El Automovil Gris (The Grey Automobile)

Certain Inhabitants’ Theatre presents El Automovil Gris (The Grey Automobile), directed by Claudio Valdes Kuri. Beside a film screen and working within and beyond the great Japanese Benshi tradition of silent film narration, a Japanese actress and a Mexican actor will narrate The Grey Automobile a Mexican silent film classic directed by Enrique Rosas in 1919. As the film progresses the actors comment and give unique voices to each of the film’s characters, playing with language, treading the fine line between correct interpretation and misinterpretation generated by the encounter of two distant and very different cultures. A Mexican pianist also accompanies the film.