Houston Symphony Presents: Halloween Silent Film Double Feature

On Friday, October 25, 2024 at 7 p.m. in Jones Hall, the Houston Symphony is screening a classic horror double feature: the silent films The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920), and The Phantom of the Opera (1925), starring Lon Chaney. Both films are being screened solely with the musical accompaniment of organist/conductor/arranger Brett Miller, who specializes in the art of silent movie accompaniment.

Directed by Robert Weine, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari is considered one of the greatest films of the silent era. It tells the macabre tale of the deranged director of a mental hospital, who uses hypnotism to commit murders. Long before M. Night Shyamalan, this film pioneered the twist ending for filmgoers.

The second half of this frightening double-bill is Lon Chaney’s classic performance in the title role of Rupert Julian’s The Phantom of the Opera. Based on the Gaston Leroux novel of the same name (as is Andrew Lloyd Webber’s mega-hit musical, also of the same name), this film tells the tale of a mysterious Phantom that haunts the Paris Opera House, taking an obsessive interest in a young singer that leads to tragic consequences. The great Lon Chaney, known as “The Man of a Thousand Faces,” stars in the title role.