Jim Jarmusch Staging NYC Concert to Accompany Upcoming Vampire Film
Acclaimed director and musician Jim Jarmusch will celebrate the opening of his 11th film Only Lovers Left Alive with a special pre-release event in New York, combining a screening of the film with live performance by his band SQÜRL.
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The April 1st event, held 10 days before the film’s official release, will occur in two parts: the screening will be held at 7:00 p.m. at Sunshine Cinema, while the post-film concert will take place at nearby club Santos Party House. The concert will feature musicians who appeared on the film’s soundtrack, including Zola Jesus, White Hills, Jozef Van Wissem and Yasmine Hamdan. Jarmusch has previously staged similar events in Cologne, Berlin, Paris and London where, like New York, guests are encouraged to wear sunglasses & dress gloves.
Jarmusch formed SQÜRL with Vampire Weekend/Sleigh Bells engineer Shane Stoneback and drummer and longtime Jarmusch collaborator Carter Logan in 2009 to record original instrumental music for his film The Limits of Control (under the name Bad Rabbit). The band released the first two of three planned EPs in 2013, recorded over a three-year period in Brooklyn, NY, via ATP Recordings.
Billed by Jarmusch as a “crypto-vampire love story,” Only Lovers Left Alive tells the story of a depressed, reclusive underground musician named Adam (Tom Hiddleston) who reunites with his centuries-old free-spirited wife Eve (Tilda Swinton), but finds trouble with her unruly younger sister Ava (Mia Wasikowska). Anton Yelchin, Jeffrey Wright and John Hurt also star in the film. The film’s soundtrack will be released on April 8th.
At the film’s North American premiere at Toronto International Film Festival last year, Jarmusch said it took seven years to get the financing to make the movie and Swinton stuck with the project the whole time. “We made this film last summer in seven weeks over three continents and it was one of the most rewarding experiences of my life,” he said.
“There are some kind of heavy themes in the film about what humans are, what they’re doing, but when you see the film, there’s a lightness that I’m happy is in there,” Jarmusch said after the screening. “It wasn’t so clear to me while making the film. Of course, I always try to make funny things in front of me, but I’m happy. I’m hoping there’s a balance of those themes, but they’re delivered with a kind of lightness as well. I can never analyze what it is.”
Tickets for the event, including both the film screening and concert, are $35 and can be picked up on TicketWeb.