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Dedicated to preserving the experience of seeing silent comedy film

 
updated -- August 7, 2005

The Silent Clowns Film Series, New York's longest-running regularly-scheduled showcase for classic silent film comedy, screens the movies of Chaplin, Keaton, Laurel & Hardy, Lloyd and more.  Every show features live musical accompaniment by Ben Model and introduction and Q&A with film historian Bruce Lawton.  Programs are presented on alternating Sunday afternoons from September to May every year.

The series will begin its ninth season of silent film programs on Septermber 25th.  This fall, the series celebrates the 30th anniversary of the publishing of Walter Kerr's landmark book on silent film comedy, "The Silent Clowns" (Knopf, 1975).  For date and program info, click on the Now Showing button. 

The Silent Clowns Film Series holds its shows at The New-York Historical Society, located at 170 Central Park West (between W. 76th and W. 77th Streets), near the Natural History Museum. For more information about the theater, tickets, and what's happening at the Little Theater at the West Side YMCA (where our shows have been presented for the last 3 years) click on the Theater button.

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The Silent Clowns Film Series is dedicated to the memory of Walter Kerr, whose landmark book, "The Silent Clowns," was the inspiration for our series (and its name), as well as to the memory of William K. Everson, Lee Erwin, David Gill, Herb Graff, Eleanor Keaton, Paul Killiam, Don Malkames, Warren Rothenberger and John Rogers...and dreams that survive.
 

This film series is a production of Silent Cinema Presentations, Inc., a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization.  Silent Cinema Presentations is supported by a generous grant from the Ira M. Resnick Foundation, and by funding from the New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA), JP Morgan Chase, the James A. Macdonald Foundation, the Edward Handelman Fund, and by support from Elmo USA.