'Safety Last'; UNH music professor scores classic Harold Lloyd silent film for Concord screening
New Hampshire Union Leader
April 13, 2006
DALE VINCENT

Today's major motion pictures are as much about the music as the dialogue.
Try watching any blockbuster film without the jarring screech of stringed instruments to signal impending doom or the soothing strains of a piano as a backdrop to a tender scene, and it would seem pretty uneventful.

Even during the era of silent movies, audiences appreciated the intensity music could add to the events unfolding on the screen. When the 1923 silent movie classic "Safety Last" was shown in theaters, it was common to have someone providing accompaniment on organ or piano, especially at moments of crisis or great emotion.

"Primarily, somebody would just improvise," said University of New Hampshire Music Professor Michael Annicchiarico, who recently got a chance to help revive the 83-year-old film. "It's something of an art form."

In an effort to help re-animate the work of Harold Lloyd, a physical comedian and actor along the lines of Bustor Keaton and Charlie Chaplin, Annicchiarico composed a score for a Red River Theatres presentation of "Safety Last" at the Capital Center for the Arts in Concord at 7:30 p.m. Friday.

Generally nattily attired with trademark dark-rimmed eye glasses and a jauntily placed skimmer, Lloyd created likable characters in silent movies who would have easily blended into the background of any crowd were it not for his penchant towards audacious behavior in an attempt to impress people.

"Safety Last" has Lloyd portraying a young man from the country looking to make a name for himself in the big city. Getting a job as a department store clerk, he decides to impress his girlfriend and employer by arranging a stunt that will lure more customers to the store.

His idea is to have his roommate, a human fly, climb up the outside of the 12-story building in which the business exists. Unfortunately, the roommate is wanted by the police and Lloyd is forced into being a substitute for the climber.

The building-climbing sequence is startling both because of the obstacles the building presents for Lloyd, and for its lack of special effects. The most famous obstacle is the face of a clock, and a photo of Lloyd clinging to the clock arms still is sometimes used in connection with daylight savings time.

Keyed to the characters and events, the new score features Annicchiarico on keyboards and David Kontak playing base and offering some sound effects.

Annicchiarico made use of a storyboarding technique to break the film down into sections, then wrote music which "augments the film without getting in the way ... trying to get the right mood and right character."

Although he has composed music before, Annicchiarico hadn't tried scoring a silent movie. The project grew out of a conversation with Barry Steelman, who previously owned the Cinema 93 movie theater and is a driving force behind the Red River Theatres, which has a lease on the Concord Commons building now under construction on South Main Street.

"I would really like to try to improvise music to a silent film someday," Annicchiarico recalls telling Steelman. After a collection of Harold Lloyd films came out on DVD, Steelman approached Annicchiarico with a copy of "Safety Last."

"I fell in love with it," Annicchiarico said. "I immediately had ideas for little segments. I wrote 73 minutes of music," he said, working primarily throughout January and February.

He broke the movie down, scene by scene, into blocks that were manageable. Each of the characters has a theme and "as the character evolves, the music evolves," he said.

Steelman had suggested a collaboration and Annicchiarico knew just the person, Kontak, a musician and instrument maker whose day job is director of the assistive technology office at Crotched Mountain Rehabilitation Center.

"David and I had been working on some projects," he said, and was happy to sign onto the project. "He did write a little of it, a melody," said Annicchiarico. Even more important, he said, was that Kontak would note where a sound was needed, describe what it should sound like and create it.

"He's in it. He's performing. That's a huge piece of it," said Annicchiarico. "I'm interested in continuing with this, hoping to do this in other cities."

He said the accompaniment could become even more interesting because the director of the wind ensemble at UNH has asked him to adapt it for orchestra.

Advance tickets are available at Cinema 93 Video, 15 Pleasant St., Concord. Tickets are $10 for general admission; $5 for senior citizens and youths under 12. For additional information, call 225-5650.

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