The Smithsonian Institution and National Gallery of Art Present : Ciné-Concert: Broken Blossoms
December 15 at 2:00
Freer Gallery of Art
Appalasia in performance
D. W. Griffith adapted a story from Thomas Burke’s popular 1916 collection Limehouse Nights. Set in London’s East End, Broken Blossom’s moody, fog-bound tale is a tender love story, a tragic melodrama, and a prescient study in immigrant relations. Cheng Huan (Richard Barthelmess) arrives in England to bring “the message of Buddha to the Anglo-Saxon lands” but ekes out a living as a shopkeeper. The delicate Lucy (Lillian Gish) and her pugilist dad Battling Burrows (Donald Crisp) are the locals who inhabit the uncouth life of the quarter in meager digs.
Original live score for erhu, dulcimer, banjo, and percussion performed live by Appalasia’s Mimi Jong, Jeff Berman, and Sue Powers. (D. W. Griffith, 1919, 90 minutes)

https://www.nga.gov/calendar/film-programs/fall-2019/cc-broken.html