In the iconic Billy Wilder film “Sunset Boulevard,”
Gloria Swanson plays an aging starlet of the 1920s fading in the
new era of the 1950s. The new Billy Wilder Theater will also pair
the past and present together, but it will successfully assimilate
the two, bringing a legacy of films from now and before together
with the cutting-edge breakthroughs of the future.
The Billy Wilder Theater’s opening inside the UCLA Hammer
Museum on Dec. 3 brought celebrities and other film industry
luminaries together in a private, invitation-only gathering that
celebrated the legacy of Wilder and his wife, Audrey Wilder. Warren
Beatty and Annette Bening functioned as the masters of ceremonies,
while writer/directors Cameron Crowe, Curtis Hanson and A&M
Records founders Ann and Jerry Moss co-chaired the event.
Speaking about Wilder’s prolific film career as a writer
and director of such classic films as “Double
Indemnity,” “Some Like it Hot” and “The
Seven Year Itch,” the opening paid tribute to both his work
and life, with a 90-minute program on his film legacy.
The theater’s inception has been in the works for a number
of years, as the Hammer Museum has always contained space for
theater, but was never properly able to utilize it until Audrey
Wilder’s request to dedicate such a venue to her
husband’s legacy.
“There was always this notion that the UCLA Film &
Television Archive would come to this theater, because the theater
space existed,” said Ann Philbin, director of the Hammer
Museum. “It was really just a matter of making it
happen.”
A $5 million grant made by Audrey Wilder finally made the
theater’s construction possible. Now that the theater has
opened, the Hammer Museum and the UCLA Film & Television
Archive will be able to collaborate on the theater’s various
programs, with programs beginning in February of next year.
One of the main programs will be film screenings. With
technological capabilities of the highest quality, the 295 seat
theater allows the presentation of 16, 35 and 70 mm film along with
digital projection.
The Film & Television Archive will continue its tradition of
screening a wide range of film selections, bringing the largest
collection of film ““ second only to the Library of Congress
““ from the James Bridge Theater to the Billy Wilder
Theater.
“The Archive goes from the nitrate era all the way up to
digital and contemporary settings,” said Robert Rosen, dean
of the UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television. “The
theater fully embodies today’s audience and the very
distinctive mission of the archive.”
Upcoming highlights for the Film & Television Archive
include a tribute series to Wilder, “Roberto Rossellini: A
Retrospective,” and a screening dedicated to filmmaker Guy
Maddin.
Besides an extensive showcasing of film, the theater will
provide a center for a number of non-film Hammer showpieces,
including lectures, theatrical productions and readings, beginning
Dec. 10 with Dave Eggers reading from his latest novel on southern
Sudan, “What is the What.”
The theater’s opening also represents an important step
for the Hammer Museum in incorporating film into the museum’s
extensive art collection and reinforcing its focus on encompassing
all elements of artistic expression.
“It was like a dream to fulfill the idea to show all kinds
of art,” Philbin said. “The fact that now we can also
have filmmakers, especially in a city like Los Angeles where film
is so important to people, just made perfect sense.”
The theater maintains this multifaceted theme not only in its
selection of film and other non-theatrical uses, but also in its
very structure.
Architect Michael Maltzan designed the theater as a more
contemporary, vibrant building, reflective of its location within
the Hammer Museum ““ a nexus for film amid a bustling, moving
city.
The vibrant and unusual pink color scheme of the theater
immediately surrounds visitors, as seats, curtains and aisle rows
all boast the bright color and reinforce Maltzan’s themes for
the theater.
“I was looking a for a color that had a presence that was
unique, that you probably hadn’t seen in other theaters, but
also a color that really seemed to reinforce a sense of optimism
and a sense of the future,” Maltzan said.
The lights of the theater appear as elongated beams, unconnected
to the walls and ceiling and reinforcing a more modern
atmosphere.
The lights may be unconnected, but according to Maltzan,
elements like these connect the Wilder Theater with the populous
city of Los Angeles.
“The lights are a part of a larger choreography that spoke
of the sense of the city,” he said.
This modernity is expected to especially attract younger
audiences to the theater.
“It feels like a contemporary space instead of most
theaters, which might feel old-fashioned,” Philbin said.
But no matter what age theatergoers are, they are in for a
special, interactive kind of experience at the new Billy Wilder
Theater.
“It’s large enough to have many people together
interacting with each other to create a true theatrical experience,
but at the same time, it’s intimate enough so that the
audience can have a relationship with the filmmakers,” Rosen
said.