Bert Williams

Film

Discovered as a collection of unedited rushes in MoMA’s Biograph collection, Lime Kiln Club Field Day would have been the first American feature with an all-Black cast (1913) had it been released. Assembled by the Department of Film’s Ron Magliozzi and Peter Williamson, the film stars the popular musical theater performer Bert Williams as a top-hatted dandy who vanquishes his rivals to win the hand of a local beauty (Odessa Warren Grey). Shown with Fish, a one-reel comedy written, directed by, and starring Williams, released in 1916. Piano accompaniment by Ben Model (September 8), Donald Sosin (September 15, 18).

Program approx. 80 min.

Lime Kiln Club Field Day [archival assembly]. 1913/2014. USA. Directed by T. Hayes Hunter, Edwin Middleton

Fish. 1916. USA. Directed by Bert Williams

This film accompanies Biograph/Edison: Restorations and Rediscoveries from the Collection.

Sat, Sep 18, 2021, 1:00 p.m.

MoMA, Floor T2/T1, Theater 2

The Roy and Niuta Titus Theater 2
Wed, Sep 15, 2021, 1:00 p.m.

MoMA, Floor T2/T1, Theater 2

The Roy and Niuta Titus Theater 2
Wed, Sep 8, 2021, 7:00 p.m.

MoMA, Floor T2/T1, Theater 1

The Roy and Niuta Titus Theater 1

Licensing

If you would like to reproduce an image of a work of art in MoMA’s collection, or an image of a MoMA publication or archival material (including installation views, checklists, and press releases), please contact Art Resource (publication in North America) or Scala Archives (publication in all other geographic locations).

MoMA licenses archival audio and select out of copyright film clips from our film collection. At this time, MoMA produced video cannot be licensed by MoMA/Scala. All requests to license archival audio or out of copyright film clips should be addressed to Scala Archives at [email protected]. Motion picture film stills cannot be licensed by MoMA/Scala. For access to motion picture film stills for research purposes, please contact the Film Study Center at [email protected]. For more information about film loans and our Circulating Film and Video Library, please visit https://www.moma.org/research/circulating-film.

If you would like to reproduce text from a MoMA publication, please email [email protected]. If you would like to publish text from MoMA’s archival materials, please fill out this permission form and send to [email protected].