George Eastman House, a nonprofit museum in Rochester, NY is home to one of the major moving image archives in the U.S. The first curator of film, James Card, established this program to preserve classic films for future generations. Card’s devotion to the silent era of filmmaking, the golden age of Hollywood, and silent German cinema created a collection of classics unrivalled for its quality and diversity. George Eastman House presents public screenings year-round to share its holdings with the public in its 534-seat Dryden Theatre.
BL&S’ relationship with George Eastman House began in 1983 with their production called "A Night of 100 Stars." Six leading ladies of the 1930s, including Myrna Loy, Louise Brooks, and Margaret Sullivan, were presented with the prestigious George Eastman Award. BL&S principal Chapin Cutler was the technical director and stage manager for the event. "Because of the archival nature of the film clips, we could not cut the prints," states Cutler. "We had to install six projectors in order to produce their show. It all worked flawlessly."
In 2005, the museum trustees hired Boston Light & Sound to develop a state-of-the-art archival showplace in the museum's historic Dryden Theatre. The BL&S team consulted on the theatre renovation, building a museum projection system for showcasing all formats of motion pictures, standard and high-definition video, analog, and digital audio for the current, classic, and silent motion picture exhibition.
In 2007, the upgrade began. New state of the art convertible Kinoton FP 38 projectors were installed to replace aging 16 mm projectors. Additionally, BL&S integrated a new film sound system into the facility in anticipation of a future upgrade to 70 mm. The facility will now be able to handle old silver tracks up to state of the art cyan tracks as well as Dolby Digital. Looking forward, the process will continue with a total architectural revamp of the facility as well as high definition video.

When the full renovation is complete, the Dryden Theatre will reopen with state-of-the-art electronic 16/35/70mm projection, which is also capable of running nitrate film and variable speed silent classics-and it will have a high-powered 6.1 Dolby Digital surround EX sound system of unsurpassed quality.
Request an Estimate Download Client List