.
This early Halloween treat is $25 for the general public and $20 for Crandell members. Don’t miss it!