Parlando Presents: American Aristocracy
sParlando Presents: American Aristocracy brings a piece of Westerly’s own movie history back to the screen Saturday, August 22, as the 1916 silent film starring Douglas Fairbanks is accompanied by a live chamber orchestra at the UNITED Theatre.
The 7:30 p.m. performance pairs a rare screening of American Aristocracy with a newly created orchestral score performed by Parlando, a New York-based chamber orchestra founded and conducted by Ian Niederhoffer.
What makes the evening especially unusual is its local connection. More than a century before Westerly became home to a restored movie theater and arts center, Fairbanks and a film crew were using Westerly and Watch Hill themselves as movie locations.
A Silent Movie Made in Westerly and Watch Hill
Released in 1916, American Aristocracy stars Fairbanks as Cassius Lee, an amateur entomologist who becomes entangled in romance, mistaken identities and an international gunrunning scheme.
Fairbanks was already emerging as one of the biggest personalities of the silent-film era. He would later become famous for swashbuckling pictures including The Mark of Zorro, Robin Hood and The Thief of Bagdad, and would become one of the founders of United Artists alongside Mary Pickford, Charlie Chaplin and D.W. Griffith.
But American Aristocracy has another distinction for local audiences: portions were filmed in Westerly and Watch Hill.
The connection wasn’t accidental. Contemporary reporting cited by Parlando notes that Fairbanks was staying in Watch Hill with his in-laws when the film was made. When the finished movie reached Westerly later in 1916, it was advertised for a local showing at the Bliven Opera House.
More than a century later, audiences can watch those images of the area on a movie screen only a short distance from where some of them were captured.
A New Score Performed Live
Silent films were never intended to be truly silent.
During the era, movies were commonly accompanied by live music ranging from a single pianist or organist to larger ensembles. The music supplied emotion, tension and momentum that modern audiences now expect to hear as part of a film soundtrack.
Parlando is recreating that experience with a score specifically assembled for American Aristocracy.
Rather than placing contemporary music underneath the 1916 images, the orchestra’s score is constructed entirely from works by New England composers who were active around the time the movie was made.
The result connects the film not only to the place where it was shot, but to the musical world surrounding New England during the same period.
About Parlando
Founded in 2019 by conductor Ian Niederhoffer, Parlando approaches classical concerts through storytelling.
Instead of simply presenting a sequence of compositions, the New York chamber orchestra builds programs around a central idea and provides audiences with historical and musical context for what they’re about to hear.
Its programs frequently combine familiar works with music by lesser-known or underrepresented composers, connecting them through a larger narrative rather than presenting unusual pieces simply as curiosities.
That philosophy makes American Aristocracy a particularly natural project for the ensemble. Here, the story surrounding the music is literally playing on the screen while the orchestra performs.
Parlando has established a growing presence on New York’s classical music scene and performs regularly at venues including Merkin Hall. The ensemble has also released its debut album, Censored Anthems, examining music and cultural resilience under Soviet censorship.
An Encore for Westerly
There’s another wrinkle to the August 22 performance: this isn’t the first time Parlando has brought the project to Westerly.
The orchestra presented American Aristocracy at the UNITED in August 2025. The local connection proved strong enough for the production to return almost exactly one year later.
That makes the 2026 performance something of an encore, giving audiences another opportunity to experience a movie made locally 110 years ago with live orchestral accompaniment.
Inside the UNITED Theatre
The setting adds another layer of local history.
The UNITED originally opened in downtown Westerly in 1926, a decade after American Aristocracy was released. After decades as a movie theater, it eventually closed before undergoing an extensive restoration and reopening in 2021 as a nonprofit regional arts center.
Today, the complex combines cinemas with live-performance spaces, a gallery and arts education programming.
American Aristocracy will be presented in the UNITED Black Box Auditorium as a fully seated performance with tiered seating.
So the evening brings together several generations of Westerly entertainment history: a movie filmed locally in 1916, presented inside a theater whose own history dates to 1926, accompanied by a 21st-century orchestra using music rooted in the film’s own era.
Event Details
Event: Parlando Presents: American Aristocracy
Date: Saturday, August 22, 2026
Time: 7:30 p.m.
Location: UNITED Black Box Auditorium
Venue: The UNITED Theatre
Address: 5 Canal Street, Westerly, RI 02891
Tickets: $40–$50
Tickets are non-refundable and non-exchangeable.h
