Nosferatu Live

Imaginary Worlds

Eric Molinsky

Arts, Science Fiction, Fiction, Society & Culture

4.8 • 2.1K Ratings

🗓️ 31 March 2022

⏱️ 31 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

100 years ago this month, the vampire film Nosferatu was released in Germany. Not long after, it was hit with a lawsuit – which the filmmakers lost – and every copy of the film was to be destroyed. At least one copy managed to survive, and decades later, Nosferatu became a worldwide classic. Part of what’s kept the film alive has been live orchestras who infuse this old vampire film with fresh blood and original scores. I talk with Philip Shorey of The Curse of the Vampire orchestra and Josh Robins of Invincible Czars about their different approaches to writing music for Nosferatu and how audiences have reacted to them. I also talk with Carnegie-Mellon professor Stephen Brockmann about which aspects of vampire lore originally came from Nosferatu as the filmmakers tried to change the Dracula story enough so they could avoid blood-sucking lawsuits. This episode is sponsored by Inked Gaming. Our ad partner is Multitude. If you’re interested in advertising on Imaginary Worlds, you can contact them here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	This episode is brought to you by Slack. With Slack, you can bring all your people and
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0:20.9	inside and outside of your company. Slack, where the future works. Get started at
0:26.9	Slack.com slash DHQ.
0:29.8	You're listening to Imaginary Worlds, a show about how we create them and why we suspend
0:35.4	our disbelief. I'm Eric Melinsky.
0:39.9	When I was studying film in college, I watched my first silent movies, and I was amazed
0:44.7	that these films were so adventurous. The cinematography was so fluid. Because one
0:50.2	sound came about, movies had to be made in these hermetically sealed studios with cumbersome
0:55.2	sound recording equipment. But in the 1920s, cameras were really lightweight. You could
1:00.9	bring them anywhere. And I don't think filmmaking became that agile again until the 1960s or
1:06.9	70s.
1:07.9	In one of the greatest films from the silent era, was released 100 years ago this month,
1:14.6	Nosferatu, the classic German vampire tale.
1:19.2	And the amazing thing about Nosferatu is that the movie almost disappeared completely. There
1:24.5	was a campaign to destroy it. And the story of how it survived is inspiring to me, because
1:30.2	it's about the love of cinema, and people using modern instruments, and I mean musical
1:35.7	instruments, to infuse new blood into an old vampire tale.
1:42.7	But before we hear about that, let's look at the movie itself.
1:47.4	Stephen Brockman is a professor at Carnegie Mellon who teaches German language and culture.
	...

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