I research and write about the intersection of film, culture, and history.

I am interested in charting the ways that individual films, exhibition technologies, and industry practices shape our shared culture. How does an ephemeral act like filmgoing gain cultural salience? What do the materials and technologies of film exhibition add to the experience of a movie, and how do they make individual movies and our broader culture meaningful?

My research identifies how contemporary cinematic cultures participate in discourses with the past as well as the endurance of filmgoing as a cultural practice in the face of industrial, technological, and political instability.

My research interests include the cultural, political, technological, and material aspects of American exhibition and filmgoing practices. I also enjoy thinking and writing about silent cinema, modernism and modernity, history on screen, and genre and storytelling modes.

A portrait of Paul Klein, a researcher at American University studying film and history in their Literature, Culture, and Technology program. Paul stands in front of a cityscape at sunset.

I graduated from American University with an MA in Literature, Culture, and Technology (4.0 GPA) in December 2024. As a graduate student, I was awarded several scholarships and grants that supported my research, including AU’s Double Eagle scholarship, and the Dorthy Rosenberg Phi Beta Kappa Annual Meeting Travel Grant from the American Historical Association. In 2025, I presented research at annual meetings of the American Historical Association and the Society for Cinema and Media Studies.

I attended both American University and the University of Maryland Global Campus as a non-traditional undergraduate student. At American, I completed a major in history (4.0 GPA) with a minor in cinema studies (3.99 GPA). Throughout my undergrad career, I received numerous awards and honors. I placed on both AU and UMGC’s Dean’s List each semester between 2020 and 2023. Prior to graduation, I was honored by the American University College of Arts and Sciences Department of History with the Anna Kasten Nelson Award for Excellence in History. I was also selected to present research about Western films and the Cold War, “Hidden History: High Noon, the Cold War, and the Interrogation of the American Identity,” at the 33rd Annual Robyn Rafferty Mathias Research Conference. In 2022, the AU College of Arts and Sciences Department of Literature selected my essay, “‘The Mirror’s Spooky Surface’: Get Out, Trauma, and America’s Peculiar Institution,” as Best Essay by an Undergraduate Student.

Before returning to school, I ran operations for anything from movie theaters to municipal technology startups. At Landmark Theatres I standardized theater operations, curated concessions and bar menus, and helped program midnight movies. As Chief of Staff for companies like UrbanStems and OurStreets, I helped founders raise millions in venture capital, expanded markets, and built novel products to tackle big problems.