Pandora's Box with Live Piano from Mike Hatchard

As rare screening with live piano accompaniment from Hastings composer and musician Mike Hatchard. Part of our new strand, Sunday Silents.

Louise Brooks dazzles as the dangerously appealing seductress Lulu in a gripping moral fable that is as tragic as it is charming. It's not not only a landmark film in the canon of Weimar cinema, but of the silent film era.

G.W. Pabst’s Pandora’s Box is a sensual, lurid depiction of a woman whose charm and beauty leads to her downfall and the collapse of the circle of people who surround her. Structured in eight acts, the film is a showcase for the one-of-a-kind star and flapper girl Louise Brooks, whose portrayal of the mischievous but arguably innocent Lulu is one of the most memorable and iconic performances of the silent era.

Mike Hatchard started out in the National Youth Jazz Orchestra, then toured America and Europe accompanying Cleo Laine on piano and became Matt Monro’s youngest ever musical director.

Subsequently he toured with Barbara Thompson’s Paraphernalia, the Pasadena Roof Orchestra and worked with artists as varied as Maxine Daniels, Johnny Van Derrick, Salena Jones, Tina May and David Essex.

Touring with Freddy Starr and becoming musical director to Pamela Stephenson he took an interest in comedy and performed his own shows on the circuit as ‘Marvin Hanglider’ which led to co-writing songs with Frankie Howerd and Spike Milligan.

Mike is still obsessive about playing the piano, often practising up to eight hours in a day on his beloved reconditioned century-old Steinway Grand, and is always setting new musical goals for himself - and we are delighted to welcome him to the Electric Palace and get our in-screen piano some action!

Some comments from Silent Sundays:
"Magical experience to hear live piano with the film! A rare treat!"
"Great film and marvellous having piano"
"Loved it!"
" Mike was brilliant on the piano!"

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