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Following up on our screenings of ON THE WATERFRONT and A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE during our Marlon Brando series earlier this year, please join us for more of the timeless works (EAST OF EDEN, BABY DOLL and AMERICA, AMERICA) by the groundbreaking American master, Elia Kazan, as they were meant to be seen - on the big screen.

EAST OF EDEN, 1955, Warner Bros., 115 min. Iconic status in world cinema was immediately thrust upon James Dean with the release of director Elia Kazan’s adaptation of the John Steinbeck classic. All the more amazing is that it was Dean’s motion picture debut. Dean is brilliantly cast as shy Cal, a pre-WWI teenager who can’t escape from the shadow of his perfect brother, Aaron (Richard Davalos). He is also a rebellious black sheep who will do almost anything to gain the love of his strict father (Raymond Massey), a desire that may destroy those around him, but may also, in the end, offer him his last chance at redemption. Incendiary Jo Van Fleet won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar as Cal’s estranged, brothel madam mother. With a great cast that also includes Julie Harris as Abra, the girl loved by both brothers, as well as Albert Dekker, Burl Ives and a cameo by Timothy Carey.

BABY DOLL, 1956, Warner Bros., 114 min. Director Elia Kazan’s controversial film starring Carroll Baker in a ground-breaking performance as a thumb-sucking, child bride in the deep south. Karl Malden stars as Archie Lee Meighan, her middle-aged husband, a cotton gin owner who eagerly awaits his bride’s 20^th birthday when they will finally consummate their marriage. But rival cotton business man Silva Vaccaro (Eli Wallach in his film debut) suspects Archie of burning down his gin and takes an erotic form of Sicilian vengeance in this gothic tale of pride and perversity. Tennessee Williams wrote his first original screenplay for BABY DOLL, using some elements from two of his earlier one-act plays. The film garnered four Oscar nominations, including Carroll Baker (Best Actress); and Tennessee Williams (Best Writing, Best Screenplay adapted for script). But the explosive film was condemned by the Legion of Decency upon its release. Rip Torn also makes his film debut in an un-credited role.

AMERICA, AMERICA, 1963, Warner Bros., 174 min. If ever there was a director who seemed born for the job of spinning an immigrant’s tale as not just high adventure but bittersweet tragi-comedy, it was Elia Kazan. This sprawling epic of a young Greek, Stavros (based on Kazan’s uncle), living with his family in Turkey circa 1900 and obsessed with making it to America for a better life, is one of Kazan’s most moving, personal films. Kazan molds a talented cast of comparatively unknown performers into a powerhouse ensemble: Stathis Giallelis is perfect as Stavros, with able support from John Marley, Lou Antonio, Joanna Frank and the great Frank Wolff (an underrated American actor who enjoyed a prolific career in 1960s’era Italy before his tragic death in 1971). If you’re a fan of Kazan’s more famous classics like ON THE WATERFRONT and EAST OF EDEN, but have never seen AMERICA, AMERICA, you owe it yourself to catch this masterpiece on the big screen.