It’s interesting. I really thought my idea of live-streaming a live-scored and live-hosted silent film program would catch on. Perhaps slowly at first, and then at some point it would start to snowball. After all, so many of us silent… Read More »Streamed Silents: Does Live-Scoring Make A Difference?
One of the great things about living in NYC is that by taking walks, rather than getting everywhere by car, you run into people you haven’t seen in a long time. A teacher from film school told me once that… Read More »Getting the High Sign
I wasn’t sure when I first heard about Patreon, but a recent NPR piece about it that interviews its founders Jack Conte and Sam Yam mentions their launch year of 2013. So, this was during the time in the early… Read More »Brandy Snifter on the Cocktail Bar Piano
Believe it or not, I have not been able to find answers to two basic questions about YouTube live-streaming. They’re issues I’ve been noticing for the last four weeks on the Silent Comedy Watch Party, and I can’t believe that… Read More »Over-scans and Purple-Green Bands
John Bunny enjoyed a popularity in his day that has evaporated with time. To some extent that process began right at the end of his screen career. The mid-‘teens saw the rise of slapstick in the manic Keystone comedies and… Read More »Revisiting the Films of John Bunny
Programming shorts to a theme is often useful if you need to draw a potential audience’s attention or if you have a hard time making choices from a long list. And sometimes it just happens without any planning at all.… Read More »Two Weddings and a Sandwich
“Can I tell you about today’s specials?” Okay, it’s been a couple weeks since someone’s asked you that question. But in the case of The Silent Comedy Watch Party, it applies. With people hosting movie-viewing watch parties on social media… Read More »Adding a Page to Watch Party Menu
Last week’s premiere episode of “The Silent Comedy Watch Party” was a success, so it seems I was right about going ahead with doing the stream. I was also wrong about something. Luckily that was easily correctable, and it was… Read More »Opening the Gates and Letting the Laughs Out
The premiere episode of “The Silent Comedy Watch Party” streamed live on Sunday March 22 at 3:30pm EDT (New York, east coast USA). Hosted by silent film accompanist Ben Model and film historian Steve Massa, the one-hour program will present… Read More »“The Silent Comedy Watch Party” – *premiere*
A farmhouse in Ireland, a park bench in Manhattan, living rooms in Denmark and Australia and Texas and Nebraska and Kansas. These are some of the locations people watched the pilot of “The Silent Comedy Watch Party” yesterday afternoon, a… Read More »I Threw Spaghetti at the Wall – and it Stuck