Looking Back to Look Forward, Silents Please

As I'm working on a few longer term projects and have some new projects to start, I thought it might be useful – to me that is – to look back at some of my older work. I designed Silents Please a number of years ago and worked on it for several years before it died a quiet and natural death.

Silents Please was published for three years by Bristol Silents, a volunteer run organisation that promoted silent film in the South West and around the country.

It began as a small, very small, 'zine aimed at silent film enthusiasts –mind you, this group included Paul Merton, Paul McGann, Director of the Pordenone Silent Film Festival David Robinson and Kevin Barlow, one of the top writers on silent film in the world.

the 'zine grew with the organisation, starting as a 12 page photocopy to a properly printed 40 pager in the last issue. Alas, the organisations success, touring film programmes and a huge silent comedy festival in Bristol, meant that time and money wasn't available to continue publishing.

Publisher Chris Daniels, Bristol Silents
Editor, Lesley Anne Rose.
Shown, early cover featuring the beautiful Mary Pickford. Spread explaining Chaplin's famous banana skin slip.