What’s Happening?
Cinematic Royalty with the Kansas Silent Film Festival Big stars make a (silent) splash at this year’s events
Drama, comedy, history … the Kansas Silent Film Festival has featured it all in the past 17 years, with rarely a repeat performance. The celebrations February 22-23 will headline the king and queen of the Silent Era, Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford. Event organizer Bill Shaffer calls Fairbanks the world’s most dashing swashbuckling hero. “No single ’20s star had been associated so much with costume pictures.” Fairbank’s 1927 movie, The Gaucho, is Saturday night’s big feature. Equal in legend to Fairbanks is Pickford, who had a littlegirl image on the big screen that stayed with her throughout life. Friday night will feature her starring role in the movie Sparrow. All films are shown free of charge and with live accompaniment in Washburn’s White Concert Hall.
Prehistoric Pictures: Saturday morning will bring several movies with a prehistoric theme featuring other big names from the Silent Era. On the schedule are Laurel and Hardy’s Flying Elephants, Charlie Chaplin’s His Prehistoric Past and Buster Keaton’s spoof of intolerance, Three Ages.
Westerns: A big part of the 1920s cinema, Story by Karen Ridder
Photography by Bill Stephens
Westerns will have a large presence in Saturday afternoon’s lineup, which includes
ABOVE Kansas Silent Film Festival director Bill Shaffer has cast the stage with several big names of the Silent Era for the 2013 program.
The Narrow Trail, starring William S. Hart, a Hoot Gibson short, The Man with a Punch, and Hands Up! with comedian Raymond Griffith.
Keystone: Special guest Paul Gierucki is the California-based man in charge of restoring the Keystone Kops films airing on Turner Classic Movies. He will bring samples of these movies that will run in each session.
TOPEKAMAGAZINE
Winter ’ 12
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