No Sound of Music: Hilan Warshaw is bewildered by the decision to release this ground-breaking 1913 Wagner biopic without music

A fascinating chapter in the history of Wagnerian myth-making comes to DVD with this release of Carl Froelich’s biographical epic from 1913, The Life and Works of Richard Wagner. The first known dramatic portrayal of Wagner on film (it had been predated by several comical impersonations by the mimic Leopold Fregoli), it was also one of the most ambitious film productions of its time. As the filmmaker Tony Palmer notes in his commentary, this lavish, feature-length biopic was made at a time when few films exceeded ten minutes.