The Picture of Dorian Gray

1945, US, Albert Lewin, 110 min. With George Sanders, Hurd Hatfield, Donna Reed, and Angela Lansbury

Introduced by Dr. Susana Martinez-Conde

Oscar Wilde brought to the screen: A young, English gentleman who longs for eternal youth and endless pleasure is granted his wish at the expense of everything he has ever loved and a mysterious portrait that seems to grow more hideous every day. “Filled with understated Wilde ironies, outstanding performances by the entire cast and elegant sets of the Victorian era, this Hollywood film remarkably captures the spirit and remains faithful to the book—something that’s rarely ever achieved in film as well as it is here. If only there wasn’t such an abomination as the Hays Office, this might have been a masterpiece showing Dorian’s wicked libertine hedonism at its fullest.”—Dennis Schwartz, June 2005

About the Speaker

Dr. Susana Martinez-Conde is an award-winning neuroscientist and Professor of Ophthalmology, Neurology, and Psychology & Pharmacology at the State University of New York (SUNY) Downstate Medical Center. She writes the “Illusions” column for Scientific American: MIND and authored the international bestselling book Sleights of Mind: What the Neuroscience of Magic Reveals About our Everyday Deceptions. Dr. Martinez-Conde is a magician member of the Magic Castle in Hollywood and the Magic Circle in London, and the Executive Producer of the annual Best Illusion of the Year Contest. Dr. Martinez-Conde received the prestigious Science Educator Award from the Society for Neuroscience in 2014, and is among the premier science communicators in the United States.