DUE TO PROTEST THREATS, THEATER SHELVES FILM.

Byline: Valerie Kuklenski Staff Writer

The Silent Movie Theatre in Hollywood has dropped its planned screenings of ``The Birth of a Nation,'' part of its themed convention week slate, because of threats of protests.

The 1915 D.W. Griffith epic about two families during the Civil War and Reconstruction is historically significant as the first feature film ever made, but it has been controversial from the beginning for its heroic depiction of the Ku Klux Klan's deadly attacks on African-Americans.

Charlie Lustman, proprietor of the Silent Movie Theatre, scheduled the film several weeks ago and advised the Los Angeles chapter of the NAACP he was doing so.

``And I invited them to use it as a platform to show how far African- Americans have come in cinema,'' Lustman said, adding that he offered to help arrange question-and-answer sessions after the screenings with experts on the subject.

However, after a couple of weeks the NAACP told Lustman the organization would organize a large protest if it were shown.

``I pulled it because I don't want to ruffle any organization's feathers. I don't want to be painted a racist theater,'' Lustman said. ``And who knows what white supremacist groups might come and say, 'Go Klan!'

``I understand where it's rocking the roots of their organization. They've been picketing the film since 1915,'' he said. ``I thought this was a great opportunity for them to do something positive with it. We could have done a Q&A after the film. They just took the old position of protest.''

``We can't find a good reason to even discuss this film,'' said Geraldine R. Washington, president of the Los Angeles chapter of the NAACP. ``It's my understanding that it is still used today by the Klan as a tool to recruit for the Klan. Certainly we are not interested in recruiting for the Klan.''

She said she thinks the NAACP would not endorse screening ``Birth of a Nation'' outside of academic contexts for many years.

``We could show that film in its historic perspective when there's no more Klan. Then we could all talk about it,'' Washington said.

She praised Lustman for taking ``the high road'' in deciding to cancel the screenings.

In 1980, the Richelieu Theater in San Francisco was ransacked by protesters during a ``Birth'' screening. The crowd tore the screen, damaged the projectors and struck ushers before running out.

In place of ``The Birth of a Nation'' on Wednesday and Aug. 17 at 8 p.m., the Silent Movie Theatre will show Griffith's 1916 epic, ``Intolerance,'' which interweaves four stories of inhumanity from the ancient Babylonians to the time the film was made. Lustman is using one of the original prints found in Venezuela that runs over three hours with two intermissions.

On Tuesday the theater will show Orson Welles' classic ``Citizen Kane,'' and Aug. 18-20 it's ``The General,'' a comedy based on the true Civil War story of a stolen train and Union spies, directed by and starring Buster Keaton.

The Silent Movie Theatre is located at 611 N. Fairfax Ave. Tickets are $8 for general admission, $6 for students, seniors and kids. For more information, call [phone] or go to www.silentmovietheatre.com on the Web.

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Henry B. Walthall and Lillian Gish star in the D.W. Griffith silent epic ``The Birth of a Nation.''