As a compliment to their current feature exhibition, American Epics: Thomas Hart Benton and Hollywood, the Milwaukee Art Museum will present a series of four classic American films that are related to Benton’s work. The series opens this Friday, July 8, and continues weekly through the end of the month.
The opening night feature is 1951’s A Streetcar Named Desire, starring Marlon Brando and Vivien Leigh. Widely considered to be one of the greatest films of the 1950s, Benton’s connection to the work actually dates back to 1948, when he was commissioned by legendary Hollywood producer David O. Selznick to paint a scene from the Tennessee Williams play. On July 15, the museum will feature the 1955 Burt Lancaster western The Kentuckian, in which a young Walter Matthau made his motion picture debut. July 22 features 1940’s The Grapes of Wrath, the gritty John Ford adaptation of the classic John Steinbeck novel. Benton created promotion artwork for both The Kentuckian and The Grapes of Wrath (he had also previously done commissioned work for the Grapes novel). The series wraps up on July 29 with another John Ford film, 1956’s The Searchers. Considered one of the greatest westerns ever made, the film’s sweeping views of the American West are a defining feature of the Hollywood’s “Golden Age” and provide an excellent compliment to the western-themed work of Benton.
Taken on their own, it would be well worth the effort to see each of these films in the theater setting in which they were meant to be enjoyed, but paired with the innovative work of Benton, the series takes on new dimensions that should not be missed. Each film begins at 6:15 p.m. and will be screened in the Lubar Auditorium. The series is free to museum members and included with museum admission.
