BRATTLEBORO-Epsilon Spires will host a fundraiser for New England Center for Circus Arts (NECCA) to celebrate Friday the 13th with "one of the most bizarre silent films to come out of Hollywood," according to organizers, accompanied by a live pipe organ soundtrack by Jeff Rapsis.
Epsilon Spires' immersive sight and sound experience begins at 8 p.m.
The Unknown (1927) features Lon Chaney's performance as carnival knife thrower "Alonzo the Armless" who throws knives with his feet in a daring circus act featuring the alluring Nanon Zanzi, played by Joan Crawford in her first major role. "Offering romance, macabre obsession, and surrealist horror while steering clear of familiar tropes," say organizers, "the film's strange power remains potent nearly 100 years later."
Director Tod Browning ran away from his Kentucky home at age 16 to join the circus, where he took jobs as a barker, a contortionist, a clown, and a somnambulist buried alive in a box with its own ventilation system. Following a stint in vaudeville and adopting the moniker Tod (German for "death"), Browning first found a home in cinema as an actor until a life-altering car accident placed him behind the camera to create some of the most original and eerily atmospheric films of the silent era.
Offering vérité glimpses of the circus world, Browning's masterpiece The Unknown was later overshadowed by the controversial film, Freaks (1931). He was described as one of cinema's "thorniest humanists."
"His groundbreaking achievements in horror and underworld melodramas were typified by manifestations of beauty shown alongside complex moral ambiguities, subversive sideshow milieu, criminality and retribution, and psychosexual innuendo," say organizers in a news release. "Browning's influence can be seen in the work of David Lynch, John Waters, Guillermo del Toro, and David Cronenberg."
Rapsis will perform a live musical score for the film on Epsilon Spires' historic Estey Pipe Organ. His technique is to create a set of original music in advance for each film, and then improvise a score based on this material while performing live. Rapsis has previously soundtracked seven films at Epsilon Spires.
Tickets are available at epsilonspires.org by sliding-scale, with a special option to donate support for NECCA.
This Arts item was submitted to The Commons.