The Film Society of Lincoln Center (FSLC) will present a weeklong series, David Bowie, Watch That Man: David Bowie, Movie Star, August 2 through August 8. The retrospective focuses on the artist as an actor with his many roles on the big screen plus two special rarities from the BBC archives, one of which has never been seen in the U.S.A.
Bowie’s turn as Catherine Deneuve’s vampiric partner in Tony Scott’s The Hunger (1983) opens the series with a special midnight screening on Friday, August 2, followed by the collaboration with Muppet master Jim Henson in Labyrinth(1986) and a screening of his risk-taking performance in Nagisa Oshima’s drama set in a Japanese POW camp in Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence (1982).
Other films include Julian Temple’s love letter to the bohemian scene of late 1950s London, Absolute Beginners (1986), Julian Schnabel’s Basquait (1996) featuring Bowie’s portrayal of Andy Warhol, and Christopher Nolan’s The Prestige (2006), in which Bowie portrayed inventor Nicola Tesla.
Two special highlights of the series are rarities from the BBC’s archives including the U.S. Premiere of Alan Clarke’s musical adaptation of Bertolt Brecht’s Baal with Bowie in the title role, and a rare screening of Alan Yentob’s BBC documentary Cracked Actor (1975) which will be paired with D.A. Pennebaker’s concert film Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars – The Motion Picture (1973).
All screenings will take place at the Walter Reade Theater, 165 West 65th Street in NYC. For further information visit the FSLC website here.