Film folk; close-ups of the men, women, and children who make the movies

Wagner, Rob, b. 1872

^oh 'V/aathei*

CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY

3 1924 060 247 859

Cornell University Library

The original of tliis book is in tine Cornell University Library.

There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text.

http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924060247859

FILM FOLK

Cijurtesy of Majestic KolianrB Stud

D. N. GrilFith'a first production, ten years af;,), cost ,M"litv doU'irs —tins one cost luorc tlian that

Copyright, 1918, by The Century Co.

Copyrieht, 1915, 1916, 1917, by Thh Curtis Publishing Company

Published March, 1918

Acknowledgment is herebymade to The Saturday Evening Post for permission to reprint these stories.

FOREWORD

The writer wishes to confess at the outset that he is not an actor, director, extra girl, camera man, movie queen, or any of the other first-persons who voice forth these tales.

As a detached, but interested, observer he watched the moving picture industry grow from its crude beginnings to the huge thing it has become, and during all those years he wondered why some one of the great army of publicity men employed by the various studios did not splash in and tell the truth about the film folk, finally concluding that it was either that their familiarity with the truth had bred contempt, or that the companies, for some strange reason, had employed only fiction writers.

When these stories were written the author had only one hope: that they would be amusing and entertaining; and only one purpose: that, being merely a painter, he needed the literary exercise. Imagine then his surprise when he received the following letter from a profound and corrugated professor of English at a large university:

"The arts of music, sculpture, architecture, painting, and the drama are as old as human records. No new art has come into the world within the history of man, until the birth of the photo-drama. Though all the other arts are more or less related to one another, and the photodrama has borrowed something from her older sisters,

FOREWORD

nevertheless it is a new art-form. Future historians will regard this new birth as an epoch marking event.

"You are fortunate in having been present at this birth, and the intimate pictures you give will be . . . etc., etc.

"What a contribution to the literature of the drama if some writer of the 16th century (even though he had been a very bad one) had given us a little peek into the lives of Shakespere's actors, stage hands, and press agents!

Heavens, to think I had been singing so glibly of a cosmic event! It is just as well that the critics are accessories only after the fact, for had this lofty purpose been in contemplation Posterity would have been denied, as the writer would have been too self-consicous to have sung at all.

But here are the tales; written for the moment, but destined by the prof, to go bowling down the ages as Dramatic Literature (even though it be very bad literature) .

An author has one great advantage in writing for Posterity. It, at least, cannot get out an injunction forbidding publication.

CONTENTS

CKAPXEB PAGE

I The Film Favorite 3

II The Movie Queen 59

III The Vicissitudes op Victob 112

W "Ready! Actiost! Camera! Go!" . . . . 160

V Supes and Supermen 209

VI "Mother, Mat I Go in the Films?" .... 244

VII The Bell-ringers 276

VIII Plots and Counterplots 317

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

D. H. Griffith's first production, ten years ago,

cost eighty dollars Frontispiece

FACING FACE

Nowadays, when we do the animal stuff, we are the ones who occupy the cages 16

These are the scenes the school-girls like 17

Charlie Chaplin and Eob Wagner 48

Douglas Fairbanks has to keep in perfect physical trim 49

Phillipe Smalley, Mme. Schumann-Heink, and Jack Kerrigan 80

Pavlowa selecting her costumes 81

The make-up man at the Universal Studios .... 96

Visitors watching Western Company from platform . . 97

I'd sooner leave the shooting of the sea stuff to the sailor 128

I once stayed in the water for two days waiting for some fool porpoises ., 129

By the use of the telephone he can direct the movements of thousands of troops 144

If one hopes to shoot a hobo in his sleeper one must expect to be discomfited 145

Cecil De Mille coaching Mary Piekford 176

Even a knight grows tired of wearing "tin cans" all day 177

Fraser directing and camera men ready to shoot picture No. 1 as the people are swept beneath their bridge . . 192

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

FACING PACE

Thomas Ince directing a round peg into a square hole . 193

A feud of a few weeks' standing added much to the fury of a battle 224

Only professionals can do it like this 225

Daredevils are hurt in spite of nets 240

Extra men going to their dressing rooms 241

Employment Office of the Eelianee Company .... 256

Society stuff is called working in soup and fish . . . 257

Sixty tons of water will presently come tearing down the

stairs 272

Wiring up the Queen of the Fairies 273

This is not a town in Normandy 304

Scenes are no longer painted, they are built .... 305

The coronation of Charles VII 320

This is how the movies killed the melodrama .... 321

Cecil De Mille, Mary Pickford and Ian Hay sitting with the "Germans" 336

Wallace Beid, Hobart Bosworth, and Geraldine Farrar . 337

FILM FOLK

I

THE FILM FAVORITE (AN ACTOR'S STORY)

THE two tragedies of my youth were my "beautiful eyes" and my "lovely hair." How I detested them! My family, however, thought I was the most irresistible boy in all the world. It seems to me that my whole childhood was wasted in Fauntleroy clothes, frilled shirts, and Florida water. Being at heart a regular boy, I did my best to profane this exaggerated beauty; and I remember one time, when I had been all dosied up for the photographer, with what diabolic joy I sneaked off to my sister's room and cut great wads out of my golden forelocks and clipped my lashes to the roots. Little did I realize that some day my cow eyes and lovely hair were to be my capital stock in trade.

To add to my youthful cross, I was compelled to speak pieces on every possible and impossible occasion. I did not suffer much from this burden during the "moo-cowmoo" period of my babyhood; but when I was about eleven years old and began to develop a sense of shame I endured acute tortures whenever I was called on to

3

face an audience and declare that curfew should not ring that night! The preparation for one of these elocutionary spells was almost as painful as the ordeal itself; for it took hours for my sainted mother to scrub, brush, and polish me up so that I should be worthy of my plush panties, frilled shirt, and wide Byronic coUar. If persisted in long enough, such Olympian demands will break the spirit of any boy, and by the time I reached the sixth grade I had become shameless. One day, at the end of the school term, I stood before two hundred people and held them spellbound while, in a beautiful lyric tenor, I recited Spartacus' Address to the Gladiators.

I know I made a magnificent picture as I rose to the full splendor of my four feet six, while Spartacus furiously urged the slaves to action, for I have my photograph before me as I write. It is the last of a stupendous series of Paris panels and cabinets that recorded the physical and sartorial glories of my childhood. I think, however, the high-water mark of my beauty was attained several years earlier, for in this hand-tinted print I seem to be too large for the Russian blouse.

GETTING TO BE A REAL BOT

At about this time I began to grow, and my beauty went into eclipse. My shame had long ago departed, and now I began to steal, torture cats, smoke corn-silk, break windows, fight with the Micks, and otherwise behave in a very un-Eollolike manner. Mother was much distraught, though father seemed strangely unperturbed. My personal appearance was the hardest blow to her maternal pride, for in my savage revolution I had gone

from plush and white linen to the depths of depravity— corduroy and sweaters. For several years I was exceedingly plain; the hair clipped close to my sconce only emphasized the bright spark of sinister intent that lurked in my eye.

The languishing looks had departed, but not for keeps. By my early twenties my beauty had returned, the cow eyes and lovely mane, glorified. If any one was ever cursed with fatal beauty it was myself. The girls thought I was "perfectly grand!" What the men thought would melt a linotype; so their opinions must go unrecorded. One he-comedian sent me a comic valentine of a male cloak model, the verse being more unpleasant than the picture, which itself was a notable accomplishment. If I had known then that in a few years this godlike beauty was to be worth a thousand a week, I think I could have borne all the comic valentines with exasperating nonchalance.

Only to-day I saw my picture in the window of a leading haberdasher. In it I am wearing one of a dozen sport shirts sent to me by the merchant, and a card informs the gaping bystander that I am America's Greatest Film Favorite!

No doubt, cjmical reader, you have decided by now that I am a vain, insufferable cad. Maybe I am; maybe not. My blessed mother has done and said everything she could to turn my head; but my father is Irish, and he saw a joke when nine days old—and told it to me. So, though the latest moving-picture beauty contest has awarded me the palm as the handsomest male extant, I have not allowed the victory entirely to unseat my reason. Knowing my limitations as an actor, I shall

work this dear old fashionplate beauty of mine just as long as the crowd wants me.

Now in America we worship two things, efficiency and success; and when one of us makes a barrel of money by boiling soap, or hits the pay check for a thousand a week, he runs straight off to a newspaper or magazine to tell how he did it, so that others may emulate his achievement. Being a good American, I, too, shall tell my story.

It matters little who I am. The question that will interest nine gentle readers out of ten is. How to Succeed as a Moving-Picture Actor; and I feel that I can be more free in making observations if I do not disclose my identity. I propose to tell of episodes and make comments on things that are true to fact, though personalities may be somewhat disguised. My name is not Grannon, and I was not born in Syracuse; but that name and place are close enough. John S. Grannon, however, is not a very rococo name for a great actor; so when I decided to become one I changed it—let us suppose —^to Spencer Grandon.

It is unnecessary to tell of my shameful, effeminate youth in further detail. Added to my cherubic beauty, a high-pitched voice seemed to justify the name "Sis" by which I was known even through my college days; but it was at college that I found myself, and there I determined to become a he-man, even if I had to eat raw meat and grow a full beard. I plunged into athletics, and by my senior year I had won a place on the football team and was the intercollegiate champion for the Middle West in welterweight wrestling. Up to this time I was answering all the hopes and aspirations of

my doting parents, and in the spring would become a bachelor of science, prepared to go forth and shed my light before men.

However, a little thing happened that turned my whole career in another direction. I was chosen to play the lead in the senior comedy, the beginning of my decline. From the possible heights of a consulting engineer I was to fall heir to the doubtful distinction of the most ravishing lover who ever rescued maiden fair. Nothing but the stage would do for me.

Father received my decision with some of the quaintest and rarest Irish in his very rich vocabulary; but mother—^bless her dear old heart!—^just knew that I would succeed at anything! If you do not believe I am the greatest actor in the world just drop my mother a line. But don't ask father!

Having chosen a career, I splashed in immediately, went to New York, took the usual bumps, and scored several second-rate successes. My piping voice was the worst handicap. For four years I messed round with one company and another in every State in the Union, and stood about as much chance of dramatic preeminence as a snowball down in Yuma. Finally I found myself in Los Angeles without a job, and with only sixty dollars in my pocket.

Los Angeles, as you know, is a terminal, a dramatic jumping-ofif place, the end of many a histrionic career. When a road company leaves New York and wends its weary and unsympathetic way across the continent it usually ends up in Portland, San Francisco, or Los Angeles—and then disbands. The latter place, especially in late years, has been the finish of many a gallant

troupe that has tried for three thousand miles to buck the growing competition of the moving-pictures.

THE STABBT FIRMAMENT OP LOS ANGELES

According to the story-books and songs, when a company goes broke the orthodox behavior of the hams is to hit the ties back to New York; but Los Angeles is not Schenectady, and the walking across the Mojave is very inelastic. Besides, the Rialto has moved, as I shall explain later. If a theatrical bubble bursts in Portland or San Francisco, the worst has happened and the "artists" wiU have to go to work; but, being willing, a good strong man or woman can always get a job canning apricots or salmon. In Los Angeles, however, another hope is left, for down there, besides fish and fruit, the canneries include the drama; in fact, this latter industry is far more important than either of the others.

It seems curious that a city in one of the nethermost comers of the United States should have become the moving-picture-producing center of the world. Statistics are not satisfactory, but the best authorities state that eighty per cent, of the pictures made in America are produced thereabouts. New companies are forming every day—^many of them, however, surviving only the first picture. Whenever an actor, director, or camera man begins to feel his oats, he starts a company of his own; but most of them go on the rocks. Notwithstanding these numerous fiascoes, the solid, enduring companies are growing every day; and, as a result, there are more actors employed in Southern California than in any other place in the world.

With very few exceptions all the stars of filmdom

reside there, and it is there that they have their organizations, clubs, balls, picnics, and barbecues. In the past few years their ranks have been filled by stage stars, so that a benefit or ball will call together "the greatest galaxy of headliners that ever appeared under one roof!" Yes; the Rialto is still on Broadway, but there is another Broadway, and it lies three thousand miles west of Herald Square.

I have said that Los Angeles is the end of many a dramatic career. I may add that it is also the beginning. Fortunate for me it was that the Candy Kid Company petered out in the City of the Angels; for— who knew!—I might soon see myself as the heroic driver of a fire-truck that would go tearing through the streets, upsetting news-stands and comic policemen! At any rate, here I was, with my crofty clothes and sixty dollars, and here were the studios of some twenty companies. I bought an m.-p. magazine and sat up all one night in my room at the hotel making out an itinerary, so that on the morrow I might hie me forth to land a job.

It was not an encouraging beginning, for on the next day I visited three of the larger studios and the numerous friends I met all told the same tale of overcrowded companies, with thousands of applicants. Introductions seemed to help little; so I determined, as long as my money lasted, to take my chances with the "bunch in the yard." After a week's pilgrimage I picked out the most likely-looking company and settled down to wait.

These Western studios are vastly different from those still remaining in the East. The one I chose. The Climax, was typical of the best. It was a great eighty

acre tract near town; but within its high walls were hUls, wooded barrancos, a brook, and a small lake—all of which made possible many beautiful outside locations. The interior sets were arranged on a great platform three hundred feet long by one hundred deep. These stages are without any covering whatsoever, except the sliding muslin diffusers that are drawn over to soften the sunlight.

It is the "yard," however, which one first encounters; and the waiting-rooms of the New York managers present no such picture. As early as eight o'clock in the morning the place is thronged with the most amaiiing aggregation of humans within whom ever burned the light of hope. What is there about the moving-pictures that attracts so many of them ? They could earn a much better living picking lemons; so one almost wonders whether it is not the call of the ego that is the drawing force. Long benches are crowded with cow-boys, shopgirls, precocious children with admiring parents, plumbers, has-been actors, high-school girls, callow, cigaretty youths. Chinamen, negroes, and Mexicans. All sorts and conditions of men, women, and children are sunning themselves in the open and, for the most part, reading moving-picture magazines.

As the assistant directors—they choose the "extra" members of the cast—make their daily tour of the yard, scanning the benches for types that wiU best suit their needs, the hope that burns in the eager faces of the dramatic candidates is one of almost ecstatic expectation. The qualifications for a job are often astounding. "Does any man here know how to handle a rattlesnake? Which of you can ride an ostrich?" calls out a director.

THE FILM FAVORITE 11

A burly chap who sat beside me for a week finally got a job because of his expert knowledge of explosives.

TRENCH FIGHTING IN A TWO WEEKS' BATTLE

As I loafed there day after day, trying to catch up in my reading, I had time to contemplate many of life's vanities. What humiliation was this for a real artist! From the "legit" to the movie what a fall! Where were my dreams of yesteryear? The fall, however, was somewhat softened by the knowledge that the pay checks were twice the size of those of regular actors.

For almost two weeks I hung round the yard, refusing, because of my pride, to go on with two or three hundred others in "mob stuff," even though the job might pay me five dollars a day! But my pride began to peter out as my sixty continued to shrink, and one day I said to myself: "Well, Mother, here goes your dear, beautiful little Spencer boy into the depths of the drama!''

Talk about beginning at the bottom! I started in a ditch. I was one of forty who were shot up in a Civil War story, and I lay in a ditch all morning while regiment after regiment passed over my beautiful, prostrate hulk. Crowded in that bunch of forty humans, I was thankful that cameras had no ears to hear; for such language as came gurgling to the surface beat any suffocating gases the Germans have yet invented. Those on top certainly learned some new ones from those at the bottom.

Yet most of these fellows boast of this indignity and will make a story of real dramatic triumph out of it. One of these very soiled individuals, who, no doubt, would have made a sincere gas-fitter, told me how he had

worked with Henry "Whitnall in The Cataclysm. When I asked what part he had played, he replied: "I was one of them niggers in the road, with m' throat cut; but in th' third reel I was in two swell close-ups."

My trench fighting was indirectly very fruitful, for these battle scenes lasted two weeks. "When I was not violently shooting a gun or impersonating a corpse in blue or gray, I utilized my leisure in wandering about the lot and watching the other companies at work. At this time eight stories were being enacted at the studio, with six companies in the mountains and at the beaches. I might add that the place had a complete menagerie and specialized on animal pictures.

There was a time when it was possible to fake the "animal stuff"; but that was before the film fans became oversophisticated. The skeptical habitues of the film drama may not believe it, but the animal pictures are now being made "straight."" My attention was called to this fact by the elaborate precautions taken in preparing a scene in which it was evident that the action would be of great danger to the actors. The story was a South African romance, and the Boer's daughter, played by Gene "Wilkinson, a handsome and fearless girl, was scheduled to do a scene with an unbroken puma. I think the action can be pictured more graphically by a diagram of the set:

It will be noticed in the diagram that a high, stout, wire fence, inclosing a clump of trees and an open space, funnels down to a point where three cameras are located. The trees and bamboo entirely screen the fence from view, so that the illusion is that of the interior of a jungle.

■;'.r/ .■■'.■'J'J*1

CMMtk MM

Birit't'jcra View of a Jangle Picture

13

In the scene Miss Wilkinson comes wearily staggering across the clearing and falls from fatigue on the spot indicated in the diagram. The location must be exact, because the action takes place within the angle of the camera and yet just at the edge of the picture. Then, as the girl rises on one elbow, she is horrified to see bounding straight toward her a great gray mountainlion. She raises her knife to strike; but just as the animal reaches her the picture is cut. When it is cut in again one sees the apparently dead beast, and Miss Wilkinson, much torn and lacerated, leaning over it.

CHALLENGING A WILD PUMA

What really happened was this: Just outside the camera line stood one of the keepers with a freshly killed chicken in his hand. The puma smelled this and came bounding across the corral; but, in order to get his game, he passed directly over Miss Wilkinson's head. Scenes like this, as one may guess, have no rehearsals—^with the animal; so three or four cameras are always used to obviate the necessity of a make-over. One must not think that such an act is perfectly safe, as there Is always danger in performing with the "cats." In many scenes it is absolutely necessary to use unbroken animals; for when a lion, tiger, or puma has been broken he is afraid of his keepers, and is likely to skulk in the corral and refuse to do the expected stunts.

This picture gave me an idea, and I knew if I could pull it off I should land big with the company. During the next few days I talked often with the animal keeper and made careful observations of the cats. I had determined to make an offer to the director of the animal

THE FILM FAVORITE 15

stuff to go on and fight it out with puma in front of the camera. From what the keeper told me, and with my knowledge of football tackling and wrestling, I decided that I could clinch with and hold one of these brutes with little danger to myself.

The director listened to my plans dubiously, but with much interest, and told me he would give me an answer later. The next day, however, he came to me with a telegram in his hand, and said that if I would sign a release for damages against the company, and provided we should get twenty-five feet of good film, he stood ready to pay me a thousand dollars.

I sent for my football clothes and had them reinforced in the abdomen and on the back. I intended to wear them underneath my costume. The keeper had promised to clip the beast's claws just enough to blunt the extreme sharpness. With these precautions I was to take my chances. The director was not particularly confident of my getting the picture, as was shown by the fact that no scenario was forthcoming; a story would be written round the incident, he said, if I made good on the big scene.

It is no exaggeration to say that I had the biggest gallery that had ever watched a scene at the studio since its founding. The regulars and several hundred extras occupied every possible vantage point about the lot; but they kept at a respectful distance, as the cats are easily disconcerted by a crowd and, likely as not, this one would sneak off and refuse to attack me. Armed keepers were hidden behind shrubbery and two sharpshooters stood just outside the corral. A formidablelooking doctor arranged his kit of bandages and dope.

16 FILM POLK

Most of the spectators, I believe, were hoping for the worst. At any rate, they were fully expecting "Sister" to get his! The only ones fully confident of success were the keeper and myself.

Twice—three times—I rehearsed the action, in order to time the footage of the film. At last the director called, "Action!" and the cameras began to click off their sixteen exposures a second. I came strolling slowly across the clearing in front of the bamboo. Hearing the opening of the gate in the rear of the inclosure and the rustling of the tall grass as the puma sniffed his way forward, I swung round. As I beheld the great, crouching beast, I was supposed to turn toward the camera and register "horror." I did so, and the puma bounded toward me. "When he was only ten feet away, at a signal from the keeper I turned in my tracks; and as he sprang high at my head I sidestepped and clinched from behind. Then for fully a minute there was real excitement. They tell me they could scarcely see us at times for the dust, and the sound of the spitting was like a ten-cylinder motor car with the mufHer cut out.

I called out every few seconds that I was all right; and when I thought we had gone for about a thousand feet of film I rolled the cat outside the angle of the camera, where the keepers pounced on him, manacled all four feet, and dragged him away. The camera man reported sixty feet. When it was seen that I was up and smiling the relief of the tense situation was sounded in rousing cheers. A slight scalp wound and one claw scratch deep in my foot were my wounds, the cauterization of the latter being the only pain I suffered.

And now the question is. How did I do it? I will

tell; for maybe there lives another fool who wishes to try his skill on a tiger. But never again for me! Not that I have elaborate respect for the strength of a puma, but the gods might not again be so kindly disposed. I had in my left hand a pigeon, still warm, though dead. As I held it aloft the beast plunged for it; and as he did so I fell forward with my one hundred and seventy pounds full on his back. Bearing him tightly to the ground, I succeeded in getting a full nelson on his head, which put that member out of danger to me, and I held his forepaws straight out at right angles; then I scissored his loins with my legs, and in this position we began to roll. At no time after I closed on him was I in any great danger. The result of my success was that I went on the pay roll as a regular, for it was necessary I should act in all the scenes that were to come before and after this one.

LOVELY HAIE AND COW EYES BEGIN TO SCOKE

I made only a few animal pictures after the puma story, for it was soon discovered that I had possibilities as a romantic hero. It turned out that I had a fine moving-picture face; my lovely hair and my cow eyes had at last come into their own. Neither would my voice now be a handicap. I heard endless tales of how some of the greatest actors in the world had failed in the pictures, and of how many who had utterly failed in the legitimate had become leaders in the silent drama. One noticeable fact of the moving-pictures is that one must act, even though he acts badly. He cannot stand about in beautiful attitudes, uttering sonorous lines in an organ voice, and put over the scene. It must be

18 FILM POLK

done through the eye—Whence the reversal of fortune of many an aspirant.

Such, indeed, was my own experience. Achieving nothing much higher than the role of a romantic Harold in musical comedy, here I find myself in a few years advertised as one of the highest-priced film favorites in America! I know I am not a good actor, and I know that the advertisement bears a fleeting sentiment; and in this knowledge I am almost unique among my brothers. Many of the successful ones believe they are great artists.

The picture business is so new and so big, however, that in the first hard boiling many bubbles have risen to the surface. I have no doubt that not a few favorites would weigh at least two pounds less than a Panama hat. For some of us, the most trying part of our daily routine is the compulsory association with one another. The kultur of some of my brothers finds expression in great red, white, or blue, iU-mannered motor cars, some of them as fearsome as battleships, the noise they make being a hope expressed that people will notice the occupants, most of whom have their initials, eoats-of-arms, and a few their full name, emblazoned on the door. To certain-shaped heads it gives a glorious thrill to drive down Broadway in a great, powerful car, a sport shirt displaying one's beautiful throat, hair flying back in splendid abandon, while the girls on the sidewalk utter ecstatic, hopeless sighs.

Another trial that some of us pretend to dislike very much is the necessity of so often appearing in public simply to be looked at. If any charity wants tickets sold like hot cakes, it prevails on the managers to send down

a film favorite to help the sale. Benefits innumerable, fiestas, dedications, and school commencements call us from our work or families. The managers acquiesce in these public affairs, even to the great embarrassment of our work, because in that way they put the societies and institutions under obligations; and who knows but we may some day want them to appear in a picture!

There are times when extra people can substitute for lis with wholly satisfactory results. A short time ago an official of a seaside resort came up to arrange for the participation of film favorites in the annual bathinggirl parade. This is a spectacular feature of the yearly carnival of this Pacific Coney Island. To advertise the moving-picture girls in the contest was to insure an immense crowd. It was decided that one headliner should go, and thirty or forty extra girls should be sent to fill up the ranks. These extras can be picked up any morning at the studio. So, for a few hundred dollars, an attraction was put on that meant a great boost for the trolley-road, as weU as the place that staged the show.

This deliberate confusing of the public mind as to the personnel of the film favorites is one of the most exasperating angles of the profession. The newspapers are outrageous offenders. Any poor, defective little girl who gets into trouble is unloaded on us. "Movie Queen Stabs Sweetheart with Can-Opener!" reads an exciting tale in this morning's paper. I have never heard of the young lady; but what of that ? She was crowned by the city-editor. If a girl appears once, with two thousand others, in some great mob scene, she tells the reporters she is a moving-picture actress.

ALL WANT TO BE MOVIE QUEENS

Now I do not wish to pay any excessive floral tributes to the virtues and intellectuals of the regular movingpicture actor. His intelligence is not always so profound as to excite comment, and directors are not all weU-bred and cultured artists; but I object to having all the domestic muck in the village credited to my profession.

While I was reading this tragic crime of the canopener to Mrs. Grandon this morning at breakfast a happy thought came to me.

"What's the matter," I said, "with having somebody get out a Who 's Who in Filmdom, giving a complete list of companies and plays, with half-tones of the regular players? Then, when the police round up a burglar, we could prove that he is not a Film Favorite."

"Yes," said Mrs. Grandon; "but it might be embarrassing to have the burglar prove, as no doubt he could, that he was at the head of your scenario department!"

Mrs. Grandon often says things like that.

Did you ever stop to wonder how many short brunettes there are in your town? Or tall blondes? Or redheaded girls with aquiline profiles? I have a plan by which one can determine just such delightful data without the trouble of plodding through voluminous census reports or insurance statistics. Take, for example, the red-headed girls with aquiline profiles. If I wish, I can behold every woman in town thus endowed to-morrow morning at nine o'clock! The result can be accomplished simply by inserting in the want column a line to the effect that red-headed girls with aquiline profiles

are wanted at the studios. Every miss or missus who, by a stretching of the chin or oxidizing of the hair, can come within a mile of this description will be there on the dot. The accuracy of the count will be based on the statement that everybody wishes to act in the movies. The reason for it is puzzling; the fact is indisputable.

Last week Los Angeles had a population of five hundred thousand souls—and many Mexicans; and I will say, for the benefit of the statistically curious, that out of this vast congregation there are engaged in the movingpicture business, in one form or another, five hundred thousand souls—and all the Mexicans. This may seem like an exaggeration. It is not. It is the gospel truth— that being a truer kind of truth than the ordinary kind. It is a rare citizen who at one time or another has not appeared in moving-pictures. If there be those who are not past, present, or future actors, one may rest assured they are writing scenarios. There are actually thousands of us who make acting our vocation, and of all the remaining inhabitants it is the avocation.

There is hardly a public gathering of any kind that is not utilized by some film company; and if, during a G. A. R. or an Elks parade, one sees a ridiculous individual making an ass of himself, one invariably looks for a camera. At the last Vanderbilt race at Santa Monica visitors were horrified to see a machine, dragging somebody behind, dash past the grand stand, while two policemen, who rushed out and tried to stop the wild monster, were bowled over like tenpins and rolled fifty yards down the track in a cloud of dust.

There was a time when fire-engines suggested that something was burning somewhere; now, however, the

commotion may be nothing more than a ladder-wagon headed for an actress lying flat on her ample tummy in the middle of Main Street.

After seeing some Charlie Chaplin drive a jitney into a hearse, scattering the dear departed all over the Plaza, one finally becomes suspicious—even of a funeral. An open patrol-wagon, full of fierce and piratical police, may go tearing through the heart of the town; but the sophisticated villagers on the sidewalk pay them only the bored attention of fellow artists. It is the tourists who stop to rubber. There are no studios in Keokuk; so all this excitement is very interesting to the outlander.

There is hardly a building, public or private, in the city that has not been used as a location in a picture. Occasionally the location hunter gets permission, but oftener we go and take the picture and explain afterward —if explanations seem necessary. If we run into a landlord who lacks local patriotism, and he makes a disagreeable scene, the director may manage to have him pull it off in front of the camera, and thereby get twenty or thirty feet of good "quarrel stuff."

In one of my first pictures we were doing a scene in a beautiful place in Pasadena, and the owner of the estate arrived just in time to see twenty or thirty nuns coming out of his front entrance. Looking about the grounds he beheld brown-frocked and sandaled monks going about their labors or saying their beads in the shade of a high, brick wall that inclosed the place. It was the first time he had realized what a fine old cloistral effect his architect had achieved. The butler had given us permission to use the location during the absence of the owner, whose premature arrival did not, however, bring censure to

Jorkins. Later the whole place was put at our disposal.

Recently one of our directors came to the studio beaming with delight because he had secured the services of a church congregation to pose for a camp-meeting scene. Five hundred dollars for The Cause had done the deed.

One day the city was placarded by huge bills advertising a bullfight at the Stadium. Mexico's most famous matador was to appear. Thousands journeyed to the great amphitheater—only to find that they were to act as a background for one of America's greatest singers, who was appearing in a seven-reel production of Carmen. Enough extra people in Spanish costume were employed to furnish the "crowd" for the close-up stuff. In the big pictures this detail of costume is not necessary, for only the immensity of the multitude is noticed.

If one goes home some afternoon and finds an ambulance or a motor cop outside the door, he instinctively looks for the camera. It usually emerges from a group of little boys.

A CALIFORNIA COSMOPOLIS

In Hollywood and Santa Monica, where so many of the studios are located, the inhabitants have ceased to marvel at anything. To come from behind their hedgerows and run slam up against one of Rome's legions is to them no more surprising than to look up suddenly into the immense face of an elephant. Automobiles full of Zulus, Arabs, and Cossacks race through the town unnoticed. An Egyptian princess, sitting on a high stool and encompassing a nut sundae, might create a sensation in an Eastern drug-store; not so in this country. It is all part of the workday life of the place.

The astonishing number of floral and electrical parades, fiestas, and pageants only adds to the sophistication of the villagers and the bewilderment of the tourists. Nothing in the way of weird costume or outrageous make-up seems incongruous in this carnival city. With my face loaded with grease paint, I have sat many times at luncheon in a downtown restaurant and attracted only passing interest. Some waiter occasionally gives me the high sign of our tribe, for the chances are even that he himself is a past m.-p. performer.

There is a cafeteria near our studio that is patronized almost exclusively by moving-picture folk in all their stage feathers. It is the most cosmopolitan restaurant in the world; for at any time one may find every race and type extant rubbing elbows and eating chili beans in perfect harmony of spirit—if not of raiment.

Stagecoaches still go tearing through the hills and over the mountains as they did in '49; but the passengers they carry are the heroes and heroines of our mimic world. It is not a comic-paper joke that occasionally some stranger, usually an Englishman, who runs on some scene of Western daring while touring the country, will straightway speed madly to the next town in great excitement to report the hold-up of a stage. There is always some kind-hearted person who will lead him aside and explain the ribald laughter of the sheriff's office.

The reason the greatest rodeos of the country are now held in Los Angeles is because aU the best cowboy riders and ropers in the West are performing here, with one company or another. Besides working in the Western stuff, they perform in all pictures where dangerous riding is necessary; and there is always somebody to double

with the hero when the latter must make some wonderful escape or rescue. By cutting in and out, the deception is easily arranged.

I have a chap named Curly who doubles with me; he is about my build, and we have costumes made exactly alike. I can get away with the ordinary riding stuff; but when the part necessitates a hard fall or any rough riding I gladly turn that feat over to a professional, who knows how to take his bumps. In these scenes the double is careful to keep his face turned from the camera; but the speed of the action alone is sufficient to conceal the substitution.

There are some pictures made on the plains and in the hills that are really worth a long journey to witness; these are the great battle scenes, ancient and modem. Some of them involve thousands of men and horses, and are enacted over miles of country. It seems too bad that the magnificence of these spectacles is witnessed by so few. The film picture can never be so stirring as the actual scene, yet often a handful of men are the only spectators.

By linking up with a showman, the moving-picture director can pull off the big stuff at very little cost. It is a beautiful scheme; the extra people, instead of receiving five dollars a day, flock to the beach by thousands, thus paying for the film through the railroad companies and at the same time acting the mob stuff for nothing. Besides this, fifty or a hundred thousand people alertly await the release of the great war stories in which they figure so inconspicuously.

In Shakespeare's time poor old Thespis was in much disrepute and the players were compelled to stay outside

the walls of London; but, alas, how the wheel has turned up m some three hundred years! Now everybody within the walls has become an actor and a city is the stage. I should qualify that statement by saying that four hundred thousand are actors and two hundred thousand are writing scenarios—the city has grown one hundred thousand since I wrote the first paragraph!

CINEMASIPBIiAS

Why do we all wish to act? I have never seen anyone refuse, and most people are quite honestly excited about appearing in the pictures. Even great and modest public men succumb, with only very faint struggles.

It is a curious sort of egotism; the only actors who do not have it are little children. That is why children usually do so well. The most egotistic among us are those who wish their faces to loom largest; we call them by the indelicate name of camera hogs. Some there are whose artistry is stronger than their egotism, yet they are often compelled to hog the picture by their directors. These latter are the men who lay more emphasis on the film favorite than on the play.

I learned later, however, that there were other reasons why the professional actor succumbs to the lure of the moving-picture. When one thinks of the nervous, helterskelter life of the average American actor, a normal working life makes a tremendous appeal. Instead of touring the country in stuffy cars and living at secondrate hotels, he can now have a home. Many of us, indeed, have beautiful places. Our jobs are fairly permanent, if not with one company, at least in the same city.

I know many fellows who have been with one studio for seven or eight years.

Also, in the moving-pictures we can work for fiftytwo weeks a year, instead of thirty or forty. There are days—^because of the weather or for other reasons—when we do not work, yet our salaries go right on; but, best of all, we control our own evenings and can enjoy the same social life as other professional people. That is why our clubs and balls are such great successes; we can all go if we wish.

Another strong factor in this life that makes it more interesting than the grind of the legitimate stage is the fact that we do not work monotonously in one part during an entire season. There is constant change, and our work is ever new. The variety of the scenes takes us from the mountains to the sea, all over this glorious country—^to the Yosemite, Catalina, Mexico—every place of picture possibilities and interest. It is one grand adventure. One week I am playing polo in Pasadena, in a society play; the next I am sailing the Channel in a Fisherman story.

Then there is the great joy of the first night. The moving-picture magazines publish lists of releases for the coming week; and if one of our pictures is scheduled for a local theater, the whole company flocks down to see itself. "We attend our own performances and become our own critics. And such criticisms! To hear the roasting and the joshing of the action and the actors as the story develops! The ordinary dramatic critic is charitable in comparison to the self-criticism of actors.

Unfortunately, or fortunately for me, Mrs. Grandon

is one of those purposeful girls who refuses to be tremendously impressed by our work. She always accompanies me to our premieres, but sometimes /smiles throughout the loftiest heights of my dramatic effort. This morning I read a newspaper story to her that commented fulsomely on the latest triumph of a woman star, and laid perhaps too much emphasis on the size of the young lady's salary.

"I do not wish to be unkind, Spencer; but the fact is, I am vastly more interested in the minimum wage of shopgirls than in the maximum wage of moving-picture queens," said she.

Mrs. Grandon is one of the girls who worked her way through college.

THE HEBO WORSHIP OF THE PUBLIC

"Movie Actress Eats Thirty Ice-Cream Cones a Day!" announces a headline across three columns on the first page, second section. The city-editor believes the story to be worth three columns—and city-editors are wise in knowing what their readers want.

It is a strange quirk in human nature that makes everybody want to know the most intimate details in the lives of public persons. John Smith may be as eccentric as he pleases, and nobody cares; but be it learned that General von Hindenburg eats gasoline on his breakfastfood, and the whole world is agog! The success of such magazines as London Answers, which deals largely in intimate gossip of royalty, and the immense circulation of some of our moving-picture monthlies, which play up portraits and the personal note, are based on this common human weakness—if weakness it be.

Actors, especially, have always been targets for the curious. Everything they say, do, or think is regarded as worthy of large headlines. If the stage actor numbers his admirers by the thousand, one can imagine what happens to the film favorite whose devotees are counted by the million. Our mail is positively overwhelming, and it comes from all over the civilized world. Australian girls seem quite as mad over our excessive beauty as their American sisters.

I have often asked myself why the public is so inordinately interested in our careers. I am sure many of us are much less exciting than bankers and winemerchants. In contrast with the legitimate actor we are as prosaic in our homes as plumbers or preachers. We have our bungalows, garages, and gardens. One of my friends goes in for rabbits; another for roses; two have orange ranches; and several are buying desert lands.

If these disclosures disillusion our distant soulmates, I doubt that they will affect in the least the aspirant who wishes to act, for probably he is positive that the light hid beneath his bushel will make other stars look like burned-out moons. Many of the letters we receive, with superlatively mushy appreciation of our excessive talents, are but bouquets to lure us into a mood of ecstatic receptivity. Often a thinly veiled hint suggests that the writer herself would not sidestep an invitation to grace the moving-picture state. These hints are usually accompanied by photographs of the aspirants; and I will say I never before knew there were so many charming young girls in the world. Sometimes the parents take a hand, to tell of Mamie's amazing mimicry, and not a

few letters are accompanied by tempting financial offers to assist in placing Mamie before the world.

No actor who is working has time to reply to all this epistolary junk, but in my case Mrs. Grandon answers whatever she believes worthy; she also signs all the albums and photographs. Most of us actors pretend to be bored with our mail; but, to be frank, I find it quite exciting, and, even though I see the joke, I am afraid I sometimes look very pleased with myself when I am flattered. Mrs. Grandon says: "All actors are alike." The writing of these letters by romantic school girls has a tragic side, however. If the recipient happens to be a cad,—and I regret to say that occasionally he is,— his replies are not always a safe guide to the young girl. The relationship hinted at here has become a problem for some of the larger studios; but it has been solved, in a measure, by the employment of a studio mother.

THE MAGIC CARPET

At nine o'clock in the morning the lot presents a wonderful spectacle. It has all the movement, costume, and color of a great carnival city. On the huge open-air stage the carpenters are at work putting together the various sets for interior stuff; perhaps as many as sixteen different scenes will be acted here simultaneously. A great winding staircase for a society play will stand next to a sordid attic for Maggie of the tenements. A Japanese tea-house, a library, a harem, and a ship's cabin—set on rockers to give the pitch of the sea—will be placed so close together that there is apparently no line of demarcation.

This arrangement is possible because the movingpicture camera cuts a very small angle. The close-up stuff requires only about twelve feet of stage—an almost prohibitive embarrassment to the dancers—and a deep set rarely needs more than thirty feet. So it is possible to place seven or eight sets on a hundred-foot stage.

To the uninitiated the scene is one of utter bewilderment—like a great fete without the bands and confetti. Society people in ball gowns and evening dress move about in the fierce white light of day; a group of cowboys may be seen over in the clearing, practicing with their ropes; and 'way off yonder is a street in Cairo, already thronged with the bright-costumed figures of the Egyptians.

The yard is jammed with perhaps three hundred people, all hoping to be taken on as extras, while among them pass the various assistant directors, making their choices. One director wants the ten tallest men, another the five shortest; one wishes an old, gray-haired woman, another a man who can shoe a horse. Their demands range from the sublime to the ridiculous, from an infant in arias to an army of infantry.

Outside on the street a hundred automobiles are drawn up, waiting to take different casts out on location. Several great sight-seeing busses are filled with German soldiers, headed for an outside scene of Old Heidelberg; motor trucks are loading saddles and rifles, to be used by the thousand horsemen waiting in the Santa Monica foothills to perform in one of the great war dramas.

By ten o'clock the place is in full blast; the actors on location are gone, and most of the hopeful aspirants in the yard either have been taken on or have dispersed

until the morrow. Always, however, there are at least a hundred who hang about, hoping to be selected in some emergency.

On the big stage, where so many scenes are being enacted, bedlam reigns. The shouting of the actors and directors is punctuated by gunfire in some wild drama or rough comedy, and stage carpenters and scene shifters add to the din with the necessary noises of their craft. While waiting for the director to satisfy his esthetic soul regarding draperies and props, or until the camera man has tuned up, actors are wandering from one set to another, smoking, chewing gum, or fox-trotting down the aisles. To see a savage pirate doing the lame duck with a society queen does not seem incongruous in this great human omelet.

ACTING FOR THE FIVE MILLIONS

EfSciency experts are horrified at the apparent waste of time in these enormous plants; hundreds of players seem to be always loafing. It may take a whole morning to produce a certain scene, yet the actual time before the camera may occupy but a brief ten minutes. Meantime the cast must be always within call. No plan has yet been devised by which this leisure can be utilized. All sorts of schemes, from splitting wood to splicing film, have been suggested; but none seems practicable.

The question arises: How can the actor do intelligent work in such an atmosphere ? In addition to the awful confusion of noises and movement, there is not even the stimulus of an audience. When I was elevated to the rank of leading man this latter condition worried me: it

was like talking to oneself. I felt constrained and selfconscious. One day Stanley Barryworth, one of our best men, passed by and, sensing my embarrassment, said: "Grandon, there are five million people looking at you through that camera." The psychological reaction on me was magical. I had an audience, but had never before realized it!

The noise and confusion, however, were still so disconcerting that I finally demanded that all my scenes should be inclosed. This was easily accomplished by buUding a canvas waU, with siK-foot flats, entirely round the set, running down to a V, where the director and camera man took their places. Most of the leading men now demand either a separate stage or an inclosed set.

An astonishing number of actors have absolutely no interest in other than their own performances, and turkey-trot or horseplay while the performer tries to concentrate on a serious bit of interpretative work. One would think that the second- and third-rate actors would be interested in the technic of a man like Barryworth, for instance, since he is one of the most finished actors in America—a man of fine intelligence and deep understanding, who has brought, besides his brains, a fine artistry to his work. Do you think any of those poor, light-minded lads would condescend to watch his technic in order to learn something? Oh, dear, no! They wait until they see the picture on the screen and then tell how it should have been done.

Then, too, think of a man who hopes to make good in the movies sitting on his shoulder blades and reading a moving-picture magazine with the bunch in the yard.

while he might be watching one of Whitnall's biggest scenes! Harry Whitnall is not so versatile as Barryworth, but we all regard him as the greatest actor in our profession. He is an artist to the tips of his eloquent fingers, one who says more by doing less than any other man alive. I saw him acting a short, two-reel story of Turgenieff's last week, whUe four would-be leading men played dominoes within twenty feet of the scene. Then people wonder why there are so few Whitnalls!

There is one type of actor who is sometimes employed, not at all because of his histrionic ability, but solely because he can do certain things that require great strength, agility, or daring. Some of the best roughriders, who have learned to make spectacular falls from a horse going at full speed, are in constant demand. Occasionally one of those fellows develops real acting ability. One of the greatest impresarios in the motionpicture world to-day was a plain cow-puncher only a few years ago; and when a good actor can do dangerous work he is sure to land among the leaders.

Even the rank and file, however, are sometimes subjected to a certain amount of rough work. Two years ago three of our leading women were in the hospital at the same time. One broke her ankle in a fire scene; one had her leg fractured when a hors^ fell on her in a riding scene; and one was badly scratched while playing with the cats in an East India jungle story. Some of these girls and men are absolutely fearless and will do anything the director asks, from swimming a rapids in the high Sierras to jumping off an automobile going fifty miles an hour.

TRICK FILMS GIVE PLACE TO THE EEAL THING

It will be observed that the producers are novF reaping a harvest of incredulity on the part of their audiences which is of their own making. For years they fooled the fans with all sorts of ingenious mechanical tricks—as soon as one trick was discovered another was invented— until the spectators became inured to all devices and will not now believe a picture, even when it is sincerely made. So sophisticated have they become that they are positive these feats of daring are the result of some film manipulation. If they only knew some of the bumps and bruises the actors get, they would have a higher respect for their courage.

In one picture, made a few years ago, Barryworth, at that time our leading man, was playing opposite Tom Sentous, the villain, in a German dueling scene. Tom is a great, big, handsome god, as modest as he is courageous; and because of his willingness and ability to take punishment, he was invariably cast for the villain. No fellow in all filmdom has been so hissed in the nickelodeons as has Tom; yet he is one of the finest men in the profession.

In this story it was necessary for Barryworth to cut Sentous across the face with his sword. The scene was rehearsed time and again, but always the action looked faked, because of the necessity of soft-pedaling such a blow. Even by using the flat of the sword, the blow was too gentle to convince. Finally the director lighted a cigarette and went out. When he came back he said:

'' Tom, for the sake of the picture will you take a good

wallop? I '11 put three cameras on, and if we fail, I promise you there will be no re-take.''

"Certainly, I 'm willing," said Tom, briefly.

"When everything was ready and the duelists had been fencing rather gingerly for perhaps half a minute, the director called out: '' Now!'' Barryworth swung round with a full-arm blow with the flat of his sword that would have felled an ox. Tom had a gob of grease paint in his left hand to smear on his face, in order to give the effect of an open wound; but there was little need of it, for the sword raised a welt on his neck and cheek that could be seen a block.

In one of the great feature films of last year Sentous appeared in a figlit scene that stands among movingpicture men as the most realistic ever enacted. I happened to be present the day the picture was made; and, having heard the principals discussing it the previous evening and knowing that they had determined to strike no fake blows, I was eager to see the action. It was the finest exhibition of brute courage I have ever witnessed. For two men, both as powerful as Jeffries, to stand up and slam into each other with fists and chairs was a shocking thing, unless one knew that they were the best of friends and were doing it "for the sake of the picture." They both suffered excruciating pain during the scene and afterward, and Tom's arm, due to the strain of the hammer lock, was quite useless for days. It was a picture of the utmost brutality; and when it was shown, though it had the spectators sitting on the edge of their chairs, I have no doubt the greater number of them believed the violently cruel blows to be simply good acting.

The girls are not often asked to take punishment, but

they must do many things that require a high degree of courage. As examples of this, I wish to pay my distinguished respects to two young ladies who have performed some feats of daring that surpass anything the men have done. Both were episodes in the animal stuff.

In one picture the director was anxious to show a girl pursued by a lion, beating it to the door of a log cabin by just a hairbreadth. To do this it was necessary to have the girl and the lion arrive almost simultaneously. Beatrice Hunter, one of the youngest members of the company, was chosen for the unenviable role. She is a wisp of a girl, but has no end of nerve; and because of her light weight and agility, she has been in many scenes that required athletic skill. Only the week before she had allowed herself to be carried down scaling ladders from the top of a seven-story building that was actually on fire.

In this burning-building scene Beatrice was rescued from her bedroom in an unconscious condition, and was hung over the fireman's shoulder like a sack of meal while he brought her to the ground. She was dreadfully frightened, she said, when she first went over the edge, but gained courage during the perilous descent. No one doubted that the choice of Beatrice for the lion picture was a good one. ,,

In order to film the scene correctly it was necessary to time the speed of Beatrice and the lion with deadly precision, so that the finish of the race would picture the lion almost upon the girl as she entered the cabin. This split-second timing was accomplished by an ingenious arrangement of woven-wire fencing, which permitted many rehearsals of the actual race. High wire

division, bisecting the corral and leading to the door of the cabin, was erected. On each side of this fence the lion and the girl were released at the same instant, but at different distances; and the time of each, running at top speed, was thus ascertained.

For the actual picture the fence was removed. Every other possible precaution was taken against a misadventure. Spiked running-shoes and a short-skirt insured the girl's footing and the freedom of her legs. To further guard her life, in case the lion should seem to be overtaking her, four cowboys, who could shoot the cigarette out of one's mouth, were stationed outside the corral.

It is needless to say that the company did not wish to lose the girl; neither did it wish to lose a five-thousanddollar lion. As the four cowboys might differ in their definition of danger, it was left to the director to give the signal to shoot—if shooting was necessary—for on him rested the responsibility for the picture, responsibility which included the lives of Beauty and the Beast

BEATRICE hunter's RACE FOR LIFE

Everybody thought that Beatrice would be equal to her task, for she had never failed; and if she was the least bit nervous, she concealed it most amazingly. However, as a sporting proposition, it stirred up the whole studio. Every other company on the lot stopped to witness the race.

When everything was in readiness Beatrice stood like an athlete on her mark, while the big lion was restlessly pawing at the gate some twenty yards behind. The cameras were arranged to pick up only the last ten yards

of the race. The director occupied a place just outside the corral, where he could direct the cowboys. The falling of his upraised hand was to be the signal to shoot.

At the call of "Action!" the cameras began, the lion was released, and Beatrice started. On she came like a deer, the lion gaining rapidly. She tripped a little bit, but did not lose her stride. The hesitation, slight as it was, frightened her, however, and her fear showed unmistakably in her eyes as she glanced back over her shoulder.

"Don't look back, Beatrice, but beat it now for all you are worth!'' cried the director.

She fairly flew; but so did the lion, and it seemed for a moment as though he would overtake her. "When she reached the cabin door she was not two feet ahead of him, and it was only with the greatest speed and skill that the door was closed after she plunged into the cabin. .This detail had been rehearsed many times. The man who slammed the door and the other who threw the bolt both felt responsibility for the girl—and incidentally for their own safety.

The impact of the lion on the great, heavy door would have wrecked the set had it not been heavily reinforced; but it held firmly and the beast was thrown almost on his back. He was in a towering rage when he got to his feet; and he stood there roaring and snarling magnificently for fully fifty feet of film.

As I looked at the little girl, pale and trembling, lying in her sister's arms, the thought occurred to me that the heroism displayed in making the film was much more splendid than the rather pompous heroian she would simulate in her part of the story.

The other episode exhibits the quick wit and fine courage of another young woman. It happened in the first animal picture in which Gene Wilkinson appeared, and it began a series of pictures that ultimately made her famous. The scene was set in a manner similar to the others I have described, but in the action there would not be the slightest danger so long as the lion adhered to his role. That role was to stay half hidden behind the bamboo in the rear of the inclosure, while Miss Wilkinson walked slowly across the foreground. As ia the other cases, there were emergency exits and sharpshooters to insure her safety.

Twice the action was rehearsed and the time taken, the lion skulking in the jungle beyond; but when the director called "Action!" the clicking of the cameras in some mysterious way stirred the king of beasts into great indignation. He let out a roar that could be heard a mile, lashed his tail against the bamboo, and suddenly bounded straight toward Miss Wilkinson.

"Beat it. Gene!" shouted the directer, holding open the nearest emergency exit. She started, but, seeing she could not make it, turned on her heel; and, to the amazement and horror of everybody, she ran straight toward the lion. When he saw her turn he came to a full stop. The meeting was something of a melodramatic anti-climax, for the beast did not swallow the maid. On the contrary, her spiritual conquest expressed itself by her scratching him on the forehead. He walked out of the picture in dignified humility.

It is easy enough to explain that the animal trainer had coached Miss Wilkinson in the etiquette of animals —especially the cats—and had told her how to bluff her

way out when she got in a tight pinch, but the point is, though knowing exactly what one ought to do in such a crisis, how many are there who would deliberately turn and charge a lion?

THE COST IN BUMPS AND BRUISES

I might continue telling of the exciting and perilous adventures incident to the lives of moving-picture folk; but the foregoing fairly typify the dangers of the rough stuff and show the efforts being made by producers to meet a gigantic problem and win the faith of a suspicious public without the aid of trickery.

One more episode I must record, however, for the remark of the hero in the crisis of his danger voices the exasperation that all actors feel when, after doing a notable feat of daring, the moving-picture patrons believe the picture to be faked. The incident occurred on a trip to one of the nethermost islands off the coast of California. "We were doing the Treasure Island kind of stuff and had selected a perfect location. Nothing could have been more wild and windswept. There were great caves that sheltered strange birds during the big storms; high, precipitous cliffs, and long stretches of beach on which was thrown the wreckage of lost sailing vessels. The only inhabitants were wild boars and a curious fox.

We made no end of bully pirate pictures, and a wildman story that nearly ended in disaster. Tom Sentous was cast for the wild man, no one else being physically eligible. Tom appeared in scene after scene, pursued by English sailors, and finally was overtaken on the top of a cliff overlooking the ocean. A hand-to-hand combat

with an English lieutenant ensued, and they rolled over and over among the lava rocks until Tom's body was scratched and bleeding from head to foot. Finally Tom was thrown off the cliff and went hurtling down some fifty feet into the water.

We had waited several days until the sea should be calm enough to make the picture, for it was necessary to have assistance close by, in order to rescue Tom from the rocks. A dive was out of the question—no one pitched off a cliff would start in a diving position; so Tom had to go any old way and take his chances. He did; and they turned out to be very precarious, for the poor fellow hit the water with such an impact that he was utterly stunned. It was such a long time before he came to the surface that we grew mightily alarmed; and when he rose it was seen that he was in great distress. There was much blood on the water, but that was only from his lacerated body; his real trouble was more serious.

"With much difficulty we got him into the boat, for he weighed one hundred and ninety pounds. For several hours we rubbed him and applied restoratives. When finally he came round, and was able to talk, his first remark, uttered faintly and with much effort, was:

"I will kill the first flat-chested film fan who says this picture was faked!"

Then and there we all swore to the same murderous intent!

EXPRESSING THE FESTAL SPIRIT

"Register joy there, Grandon! This is not an undertakers' convention; it's a house party."

And so I jumped up and down, clapped my hands in childish glee, and ended by dragging all the dinner guests into the middle of the room, where we played ring around a rosy!

That was what Condon, my first director, considered a fine expression of the festal spirit. He and his cult believed that the moving-picture demanded action, and that any repose whatsoever was just so much waste of film. How we used to prance and tear through the tumultuous scenes! Life in those days was full of riot and abandon. "Action, action, action—more action!" All the time! We were even taught to enter a room with terrific ostentation, and the simplest questions could not be answered without violent gesticulations and facial acrobatics.

Besides his insistence that life should be interpreted in the most dynamic way possible, this director had many weird and peculiar obsessions regarding its symbols. For instance, he firmly believed that only a few intellectuals knew the meaning of the mystic letters M.D. He was positive that a shingle on which was inscribed "George Smith, M.D.," would forever remain a dark and cryptic puzzle to the average man. No doubt he saved millions of his spectators from splitting headaches by solving their puzzle on a sign three feet long, which read: "Doctor Smith." "With such a label, one might feel sure that the pale-faced maiden staggering up the front steps was not seeking a piano tuner.

Some of his conceptions were perfectly magnificent. So contemptuous was he of average intelligence that he labeled everything possible, even the dignified city hall

being unable to proclaim itself without the exaggerated assistance of a sign writer.

It was not only in scenery and props that his amazing talent for leaving' nothing to the imagination expressed itself. It was also evident in the invention of a whole new technic of acting; and under his direction a brand-new drama has been evolved. Take, for example, the registration of sudden poverty. On the stage they do it by dramatically hissing, "I am ruined!" but, ia lieu of the spoken word, he told his actors to simply turn their pockets inside out—a most eloquent gesture and one universally understood.

The cinematograph is essentially a mechanical device, and during its development into an instrument of precision mostly enlisted in its service mechanical men. It was natural, therefore, that its first triumphs were of a mechanical nature.

A few years ago our best pictures were the phantasms. The dissolve, the double exposure, the reversed film— every mechanical stunt imaginable was used to bewilder and entertain.

Along with these there were a few fierce melodramas involving shipwrecks and derailments; also, the pursuit pictures, in which a whole village joined in a mad chase and tore through town, upsetting apple-earts, baby-carriages, and scaffoldings, until finally everybody was subdued in a bath of whitewash. '' Them was the good old days!"

This palled, however. There was a demand for romance, plot, and real acting. The mechanics were up against it, but they stuck to their tasks and did their level best to meet requirements. Now their best was rather

THE FILM FAVORITE 45

awful; yet it must be said that some of these same chaps grew in artistry as the world moved ahead. Gradually there came into the picture business men who had brains, technic, and poesy. At the present time there are engaged in this work in America half a dozen really great artists, and a considerable number who are better than the pictures they are compelled to make. But, alas! many of them are merely showmen of the rough-andtumble type. They stick to the early technic; and when they add to it a new symbol, it is ignorantly conceived.

Even some of the better directors are guilty of childish devices. The present pilot of my particular star still insists that an engagement can be put over only by the use of the ring. While performing last week in a very romantic story, I was called on in the first scene, when I met Her, to show that I had been very much impressed. I endeavored to do this quietly and unostentatiously, as any fellow would, still recording the fact that my sentimental bell had been rung. But the director would not stand for it.

"You know it, and she knows it; but remember this: there are thousands of fans who would never get it without having it driven in with a mallet! Now do it again; and leave nobody in doubt!''

So I went through the regular formula for love at first sight, which first consists in enlarging the eyes, to indicate wonder; then a smile, suffusing the face, to register satisfaction; ending, however, in the pointed brows, the sign by which one interrogates. The next spasm is the heaving chest, to indicate that the heart has been stirred to its nethermost depths. Now, "determination to have her at any cost" must be shown. This is accomplished

by a toss of the head, a forward thrust of the chin, and a tense clenching of the fists.

"When I pulled this sort of stuff, I tried to maintain that the last Chink in the back row could finish the story—for what chance has the poor girl when Handsome Harold is thus affected and determined ? But the director was stubborn, and his final argument was the success of the film.

SYMBOLISM BETTER THAN REALISM

The more violent work is really more easily produced than that of the higher forms of drama, for the reason that the actors are obedient puppets, performing to certain set symbols. For instance, when parts are assigned for a new play each actor knows instantly how to make up. The father of a girl of eighteen must look sixty at least, gray and dignified. The mother of the same young lady must appear motherly, that is, like Martha Washington, or a dear old dowager duchess. In reality, the father and mother of a girl of eighteen would be enjoying their vigorous forties, and, likely as not, would be found on the tennis court playing a hard deuce set; but as symbols they would never do, unless elaborately labeled.

The chap cast for the doctor, without further ado makes up with a fine, septic point-lace beard and a stem, professional frown. I recently visited a meeting of the American Medical Association and, as a moving-picture actor, I was amazed at the scarcity of facial foliage—a few mustaches, but most faces were clean-shaved.

I have often wondered whether the victory of the North in the Civil "War was very creditable. If we are to believe the moving-pictures depicting that struggle, all

THE FILM FAVORITE " 47

the officers wore gray mustaches and goatees. It does not seem fine to have beaten up so many old men.

The negro mammy in those same war dramas was originally designed by Lew Dockstader, and the symbol has never changed. Why, you ask, do they always make up white people as negroes who could not possibly deceive a child, when a real mammy is so easy to find ? The colored folk are infinitely better actors and much easier to obtain than Indians; yet these people are rarely faked.

No doubt it has been noticed that we insist on Indians wearing war-bonnets at all times, whether they are at war, peace, or Irish picnics; but an Indian minus feathers would be like a fisherman without his oil-skins. You can bet our fishermen never venture forth without oilskins. On the hottest days in August, with a sea like glass, we load up the poor devils with rubber boots, tarpaulins, and sou'westers. They eat, sleep, and work in those smelly garments at all times; if any of them should be omitted, even for an instant, some clerk in the front row might mistake a fisherman for a butcher.

A great many actors know better than to behave as they do, and occasionally they care enough to argue the point with the director. Sometimes even the extra people develop courage sufficient to revolt. In one story the director curiously enough happened on a cockney Englishman to play the part of a butler, a position he knew well by long years of service. At the first rehearsal the explosion came. Condon had ordered him to dress like a court chamberlain in a fairy-tale. He submitted to this indignity; but when he was told to stand like a ramrod, with his nose in the air and his arms

48 FILM FOLK

held like parentheses, loyalty to his calling demanded that he protest.

HOW A BUTLEE SHOULD BUTTLE

"Oh, I say, Mr. Condon, I cawn't act that w'y! Indeed I cawn't! No, sir! I 've friends who will see this pitcher, and I cawn't 'ave 'em think I 've lost me reason. I 've served in some of the best 'omes in Lunnon, sir, and I never yet saw a butler dressed as I am, sir. Sometimes a colored weskit and gloves, sir; but never such duds as these, sir! Some of the rich brewers 'ave footmen dressed as 'andsome, but never a butler, sir! On my word, sir!

'' And then such manners, sir! A butler does not walk like a German soldier doing the goose step, sir. Nor do they stop and turn a comer on their 'eels, sir, like a bally sergeant! No, sir—if I do say it—the manners of a good English butler are graceful and easylike. I think you 'ave 'card the story, sir, of Lord Cromer's dreadful blunder in mistaking the American Ambassador for the butler. It 'appened at Marlborough 'Ouse, sir. No, sir; if I am to play the part of the butler, sir, I 'ope you will permit me to play it as it ought to be done, sir!"

With that out of his system, the butler stood expectant. This is what he got:

"When I want you to help in directing I '11 make you my assistant. Meantime you play the part as I tell you. This story is not produced to entertain a bunch of English servants, but for the American public; and I have an idea that I know their definition of a butler a little better than you do."

Charlie Chaplin and Rob Wagner

Oourtesy of Artijraft Studios

Douglas Fairbanks has to keep in perfect physical trim for his athletic stunts

This character of the butler is the most useful of any in the photo-drama. It is amazing the amount of scenery he saves! An interior set may be cheap and shoddy, and have about the same magnificence as a tintype studio; yet when a splendid butler enters, one begins to breathe the rarefied atmosphere of aristocracy and the spectators get their bearings at once, for they know from reading our popular novelists that only the rich can afford such pets.

The richness of an interior set is in direct proportion to the amount of furniture used. The richer the people, the more impedimenta clutter up their lives. Plumbers who have risen to the proud distinction of movingpicture directors insist that the rich simply wallow in furniture. A truckload of junk rented from the People's Outfitting Company, with a large plaster Cupid and Psyche from the prop, room, will produce a salon that would make the Duke of Bedford hide under his bed.

Jorkins, the butler, is not the only servant who has a fixed symbol, however. Burgette, the maid in the banker's home, is equally well standardized. She wears astonishingly short skirts, a white tidy on her head, a dinky little apron, and answers the simplest questions with a curtsy. As no maid in real life ever performed thus, I think this symbol must have come down to us via musical comedy. Sometimes, when the action becomes fast, these poor French dolls bob like corks.

In looking over my note-book, I realize that I have forgotten to mention the lads in the hair pants. What would become of the "Western stuff without these curious nether garments ? A sombrero, an open shirt, two young

cannon, a package of tobacco, and hair pants—and your lily-handed leading man has immediately achieved the outward symbols of the boy of blood and oxen.

Up to now I have spoken only of the standardization of characters; but action has become quite as hardboiled, and there are definite stunts by which to express the whole gamut of human emotions, intentions, and conditions. I think I have mentioned how love at first sight is registered; but there is one bit of action even more stupid than that.

"Watch for a moment the actions of Jack Manly, who is about to call on Miss Oodles Ovit at her home in Fifth Avenue. Does he approach the house, glance at the number, then walk up the steps and ring the bell? He does not. He comes down the street, card in hand, scrutinizing every number until he arrives in front of the house and the camera; here he points to the number —which can be read a mile—one digit at a time; then, holding up the card—cut-in, showing card enlarged—^he points out the figures on it one at a time, thus showing that the numbers are identical. This accomplished, he turns to the camera and, his face beaming with delightful surprise, brings down his fist in his open palm and unmistakably says: "I '11 do it!"

The quick sequence of events necessary to tell a story in twenty minutes often requires that love at sight shall ripen into an engagement in sixty feet of film. The only way so far discovered by most directors to indicate this pleasing result is through the symbol of the engagement ring. Every actor must carry a pocketful of these in different sizes, so as to be ready for any emergency.

If the handsome cowboy in the leather panties meets the girl from Gotham for the first time, in the middle of the desert, and strolls off up the wash to make movingpicture love to her, he must be ready on returning close to the camera to slip on her finger a ring that fits. This saves much talk, a trip to the jeweler, and other clap-trap of real life.

Death is put over by two different symbols, one for the home and the other for outdoors. The sick-room death scene, with slight variations, is pictured thus: The doctor and the family are on the far side of the bed, which is set in a stage tableau depicting tense anxiety. The sick mother, lying well downstage, rises from her pillow, stares vacantly into the Great Beyond, clutches frantically at her beads, and, with several fine convulsions, expires. The doctor now takes her limp hand, looks long and thoughtfully at the departed, and then, slowly raising his eyes to the chief loser, mournfully shakes his head. She sighs heavily and, turning to the next mourner, shakes her head; the next one does the same to his neighbor—and so on down the line to the last servant. "When they have all shaken their heads one feels sure that Annie's mother has passed on; but, lest there should be some mental defective among the spectators who has not understood, the doctor closes Annie's mother's eyes and pulls the sheet over her head. This clioches the fact that death has come.

DEATH AND KISSES IN THE OPEN

The out-of-door demise is presented in quite a different way. Here the victim has been shot, smothered, or run over. The doctor arrives, looks over the wreckage

and, facing the camera, says: "Dead!" But, instead of sighing and shaking their heads, the bystanders all remove their hats and drop to one knee in prayer and benediction. Anyone who has ever seen firemen stop in the midst of their hazards and hose to pray for the fatality on the sidewalk knows how true to life this picture is. Think of a bunch of cowboys in hair pants showing respect in this way! It is superb!

I have often wondered what lawyers think of the jurisprudence of the moving-pictures. It stands to reason that we could not very well wait on the slow processes of the law, when we must do so much in twenty minutes. It does seem, however, that we ought at least to legalize our wills and weddings by having witnesses to the former and licenses for the latter. But what do we care for such trifles! "We can arrest—^without warrant—try, and hang a man with five hundred feet of film. That beats anything England ever did with her snappy criminal code.

Up to date there is only one recognized symbol to indicate great distance: we shade the eyes, lean forward, and sweep the long horizon. I used to believe that when a person shaded his eyes it was to keep out the sun; yet we do it, in broad-brimmed hats or with our backs to the sun, on cloudy days, and, in fact, under the fierce, penetrating rays of the quarter moon. Having discovered our quarry, or prey, or prize, 'way off yonder, our instincts call us naturally to instant action; but we must not start too soon. So, after gulping, backing and filling for at least ten feet of film, we gain a firm foothold and, with heaving chest, fare forth.

Moving-picture lovers are the kissiest people on earth.

"We kiss letters, lockets, flowers, fans, fur coats, and anyother props that happen to be kicking round or are concealed beneath the bosom of the sentimental lad or lass. And when we arrive at the happy ending—well!! It is technically known as the clinch, and ends the film in a slow dissolve. The action begins by a coyness on the part of Hortense and a languid yeamiag on the part of the lad. Finally we rush together in an attitude resembling the first hold in the bunny hug. Then slowly she raises her face to mine and I bend to my duty, the picture dissolving out in a long languorous kiss that leaves the on-lookers wondering all the way home how long we stuck it out!

So essential is the clinch, to show that lovers care for each other, that we pull it off in the most extraordinary places. Anywhere, from the hurricane deck of a camel to a comer of Fifth Avenue at noon, will do. "We are shameless, yet the villagers seem not to notice anything unusual; in real life we should be pinched, or should draw a crowd that would send in a riot call.

WHEN DIGNITY COLLAPSES

Of all phases of the silent drama subtle comedy is the most difficult of expression; and a situation that depends on the turn of a phrase and a witty reply in a dialogue is almost impossible, because of the objection to long titles and the cutting of the picture with too many subtitles. Many of our best comedians, who have amused us well for years on the legitimate stage, have made miserable failures in the photoplay; but, on the other hand, the low comedians and the clowns are enjoying a tremendous vogue, the fellow with the rubber

face or the one who can submit to the greatest anatomical assaults seeming to win the heartiest approval.

These entertainers have brought back all the old claptrap of the miisic-hall and vaudeville; the slap-stick, Seltzer bottle, and bucket of paste are creating uproarious laughter, as they did twenty years ago. The demand for these purveyors of joy seems to be in direct proportion to the number of flip-flaps one can negotiate when kicked in the stomach; but even so. Seltzer bottles and slap-sticks alone will not carry an actor to very great heights. Even in the rough stuff there must be art.

A few years ago there came to Los Angeles, in a riotous vaudeville stunt, a little bit of a fellow who seemed designed by Nature for the photo-comedy. He was a hit from the start, and in less than four years he had become probably the best-known actor in the world. There is no doubt that at this moment he has the greatest personal following in the whole history of the stage; therefore it becomes interesting to try to analyze his success.

What does he do that is so funny ? Why do we howl at his antics? It gets us nowhere to try to appear superior and dismiss him as a cheap vulgarian; for, notwithstanding an occasional lapse of this kind, he is yet the god Billiken to one hundred million people. A man who can make a nation laugh, not once, but every week, must be considered.

Perhaps Gr. K. Chesterton gives us the answer. Our English paradoxer takes the most elemental joke in the world and asks the question: "Why do we laugh when a fat man falls down? We do not laugh when a tree falls, or a house, or a child, or a poor man; but we howl

when a fat man strikes a banana peel, and even the gods smile when he is compelled to chase his high hat down the street."

"Why is this funny? The question is answered in Chesterton's statement that the reason is a religious one. Man, he says, has decided that he is made in God's image and has thus given himself a divine dignity. "Now the collapse of dignity is essentially humorous; and the greater the dignity, the greater the collapse. There is nothing in Nature so dignified as a fat man in a high hat; hence the humor of his faU."

The keen observer will recall that the comedian under discussion has evolved a character of much dignity; he wears always the suave manner and sartorial symbols of gentility, though a shabby gentility, it is true. His tightly buttoned coat seems to express a dignified hope that the absence of a shirt will not be noticed; his small, well-trained mustache, his bowler hat and ever-present cane—all are symbols of the gentleman. Even his little mincing walk and the stiff-legged rigidity with which he takes the comer are the things that make his collapse so utterly comic. He kicks his way through life, and in turn is kicked; yet his manner is one of dignified aloofness from the proximity to danger. The humor of his kicks lies in the fact that they emanate very suddenly from a serene, reposeful attitude of calm dignity. Even in his most tumultuous scenes, the manner in which he grasps his stick and endeavors to keep on his hat shows that he is constantly aware of the dignity he fears to lose.

Lacking this attribute, his rivals are only clowns. Even the clown, if you remember, played opposite the

ringmaster in high hat and swallowtail, in order to have something dignified to upset. The fall of the ringmaster was humorous; the fall of the clown merely grotesque.

The same test applies to the humor of the comic policeman. A guardian of law and order, his uniformed and serious dignity is in joyful eclipse when the patrolwagon hits a hydrant and the police department goes rolling down the street into the river.

It is amusing to hear some of the bad comedians trying to account for the other fellow's success, when they know perfectly well that their own stuff is so much better. Benny Bernstein, who does rough comedy for our studio, spends his life trying to imitate and outdo his master. A few days ago I heard some extra people laughing uproariously on the seat next to me; and, looking over the screen, I beheld Benny with his head in a goldfish bowl. He was drinking the water and apparently eating the fish—an Epicurean illusion produced by the use of sliced carrots. And Benny gets a good salary for eating goldfish! He tells me he is now working on a magnetic wig that will cause the hair to perform with every change of gesture; with this he hopes to land in the thousand-doUars-a-week class.

However, the comedians have one advantage over us: each of them can and does invent his own technic. Comic situations are limited, but within the limitations the comedian is an individual; in fact, it is only the manner in which he kicks or shoots his opponent in the north equatorial region, or accepts kicks and shots on the

THE FILM FAVOEITE 57

same anatomical target, that differentiates him from other comedians.

In thus attempting an analysis of moving-picture technic one wonders what it has to do with art. That there is art—and even great art—finding expression in the films, none but an utter bigot wEl deny; yet it must be admitted that much of the present output could hardly claim such designation, and it is that which has been under discussion.

We of the moving-pictures have all kinds of censorship in the interest of the morals of messenger boys; but as yet there has been no official protector of poor, old, defenseless art from the criminal ravages of the dramatic plumbers. However, the higher censorship of public patronage is beginning to assert itself, and the great success of some of the really fine productions is a most hopeful sign. The average spectator is not so low-browed as the old-time director thought, or else the crowd has improved immeasurably in the past few years. The estimate of indiscriminating ignorance is fast going the way of the dear old fiction which says that the moving-pictures are patronized only by children.

There remains in the moving-pictures a good deal of artistic carnage, but it is due to an abnormal condition consequent to a sudden enormous demand on an art that was not properly prepared. At present, salaries out of all proportion to service are paid. Pretty little girls with very modest talents, and mediocre actors with beautiful hair and cow eyes, get greater pay than senators. This is but a part of the evolutionary process of a new and sudden art.

58 FILM POLK

As it shakes itself down, the mechanics will be replaced by artists. More men with full sets of brains will be attracted; and then—I shall lose my job; but as Mrs. Grandon, who never has been properly impressed by my success, says:

"WeU, of course, Spencer, you 're a good strong boy —and you can always go to work!"

II

THE MOVIE QUEEN (A WOMAN'S POINT OF VIEW)

I MAY CHAPIN, rough-stuff comedy girl, have been elected to splash into the strange waters of literature and celebrate the lives of the movie queens. No doubt I shall have to come up for air occasionally, so this story is likely to have about as much literary construction as a hardware catalogue. However, I hope the editors will be as good sports as I am. Like "Spencer Grandon," I, too, shall use the device of anonymity to conceal from the public the identity of my characters—myself included. For this is not to be press-agent stuff, but a further intimate peek into the lives of the film folk.

Whatever biography the story contains must, of necessity, be that of two girls, for Agnes Underbill and I met in high school, when we entered the ninth grade with four hundred other students from all over town; and our lives have run parallel ever since. There is a joyous democracy in such a school as we attended, profitable both to those who come from the Westlake district and to those from the gas tanks. Agnes was a beautiful, cultured daughter of one of the first families; I, too, was the daughter of a first family—if you come ia by the Way of Watts. Her father was a judge of the superior court; mine, a motor cop. Both were officers

59

of the law; we had at least that much in common. But notwithstanding the great social gulf that separated us, by the end of our Scrub year we were known as Mocha and Java.

Mrs. Grandon, who is guide, philosopher, and friend to all the girls at the studio, has the most fascinating reasons for these high-school friendships. They are economic and sociological, and I cannot quote them here; but she makes a very strong point of the fact that two boys on our debating team were the closest friends, while their fathers, who were rivals in business, notoriously hated each other. The reason, she says, was because their interests were identical.

THE GOLDEN AGE OP ROMANCE

Agnes and I had an identity of interest. Besides our mutual loyalty to the school, we both wanted to be movie actresses. In this desire, however, we were not entirely original, for out of twelve hundred girls at the school at least eleven hundred and fifty aspired to the same lofty heights. Some of them, of course, were taking domestic science and others commercial courses; yet there burned in the heart of nearly every girl there a romantic hope that some time she would attain the purple of a moving-picture queen.

But we two had determination as well as hope, and we framed up our courses with our goal in mind. We took all the oral English expression, and dramatics the school offered, and that was one of the strongest departments. We had a class on stagecraft that made a practical study of the mechanical side of dramatic work. In our second year we were both elected to the Players Club, and by

the time we were eleventh graders Agnes had won the lead for the big play of the year. I was given a comedy role.

We were now fully determined to show some of the movie queens how it ought to be done, though I fear I was the more dynamic determiner of the two. I knew perfectly well that my mother would explode when I told her my plans, and as for Dad, he would cut out his muffler on the choicest lot of Irish thunder-words in his vocabulary. But though Dad was very volatile, he always permitted his little May to go right up and scratch him between the horns, and in the end he would blow out a tire to help her get her tiniest wish. With Agnes it was different. Her set believed in owning moving-picture studios, but in working elsewhere. She was destined for college, Europe, and all the other finishing touches which would fit her for her station in life. It was my job to nurse her rebellion and keep her untamed. I was firmly convinced that if ever Agnes broke in, she would make most of the headliners look like canceled postage stamps.

These were our school-girl dreams. We simply had to act; there was nothing else for it. The gods had marked us and the world must not be denied. Exactly what I was to do I had never quite determined, but I knew I was to do it magnificently. Agnes was more romantic than I and read Maurice Hewlett; I liked Shaw, Synge, and George Moore, my tastes being Irish. And heavens, the superiority we felt to girls who were content with Longfellow, Wordsworth, and Dickens! Agnes's romance was abstract—she wasn't very strong for the boys; mine was concrete, and I always included

a suitor or two, until I fell for my film favorite. Then the boys became merely scenery to me.

I have learned that every age has its romance. My mother tells me that her girlish dream was to marry the riagmaster of a circus and go to Niagara Falls on a wedding trip; while my grandmother, when young, was wont to read the novels of The Duchess, and spent her maidenhood hoping that some day Sir Guy Harringsford would come galloping through her village and carry her off to his manor house, where she would live and die a willing prisoner. My idea of the quintessence of romance was to play opposite Spencer Grandon, and have him mean what he does in the final dissolve. I '11 bet I had fifty pictures of him, my favorite being the one in the sport shirt. Oh, those cow eyes of his! I could have died for "one look into their abysmal depths.'' And to think, all this time he was married to the finest girl in the world!

While I was dreaming of my hero, Agnes had a case on a girl, for she always bestowed her affections on her own gender. This romantic phenomenon is common among school-girls. First it was her dramatics teacher, and then Vivian Vane, the reigning movie queen. I couldn't understand this devotion at all. Vivian Vane was beautiful, but it was an insipid sort of beauty and, personally, I thought Agnes had her beaten to a custard. Anyway, I burned all my candles before Spencer Grandon.

THE VISIT OP VIVIAN VANE

In our last year in school Agnes had the lead in the Senior play and I, as usual, had the comedy role.

That 's what always fell to me, because I had a tumed-up nose. My dramatics teacher insisted, however, that I was thus fated because I inherited my father's grim sense of humor.

Her slant on Dad was gained from the following episode: One day my mother received a note from the vice-principal criticizing my personal appearance. She objected, she said, to the rouge. Mother wrote and told her that if I came to school that way again, I was to have my face washed right there. Next day it so happened. Imagine her chagrin when my Irish skin refused to yield up its color. A few days later Dad arrested the vice-principal for speeding on Wilshire Boulevard!

Though we were up to our ears in the Senior play, June seemed ages away. "We had become the worst movie fans in school, and were restless to splash in. We went to see all the first runs we could crowd into Saturdays and holidays, and we usually managed to sneak in a few others during the week. We read all the motion-picture magazines, and once, in sweet embarrassment, we wrote letters to our favorites. We received no replies.

One day the principal of the school announced at assembly that he had given permission to a picture company to make scenes on our campus at the noon rollcall. The boys were to play some football, and the other students were to fill up the bleachers. We were only mildly excited, for many other companies had used our campus in a similar way; but imagine Agnes' sensations when she heard the cheer-leader call through his megaphone: "Now, all together, fellows! Let's

give three for Vivian Vane! Are you r-e-a-d-y ?" Two thousand students roared their Indian greeting as the queen of the movies emerged from her automobile.

"Agnes," I said, "if you want to meet her, beat it down to one hundred and forty and stick round until she comes! Don't ask any questions. I 've got a scheme.''

I made the fine-arts building in about two jumps, and when I returned to the field I bore a note to Miss Vane from our teacher in dramatics which invited her to visit our class in stagecraft. "Would she come over right after the picture ? She would! And Little May was to escort her, greatly to the jealousy of one thousand callow school-boys.

Through long association with each other Agnes and I were telepathic partners, so she tumbled to my scheme at once, and when I ushered the brightest star in filmdom into one hundred and forty to see the workings of the miniature theater and our new lightning stunts, Agnes had everything in readiness. They took to each other at once, and when they parted Miss Vane was asking Agnes to come and see her at the studio. You should have seen that girl after her goddess had flown!

Her eyes were as large as a leading man's and she fairly trembled in ecstasy. That afternoon she flunked in chemistry and Spanish; the next day she flunked in everything.

The following Saturday Agnes took a car to Hollywood at seven o'clock in the morning, though her engagement was not until ten. What she did there I was never able to learn; she raved and mooned about so much that I could gather little sense. All I really un

derstood was that when she departed the beautiful Vivian had kissed her good-by and had given her a signed photograph. After she left the studio she walked four miles in the country. She wanted to be alone!

It was now good-by to work, home, mother, and everything! Agnes bought an old-rose sweater like Vivian's; she wore her hair like Vivian's; she had her dresses made like Vivian's; to Vivian she sent flowers and notes. In fact, in all the Vicissitudes of Vivian there was nothing so terrible as the ease Agnes had on her. I tried to hold her to the ground, but she had gone up in the air like a beautiful pink balloon. Her work in school became utterly demoralized and, dropping from the proud heights of four A's in the first term, she had notices from all her teachers of impending failure.

One day the vice-principal called Agnes to the office, where she met her mother—face to face. Preliminaries were short. With the wisdom that comes with her office the vice-principal explained in two minutes exactly what the trouble was.

THE SIEGE OP THE STUDIOS

"Mrs. Underbill," she said, "this moving-picture business is the hardest problem we have to combat. All the girls are troubled with it and a few of them have lost their heads entirely. We have more than twelve hundred girls in this school, and if it were not for constant supervision of their dress and manners, a thousand of them would look like moving-picture actresses. Such are the standards of the day."

Agnes was dismissed from the conference. What happened subsequently I do not know, but she began im

mediately to feel the results at home. Her wardrobe was edited from hat to shoes, and to add to her humiliation her brothers guyed her unmercifully.

If it had not been that our past records in school had been good, I don't know how we should ever have graduated, for our minds were so fuU of plans for a summer campaign of assaults on the movie studios that we could think of little else. The annual discussion as to the propriety of each girl's making her own commencement gown out of a dollar's worth of material, or being permitted to blow herself according to her ability, did not interest us in the least. All we wished was to muddle through somehow, and then be free.

The week following our graduation we set out, I with the consent of my family, but Agnes surreptitiously. Our first few days' experience was very discouraging. We found that we were not the only girls who were trying to break in, that there were literally hundreds of us. True, most of the applicants waiting in line were without any qualifications whatsoever, even good looks, yet there were a few who seemed to have it all over us.

At the big studios there were regular employment agencies with limited office hours, usually from nine until eleven, and the method of registration was not unlike that used at domestic employment offices. As a rule they simply took one's name and address, and that ended it. But if the unsympathetic gent with the cold eyes saw anything in an applicant that he thought might be useful, he would look her over, like a judge in a dog show, and ask innumerable questions.

In three studios we were fortunate enough to have

our photographs and points entered in the large album. Dad told me that burglars enjoyed the same attention in his business. I learned later that all these albums are indexed according to type, so that the studio can, at a moment's notice, get in touch with any kind of human architecture that a particular piece calls for.

We found, however, that a simple registration of our physical charms and eccentricities was not enough. A perpetual bombardment was advisable, for often the assistant directors would go down the line or into the yard and pick a lucky victim—sometimes a whole bunch —^for immediate work. The waiting in line was pretty tiresome at times, but it was made interesting in contemplating the others and hearing their stories—tired girls out of work, unhappy wives, ambitious mothers, and no end of school-girls registering under fictitious names.

The mothers with precocious or stupid children were the most puzzling to me. Some of them, in the hope of exploiting their offspring, had dressed them up like bisque doUs with bare knees and skirts like lamp shades. One mother actually had her little four-year-old daughter painted like a leading lady. The sight was discouraging to one opposed to child labor.

Since this first insight into mother love as displayed at moving-picture studios I have seen some shocking things. The hardships some mothers submit their children to for three dollars a day is downright cruel. I saw one woman allow her infant in arms to lie in a cot through a fire scene in which the babe was nearly strangled by smoke from the pots. The director, on account of something that was wrong, ordered a retake.

68 FILM FOLK

The mother immediately placed the poor child back in the cot. When the director's attention was called to the condition of the infant he gave the woman a fearful dressing down, cut out the scene, and told her never to report at the studio again. Of course all the mothers were not as wicked as that one; yet we saw some pretty hard faces during those discouraging days of waiting.

SOUVENIES OF TITLE-k6uBS

Besides this method of direct application, there was another way to break into the pictures: this was by going to dramatic schools that guaranteed to place the student, after good, stiff training and a stiffer price. Some of them no doubt were honest enough, but there were innumerable fakes. Then there were men who advertised that if you simply paid for the film, they would take a picture of you leading in some standard drama or opera, such as Carmen; and in this way the actress could see exactly how she looked on the screen. It was also promised that these films would be submitted to the directors, who would immediately seek out anybody who made the grade. There are many poor, disillusioned girls who have a few feet of such film as the only souvenir of their dramatic experience. Still it is something to have once played the title-role in Carmen. There are real actresses who have n 't done that.

But the most undignified way of achieving one's dramatic Arcadia was to answer one of the innumerable advertisements for girls. Some of them were invitations to attend a ball "where a well-known director will be in attendance and for a prize will select the prettiest girl on the floor and guarantee her a position with a famous

company." Others were for bunches of girls to act in mob stuff.

As sophisticated as we thought we were, Agnes and I fell for one of these latter come-ons. Out of the two hundred girls who answered the advertisement about twelve were given work for two hours. "We were among the fortunate dozen. When the scene was finished four of us were requested to remain; it looked as though we had made a hit, and we were the happiest girls in Los Angeles.

But somehow I did n 't like the looks of the man who selected us. "When he told us he thought he could use us Monday and would like us to go motoring to the beach with him and his assistant to discuss our parts, I had his number. Dear little Agnes, who was a year older than I—by the calendar—^was all for going; but I said:

"Nothing doing, Mr. Man, on the beach stuff. I think we shall return to our mahmahs." There is some merit in having one's dad a motor-cop; he knows the beaches well! The other two girls went.

The next advertisement was blind, and we soon discovered the thing was not on the square. One look at the office and we knew that the buzzards in charge of the trap had nothing whatever to do with movingpictures. I will dwell on this unpleasant phase of the game only long enough to warn ambitious girls that the moving-picture business has its share of beasts who make girls pay for their jobs; and that there are fake schemes for luring movie-mad girls for purposes deliberately sinister. At one time many girls disappeared so suddenly, after stating that they were going to certain studios, that the police stationed men in the

"yards," where applicants wait, and arrested several notorious characters. In these latter cases the studios, of course, were quite innocent of wrongdoing; their plants were used by the underworld without their knowledge.

AGNES PROVES A SCREEN BEAUTY

But let 's talk about the birds and the flowers. One day the cold eyes of the gent with the big album stopped at our pictures! Then he read: School-girls, good typ^, swell dressers, pretty, look intelligent, and so forth. I saw this charming catalogue three years later and modesty forbids a fuller quotation. He called up our number and asked my mother if the Chapin sisters would report at the studio at eight o'clock on the morrow. I forgot to mention that Agnes was registered everywhere as my sister, for her family would have been wild had they known she was trying to break into the movies. The way they finally learned of it, and the reason of their consent, will have to be told farther along; but they will not know, until they read this, exactly how it all happened. Agnes thinks it will be great fun to have them learn it in this way.

As I was saying, at last a real studio, one of the best, had sent for us! It was a rah-rah story with Hubert Kawlins—I had hoped it would be Spencer Grandon— in the lead. But Spencer's cow eyes didn't have much on this leading man, for Hubert Rawlins had the most ravishing dimples that ever called forth lavender notes from languishing lassies. The director wanted sorority girls, and as we were just out of school, we had exactly the wardrobes that the parts demanded.

Neither of us ever got to college, as our scholastic schedule called for; but nevertheless we have had all the thrills that go with sorority life. We joined the Kappa Pajamas for a week, and if college life is anything like the stuff we did, then acting in the pictures is puritanical in comparison.

It was a fortunate beginning, for the parts exactly suited our clothes and temperaments. I pulled some pretty good comedy in a small way, and Agnes, of course, was the typical sweet-girl-graduate. The director was delighted and gave us a lot of praise. When the first reel was developed it was found that Agnes was a perfect scream on the screen. Her photographic beauty was almost sensational. We were both asked to report the next week.

My story from this point on is not very eventful, for the simple reason that I landed almost immediately. Female comedy is the rarest thing in filmdom—there are ten men to one woman—^so when they saw I had a comic slant they grabbed me, and from then on it was easy sailing. Agnes had a few bumps before she arrived, and they are worth recording because they give a view of the inside of studio life.

With all her natural gifts Agnes seemed unable to advance beyond a certain point. She was put on a guaranty, which meant that she was paid three dollars a day whether she worked or not, and occasionally she was given "bits" to do. We did not understand this treatment of her, for the director of the college picture had been very encouraging.

But after we had been working for a month we discovered that nowhere in the world is the caste system so

strong as at the studios. The caste is determined by salary. The big fish, which include the stars, leads, and directors, do not swim with the fifty-doUar-a-week character men and second leads; and these in turn do not swim with the twenty-doUar-a-week minnows; and the camera kids, who draw a splendid fifteen per, pass through the bunch in the yard with perfectly magnificent hauteur. Thus is the golden inner circle preserved, though these social distinctions are no doubt accountable for the failure of so many of the photo-drama clubs.

We found out that these strata were adamantine. Some of the stars passed us daily for a month, and to them we were only props. And furthermore, if a star said, "I do not wish that girl in my picture," even the director would be forced to acquiesce to her wishes. But Agnes was extraordinarily beautiful, and patience finally saved her.

The salaries of the big fish were amazing to me; I never really believed them until I began drawing one myself. There seemed to be no end of money. The big director spent prodigally; he raised the salary of the costume woman from seventy-five dollars to two hundred dollars a week with a mere sweep of the hand; if a bunch of horsemen did some battle stuff particularly well, he would order that they each be given ten dollars extra; he bought a team of horses one day for six hundred dollars, and sold it the next for three hundred.

But one day an order came from New York to cut expenses. They began at the bottom—and stopped there. All the minnows were beautifully slashed; the codfish lost a few scales; but the big whales still fed on goldfish. Agnes was given a blue notice, which meant

she was off her guaranty and, if she stayed, she would be paid only when she worked—which was little better off than the bunch in the yard. She cried for nearly a week in her dressing-room. Mrs. Grandon, who had taken to mothering both of us and for whom I had grown to have a warm affection, notwithstanding the fact that she had blasted my school-girl hopes of running off with Spencer, did her best to console Agnes. She assured her the same rule worked in every phase of what she called the jungle fight.

"When railroad men are reduced ten per cent, in wages, the president of the road still gets his fifty thousand dollars," she said. It was true, no doubt, but that didn't get Agnes anywhere. She wept and languished.

Another cross the poor girl bore was in keeping her movie work from her family. Fortunately her father and mother had gone to Santa Barbara for the summer, and her refusal to accompany them, "especially as she was going to college in the autumn and they would see so little of her," required a lot of explaining. Then her brother Ralph grew suspicious of so much golf over at Beverly Hills and followed her one day in his Bear Cat, as he called his little stripped runabout. He found out what she was doing, and two or three times he threatened to squeal. Fortunately Agnes had something on him. He would have died rather than have her tell his mother.

WHY VIYIAN VANE SQCCBIiDBD

Agnes had determined to inform the family as soon as she landed—she felt their opposition would be softened

by her success—but time was flying, and if nothing happened within a month, it would be Greek verbs for her! One night the Grandons invited us to motor with them along the foothill boulevard. Agnes sat with Spencer and I rode behind with Mrs. Grandon. As we silently slid through the gorgeous orange country Mrs. Grandon talked to me for an hour or more on the subject of success, and when Mrs. Grandon has talked for an hour she has said something. This night she was analyzing the success of Vivian Vane.

"The greatest human charm is youth," she said. "Vivian Vane has capitalized it to the limit. Without any particular dramatic ability she has played up a winsome girlishness that has made her the greatest favorite in America. Notice the fine abandon with which she dresses her hair, yet it is carefully curled, and the abandon is studied. Her little flat-chested frocks give her the boyish figure of young girlhood. Her nwivete is quite as studied as the abandon of her hair; no woman is naive without purpose. First she pouts, and then she jumps up and claps her hands. Never, even in her love scenes, does she permit herself to lose her innocent charm. Instead of acting like the mature maid in the full glory of her sex, who raises a soulful face to be kissed by the hero in amorous embrace, she just snuggles up and buries her face in his shoulder; and her lover must be satisfied with a chaste salute on the top of her golden hair. Her technic is always the same; and it always gets over."

I did not sleep much that night, for my red head was evolving a perfectly good scheme. Next day I went to

Harry Barlow, director of the college picture, and told him if he would give Agnes a chance in a one-reel ingenue part, I would pay her salary; but she mustn't know it. I knew the director was limited in his salary list, so that otherwise he could not use her. I was getting thirty a week.

The director agreed to my plan, and then I asked Agnes to go with me to see Vivian Vane in a different picture every night for a week. We made a systematic study of her technic and the psychology of her audiences. Mrs. Grandon was right. So I said to Agnes:

"If that 's all there is to it, dearie, you have the figure, the tresses, and the beautiful fagade. Now let's see if you can give a correct imitation of sweet sixteen."

The scheme worked beautfully. The first picture was a success, and the second one better. Agnes soon dropped all imitations and began to exhibit her own sweet personality without any affectation. The rest was easy, and her future was assured by the manager of the studio, who offered her a contract.

It now became necessary to make known her identity, so we went together to the manager and told him the situation. He only smiled and called in his press agent.

"Mac," he said, "you can release that story of Judge Underbill's daughter making good in the pictures."

Agnes looked flabbergasted for a minute, but she managed to say: "Do you mean, Mr. Wendell, that you knew I was not May's sister?"

"Why, my dear child, I 've known it for a month and have talked it all over with your father; he is strong for

you. All that bothered him was your possible failure. The story in the paper will make him purr like a jew'sharp."

Agnes was so happy that she motor-bussed up to Santa Barbara over the week-end.

And such a story! I am glad Judge Underbill was capable of purring. It was a two-column feature with a three-column cut of Agnes. "Society Bud Makes Debut in Film." The same old bunch of superlatives followed. I thought the display would seem a bit vulgar to the Underbills, but they were quite unperturbed. Mrs. Grandon says that the judicial mind is not necessarily immune from ordinary human vanities.

But this was not the usual press-agent palaver. Agnes had really arrived. In fact, in a very short time her pictures became wonderful sellers. As the demand increased, her salary advanced, and within six months from the time we first went to the studio she was making a hundred and fifty dollars a week. Then she left us to go with another studio at two hundred and fifty dollars, and for a year or more she was first with one and then with another; but she finally came back where she started, with her first director, Harry Barlow. That was four years ago. Since then they have gone up the ladder together, until Agnes is now one of the greatest favorites in America, with a salary of a thousand dollars a week—the kind of money the banks will take; and Harry Barlow is one of the big stockholders of the company. If Agnes had written this story, she might have told you whether or not the business ladder was the only one she intends to climb with Harry Barlow. I don't know myself, but I am a monstrous good guesser.

COSTLY PRODUCTIONS AND BIG SALARIES

Now that I have got us into the pictures and you have met a couple of movie queens, I shall talk about the inmates of filmdom and their capers. A few observations, a lot of facts, and an occasional adventure suggest a literary omelet that would get a "not passed" in B9, English. But this tale is not written for schoolteachers; and besides, that seems to me to be the only way to tell the things I feel most people want to know.

The first question usually hurled at us is this: "Are the advertised salaries and costs of production pressagent stuff?" Well, here is the truth, as near as a woman can get it in such things. Big feature pictures cost from fifty to one hundred and fifty thousand dollars to produce, which, of course, is much more than most stage plays cost; but the earning capacities of a successful film are iafinitely greater than the greatest of the legitimate dramas. In some cases one can estimate the cost of feature plays by dividing the press dope by three.

The amazing salary stories of the stars, however, are usually pretty true. As a rule the men do not earn so much as the women. This difference in the drawing power of men and women is one of the strangest phenomena of the moving-pictare business. On the legitimate stage great stars are famous irrespective of sex; but in the movies the girls are far more popular than the men. Agnes Underbill has a stupendous following of her own sex. In the great lines waiting outside the theaters where she is filming, the women outnumber the men three to one. Most of her mail is from

girls, and the older women send her all sorts of gifts, from Bibles to flannel nighties. They all want to mother her.

THE DraECTOR AND HIS METHODS

This same sex preference is manifested in the newspapers. It is very hard to get the press to use pictures of the men actors; they invariably want girls, and as a result of this the directors have to face a very serious problem. Every drama does not demand a girl lead; yet, as they are much the best sellers, the studios are put to their wits' ends to meet this financial urge. Naturally they are in the game, first, as a business.

My own opinion is that of the popularity of girls over men is largely the fault of the studios themselves. For some reason they have always believed that a hero should be beautiful, and they have played up these masculine dolls to the limit; whereas if they were discerning they, would know that most women and all men despise a beautiful man.

The actors and their salaries gain the most publicity; but there is another element, and perhaps the greatest, in the success of the moving-pictures about which the world knows little. That element is the direction of the film. The director is a new sort of bird that so far seems to have been left uncatalogued. I shall attempt his analysis.

"We find that there are two distinct types with opposite psychologies, and within each class there are some splendid artists and many duffers. Those who are familiar with the technic of the stage-director know that he must of necessity have real actors to deal with, or his pro

THE MOVIE QUEEN 79

duction will be bad, or at least very amateurish. He can only direct the members of the cast in rehearsal; when the real performance is given they are cast upon their own resources. But in film drama the actual performers, from first to last, can be directed from behind the camera. Each exit and entrance, and every little movement in between, can be ordered with the most minute precision.

This method accounts for the success of many an actor who had nothing to recommend him but an agreeable personality, and it has developed an entirely new psychology in dramatic art. The director who has it believes that he alone is the artist of the picture; to him his actors are merely pigments with which he paints his canvas. He prefers to work with plastic personalities who can do his bidding in the tiniest detail. His egocentric conception of his function forbids his letting his paints know his intention, for if his actors should know the story, they might feel impelled to put their own interpretation on their parts, thus running counter to his. So in many cases such directors do not permit the cast to read the script. Often the actors go through a whole picture of many reels and haven't the slightest idea what it is all about. As scenes are never made in the sequence of their projection, it is easy to understand the difficulty of interpreting the action.

To illustrate the manner of this kind of directorship, I shall try to report a scene that I saw at the studio this morning. The stage was set, the cameras focused and properly angled, and the cast was ready. The director, sitting in an arm-chair, flanked by his assistants, called out: "All ready—camera!" Camera man

80 FILM POLK

begins cranking. "Now, Smith, enter slowly—^look about —walk to desk—sit down—discover letter—'I wonder what this is'—open letter—as you read, register pain— now slowly raise the eyes—hold it a minute—now register pity—lower the head—^hold it—now reach for the telephone—call number A4327—slowly and without excitement—shake head, as though changing your mind—

dissolve " This last order is to the camera man, who

speeds up the machine so that the picture dissolves upon the screen.

To see an actor with a full set of brains—^there are a few with such equipment—^thus performing like a puppet is somewhat shocking, yet some of them have to do it. However, this type of director prefers to work with handsome marionettes who will gladly subordinate whatever minds they have to his, and if a director is a real artist, he can often make the cast do very unusual acting. Not a few of the greatest film successes are only beautiful creatures with no ability at all, except that of performing according to instructions. This is proven by their utter collapse when they chance to fall under the direction of an inferior artist.

It must not be inferred from this that directors of this kind are necessarily egotistical. Many of them believe that a picture should be the work of one man, and the undeniable success of many of their films fortifies them in the belief. The great danger from this kind of direction is that after a while all the manikins act alike. In other words, they interpret their parts just as the director would if he were acting.

The other type of director builds his picture cooperatively. He is likely to call his cast together, after hav

(Courtesy of the Universal Film Co,

Phillipe Smalley, Mme. Schuman-Heink, and Jack Kerrigan

ing given them the script to read, to discuss the play, the character parts, and perhaps the psychology of the plot. He confers with the scenic artist, gives the technical director much latitude, and the actors retain great individual freedom in interpreting their roles. A full stage-rehearsal of the play in proper dramatic sequence is then ordered. In directing the scene just referred to, he would do it something like this:

"Now, Smith, this is the scene in which you come in and find the note from your daughter on your desk. You will recall that when you read it you are crushed, and your first impulse is to telephone her husband; but you haven't the spirit. Now let's try it."

CUSTAED PIE COMEDY

The scene is acted just as Smith thinks it should be done. Then the director:

"Now that was very good, but I think you should hold the telephone longer; your indecision didn't get over very well. Let's try it again."

It can be seen that it is essential that Smith should know how to act. In fact, this director can work well only with trained actors. He usually directs stars from the legitimate stage, and when one of these positive personalities falls under the first type of director the picture is a failure, if it ever gets that far. It usually doesn't, however, for stars object to being told how to fold their hands.

Nevertheless, both kinds of directors are a success. One of the greatest in America is of the first type. His actors, though fairly well known in filmdom, are immeasurably less important than he is. It is often said

that the reason he turns over to other directors the great stage stars who come to his studio is because he refuses to share the headlines with them. I think, however, that he believes he can make better pictures by using plastic actors in this way, than by permitting personalities to obtrude themselves upon his canvas. I might add that there are a few directors who follow both methods, the choice depending upon the materials with which they have to work.

The egocentric director is almost impossible in comedy, for that form of expression depends largely upon the comedian. Most people are familiar with the comedies in every one of which, year after year, the cut-ups do exactly the same stuff. They are the work of a director who employs a lot of fat or thin, long or short, foolishlooking humans to puU his slapstick stuff. But no real comedian of the pictures could have aU the details of his comedy arranged for him, because so much depends upon the exigencies of the moment. Unlike stage actors, we cannot have absolute direction, especially when we are working in public places—on street comers, breaking into parades, or at automobile races. One of the famous comedians of the country canceled his contract a short time ago because he refused to offer his face to the impact of a custard pie. He did not know that custard pie was the favorite comedian at this studio.

In my own case I merely learn the situation, and all the comedy is my own—often thought out at the last minute. In rehearsing I simply walk through my part. Neither the directors nor the actors know exactly what I am to do until the camera begins.

And here is a curious thing: I often suffer the most

excruciating stage fright during rehearsals and, indeed, I have sometimes had to abandon a scene temporarily because of it. But usually when I hear the camera click it is like a "shot in the arm," and I plunge in with the most abandoned joyousness.

They say that every comedian wants to play Hamlet and that every comedienne aspires to Rosalind, but I have wit enough to recognize my limitations, especially those of my nose. Also, I am made delightfully aware that feminiue comedy is the rarest commodity on our market, and though I am not the romantic favorite that some of my sisters are, my films sell so well that I beat nearly all of them to the pay envelope.

UNEEALITIES OF THE SILENT DRAMA

Spencer Grandon in some articles he wrote gave a pretty full catalogue of the curious symbols of the "defandum" drama has evolved; but he overlooked several that, no doubt, the women have noticed. If a director wishes to register the fact that a woman does not respond to the unwelcome advances of a man— say, in a ballroom, where Count Dubski is trying to pick up the banker's daughter—^he tells her, first, to flash anger with her eyes, then turn on her heel, toss up her head and sail haughtily away. Now no man ever yet saw a woman behave thus. What they all do—this is for the benefit of male directors—is simply not to see the man or notice him at all. Perhaps the reason some directors have never learned this little fact is because they are never snubbed.

What kind of married people do you suppose address each other in letters as "My dear Husband" and "Your

loving "Wife"? It probably would be shocking in the picture to have a wife write, "My dear Billy-Boy," and sign it, "Devotedly, Mabel." Yet that 's about the way the married people I know write letters. Think of any woman, especially some fine old dowager from the codfish set of Boston, winding up her letter, "Tours truly, Mrs. Peabody."

Another thing the girls want me to apologize for is our table manners. I assure you that, out of the pictures, none of us race through our meals with such atrocious speed as that dictated by directors. Neither do we aU sit on the windward side of the table in order to gargle our soup more brazenly. Because there is so little action, a dinner is difificult to stage, and we are taught to supply this defect by exaggerated grimaces and caveman manners. Some directors must think that our standards are determined at stand-up lunch counters.

Eating is one of the daily physiological functions, disgusting enough, and the only way to make it socially agreeable is to surround it with an elaborate ritual, called manners. Let anybody break one of the rules and make a noise eating soup, and everybody else within earshot is made quite ill. For this reason I have steadfastly refused in my comedy roles to resort to any gastronomic aerobatics. I don't like it. Even rough comedy need not be coarse.

Another thing: why will they never allow us to act with our backs to the camera? Our directors seem to think that digust or indignation can be shown only with the face. I saw a famous French actress filming in one of her own successful stage dramas, and in her best scene she was supposed to have her back to her

audience—and such eloquence as her back revealed! But her director compelled her to perform fullface toward the camera.

There is one popular misconception that I wish to end forever—at least, as far as it manifests itself in my profession—and that is that the female of the species is more temperamental than the male. This absurd notion came about through press-agent stories of grand opera song-birds, who are supposed to be the least dependable bipeds extant. But I could cite hundreds of examples to prove that the male has ten times the artistic temperament that we are supposed to possess.

Time and time again we have had scenes tied up because the director was off his oats. In a great big set, made recently, with more than two hundred people assembled, the big chief became temperamental and ordered in a piano, so that he could learn the new motif in the lame duck. Everybody joined in the dance and though some of the joy was not quite refined, it was good fun. Such concessions as these to the director's artistic temperament must make pictures cost a lot more money than necessary. An ill-tempered director will semetimes pi a whole day's work and dismiss the cast because he "loses his buttons." Most of them, however, are supposed to turn out so many feet a week, so they cannot always indulge their masculine eccentricities.

To prove further my contention I must tell a story of a rooster. This incident happened not long ago. But first it is necessary to inform Eastern readers that the idea of roosters crowing at sun-up is of purely local origin. In CaUfomia they crow all the time, night and

day. In fact, so persistent are they in their paeans that aU sorts of ordinances are passed either to eliminate the roosters from the cities or else to compel their owners to attach mufflers.

It would seem easy, therefore, to get a rooster to crow in a picture. We tried it once, and for the purpose secured a great big black Minorca, that was famous among fowl for his Caruso-like accomplishments. The scene was in a graveyard, and we had Mr. Chanticleer tethered to a hidden peg upon the mound of a Mr. Hickey. I was supposed to be asleep on a stone slab, like a recumbent queen in Westminster Abbey. As the cock crowed I was to arise, wipe my eyes, and rush out of the cemetery in horrified abandon.

We got an early start—about 8 a. m.—and when everything was set I took to my granite couch and waited— and waited—and waited. The director tried everything from food to fright, but that darned rooster just strutted up and down over the late Mr. Hickey and never piped a note.

I wish I could make this account as long as my mortuary vigil, and then perhaps you would understand why I feel so strongly on the subject.

Several times during the day the handsome thing preened himself and, after taking a fine long breath and tossing his head heavenward, went through the first motions of a call to arms—^but that was all. His temperament always choked him back into silence.

At exactly 4:15 he looked over at my pained and haggard figure, lying as in death, and feeling that he had something to crow about uncorked a rough and raucous song that could be heard in Hollywood, making

with it all the accompanying gestures. Since that day I have been laying for the rooster-minded men who get off that old bromidiocy about the temperamental ladies of the stage.

SECRETS OF THE TOILET

If my male readers who have followed this story will now please stand aside for a few minutes I will take the ladies gently by the hand and lead them to our dressing-rooms. Men are excluded, and of course no gentleman will peek.

In this room what do you think the negro maid is doing to that young lady standing like Diana at her bath? She is giving her a nice, thick, gooey coat of olive oil, for she is sentenced to do tank stuff—a castle moat, I believe—and will probably have to stay in the water all morning. And that character woman over there is being upholstered in anticipation of a shocking bump from a jitney. Those two young ladies who are having their torsos laced up in stout, corset-coverlike bodices are preparing for a violent quarrel in a cigarette factory. If they were not thus incased beneath their shabby dresses, their clothes would be unable to contain them, and the scene would be censored out. The undergarments of many of the others, you will notice, are not such as are advertised in the daily papers, for our needs are peculiar, and we have to be prepared for all sorts of bizarre adventures.

These surroundings are luxurious, however, compared with the inconvenience we have to endure when out on location. Talk about dressing in a Pullman sleeper! Imagine the privacy of a jitney or the "lee'ard" side of

a sagebush on the desert. True, some of us have motorcars rigged up like traveling minstrels, but often we have to shift where no motor-car can go. I have had to make a complete change in two feet of snow behind the doubtful shelter of a sugar-pine up in Bear Valley. To hang a mirror in a manzanita bush and make up in a blizzard is indeed earning one's salary in the most cold-blooded way.

I'll never forget the amazement of a forest-ranger in the Sierras when he rode into our location and in all directions could see men and women hiding behind trees. He thought a stage had been robbed; that the highwaymen had taken even the clothes of the passengers, and that we were only waiting for the cover of night so that we could crawl shamefully back to civilization. "We develop some situations that are funnier than any you see on the screen, but I 'm afraid the censors might be a bit squeamish about releasing them.

HOW WTARDEOBES EMPTY THE PAY ENVELOPES

Now, gentlemen, you may rejoin us. You will not be particularly interested in our wardrobes, except in a fiscal way, but this factor ought to supply the shock you have just missed.

Before I reveal this sartorial heaven to the ladies— the men trailing behind—^permit me to make one or two observations. When you hear of the salaries that some of us get, you no doubt think that our greatest sport is to go down and laugh at the mint. But I assure you our expenses are quite as alarming as our pay, especially if you consider the girls who play straight leads.

An automobile has come to be a necessity; a maid or a seamstress indispensable; daily subscriptions or charitable touches amount often to as much as twenty-five dollars a week. Photographic bills are outrageous; then we have to pay for our own gowns iu everything except costume plays.

A girl starting in often has to spend her first six months' salary accumulating wardrobe necessities. The gowns for one five-reel story cost Agnes Underbill nearly fifteen hundred dollars. And the tragic part of it is that they are useless for further picture purposes.

Just as the studios find it cheaper to rent furniture, so that the sets will always be new, so, too, the directors demand that each new story have its own gowns. And such memories as these men have! Don't ever again tell me that the male sees only the face. These uncanny men have the crudest memory for feathers, fine or faded If you try to ring in the simplest hat that you wore two years ago, they will spot it a mUe away.

The wardrobe of a comedienne is not particularly exciting, so I shall take you in to see the glorious raiment and the many little coquetries of Agnes Underbill. No, this is not a store, nor are these the gowns for a whole cast. That last ease contains only the dresses she wore in The Do-Nothing. She cannot wear them again and she cannot make them over—^we call it taking them down —until the picture is released in New York. This ties up a fearful lot of money, yet it is essential to "keep them on ice" against the possibility of a make-over. For if the big fish or the censors order a retake of a certain scene, we must be prepared, and it can easily be seen how difficult it would be to rebuild a gown after

it had been taken down and perhaps merged into several new ones. The slightest change might be fatal to the picture. These slips are most likely to occur when scenes are made days apart, or when a make-over is ordered a month after the original scene was made.

Suppose, for instance, that I was making a scene Saturday morning, and rain or something else compelled us to abandon the finish of it until Monday. Suppose that Monday I put on canvas shoes, forgetting that I had worn black shoes Saturday. This is what would happen when you looked at the finished picture: You would see me—picture made on Saturday—jump up from my chair, grab a revolver, dash out of the front door, and shoot a book agent. Returning with a smoking revolver—picture made on Monday—^you would behold a pair of shoes turned white, simply because I had shot a book agent! Nobody could convince the amazed audience that such things happen in real life, especially as the shootiag of a book agent has never been considered bad form among nice people.

This hypothetical case is not stated to be humorous, for slips of this kind are constantly happening. A man wiU enter a telephone booth in a gray coat and come out in a black one. Hortense might be on her deathbed, and while a three-foot title was spliced into the film some one might have changed the carpet on the floor or even raised the ceiling. Indeed, so difficult is it to carry over the minutiae of the mise en scene that, unless it is absolutely impossible to do so, all scenes in the same location are made at one time.

To emphasize the great care that must be exercised in order that the sequence of scenes may not be made

ridiculous by too sudden a change, I must tell of an incident I witnessed the other day when Gene Wilkinson was doing one of her famous stunts with the cats. It was necessary for her to sneak up behind a small, sleeping tiger and hold it at arm's length by the skin of its neck—a very dangerous performance. After a great deal of preliminary care she accomplished the picture, and the director called for a close-up of the scene. "While the camera man was moving his machine Gene released the beast, because of his weight, and when she picked him up again a great argument arose as to whether, in the first picture, she had held him with the right or the left hand at his neck. In order to be sure, two pictures were taken, one with the squirming beast in the right, the other with him in the left hand. They will use only the one that corresponds to the first film.

WHEN WHITE IS YELLOW OR BLUE

So one can see that it would be unsafe to take down a gown until the final release of the picture. However, there are a few studios that have introduced a regular department of dressmaking, with a high-priced designer of gowns in charge, and thus they are assuming the expense of owning a wardrobe, with satisfactory results to themselves. These dressmakers seek out the best models at the spring and autumn fashion-shows and copy a two-hundred-dollar gown with fifty dollars' worth of material, each garment being so built that it is easy to take down after the release has come. The material, of course, can be used again.

The men of the pictures own a complete wardrobe— evening clothes, dinner coats, morning coats, tweeds,

and riding breeches. Their linen is usually yellow, but not always, and this reminds me of another of our crosses—^the color eccentricities of the camera man. If there were any fixed chromatic formula, it would be easy; but one fellow insists that all white be reduced to a certain yellow, while another one has a different tone. Some, indeed, demand a blue; then everything from shirts to feather boas must be dyed to suit him. Often what one believes to be a gorgeous gown gets thumbs-down from the camera man. Even the director has to acquiesce, or otherwise become responsible for the photography—and directors have enough responsibilities without assuming foreign ones.

In the pictures the actinic value of various colors changes the technie of make-up used in the stage drama. Much depends upon the location and the atmospheric condition of the light. At the beaches and on the desert, because of the intense whiteness of the sand, a very light make-up is used; otherwise the faces would appear too swarthy. For ordinary studio purposes the women use a number five and the men a number six grease-paint. Blondes use a light Japanese make-up. Because their high lights are much hotter than those of brunettes, red-haired girls always photograph very dark. Rouge is not used because the photographic value, being dark, makes shadows rather than color on the cheeks.

Practically everybody, except little children and one or two girls who happen to have magnificent skins, has to use grease-paint. This is due to the close-up. When one's face is enlarged on the screen to the size of a moving-van, even apparently smooth skin looks like a plowed field with spring wheat just emerging.

Everybody is supposed to report at the studio at 8:30 o'clock in the morning in make-up, and, unless released, must remain there thus glorified all day. The necessity of this daylight use of calcimine has some very curious consequences. A seven-passenger car with twelve occupants in fuU evening dress, and all made up like "shameless jades," goes right through the shopping district at ten a. m. on the way to some location. Is it any wonder that a lot of people think we spend our nights carousing at the beaches, and that certain ministers are in a constant state of turmoil over our scrambled morals? However, most of us have become immune to these attacks, and we go nonchalantly about our work without the slightest sense of shame.

EEAL TEAES POK FUSST DIRECTORS

If, however, we are making a street scene and do not wish to attract attention, the camera is hidden in a motor-van and our make-up is very carefully done. One time, while doing a boy's part, I was standing in front of a bank building when a man called to me to crank his car. I did so, and as I stepped up to accept the ten cents he handed me I saw that he was looking into my face with chagrin. I knew who he was and he recognized me. His embarrassment was expressed by beating it away four bells ahead.

Every profession has its disagreeable duties, and one of ours is to work under the studio lights. Every actress dreads them, for they are simply cruel to the eyes, and to work within a few feet of eight or ten ghastly, hissing, flaming arcs will unnerve the strongest of us. The red rays are entirely absent in these awful things, the conse

quence being that when they are used, ever3i;hing in the scene is bathed in a sickly, bluish green. Faces appear ashen gray and the red of one's lips looks purple. The actors appear like uncanny corpses suddenly come to life. The light is so dreadful to the eyes that the least result is a splitting headache, and the worst, the necessity of seeking the solace of an oculist or of wearing amber glasses for several days.

Speaking of eyes reminds me that we have one emotional stunt that puts it all over the legitimate stage, and that is the registering of real tears. Even if the emotional actress can turn on the tears, only those in front would ever see them; but we have the advantage of the close-up. Of course the usual way to produce them is to smell an onion concealed in a handkerchief, or in the shirt front of the lover—in case the sorrowful lady has to weep on his manly chest. The onion, however, will not have the same lugubrious consequence with everyone.

These immunes must either sit and look at the sun until their eyes run, or use a little boric acid and oil with an eye-dropper. But the onion produces the most Madonna-like tears and is by far the most popular method of producing the dolorosa effect.

However, artificial tears are not allowed by some directors, and they resort to all sorts of devices to cause real ones to flow. The process is called "pumping." A few days ago one of these chaps tried in vain to work up the emotion of a young girl so that she would shed tears of hate at the man in the plot. When he had struggled for twenty minutes, he turned on her in contempt and indignation:

THE MOVIE QUEEN 95

"You are the worst actress I ever saw. You 've got about as much temperament as an ice-man. I 'm going to get this scene, and I 'm going to have Blanche Harvey"—^he knew their enmity—"make it."

Then came the flood; and while the girl was mad clean through, the director got a close-up of the most indignant tears that ever leaked from pretty eyes. Perhaps the trick won't work again.

One of the few women directors in the business insists that tears shall be real. I saw her work over a girl for half an hour, while she went through the whole story, acting every part. The girl finally lay down upon a couch, and the director knelt beside her and pounded away. What she said I do not know, but the girl cried all right, and furthermore she had to be carried to her dressing-room in downright hysterics. If the realism that demands our suffering the actual pains of our heroines is carried much farther, it will some day exhibit a tender young girl permitting a lion to bite her ear off—just for the sake of the picture! You can get people to do almost anything if you will pay them well enough.

TWINKLE, TWINKLE

Astronomically speaking, the firmament of filmdom is occupied by fixed stars—those who are permanently employed in the moving-pictures; the comets of the stage, who temporarily leave their orbits, and, acting for a few weeks or months, return whence they came; and the burned-out old moons, whose effulgence is a reflection of past glories. The comets are the most spectacular and perhaps the best known, and for their short stay make stupendous sums.

96 FILM FOLK

Besides the fabulous salaries paid them, they are often provided with private cars, furnished bungalows or mansions, fully equipped with servants, and motor-cars, grand pianos and other household pets. The dressingrooms of some of these pampered ones would make Count d'Orsay feel like a plumber. They have ivory toilet-sets, great mirrors, "hot and cold folding-doors," and every little frill to delight the feminine heart.

Are we jealous ? Oh dear, no! Their pay checks are bigger, but ours come oftener!

Now that most of the studios are cutting out the onereeler and going in for the five to eight reel feature stuff, we are drawing more and more of the stage stars to the pictures. Some of the less thoughtful of the film favorites deplore the competition, but many of us believe the capitulation of the legitimate stars is a great boost to our business. Every year adds to the dignity and artistry of the film drama, and in that we all profit. Even in my work, starting out as a sort of female Charlie Chaplin, subjecting myself to all the grotesque clownishness of the slapstick and spit-curls, I find myself at last cast in comedy dramas that call for something approximating intelligence and offer a chance for more subtle comedy than cyclone and cataclysm.

Studio life is not exactly what most outsiders think, for I believe it is generally supposed that we are on the jump from morning to night. The fact is, our personal excitements are few indeed, and four hours of actual work is quite a full day. It is true that those in stock must report in make-up by 8:30; but that does not necessarily mean that work begins at that hour. There are many factors that determine the time of taking

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The make-up man at Universal Studios

a scene: the light, the position of the sun, a scenic experiment, the temperament of the director, and many other things. Any or all of them may drag out the waiting for half a day or more, yet the company must be ready to go out at any moment. Then one may be east in a part that will not be staged until the next week, yet he must stay on the lot, though he does not need to make up. The stars are privileged to stay away when not working, though they must telephone the studio every morning and evening and leave word where they can be found between times. And, of course, the stars have more to do outside, for they are constantly attending the dressmakers' and milliners'.

LEISUEE BETWEEN SCENES

But for the rank and file there are sometimes days on end when they do no acting at all. It is interesting to see how the actors employ their leisure—a problem which becomes more important in this profession than in any other. I hasten to say that the women use their time to much more purpose than the men; the majority of them sew, embroider, knit, or mend. They sit round in little groups, as intently interested as any altruistic church sewing-circle knitting bands for Belgian babies. Indeed, one English actress at our studio has knitted hundreds of pairs of socks for her soldier boys. Another, a socialist German girl, also knits, and, as she has no way of getting her work to Germany, she sends it with the English girl's. I only wish the poya who get the socks could know!

Horrified uplifters, whom our morals are constantly concerning, would feel very much chagrined if they

could investigate a studio on a dull day. Some of the women read a great deal, not only the movie dope and papers, but good stuff. A young college girl at the studio has installed her library, and rents her books to the others for ten cents a week. "With the proceeds she adds to her library.

Although the men for the most part just loaf round, smoke, and read the movie magazine, there are occasional book-lovers, and always a few who like to work with their hands. One chap here spends all his time modeling in clay; another in learning scene-painting; one studies Spanish; and another, an American boy brought up in Mexico, has built a theater of marionettes.

Of course there are eccentric individuals who will not mix at all with the 'others. One girl, with evidently enough money to be independent of her job,—she is an extra, and sometimes makes nothing for a week or two,— spends most of her time reading in her dressing-room. Another youngster, with no more talent than a rabbit, but with the artistic temperament of a psychic seeress, moons round all day looking at the hills. Her firm belief in her art is perfectly beautiful. She is the daughter of a large stockholder, but even her pull never seems to penetrate the prejudices of the many directors. One very daring fellow cast her for the role of a maid-servant in a cafeteria scene; she played the part like the wronged lady in "East Lynne."

Besides the actresses, there are carpenters, scene-painters, costumers, property men, developers, printers, shippers, splicers, chauffeurs, and numberless other craftsmen and functionaries who make up the life of our city. The developers, curiously enough, are nearly all Rus

sians. The girls who do the splicing and trimming of the films work eight hours, as factory laws in California limit their day to that time, and it is rather interesting to note that very few of them care a,nything about the acting part of the business.

I know I have spoiled a very vivacious conception of our lives by indicating a certain amount of tiresome loafing and routine work, yet every week we have visitors who enliven our interests. The thousands of travelers coming West want to visit the studios; but if we permitted all of them to come in, we would never be able to get any work done. However, important people are usually shown about, an event which adds as much to our entertainment as to theirs. One day it will be Edison, another Bryan, Dooley, or Debs.

At the risk of spoiling the visit of several of our most distinguished guests, I must tell a studio joke. Sometimes when we get word that a Big Fellow is coming it so happens that most of the companies are out on location and there is nothing doing on the big stage. It would be ungracious and bad business to disappoint Importance, so the scene fellows are ordered to throw up any old set and then, by grabbing off a few idle actors round the lot, a director puts them through a scene with all the care and unction he would practice on a feature story. Everything is so arranged that when the great man arrives, and they crank away for fifteen minutes, he doesn't know that it is only an empty camera grinding a lot of old dead film. It all looks real enough, and the visitor goes away quite excited because he has seen a film made. Perhaps it has been noticed that I am pretty strong

for my sex, but to one emphatic point of Spencer Grandon's I '11 have to agree; girls are more dippy than boys over their favorites. Even the women get far more letters from girls than from film-mad boys. Agnes receives quantities of the same kind of gush that we ourselves wrote only five years ago. I get my share, but mostly from girls who imitate a certain gown and coif I have committed, and have won prizes for their sins. Thpse letters often contain clippings telling how Willie Whistlewood won the boys' first prize for his imitation of Charlie Chaplin; and how Kitty Gargoyles won the girls' prize for her inimitable imitation of May Chapin. And will I please send her a signed photograph?

THE PHOTOGRAPH PESTS

These letters form only a small part of our daily mail. Out of the pathos, ignorance, vanity, or sheer banality of our epistolary bombardment we occasionally get a whiff of fresh air. I have corresponded now for a year with a chap who wrote me first from England. It was a fine, straightforward letter of appreciation, nothing fresh or sentimental, and no requests. Since he first wrote he has gone to the trenches, and the letters I have had from him beat all the press stories I have read. After the war, he says, he is coming over. I don't know whether I am glad or not.

Even for letters we feel we must answer the postage is rather staggering, yet it is nothing compared with the cost of sending photographs to our admirers. When I say that Agnes Underbill's bill at the photographer's for one month was close to a hundred and fifty dollars,

it will be seen that we have to pay a pretty stiff price for this kind of flattery. Last summer some of the girls I knew at school told me it had become a regular practice for school-girls to write to film favorites of both sexes, asking for photographs. I learned that they had not the slightest interest in many of us, but liked to see who could get the most pictures. They plaster their walls with them, just as my kid brother does with pennants ; and to cover their silly boudoirs we are expected to furnish the paper, at the rate of fifty or more dollars a month. Since then I have thought of a beautiful-looking boomerang by which, in time, I hope to recoup my dissipated fortunes. When I receive such a request now, I mail the devotee a printed post-card reading thus:

Dea^ Miss:' I wish to thank you for your very cordial words. I shall be glad to send you a beautiful signed photograph if you will send me fifty cents in stamps and an addressed and stamped mailing tube twelve inches long. I am forced to ask this, as I receive hundreds of similar requests from thoughtless admirers.

Sincerely yours,

Mat Chapin.

The number who do not reply is positively insulting, yet there are enough of them who do to bring me in about ten dollars a month. I get the photographs for twentyfive cents apiece. Now that I am actually selling my pictures, if I can only sell this story of my life I '11 be in the same class as the Pat Lady and the Sword Swallower. In order to disarm a blow I see coming, I wish to add that I put all my photographic profits into a fund to pay constant studio assessments. So if ever you feel stung at handing over fifty cents in payment for my

vivacious frontispiece, remember that you are probably assisting in curing the measles of some poor cameraman's kids.

GOOD PEOPLE WHO WORK HARD

The real truth of the matter is that, although we receive an occasional thrill, most of these alleged admirers are downright pests. In any event, they compel us to have our telephones recorded under fictitious names, and we give our numbers only to the studio and to our friends. At the studio we are absolutely protected. We are "not there."

You see, most of these admirers do not love us nearly so ardently as they love our jobs. Nine out of ten want to break into the pictures, and they will do the most amazing things to call attention to themselves. I first thought ambition and vanity were the impelling forces behind this army of girls who wanted to act; and I fear I was not as charitable in my views as I am now. Mrs. Grandon set me right. She* says that many girls who work live very gray lives. The pay is usually low, and there is not much joyousness in their daily grind. The salaries of even our lesser lights seem dreamlike to them, and the life appears so fuU of sparkle and joy that it is not unnatural that they should seek it out. They see one of us at an automobile show, and learn that we were given a white-and-gold fairy chariot for simply sitting in it for several nights; and thereafter they think of us as always in deep cushions. Our lives are not as soft as they imagine; but no doubt, even at their worst, they are heavenly compared to theirs.

Thus we find a perfect army of young girls, and some

not so young, knocking at the gate. Is it any wonder, then, that some youngster hooks up with a camera-kid or scene-painter; for has not this exalted person the key to fairyland? Perhaps he can get her in. The uplifters are front-pagely concerned with the "price she paid" to get a job; but Mrs. Grandon, who has no elaborate respect for our profession, though Spencer is one of the leaders, says that as men and women go, we are neither better nor worse than the rest of them. She suggests that it would be more to the point to find out why so many girls are unhappy in their jobs. One would think, to read the papers, that we were the most shameless creatures ia the world; but my dad, who motor-copped for years on the beach boulevards, says that the movie people are pretty decent compared to a lot of "respectable business men" who go to the beaches and come home lit up like battleships.

I started this story by saying that I was the daughter of a motor-cop. I am now the daughter of an avocado rancher, which is some social and horticultural distinction, for, as Dad says, only Swedes and Irishmen can make avocados grow. Motor-copping was exciting, but it would hardly do after little May landed on the dotted line for a hundred a week. I loaned Dad enough to become one of these "little landers"; and what he has done in five years to those four acres near Hollywood should make every other motor-cop ashamed to meet his Judge. I forgot to state that avocados are alligator pears, and even out here they sell for twenty-five cents apiece.

Agnes has just come from the post-office—^we have our own substation on the lot—and among my letters there is

one from my soldier correspondent. I '11 quote part of it.

M't deab May: . . . I aju convalescing in a beautiful little hospital in the south of France. We hear little of the war, as they believe all excitement should be kept from us. Everything is done for our comfort and entertainment. We have had a cinema installed, and last night my heart nearly stopped when the title of the first picture proclaimed a three-reel comedy, with you as the feature. . . .

I used to have a rather contemptuous opinion of comedians and clowns, but having witnessed the tragedy of the ages, I feel now that anybody who contributes in any way to the sum total of human happiness is fulfilling a holy mission. . . .

I shall never be able to return to the front, so have made up my mind that as soon as I am able to I shall go to the States. I have an uncle living in Santa Monica.

I wish I could fill in the omissions; maybe I '11 read some of them to Agnes, but they are too personal for public contemplation. In a postscript he compares his present life of calm and comfort to the dangers of mine; which suggests that I must get on with my tale.

Our lives have their dangers, it is true, but it is not always the most advertised Hazardous Hannah who takes the greatest risks. Some of the professional thrillers have very ingenious ways of side-stepping real danger. One of them, whose reputation rests upon her thrilling railroad stunts, suffered a vicarious accident a short time ago that let an amused public in on her technic. The early editions of the papers told how Hannah Hearthstone, of the Headlight Film Company, had been painfully injured in attempting to jump from a railroad bridge to the top of a moving train. A later edition disclosed the fact that the accident had not befallen Hannah

but a female impersonator, who doubled with her in all her dangerous scenes. Even at that, this girl does enough rough stuff to demand a fat salary.

My comedy roles do not often call for real danger, but nevertheless I have had a few adventures that had much verve. In my sprightly young life I have been in a storm at sea, have ridden a "ship of the desert," have gone forty miles an hour on a flat tire, and have dreamed that I was falling off the Woolworth Building. But I ask you, Madge, did you ever ride an ostrich? The aforesaid sensations are absolutely flat and static in comparison.

DOLNG AN OSTRICH STUNT

We had a director who very foolishly ordered a lot of South African scenarios, because he thought ostriches would make such "bully local color" for the scenes. But he had not spoken to the ostriches about it. Had he done so, he would have learned that the biggest bird in the world has a set of ingrowing brains. It is hard to believe that any creature could be so stupid, and live. About the only real intelligence it manifests is that the male sits on the eggs; in that ostriches are superhuman.

I shall not attempt more than to indicate my thrills, but if any of my readers saw the exhibition of the Italian Futurists at the San Francisco Fair they will understand. Those pictures exactly record my feelings, but are much more definite and objective than anything the camera man got. The laboratory reported three feet of blurred film! A half a mile in three feet!

The day on which I made my snappy little ride was replete with excitement. "We had gone 'way out to San

Jacinto, where there is a great farm of six hundred acres and more than a thousand birds. We arrived early in the morning to see the dancing, and, if possible, to get a picture. Ostriches always begin their day with the most amazing waltzing by the males, and while the dancing is in progress it is not safe to go in the corral, the males being very savage. In fact, at all times it is necessary to carry a long stick with a pronged fork on the end, so that if a bird makes an attack you simply hold his neck in the fork, at arm's length, and the poor simp is absolutely helpless. Another safeguard against his attacks is to fall prone on the ground, and then the bird kicks right over his prey and misses it by a foot.

After the dance, armed with forks and instructions, we all ventured ia. The scene was easy enough: The birds, to be observed in the background of the picture, were simply driven by in great battalions. Ned Quigley, a big, fat comedian, became so nervous that it was only by the utmost pleading and joshing that we could keep him in the corral long enough to make the picture.

"I can't handle this 'ere tool, and if I should lie down, the darned thing would get me from any quarter," he cried. And that, no doubt, was true. For from pole to pole and round Ned's equator it was about fifty-fifty.

Far be it from me to detract one little bit from the glory of animal actors. I know that some of their acts are dangerous; but that does not mean that all of them are. I myself have appeared with a lion—a real, great, big, hairy brute, too—and he was just about as ferocious as a Canton-flannel dog.

We once employed three brothers who have brought up

a lion from cubhood on boiled milk and blanc-mange, and the only danger from the great beast was that he might knock you down if he heard the milkman. We used him in an alleged comedy, wherein his part was to jump from a balcony into the lobby of a hotel and scatter the inmates in all directions.

It was the hardest and longest scene I have ever made, for poor old Leo was so friendly that he absolutely refused to program. One of the brothers, disguised as a hotel clerk, was supposed to be treed in a telephone booth, with the lion waiting just outside to eat him up. "While he held the receiver he shook like an aspen leaf, but instead of calling the police, he was shouting:

"Come here, Leo, old chap! Come here! Come on, old top! For the love of Mike, somebody slip me a lump of sugar! Come here, you darned old cat, or I '11 beat your bloomin' head off!"

At last the king of the jungle recognized his friend and keeper, and came over and sniffed at the door; and while the clerk was acting his fearful agony, he was kicking sugar under the door to the happy and smiling lion. The only casualty suffered was that I had some of the grease-paint licked off my chin by what felt like a file. You see the animal stuff isn't rough, if the animal has been brought up nicely.

THEILLEKS OP SNOW AND SEA

One must admit that wild beasts make the most thrilling pictures; but, after all, the actors are hedged about by every known protection, and in time some of them become as care-free as the trainers themselves. There are other adventures, however, which though they may

not seem to the casual observer as dangerous as the cats, require even a firmer courage. The same Gene Wilkinson, of whom Spencer Grandon spoke, played with the cats successfully for five years, and then nearly lost her life last summer in a shipwreck story at San Pedro.

She was tied to a spar and was being washed ashore, carrying a little tot of five in her arms. Suddenly the spar turned completely over, submerging both woman and child. The ropes, which had been arranged to untie easily, became swollen with the water, and Gene was held fast. She had sense enough to let the child go, and it was picked up when it rose to the top; but the men had great difficulty in getting Gene loose. The chap who accomplished it, an extra man, stayed under water for a full minute before he got her unfastened. A pulmotor was used on both of them.

A near-tragic comedy happened up in the Sierras last year when Barryworth and Bessie Creighton were making an Alaskan story. Bessie had to shoot a very dangerous rapids in one of those heavy Northern canoes. Barryworth, who was playing lead, was also directing, shouting directions from the bank. As the canoe rounded a very dangerous curve it overturned, throwing Bessie into the freezing water. First she was up and then under, but struggling heroically to reach a place of safety. It so happened that there was a bunch of Yosemite. tourists watching the scene from the opposite bank, and when Barryworth shouted to them to save the canoe, they all wanted to "lynch the brute!"

However, they did n't know what he knew. That was that Bessie Creighton would tackle Niagara Falls and likely get away with it, but there was only one canoe

like that in the Sierras, and he had to have it. Sure enough, Bessie came up the trail a little later, cold but smiling. Another fine young job framed up for this pampered pet with the big salary was to tunnel into a snowdrift and, after pokiug a bare arm and hand up through the snow, to remain there for fully twenty minutes while Barryworth fought off a pack of wolves.

I should like to ask how many people would like to "walk the plank" on a pirate ship, and step off into thirty feet of weather before striking sixty feet of water —supposing, of course, that they were blindfolded and had their hands tied ? Yet I saw thirty men and women walk the plank far out at sea, and many of them could not swim and had to be rescued almost as soon as they struck the water.

Oh dear, no! Our lives are not all caramels and limousines!

It is the pleasure and expectation of all feminine writers to utter words of advice and comfort to their sisters, and I now propose to unload mine, knowing perfectly well that not one of you will pay the slightest attention to them. If you wish to become a movie queen do not seek your crown via any of the get-there-quick schemes advertised by the quack doctors of the film drama. I have met but one girl who presented such credentials, and she couldn't have been kept out by all the fakers combined. This does not mean that a good dramatic school is useless, for, on the contrary, film work has reached that point where it is almost hopeless to break in unless one has had dramatic experience of some kind. When the business was new, and growing by leaps and bounds, all sorts of people were acceptable;

110 FILM POLK

but now our forces are largely recruited from the legitimate stage. Directors simply haven't the time to train beginners. So first of all try to learn the rudiments of dramatic expression.

Next, get some good camera man to tell you the truth about your face. Some of the prettiest girls in the world will be frosts on the film, and vice versa. A bad complexion can be altered and is no handicap; but form is the great necessity. You may be the chorus-girl type, or you may have the boyish figure of Peter Pan, or the heroic proportions of the Statue of Liberty; but whatever type you represent, you should approach perfection. Knock-knees and bow-legs and crossed eyes and cowlicks are not profitable in the picture business, unless for character work.

Good teeth are absolutely essential and dimples are priceless.

One must be prepared to mix with all sorts of people— good, bad, and stupid. The life is at least vivacious, and temptations are great enough so that, if one does not wish to "fall by the Wayside," it is a pretty good idea to have more brains above the ears than below—or, select a motor-cop for your dad.

I have often wondered if there is any other life I should enjoy more—a domestic role, for instance, under the direction of a soldier boy. This movie stuff is fun enough, but it is full of turmoil. It is surprising how much we enjoy our vacations, and still more surprising what we do with them. Most of us go home and just loaf and cook and tend babies, or any other of the homely stunts that many of the girls who write to me are trying to side-step.

THE MOVIE QUEEN 111

One of the strongest cards that "he" has played in our queer long-distance game is to make it clear that he does not care to be an actor. In fact, he thinks he prefers his profession of architecture. "Wouldn't it be awful, though, if after a few years of domestic quiet my old tumultuous instincts should reawaken and I should begin to throw dishes at him ? Even his training in the trenches could not survive my superior technic.

However, as Mrs. Grandon says: "All our lives are moving-pictures, and our success, on or off the stage, depends a lot upon the sort of director we sign up with.''

Ill

THE VICISSITUDES OF VICTOR

(THE ANGLE OF THE CAMERA MAN)

NOW I know why philosophers have always sought the solitude of the cell, the cloister, or the hospice, in which to contemplate a nervous world. For six weeks I have lain upon my fair young back and looked at four chaste and beautiful white walls, not a picture or a drape to distract my thoughts.

The result of this period of reflection has been that in the long stretches of the day and night I have had time to gain a perspective on my very tumultuous life. I "had 'er in the high" so long that I really didn't know what leisure was until I struck this heavenly place. If I had realized what rest for the spirit lay vrithin the antiseptic walls of the Good Samaritan, I should have been lots less careful of my human chassis.

The cause of my taking to the cloistered life must be told later; but meantime here I am, with two broken legs and a split collar-bone. Also, I have had a fine new set of open plumbing put in and a couple of loose teeth taken out. Altogether I 'm not what would be called a physical success, but fortunately my sconce was not cracked; so I still may not be utterly useless. A man can stand quite a while on his head when his legs are gone.

After the operation and consequent pain and discom

112

fort of the first few days, I enjoyed the enforced rest of the succeeding three weeks; but that was about all my nervous disposition could stand, and I began to irk at the deadly stillness. I wanted to be up and out and at it.

I have seen nobody except Mrs. Goodhue, the human plumber, and the white-frocked angel of mercy who ministers to my physical wants, and it is Mrs. Goodhue who is responsible for my writing the following tale; it was through her urging that I have undertaken it. "For," as she says, "the film favorite and movie queen have told their stories; and, though occasionally somebody may wonder where the camera was in some exciting scene, nobody has yet recounted the Vicissitudes of Victor, the boy who turns the crank. And they are infinitely more exciting than anything that happens to our pampered pets in the headlines."

Artists, they say, are born; business men are made; but camera men just happen. When the picture business was new, and growing by leaps and bounds, it was impossible that enough cinematographers should come from the ranks; so they were recruited from all walks of life. If I should take the first fifty of these chaps who come to mind, we should find that their previous experience included everything from undertaking to cowboying; but nowadays men are going through a regular training as laboratory men and as camera assistants. "When I broke into the game this source was inadequate to supply the demand.

I once knew a fellow' who studied for the ministry, but is now driving a beer-truck. My family had me all framed up for the law, but the gods intervened and decided that such a life was much too sedentary. As a

high-school boy I built a motorcycle, the engine of which finally achieved the motive power of a pushmobile; and in this miniature racer I entered all the junior contests. I thus got a taste for speed.

After two years of law. at the university I finally threw legal fame to the winds and, greatly to my family's distress, went to work as a salesman and demonstrator for one of the best-known automobiles. In a year or so I went into the racing game as a driver for the same car. After a few local successes, the Detroit factory sent me all over the country, until I became known as one of the most successful racing drivers in America.

Meantime I married, and right away Mrs. Goodhue urged me to quit racing. The dangers were a constant threat to her peace of mind, and for a week before a race she would be fearfully upset. She was obsessed by all sorts of visions of her Victor boy scattered over the landscape or distributed throughout the grand stand; for she seemed to think that all racing drivers were doomed to death. The joke of it is there are several of us who haven't been killed.

THE WILES OF THE TEMPTEK

But finally I succumbed to her point of view, and we decided that the Vanderbilt race at Santa Monica in 19— should be my last. I was to quit and go back into the sales department. Well, that classic event decided my future all right, but not in the way we had anticipated. All in a bunch, I was leading on the next to the last lap of the three-hundred-mile race when my tire blew out 'way over by the Soldiers' Home. By the time I had limped round to the grand stand I was hopelessly

beaten. With this depressing knowledge I drove slowly toward the pits; and as I did so, who should come running out on the track but a bunch of alleged comedians from a well-known film company, getting comedy race stuff.

When they saw me limping in, covered with dust and oil, they began to act like crazy people. The director hurried up and said, inasmuch as I was out of the race, wouldn't I get in the picture for just a few moments? Not caring particularly one way or the other, I acquiesced, and these idiots began to pull off the darndest capers I have ever seen. It was evidently trick camera stuff, for I could make neither head nor tail out of their manoeuvers, simply obeying instructions. I learned later, however, that the picture would show that, while racing down the track at eighty miles an hour, I had run over a bride and groom.

It all seemed absurd enough at the time, and I thought no more of it; but the next day I received a note from the director asking me if I could not run out to the studio to see him.

All unsuspicious of his little frame-up, I went; and this was the song he sang:

'' Goodhue, we are in a curious fix. We made that picture yesterday, and you are in it so prominently that we cannot go on unless you can appear in subsequent scenes. The stuff, so far, is bully; but it's all lost unless you '11 consent to come out for a week and let us finish with you."

Inasmuch as I was out of racing and was going back to the gentle art of selling cars, I saw no reason why I shouldn't put in the week making pictures, especially

as they were going to pay me well. Mrs. Goodhue was delighted; she thought perhaps I could break into this new, high-salaried business, make a great success, and be doing work that would not jeopardize my foolish bones. I found out, however, that the boss had been stringing me beautifully. They really did not need me to finish the comic story; what they wanted was to make some race pictures, in one of which I was to wreck a car going at high speed. This was a snappy change for a man who was trying to get out of the dangers of racing. Some half-wit had written a scenario that had a racing driver for the hero, and, according to the plans and specifications, I was to be the splendid boy in oilskins and goggles.

Well, it 's wonderful what a fellow will do for money. Though my chest was caved in from medals, none had ever been won at a beauty show. Mrs. Goodhue, when she wished to be really flattering, said that I had a profile like a Newfoundland cod—^this being the handsomest cod that swims the sea. But after all, eyes are the thing on the screen—^large, liquid, romantic eyes; and these can be made on an albino. Even an oblique chin can be rectified.

I will not dwell at length upon my shame as an actor. I was rotten; that 's all that can be said and get by the censor. But who cares about the acting in the thrillers? I could wreck a car when utterly sober and live to tell the tale. We don't need any Henry Irvings in the smash-up stuff. I was leading man for about a month in heroic race pictures, and knew that sooner or later an enraged or an enlightened public would demand my elimination.

However, I liked the picture game; it was exciting and I wanted to stay. From the start the camera interested

me most, as it would any mechanic, and I spent all my spare time fooling with one. I had even taken one home and had taken it all apart and put it together again, so as to know the secret of its wonderful insides.

One is often amazed at the number of chauffeurs who have become camera men. The fact is explained in this way: In the early days, when companies went out on location, the driver of the car acted as assistant to the camera man, packing the tripod, giving him focus, and so on. Through this friendly intimacy the chauffeur would learn to load and thread a camera, and occasionally to shoot a few feet of test film.

This was exactly my experience. I learned the mechanics of the camera well; the light can be learned only through observation and experience. The time came one day when an extra camera man was needed in an emergency. I offered my services; and, though the offer was considered a joke, having little choice they let me make a couple of scenes.

The light was not difficult, and I had learned the stops from Mason, the camera man who had been making my race pictures. The result was photographically good. After shooting one or two more successful scenes, I was signed up. Straightway I made the study of the camera a religion; every moment I could get away was spent in the laboratories, watching developing, printing, and splicing.

At this point it may be well to say that the relation between the camera and laboratory is most intimate—or should be to result in good work. Where the laboratories are located miles away from the studios, there is always friction, and each side passes the buck to the other for all

weak or thick films, static marks, or scratches. But where the laboratories are on the lot, the camera man can get daily reports on his film, with suggestions for his lighting; each can help the other immeasurably.

NOBODY LOVES THE CAMERA MAN

"When I went home one evening and showed Mrs. Goodhue my contract for fifty dollars a week as camera man, she nearly exploded with delight.

"Oh, to think that at last you have given up racing for good, and that you will not have to risk your precious bones just to make our living!''

Yes, sir; that 's just what she said! I was to leave the dangers of the auto-track for the peace £md security of simply turning a little crank!

"Well, here I am in the hospital as evidence of the grimness of that joke. Peace ? Security ? "Why, automobile racing is really like riding in a beach-chair! There is a mild thrill, of course, in driving a red demon at ninety miles an hour; but one has really never tasted speed until he has been lashed to a platform out in front of said red demon and has had to crank a camera carefully at the secure and comfortable occupants behind. Thirty miles an hour in the tonneau seems like eighty miles to the chap astride the radiator.

Safety first? Not for the camera man. A reporter can get together a pretty good story of a battle from what the soldiers tell him, but to get pictures the camera man must be right there. Then the leading man and woman can get doubles for their dangerous stuff. Not so with us; we must take all our own bumps.

If I should tell the whole truth, you would think I

was laying it on strong to make a story; so I shall tell only enough of these adventures not to strain your credulity. I regret, also, that I cannot fortify all my stories with photographs; but they are rarely taken. "Stills" are invariably made of the actors in all their scenes, calm or dangerous; but Hobody ever thinks of making a still of the poor devil with the camera, even though he may be hanging by his eyebrows from the edge of a skyscraper. But why should they ? Who are we, anyway ?

The public is interested only in the pictures of the Willie-boys and Minnie-girls that we record. The people care nothing about the fellow who records them. Even the old English custom of kissing the cook when the dinner was good has largely gone out of fashion. But I hope to show before I am finished that there Is often more real, picturesque excitement behind the camera than your dimpled hero is pulling before it.

Our profession is made up of camera men and crank turners, the latter being perhaps plumbers or undertakers who have jumped into the game without the least training for it. They know nothing of the camera, except to twist its tail. No crank turner ever admits that he is one, but regrets that four-fifths of the other fellows are. After a couple of years, if a chap has worked intelligently hard, he may take pictures that will justify the title of camera man. In my own case I learned a great deal inside of one year. Joe, the laboratory superintendent, was particularly patient with me and helped me through my experimental stage.

By working in sympathy with the laboratory I had full tests made of aU my work. You see, when we shoot a scene we always take about three feet after the director

has ordered us to cut; we then open the camera and cut a notch in the film. This last three feet is used for test developing. In rewinding from the magazines the laboratory man watches for the notches, and at each one he cuts the three feet behind it. This part of the film is then developed by letting one end down slowly into the developer, so that the forty-eight pictures are developed in different lengths of time. When the strip is examined, the best spot is observed and the time of development noted; then the scene from which the test was cut is developed accordingly. I might add that in my opinion the laboratory superintendent should be drawing the highest pay on the lot, for into his hands goes hundreds of thousands of dollars' worth of film for better or for worse.

Before the war, cameras ranged in price from four hundred and fifty to twelve hundred doUars; but the ambition of every camera man is to make a new machine, one that is "right." Every man who handles the cinema has all his own little devices and stunts for achieving various effects.

It is very amusing how we all watch and work for the trick stuff; but the sad part is that, after one has worked his head off to devise some new and novel effect, he can use it only once. Every other camera man hops upon his secret as soon as it is shown. So important is this fact that, in order to use a trick even once, great secrecy must be maintained; and the big, high-priced, multiple companies are very timid about allowing strangers in the studio. If a scout from some cheap little split-reel comedy company, turning out two pictures a week,

should steal the trick or situation, his company might beat the big fellow to the screen with it by several weeks.

PRECAUTIONS AGfAINST CAMERA PIRATES

This reminds me that we, also, have our pirates— camera pirates. "When some director has spent anything up to a hundred thousand dollars to build a wonderful set, some pirate might conceal his camera or sneak in early some morning and film enough of the set to use for a picture of his own. In order to circumvent that dodge, we keep the set placarded, except when we are using it, with the company's name or the title of the story. These placards, distributed everywhere, absolutely prevent stealing.

The photographers doing dramatic stuff are inclined to laugh at the camera man of the comics as a poor devil who is sentenced to do necessary but inartistic work; but, having done both, I can say truthfully that my work with the comics was far the better training of the two in helping me toward the mastery of my camera. It is true that in the drama one has opportunity to work for beautiful light effects, since much of the success of the picture depends on fine photography; but after all, compared to comedy, the work is most leisurely. People who sit and howl their heads off at the Keystone Police or Charlie Chaplin have no idea how difficult it was to make the picture.

The average fan believes that these jolly chaps splash through those scenes just as they occur, the whole thing taking probably an hour to make. The fact is, it takes more than twice as long to make a comedy as a drama.

One reel a week is supposed to be the average for dramatic work, except the big-feature stuff; but in comedy, if we make a two-reeler within a month we think we have attained speed. Often a simple two-reel comedy will take six or seven weeks of hard work to build; and in order to get that little two thousand feet we shoot perhaps twenty-five thousand, twenty-three thousand feet of which is utterly wasted!

Good comedy is the most serious stuff we make—^work, work, work, work, just to produce one little laugh. Often the whole studio will be called into consultation— managers, directors, and even extras—^to see why a particular scene is not funny and to make suggestions. It is a mere trifle to spend two thousand dollars to get a sixtyfoot laugh. The dramatic stories are filmed from script, and everything is so well planned that they often go through many scenes with only one rehearsal. But it is quite impossible to work from script in comedy; a bare synopsis is all we have. The humor must be developed on the spot, and this is not always easily accomplished. I have seen Charlie Chapliu absolutely refuse to work for several days because he could not do a few feet of film ia a way he thought was sufficiently humorous. Then, often the whole story will be changed because of some unforeseen bit of action that takes place during its making.

The speed of the action is the camera man's greatest problem. If the action is to be slowed down, we must crank faster, and if it is to be speeded up, we must crank more slowly. Normal cranking is at sixteen. This means the taking of sixteen pictures to two revolutions in one second. So, if we crank at eight, the action will

be twice as fast. Our speeds range all the way from one to twenty-four; and when you realize that we have to compensate our light with each change of speed, it will be seen that the camera man is kept on the jump quite as much as the actors. I am not going to dwell upon the tricks of the camera, for it has been done to death and is disillusionizing; and, anyway, I think the adventures of a camera man are a great deal more exciting than his mechanical triumphs.

But there is one stunt that is rather amusing. It is a very nifty way we have of stopping a train. It is easy enough to get pictures of the bunch hopping off and on a Pullman sleeper when she is in the yard; but to get the Empire State Express to slow down to almost a stop between stations would be nearly impossible. But it is impossibilities that we eat. Hand a camera man a problem and his head will split before he gives it up. You 11 laugh when I teU you how easy it is to stop an express train; and, furthermore, none of the. passengers will know it. When the train appears in the distance we crank at normal speed, but as she draws nearer we begin to speed up, thus slowing the action of the train; and if we can crank fast enough, we can almost bring the train to a standstill.

HOW TO RAISE A SETTING SUN

Because of the intensity of the light, sunrises are almost impossible to film; so if we want a sunrise we photograph a sunset and reverse the action by rewinding the film and feeding it through the camera backward.

When you are watching the antics of a bunch of comedians overturning a motor-boat, how many of you ever

stop to wonder where the camera was ? When Syd Chaplin stood on the top of a submarine while she sped along and then began to submerge, did you think the camera was in a balloon? Well, it was n't. It was on the back of the submersible; and the fellow at the crank had to keep turning until the water reached the top of his tripod, when the camera was rescued by somebody on the superstructure. But the camera man had to shift for himself.

One reason the companies prefer to own their cameras is that if the operator used a twelve-hundred-dollar instrument belonging to the company, he would take pictures with much greater abandon than if he stood to lose or injure his own outfit.

The curse of my racing reputation and reckless photography stuck so hard that I have never been able entirely to side-step it; and after serving about a year in comedy I was bought off by a company that turned out thrillers. There I found the making of railroad pictures particularly trying. I have filmed hobos tearing along through the oil and dust on the brake-beams of a fast-moving express train, while I occupied a similar position on the other end of the car. I think I have shot pictures from every part of the engine but the whistle; I grew to regard the dear old cow-catcher as being as comfortable and safe as a billiard-table. Also, with this company I got my first taste of aeroplaning. It was the one thrill left to satisfy my inordinate appetite for speed. Naturally Mrs. Goodhue was worried, for she didn't want her little Victor boy picked up on a blotter. However, a few glorious flights, on one of which I took her,

allayed her fears; and then one day I came home all chopped up.

"We had been making a pursuit picture, following a train. I had the camera, without the tripod, in my lap, and was filming a very thrilling picture of the hero sliding down a rope and dropping to the top of the fastmoving cars. There is a tremendous suction in the wake of an express train, and the pilot had a fierce time holding his course in the swirling atmosphere. When the idiot who was doubling with the lead—for fifty dollars a doub—dropped off the end of the rope, the lessened weight threw the nose of our aeroplane straight up. Something snapped, the pilot lost all control, and in less time than it takes to tell it we were off on the wing and somersaulting toward terra cotta! That 's no joke, for we landed in a brickyard. The reason we were not killed was because we were both fairly well upholstered by Nature; but, as it was the pilot had a broken leg and I was superficially slashed up.

This episode called forth another promise to Mrs. Goodhue from me. I was to leave the company and seek quieter work in a concern that made straight drama; but alackaday! there is no such thing as rest for the wicked camera man.

My first experience with the new company was mild enough; I was sent to San Pedro to do water stuff. The first day for eight long hours I stood in freezing water up to my chin trying to get a bunch of porpoises as they went by. I am not a good seaman, and before I finished that story I had cranked many a foot while I was so seasick I could hardly hold my pins.

It is curious how we learn a sort of sub-conseious rhythm. Mrs. Goodhue insists that once, in a mild nightmare, I woke her because I was cranking away on my pyjama strings. She watched me for some time and said I was doing a perfect sixteen. Finally she called, "Cut!" And I stopped and rolled over. If the tale is true—and I very much doubt it—it shows how the rhythm of the camera gets into our souls.

THE HAIR-PANTS STORT

The picture that very nearly pulled my cork was made on this San Pedro trip. I had to go aloft about forty feet, where a sailor lashed me and the camera securely to the mast, and then had to shoot down on the deck, while the darned old boat rolled over and back until I thought it would capsize. It was well the action was not immediately below me, for I expressed my physical distress in that direction.

No, I don't care for the sea stuff, the land is more restful. Restful, did I say? My next experience was making a "Western picture. The hair-pants story is usually very easy, except for the doubles; but, even at that, I had a few adventures that ruffed me up considerably. Once I was making a foreground picture of a plunging horse and rider; and as I had my eye glued close to the focusing hole, trying to get the figures into my field of vision, I suddenly saw, looming up on the ground-glass, the belly of a horse. Then, crash! down he came on top of me and the camera. The repairs on the camera cost two hundred dollars. All I received was a broken rib.

While sticking around during the few days my rib was

THE VICISSITUDES OF VICTOR 127

mending I became acquainted with Hank Grant, an excowboy who is now working the camera. The circumstance that changed his vocation was quite as accidental and absurd as mine. Hank hasn't a very lofty opinion of the moving-picture business and he expresses his contempt in the most magnificent language. It is too bad I cannot quote him exactly, but I regret to say that he is most profane, I might even say blasphemous; for he invokes his scorn upon the deities of both places. Here is his story—minus the chili sauce—as he told it to me the day we met:

THE CHARGE OP THE LIGHT BRIGADE

"I was foreman of a ranch in Arizona a few years ago when a movie outfit arrived to make some battle pictures. I furnished them with about four hundred head of horses and riders, and they employed me to do the close-up rough stuff. I trained a few good foreground horses, and we made quite a lot of bang-up pictures. Then they decided to do the ' Charge of the Light Brigade.' I was cast for Lord Cardigan; so I sends to the library at Phoenix for a book and reads all about it. I discovered that I was to be the hero of the piece. I thought it darned queer that I never got within thirty feet of the camera. And do you know that when the picture was squirted in Phoenix, and I took a bunch of the boys over to see it, I found that I had been doubling for a Clarenceboy from New York, who couldn't have fallen off a hobby-horse without doughin' up his putty face? The boys sure had the laugh on me! Then I learned that he drew a great big salary, while I took all the risks.

"Well, on top o' that, darned if they didn't bribe

128 FILM FOLK

me to throw up my foreman's job and go with the outfit to Colorado Springs, where, for fifteen dollars a fall, I doubled to save the worthless necks of pie-faced actors in sport-shirts and wrist-watches! Of course I was making money, else I shouldn't have been so self-sacrificing. But, as more 'n' more of the boys were lured off into the movies, the price of falls went down, until now you can find hundreds of the poor devils who will risk their fool necks for three dollars a day. I saw it comin' and decided to break away from the disgraceful game of imitatin' imitation actors in imitation scenes, and get a man's job.

"First I aspired to the job of property man; but I soon saw that a cow-waddie didn't have the qualifications to get away with it. In this job a man must be a geologist, botanist, biologist, taxidermist, gunsmith, gasfitter, chemist, ofi5ee-boy, errand-boy, and caddie to the director. He must also possess second-sight, have acute hunches, and know the use of the divining rod in order to locate props.

"Imagine asking anybody but a clairvoyant to fill an order like this, and have it on the west stage at nine a. m. to-morrow: A polar bear, four humming-birds in cages, a Gothic window, a set of blue-and-yellow peasant porchfurniture, the flag of the Swiss Navy, an automobile of 1890, a couple of dwarfed Japanese oaks, a bed-room set of Louis XIV, a stuffed alligator, a battered milk-can, and a steel engraving of The Crossing Policeman!

"No, I 'm no superman; so, with all my might and main I tackled the camera, and we were friends from the start. When I began to crank the picture-box my selfrespect gradually came back. I simply couldn't act in

I'd sooner leave the shooting of the sea stuff to the sailor

■a

t3

these here 'Western' pictures, directed hy dudes and acted by perfumed Percys. I don't want to look like no Sistine Madonna, and I 'm a son-of-a-gun if I '11 ever again double with one who does, just to let him be a hero. After taking a few hard humps on both ends of my axis, it used to get my hump to see how scissors, subtitles, and cinematographers had all conspired to force my heroism on the powdered automaton with the grease-paint dimples in his chin.

"Whenever I am filming a Western story and see one of these cow-eyed sissy-boys swagger into the picture in a Los Angeles cow outfit, my only regret is that I 'm not crankin' a machine-gun. Art itself demands a massacre of these innocents. The Eastern cowboys should be made to stick to their lavender teas and cut out our stuff; they are lots more becoming in white panties, hoot-owl glasses, and pussycat hats.''

Most of the splendor of Hank's contempt for actors came from his constant identification with "Western" pictures. Those red-blooded tales of the plains are a great passion with actors and directors who, as Hank says, "have rain-water running through their very coarse veias." But it must be admitted that the cowboys and Indians employed to furnish the rough atmosphere see the joke and begin to laugh as soon as the camera cuts. It is curious that the actors and directors don't ask these rough fellows what they are laughing at; but perhaps they know—and don't care.

MAKING ACTORS POLITE

The man behind the camera is in a sort of detached point of observation over the whole show, and the antics

of the directors and performers are his constant cross or entertainment. The actors furnish most of the fun, and the directors the trouble. It is from the vantage point of the camera that one can observe human vanities in all their wondrous variationis; and again, mates, I regret to say the male is "more vainer" than the female. Usually the vanity is ia inverse proportion to the actor's importance; or, it may be, the leads only appear more modest because they know they will be full up in the picture. "We have a very unlovely name for these people. They are known as camera hogs. But how some of those poor simps love it when they are ordered into a close-up! In their enthusiasm they show horror, fear, pity, and love with such unctuous exaggeration that it becomes comic. "We caU these facial acrobatics "mugging."

Camera men, as a class, are not perfectly mad over actors, as you may have gleaned; but perhaps we are unfair, for they certainly are good to us. Even the director is not subject to more pretty attentions that we camera men who take the pictures. The reason is quaint. You know the camera man can be quite snippy to any actor who gets chesty beyond an actor's limit; and that's a large latitude. There are so many dear little ways to get even. For instance, we can throw an offender slightly out of focus, or "ring" him, which means keeping him out of the center of the picture. "We can put him in the shadows or on the edge. Knowing all this, he is a foolish actor who will quarrel with a camera man, for I regret to say we are shamefully human. Another little cross that we pass to him to make his life quite irksome is in giving his make-up thumbs doWn.

The camera man has absolutely final say on the quality of all make-up. If he wishes to be especially disagreeable he can keep the poor actor humping to the make-up room all morning to rectify his tint to conform to the changing light.

I -won't say much about directors, for theirs is a job for which I have aspirations. But this I will say: there is one point of serious conflict between the director and the camera man that has a great bearing on the quality of the picture. The camera man, being entirely responsible for the photography, will often hesitate and even refuse to shoot when the light has grown bad; whereas the director, wishing to get all the footage possible, will often order a picture made when the camera man knows that the result wiU not be good. This is especially true at those studios that have installed the bonus system. At these places so-called efficiency departments are in vogue, and they figure down to a cent what a picture ought to cost.

Let us say that twenty thousand dollars is the figure allowed, and that for everything saved on this price the director is given a certain bonus. It thus becomes financially advantageous for the director to get footage at aU costs, and he orders the camera to shoot in almost any light. The scheme may save on the cost of production, but it is the death of art, and few camera men like to work under these conditions; in fact, so interested are camera men in a good picture that it becomes their only consideration. Not a few of the girl leads owe their success to the men at the crank; for if they have good photographic faces, we instinctively give them as much prominence as possible.

It is queer there are not more women directors, for they beat the men in many ways, especially in plays of quiet and subtle action. In the violent stuff they often become rattled. I was filming a Western scene for a woman director once when a bad accident occurred right out in front of us. A horse plunged, fell, rolled upon the rider, and was crushing him painfully. The idea which possessed the feminine mind of the director at that moment was not to stop the horse, but the camera. She thought that by doing so she was ending the action! So she turned to me and cried hysterically: "Cut, Vic! Cut! Can't you see he is being hurt ?''

It is the function of the camera man to keep cranking a scene until ordered to stop, and sometimes not then, if in his judgment he is going to miss something. In a Western story, where the lead suffered an accident that put him in the hospital for a month, the director ordered the camera to cut, but the operator thought he 'd take a few feet of the accident on a chance. When the actor was struck by the plunging horse, his head was badly cut and he fell forward on his face, as though dead. All rushed to pick him up, and he was carried away in an unconscious condition. When it was found that he would recover, the director decided to change the story in order to use the wonderful realism of the accident the camera man had secured; so, in the story, the hero was killed.

QUICK WIT MAKES GREAT PICTURES

Another incident that showed the quick wit of three men and made a wonderful scene happened up in the San Marcos Pass only a month ago. A man in a light

buggy was pursued by a sheriff on horseback. Coming at full speed straight down the mountain road toward the camera, the man in the buggy was to be shot and fall out upon the road close in the foreground, while the team dashed on. Curiously enough, when about twentyfive feet away, the buggy struck a rock and threw the driver out upon his head. Projected on the screen, it would look as if he had been killed by accident rather than by gunshot, which was not the point of the story. The director, thinking the scene was spoiled, and fearing that the driver might have been hurt, started to run to his assistance, when the camera man, thinking more quickly, bawled him out so scandalously that, almost out of sheer fright, he ducked behind a rock.

The sheriff also had his wits, for he knew that his man must be shot and not accidentally killed. So, when he saw his victim rising on his knees after his fall, he ignored entirely the unforeseen action that had taken place, took aim and fired. The injured driver had thought, of course, the scene was killed; but, hearing the shot, his wits told him it was his cue, and he plunged forward again as though in death. The camera man, in turn, when he had filmed the accident, pammed—^the outrageous word "pam" means panorama—immediately to the sheriff in the hope that he would shoot. He did, and this made it necessary to "pam" quickly back to get the driver's fall. The driver, watching out of the comer of his eye, gave the camefra man time to "pam" before plunging down. Needless to say, it was one of the best and most convincing pictures ever made; but it would have been lost had any of the three men been less alert.

Another incident of this kind shows the triumph of a man's art over his sense of chivalry, and it cost him a great sentimental loss. This camera man was in love with the girl who played second lead in the company, and everybody on the lot considered them engaged. One day they were doing a bridge picture, and the girl, in heavy riding-clothes, slipped and fell into the river. What's more, she went straight under. Two of the fellows dived in and succeeded in bringing her to the surface. The poor, frightened camera fellow was so placed that he couldn't possibly have reached her; but when he saw that they were bringing her up he began to crank the camera, for he thought she would be pleased to have a picture of herself rescued from actual drowning. Which shows that he was a poor guesser. The girl was furious at his heartlessness and hasn't spoken to him since. The thoughtless suitor is now the most sullen grouch on the lot.

THE LION MADE HIM NERVOUS

It used to be that the wild-animal stuff had much excitement for the camera man, but that was before we were the fellows in the cage while the jungle denizens took to the stage. I know one chap, however, who holds the most violent opinions regarding animal pictures, as he made one on account of which he has not yet regained his nerve. It was in the early days when working with the "cats" was new, and this is the story as he told it at the Static Club:

"I was a bit nervous to start with, for I have never had any use for the cats, but success meant a lot for the studio; so, when I was told to crank, no matter what

happened, I decided to keep a-goin' if the darned lion ate up the whole cast. There was a couple of bum actors I 'd 'a' liked to 'a' seen disappearin' headforemost into the brisket of the king of beasts; but—well! Who do you suppose the son-of-a-gun picked out for lunch? Me, gol ding it! Me! He even passed up chickens, both kinds, for me! I s'pose he didn't like my looks or the sound of the camera; but, in any event, when the scene started he perked up his ears and lowered his head, and though I was quite a way off, I seemed to be the only thing in the scenery that interested him.

"First, he just squatted down on his haunches and stared at me. I began to get a little white behind the gills, but I kept my nerve. Then, rising slowly and snoopily, with his head almost on the ground, that beast let out a howl that sent my blood just thirty-two below in one second. Then he started for me in great bounds. Everybody, especially the women, screamed like they was being et alive; and the director, about ten feet behind me, was bellowing through two megaphones: 'Stick to it. Bill! Don't quit for anything! "We '11 get him! "We '11 get him!' I knew, of course, that they had a couple of sharpshooters stationed behind me; but, to teU the truth, I didn't have much confidence in their ability to hit a running target, and I figured, if they did n't fire pretty darned quick, it would be squash, blubblub for your little "Willie.

"That last ten feet I cranked while I was sound asleep, I guess. I was sayin' a prayer to every turn of the handle and just looking straight ahead into a sort of growing haze. The director, being a good sport, wanted to get the lion as close up as possible before ordering

the boys to shoot. It 's easy to be a good sport with another fellow's shape. Well, aU I remember is the two shots, and then a lot of people tryiag to untangle a dead lion, a camera, and a jackass. "When it was all over they began to make a hero of me; but I ended that bunk right quick by telling them that the reason I did n't move was because I couldn't, and that God must have been cranking the camera.

"Never again! I '11 go up or down on anything, and take any human chance; but if I have to turn a handle while a hippopotamus starts to eat my foot off, the public will have to go without the picture."

ACCIDENT INSURANCE COMES HIGH

Mrs. Goodhue's desire to get me into a less hazardous occupation than that of camera man is not based solely on any silly feminine fright, just because I happened to land in the hospital. No, sirree! I leave it to her, when she wants to win a point, to back up her argument with facts.

It seems there are in the world certain hard-boiled, ferret-eyed individuals who every so often gather about a mahogany table and, from the statistics on accidents that lie before them, figure out a very gruesome thing called a mortuary table. This is the dope sheet for the sprightly life and accident insurance ofScials.

The thing friend wife discovered was that this table prompted the insurance companies to bet very high that a camera man will be either killed or injured within a specified time; in fact, they consider us fully a sixty percent, greater risk than the directors.

She told me this morning she had been talking to the

agent—"a eharmmg fellow!"—and he had told her that, even so, our rates were very much too low, considering the hazards of our profession. The only reason they were not higher was because we were such good moral— now I understand the agent's charm—and physical risks; and, furthermore, we were so enamored of our jobs that we would rather be right back on them again than stick the company fifty dollars a week while we looked at a knot-hole and smoked cigarettes.

Far be it from me to dispute their disgusting statistics ; but, such is human nature, we always feel that, of course, we shall not be killed. It is the same human optimism that prompts people to rebuild a town over the volcanic ashes of the one they lost. However, our life is not all chance and danger; it has its quieter angles. These less strenuous phases are no less interesting.

There are four distinct fields of operation for the camera man: Educational work, which may be done by travel or in the laboratory; promotion enterprises, showing, for instance, the citrus industry or a manufacturing plant; the semi-weekly news service; and studio work. It is in the last that I have had my adventures; but I know enough of the exploits of the other fellows to give a quick slant at their various stunts.

MOVING-PICTUEE NEWS SERVICE

The camera men of Los Angeles have an organization known as the Static Club, and at its meetings the members exchange views of mutual helpfulness and incidentally enliven their evenings by recounting their experiences. A writer seeking material for the adventure

stuff would find in the affairs of these men a veritable gold mine of incidents upon which to build his stories.

One chap, for instance, was the first cinematographer to penetrate the Congo. He took pictures in the days when reels were only sixty feet long; and he has a story that would curl your hair. Another has filmed icebergs and glaciers in the Arctics; while one got into the deepest recesses of forbidden Tibet. In every remote quarter of the globe these fellows have filmed the wonders of the world and made them real. Each one has his story, but they are perhaps more interesting as travelogues than camera experiences; so I shall confine my story to the news bulletin and the studio camera man.

A few years ago the moving-picture newspaper was practically unknown; if a public event happened in a city where some studio was located, a man would be sent out to make a picture, which would be spliced on any reel that happened to be short. But, as the interest in news pictures grew, a few of the studios began to devote more time to the work, until its importance demanded a complete department for handling news stories only.

Now we have several great organizations devoted to the single purpose of furnishing biweekly news bulletins to the public. They are pictorial newspapers in every sense of the word; each has its central office, editorial staff, headline writers, reporters, mechanical plant, and circulation department. From the central office, the editor is in telegraphic communication with his reporters all over the world. In this case the reporters are camera men. If an event of any importance is scheduled in the remotest comer of the earth, the editor looks at

his map, covered with little flags giving the precise location of every reporter, and telegraphs to the one who is most accessible to the spot. It may mean a motor-trip of three hundred miles, or the hiring of a special train, in order to get the picture; but if the editor thinks it justifies the expenditure, he orders it. And just as a newspaper editor will demand that his correspondent send in a thousand words of some feature story, so the staff camera man will be ordered to send in fifty, a hundred, or two hundred feet of film. Sometimes, after great labor and expense, the camera man arrives only to find light conditions impossible.

The editorial staff is constantly alert for possible news stories, and a scoop by one company is a complete beat when it is accomplished. A daily newspaper may find that its rival has beaten it to a good story, but it can always come out a few minutes later with enough of a story to save its face and give its readers the news. In pictorial reporting one either gets a picture or he doesn't, and it is absolutely impossible to fake up a substitute when one has been scooped.

The editorial staff handles the film when it comes in, has titles written and the footage cut according to its importance; and sometimes, in great events like the arrival of the Deutschland, holds up the bulletin and, if necessary, tears down the reel, so that the story can be spliced in. Incidentally it might be interesting to know that one reporter hired a tug at one a. m., steamed down the Potomac, grabbed the picture before his competitors, and had them scooped in all theaters west of Pittsburgh.

Competition is very keen and speed becomes a re

porter's greatest attribute. The local reporters, mostly married men with families, have definite territory to cover; they send in their film and get their weekly checks. The correspondents, of whom there are a great many throughout the country, are paid on the footage basis, the rate being from forty cents to a dollar a foot. When one of these fellows films an event, he wires to the news film the nature of it, the amount of negative, and whether competitors were present.

To facilitate speed, the men are equipped with police and fire passes.

The personality of the camera man is much more important than in ordinary reporting; and some of the feUows with the news films are almost national characters, knowing practically all the big men in public life well enough to get to them at the times they need them.

The laboratories are also run on newspaper lines; there is no leisurely developing to get fine effects of lighting. If the film arrives early, of course they can give it more time or "keep it on ice"; but most of the stuff is rushed through by express or parcel-post, and must be developed at once. Sometimes only a few hours are permitted for the work. When the make-up man finally has the film assembled, spliced, and labeled, it is projected for the editor, and then rushed to the printing rooms, where the positives are made—a hundred or more, according to the circulation of the service— and sent to the different subscribers throughout the country. Perhaps you think a circulation of one hundred is stingy; but these few copies will, no doubt, reach the eyes of five million people.

PICTURES OF POLITICIANS

Before the present elaborate means of getting "live" pictures was developed, many of the news films were padded out with very uninteresting pictures. The novelty alone sustained the interest; but as this novelty wore off, the fans began to tire of silk-hatted politicians laying corner-stones, frumpy ladies breaking pop-bottles on the bows of launching ferryboats, colorless flower parades, and stupid railroad wrecks. They could see a real wreck in the "drammer" that was to follow; so they were not interested in the pictures of a lot of smoking junk. Editors began to realize that human interest was the thing; so when they showed thirty feet of that little old sport. Captain Koenig, the audiences applauded for every foot. But the excitement of the news-service game is with the outside, usually unmarried, man. As I said before, he can't get his news vicariously; he must be aggressively present, and this has led to some very curious situations.

In the case of notable men, many of them will give out carefully prepared interviews, but most of them balk at having their pictures taken without an opportunity of editing the proofs. President "Wilson, for instance, will permit no pictures of himself as a private citizen; but as President, if he is notified, he will submit upon occasions. Mrs. Wilson at first was very firm in her refusal; but occasionally she will now walk past the machine without ducking. T. Roosevelt has the Napoleonic psychology as to the picture he wants published. Napoleon, you may have heard, instructed his court painters to render him as he wished to appear

in the imagination of the people; so the artists portrayed him as the Imperious Emperor. He also had his coins stamped with his profile, haloed by a wreath of bay leaves, like a Roman imperator.

Colonel Roosevelt objects seriously to being taken unawares, as various camera-smashing episodes testify; but he will pose, not unwillingly. An artist friend once told me that he was making character sketches of the Colonel in the old Fifth Avenue Hotel while T. R. was meeting an endless train of callers. "When finished, the artist tried to make a nice, quiet, little get-away, thinking that the Colonel had quite forgotten his inconspicuousness. He did not wish to interrupt immense affairs of state. But, after all, the joke was on the state, for it had to wait until the Colonel had looked at the sketches; and then he asked: "My dear fellow, won't you kindly put nose-glasses on me, instead of these spectacles? I wear them because they are comfortable, but in a picture they make me look like a schoolmaster." If a former schoolmaster, living in a large white mansion in "Washington, D. C, should read this, he would be entitled to a large and luxuriant smile.

J. P. Morgan, Senator Root, and Justice Hughes— at least before he became a candidate—are the despair of camera men. But their joy is Mr. Taft. He will pose most cordially.

Of course, if we are sent out for a picture of some public personage, we try to get it, even if the p. p. acts shy and kittenish about it. We sometimes have to conceal the machine in a moving-van or delivery wagon; but our best stunt is to take the camera in a limousine, and then keep just ahead of the carriage of the p. p. while

THE VICISSITUDES OF VICTOR 143

we film him through the back window. Sometimes we even arrange a street blockade, so that we can sneak a few feet of our shy little statesman. He is always perfectly furious at being snapped, and then he will go, in a state of great indignation—often several times—to see the picture when it is released.

THE VANITY OF SACKED COWS

It's too bad that I can't tell of the delightful vanity of some of the sacred cows of business and politics. There are a whole lot of these great leaders who do not care to have their pictures taken—only they do! In fact, some of them are more down-stage than the vainest film favorite who ever scrawled his John Hancock across his foolish face. There is one well-known philanthropist who is constantly inviting the camera men to his estate, hoping that the next week's release wiU show the great almoner playing golf with a bunch of important nobodies. It's a hard thing to record, mates, but the news reporters teU me that, as a rule, men have much more silly vanity before the camera than women.

The news photographer has to be very alert not to fall for the little tricks of the foxy advertiser. If it is seen that a platform is building in preparation for the filming of a certain event, like a parade or an inauguration, leave it to some merry wight, advertising shredded bath-mitts or Turkish cigarettes, to get his goods emblazoned all over the background. In order to butt into the pictures these fellows wiU resort to every known trick and a few new ones. I heard of one man who placarded the whole side of a building with a beer ad.

144 FILM FOLK

and then went to the camera man and told him he 'd give him fifty dollars if he didn't change his location. The camera man took the fifty dollars and kept his obligation, for he did not change his location; but when he shot the picture he cut it just below the brewer's eign!

Once, when an important parade picture was being taken in San Francisco, a moving-van, with a famous ad newly painted on its huge side, went by just as a great Oriental statesman was getting out of his carriage. When the film reached the editorial staff it was eon^ fronted with a great question: The picture was important ; yet if they let this wildcat advertiser get away with that dodge, they would be pestered to death in the future. Every ad man in the country would be sitting up nights trying to think up schemes for breaking into the news bulletins, for five million spectators are worth going after. The film was killed and that particular stunt discouraged. But, like newspapers, the films are developing regular advertising sections; the fashions from well-known costumers and tailors, where the name is mentioned, are straight paid advertising.

Not every news picture just happens; some are made. A news editor is constantly bombarded by curious egotists and freaks who wish the world to witness their effulgence. "The oldest living barber of Ypsilanti" will offer his distinguished bean for the small sum of ten dollars; "Lincoln's last (No. 41144!) bodyguard" will also be pleased to submit to the camera for, say, five doUars; a dietary crank who claims to live up a tree, and who for eight years has eaten nothing but prunes and hickory nuts, writes in that his picture is a

a

humanitarian necessity for anybody afflicted with "ganzes"—whatever that is. Then there are the chumps who would jump off anything, from the top of a fire-ladder to the Brooklyn Bridge, or submit to a living burial. A flat rate of a hundred dollars is the price usually paid to these poor devils.

Some of the best stories, of course, are not foreseen, such as accidents, earthquakes, and cyclones; and it is at these times that the camera man must show his resourcefulness. In a certain great train-wreck a group of about a dozen photographers managed to get within twenty miles of the scene, when their car was sidetracked and seaJed up. Railroads do not like to have their blunders advertised. One of the marooned fellows managed to smuggle his camera and himself out of a lavatory window on the off-side of the car and, after walking for two hours, secured a team of mules, which took him to the wreck. He got one hundred feet of good film, showing the injured people being taken out, and returned to the car without ever having been missed by the officials on watch.

It is in time of war that the camera man has opportunity to make a hero or an ass of himself for the sake of a picture. At present, in all the great theaters of war, there are men taking pictures; but they are being made under the direct supervision of officers, and the censorship of what is taken or goes out is so rigid that there is not the same latitude of operation as there was when the movie was new. Many of the battle pictures shown at the cheap theaters were taken either at manceuvers or faked behind the lines. When the immensity of the modern battle is considered, it will be seen how inade

quate a narrow-angled movie camera would be to portray it. "First line" photography is practically out of the question; the action is too dangerous. When one dares not look out of a trench, except through a periscope, you can see what chance a fellow would have who tried to rise up, focus, and crank a camera. A few long-distance shots can be obtained by the use of a telescopic lens, but there is not much doing in the close-up stuff in European warfare.

PAKE AND EEALITT IN MEXICO

However, nobody should get an idea that the camera man is immune from danger; his adventures in the big war will be worthy of a special history. Many of them have already received marks for distinguished service.

Some of them are taking intimate pictures of trench warfare and bomb-throwing that will be most illuminating when the release is permitted. I know one movie studio that has on ice more than nine thousand feet of such film; but it cannot honorably release the pictures until after the war.

There are a lot of free-lance camera fakers who ought to be given monuments or cyanide—I hardly know which. Some of the battle stuff they are staging is perfectly wonderful; and some of it, alas, is so raw that even a child would not be deceived.

In the good old days of the Mexican revolution the life of the camera man was one of personal adventure. He was here, there, and everywhere; in jail and out; with the rebel outs or the constitutionalist ins, but always alert for a good picture. One of the boys on our

lot was made an officer in the Mexican army, under Huerta, and was furnished with a bodyguard.

"Yes; I had a bodyguard," said he, "whenever I didn't need it. For two years I took pictures for the Mexican Government; but, as it was sometimes difficult to tell who were the ins, on several occasions I got tangled in my vivas and was led out to be shot. I was always saved by sending for the American consul or by my absolute inability to understand a word of Spanish. At this time Mexico was flirting with America; so the killing of Americans was not considered the parlor sport it had been. My greatest difficulty was in getting and keeping an assistant. A movie outfit is a fierce bunch of stuff to pack over a desert country, and though there were lots of Mexicans available, they would not stick. So, often I would have to load the whole darned equipment aboard a burro, like a mountain-gim, and go out after the war stuff alone.

"There were lots of American soldiers of fortune, but they were invariably looking for trouble and thought packing a camera much too slow. I had one Iowa chap for three days, who finally quit me for some excitement 'over there.' He found it, all right; for two days later, when I was pulling into Vera Cruz, I saw seven ghastly creatures hanging by their necks to a telegraph pole; and who should be among them but my little Yankee camera boy!

"Street fighting is the easiest to film, for if you can get a good location on a side street, you have the protection of all the intervening buildings from artillery and rifle fire, while you occasionally get a chance to shoot a few feet of swell fihn, I got some great stuff

148 FILM FOLK

in Mexico City a few days before Madero was killed. One fellow, not twenty feet out from my camera, had his head shot clean off; but, do you know, the darned censors would never let us show the picture in the States! What do you s'pose they send us to war for? To show the soldiers playing squat-tag?"

A WAITING GAME

"But the big battle stuff is almost impossible to get, and the best war pictures taken in Mexico have been faked. Mexican generals are more vain than actors, and are most eager to go bowling down to posterity in the movies. So, in order to perpetuate their heroics, they would re-ride a battle after it was over, with the dead still lying on the ground. This method was perfectly safe and it gave me a chance to make some swell close-up. A lot of the historical film in the archives of the Mexican Government was made in this way.

"You can believe it or not; but it's gospel truth that, by convincing General Soanso that he had no right to deprive the world of a record of his dashing military genius, he actually postponed his attack upon a certain town because I told him the light was bad!"

Of course the bunch at the Border had a pretty dull time; there was little to shoot and the military restrictions were very troublesome. Most of the fellows down there were glad to get back to studio work, for we do much more exciting war stuff right in Los Angeles than they had in the Mexican trouble.

But our lives are not all alarum, battles, and accidents. "We have our paths of peace, too; and they are the most peaceful paths one ever trod. Can you think

of anything less belligerent or less strenuous than sitting by a hole for eight hours, your hand on the crank, waiting for a gopher to come out?

Sometimes these little pictures, quite incidental to the plot, take longer to make than a big scene. I know one fellow who shot three thousand feet of film to get two three-foot flashes of a couple of mating pigeons. In one picture the camera man was three days getting a little short scene showing a white horse putting his head through the window and looking down the road after his retreating master.

When it is a simple case of watching, the jobs are often turned over to the camera kids—or assistants, as they prefer to be called. Even the kids sometimes show great ingenuity. Willie, my assistant, was sent one day to photograph a mocking-bird singing on a branch. Everybody knew the boy was in for one of those interminable waits, perhaps for several days. The bird was in a cage large enough to move round in; in fact, it inclosed a fig-tree. There the boy was to set up his camera and wait. Everybody kidded the kid about his exciting job; and Mrs. Grandon, wife of our feature leading man, in a spirit of joyous josh, embraced him in front of everybody and bade him a long farewell.

"All right," said Willie; "just for that I'm goin' to fool you!" And, with a jaunty bow, he beat it away.

In just two hours he returned, triumphantly announcing that he had thirty feet of singing mockingbird ; he needed only a five-foot flash. Nobody believed the story; or, if they did, they put it down to very unusual luck. But the boy had the dope, all right; we all

150 ' FILM FOLK

saw the negative projected the same day, and it wa* great.

"Willie," said I that evening in the dark-room, "how did you get that picture? Was the bird trained, or just unafraid?"

"Neither," replied the lad. "I sat up in the cage and focused a good close-up on a little branch of the fig-tree; and then I chased that bird round the cage for half an hour until it was so tired it could fly no longer, when I picked it up and put it on the limb. It was panting so hard for breath that it looked just as though it was singing, except that no noise came out. It was a dirty trick on the poor bird, but I rewarded it by turning it loose; and then I gave the kid who owned it a doUar."

Another observant lad at the studio had been watching the antics of some cockroaches in the lunch-wagon across the street. He told Bluett, one of the directors, how they behaved; and from one little scene they built round those loathsome insects, a splendid drama was enacted. The cockroaches played the part of messengers between prisoners in their cells, and carried an elaborate correspondence back and forth; one, in a fine close-up, actually crossed over the sleeping hulk of a prison-guard. The messages were written on pieces of cigarette-paper and stuck on the backs of the roaches; and, of course, the result was a concerted jail delivery that emptied the prison.

An amusing episode happened in one of the Chicago studios last winter. A well-known actor, whose beautiful dome is seen on many a shopgirl's dresser, always sported a big meat-hound of some queer breed. Ac

cording to Miss Chauncey—as our hero was known back of the camera—"this hound has quite as much intelligence as I have, you know." But this was not an entirely fair "tradelast" for the hound. Anybody with half an eye could see who had the brains of the family. Chauncey simply couldn't wait to have his dog act with him; so some paranoiac was told off to write a scenario in which the dog was to play second lead. When the picture was shot, the dog did very well in all the scenes where he could act with dog intelligence; but in one little flash he was to be shown coming down a dark hall and stopping in the doorway; upon hearing his master's voice he was to prick up his ears and come running toward the camera.

EAST ON THE TTPEWRITEB

Of course the poor beast couldn't read the script and never knew quite what was expected of him; and although he seemed perfectly willing, they could not make him stop at the threshold and prick up his ears. Chauncey tried every device and argument in his catalogue; and when all failed he showed his inferiority to the dog by taking him out and kicking him most brutally. The property man, a big, tender-hearted Irishman, jumped in to save the dog, slapped the actor across the face, called him a pup, immediately apologized to the dog, and led him away. The dog is now his faithful companion; and by direction of the management everybody was forbidden to mention the affair in the presence of our splendid hero.

Now the whole trouble arose by sticking too closely to the script. A half day's work was wasted, every

body lost his temper, the actor lost his dog and the respect of his associates—and all because of a little fourfoot flash that could easily have been circumvented.

The camera man's Mte noire is the scenario writer; he is the chump who plans most of our troubles. Because he knows naught of our mechanical difSculties or limitations, he hands us scenes to make that the gods themselves would have to pass up. He has such a jaunty way of tossing off a direction like this: "As the child is going down for the third time, bubbles are seen rising to the surface. One bubble grows larger and larger, and finally dissolves into a picture of the Heavenly Choir." This may be easy on the typewriter!

These scenario people have lately gone nutty on the heaven-and-hell stuff. Every location and personage in heaven above and hell below has been involved by mystic scenario writers—and actually accomplished in some sort of way by insane camera men. I '11 have to admit, however, that I have no particular urge toward the heaven I 've seen pictured thus far. Last week I was called upon to dissolve a great, big, coarse creature, with the general architecture of a sea-cow, into a Little Eva. That was n't so hard as it was distasteful.

I have in this world just three pious hopes: First, that whenever I hear a scenario writer is not well, I may just sit down and hold the thought hard, and hope for the worst; second, that sometime I may be vouchsafed the opportunity of "dissolving" all the scenario writers, most of the actors, and a few directors, into nice little devils, and then refuse to "dissolve" them back; and my last hope is, that I '11 get these hopes.

The camera man and the director who work with

little children must have very unusual temperaments, as infinite patience and tact are required to make these pictures. One man told me that he shot a scene fortytwo times before he could get the little two-year-old tot to go over and crawl into a bureau drawer without turning and looking into the camera. The child did it right on the afternoon of the second day.

Another picture that required marvelous patience was made in Tibet, or some outlandish place, where the chap with great difficulty received permission to film the interior of a celebrated and holy temple. The light was so dim that he had to give each picture a full minute, which meant that he could take but sixty in one hour. After sticking by the camera for three days and cranking every minute, he finally got enough film so that, when projected, it showed one minute and a half on the screen.

The laboratory workers taking movies of micro-organisms, blood circulation, and the hatching of insect eggs also must exercise amazing patience; but, of course, the work has an intense interest that compensates for its slowness.

But the fellow I can't understand—^nobody with my kinetic make-up can possibly understand him—is the one who turns the crank for the animated comics. That job is about as exciting as picking the blooms off a century plant. The artist sits at a table with a wash-drawing before him of, say, a certain desert background, and on this he lays his little cut-out figures of a hunter and a lion, which he moves about at will.

Suppose, for instance, the hunter is about to shoot. The figures are laid down in the first attitude, a celluloid

cover is pressed down, and the artist calls out to the camera man: '' Two frames!'' The fellow sitting above the artist, with his machine pointing straight down, cranks his camera twice. The camera, instead of taking the usual eight pictures to each revolution, is adjusted to the single-stop movement and takes but one. The artist now raises the transparent sheet, moves the gun up a little and perhaps pushes the lion's legs forward, the celluloid is replaced, and he calls out: "One frame!" Now a single picture is made.

SUBMARINE REALISM

In this way he moves his little marionettes slowly and painstakingly about. He has scores of them, drawn in all the various attitudes of continuous motion, cut out and lying at hand. For the slightest pause in the action, he will call out, "Three seconds!" for instance; then he sits back and holds his hands, while the camera man cranks three times sixteen, or forty-eight, frames. This takes about a minute and a half of slow cranking, and the pictures will be shown in three seconds. At this speed two men can make only five hundred feet or film in a month. The artist may get a little fun out of playing with his paper-dolls, but for the camera man to sit above him by the hot lights and crank slowly every few minutes for a month is no job for a minister's son, for we are reputed to be particularly restless.

An exciting picture for the camera man was made by an Italian down in the Bermudas. They were doing some Jules Verne stuff in submarines, and a long tube was sunk in the water, at the bottom of which the operator sat and filmed the picture. The discomfort was

fiercej for the heat was intense and the air pressure under which he worked was almost smothering. Once, when he was working in very deep water, shooting a picture of a negro pearl-diver, he witnessed and filmed an undersea tragedy that beats anything you ever read in a book. A huge octopus lay on the bottom, some distance back. The diver was to stay close in the foreground, and when he beheld the octopus he was to beat it for the surface. The strong tide, however, carried the negro too close, and the octopus reached out and grabbed him. In a moment he was tight in the coils of the monster's huge arms. In the clear water of the Bermudas this was witnessed from the surface; so a diver immediately went down and cut the negro loose with an ax, but it was nearly four minutes before they brought the poor fellow up. All the time this was going on the Italian had kept cranking; and he got every foot of the picture until the water was so full of blood and "ink" that nothing could be seen.

ELECTRICAL MARKINGS

Of our mechanical troubles, "static" is the most distressing. Static is an electrical disturbance caused by the friction of the celluloid film—you 've rubbed a comb on a cat's back—and is very active under certain atmospheric conditions. It results in treelike images being splashed all along the film, greatly to its disfigurement and often to its complete ruin. Static is most likely to happen in very cold weather.

One company went up in the Bear Valley country last winter to make some show pictures; and when they returned, out of fourteen scenes, ten were spoiled by

static. They went back to make the ten, out of which seven were bad; they retook the seven, and four were spoiled; out of the four they got three good ones. Eather than return to take the last scene, they faked it at the studio. That static trouble cost the studio three weeks' time and thirteen hundred dollars.

One of the first questions one American asks of another is: "What do you get?" There is much misinformation and exaggeration in regard to our salaries. In a few cheap studios they run as low as twenty-five dollars a week, but in first-class places they range from fifty to one hundred. Occasionally, a few get as high as one hundred and fifty or two hundred; these are the ones with the greatest experience, intelligence, and pictorial sense. High-priced men usually film the big-feature stories, as it would n't do to risk great, expensive scenes with any but the best operators. Often in these pictures one of the lesser lads gets an opportunity to make good, this occurring when there is necessity for using two or three cameras on one big scene. One man might fail, but it is not likely that three would. Here the young man is in direct competition with his master on the same picture, and if he does as well or better, it is a personal triumph that demands recognition.

So important is the work of the camera man that a few of the most enlightened companies now place his name on the title, along with those of the director, lead, and company. It has added much to the dignity and pride of the profession, and has a decided tendency toward good work; for when a fellow has his picture signed, he will move heaven and earth to make it right.

In this business, as in many others, it is largely a matter of "he that hath, to him shall be given"; for in the big-feature stuff the camera man has much more opportunity of success, because of the care in selecting location, the most propitious time for shooting, the choice of intelligent actors and director, and the footage allowed. It is not uncommon to take five months in making a ten-reel story, and to shoot over a hundred thousand feet in, order to get ten thousand.

As a crank-turner can never become a camera man until he masters the laboratory—and a lot of other things—I have always believed that a director should learn the camera. The few directors who have graduated from the camera have an immense advantage over those to whom it is a closed bos. It has been Mrs. Goodhue's ambition that I should aspire to a directorship. She says my present job is more trying on her nerves than was my racing career. Judging by the honorable scars, whose tracery is seen all over my rapidly mending architecture, she has some grounds for her opinion.

Just before I started the picture that brought me to this hospital, an ill wind to Mr. Wheeler, the director, brought me a corking opportunity. When we were on the third reel of a bully feature-story, he was taken sick with pneumonia. Many an evening we had gone over the story and visited the locations together; and he generously insisted at the office that I should be permitted to finish the picture, as I knew its needs better than anybody else. So I filmed and directed the last two reels, and, of course, have been anxiously waiting the

158 FILM FOLK

report from the projecting room, for on the results will depend my chance of graduation.

And now I must tell of the accident that is responsible for this story. We were making a mining story in the mountains back of San Bernardino, and had made elaborate arrangements for blowing off by dynamite the side of a high-rocky, canon wall. "We were to photograph the scene from almost underneath the overhanging rock; and, though we fully expected it would fall clear of us, yet we had built a shack of very heavy timbers to protect us from the loose stones. When the dynamite was shot, a big rock tore through the roof and snapped the front leg of the tripod clean off.

GOOD NEWS FEOM THE STUDIO

Magee, the director, dropped to his knees, grabbed the tripod, and held it in place so that I could film the scene. He had no more than braced himself, when crash! the whole works came tumbling down on us. When they dug us out, they thought it was flowers for me; but fortunately Magee was only slightly injured, as a big six-by-six redwood beam protected him from the load above.

That's all! And as I have been here on my poor old back for a month, I 've had time to realize that when I left the racing game for the safe and sane profession of camera man, I did not choose with notable precision. It is very fortunate for my poor little patient wife that my face is sad, like a codfish's; for had it been otherwise, they might have grabbed me off to do rough-comedy stuff, and then she would have had something to worry over, for those fellows are always in the hospital. Since

THE VICISSITUDES OF VICTOR 159

I have come here Jimmie Swasey jumped out of a fifthstory window into a concrete-mixer, and they had to

Mrs. Goodhue has just bounced in, all joy and excitement, with the cheering news that when I return to the studio I go as a director at two hundred dollars a week.

"You more than made good on the Wheeler story," she says; "and they think you are a born director."

Well, that's better than being a dead camera man!

There is, however, a little fly in my ointment. I learn that the name of my first scenario is: The Humming-Bird and the Orang-utan. Sounds scandalously like "The dear little girl and great big brute" stuff! If it is, I promise this in advance: The big hairy brute in the Mackinaw coat will not marry the dear little girl.

She will marry the soda-clerk, or somebody else who is her social equal. There is no earthly reason why a soda-clerk should be less heroic than a lumberjack— except for film traditions.

There is a lot of fine heroism right next door, if we only knew it. My first two-reeler may not go very well in the lumber camps, but it ought to be a big hit in the cities; anyway, I 'm going to take a chance. Run in and see it, if it comes your way. Now don't forget— The Humming-Bird and the Orang-utan.

IV

"READY! ACTION! CAMERA! GO!" (THE DIRECTOR SPEAKS)

BARRYWORTH in the movies? You 're not serious, Kirk, surely! It 's too shameful to contemplate! Why do you wish to sentence me to the lowest rung on the dramatic ladder when I 've been so near the top? If my health really demands an outdoor life, as the medicine men declare, I 'U get me a job selling orange orchards to Eastern tourists or driving an autohearse. But the moving-pictures? Not so long as I can look the world in its fishy eye and tell it to climb a tree!"

Yes, I said aU that, and more, less than ten years ago; and I meant every word of it. The person to whom it was addressed was Kirkland, manager of Tobosco Stock Company; the place was Los Angeles; and the time, to be exact, was January 5, 1907.

When nowadays you see the name of some worldfamous star aggressively and proudly proclaimed on great twenty-four-sheet posters as appearing in a new film drama, it seems incredible that the moving-picture should have grown from such a contemptible beginning to one of the highest forms of dramatic expression. And all in less than a decade!

To make those remarks of mine doubly absurd, here

160

I am, sitting down to write of the photo-play not as a carping critic, but as a director—and, as things go, a fairly successful one.

The wheel of fortune that brought me to this unique position revolved somewhat as follows:

Four solemn and frowning diagnosticians sat round my bed at The Players, in New York, and gravely shook their heads, thereby registering '' Not a chance!'' When they left, my domestic manager came to me and said: "Stanley Barryworth, those ridiculous men have told you that your final curtain, is due to ring down in less than a month; but I guess they have never heard of the Arizona Desert, "We leave to-morrow."

THE HEALING POWER OF THE DESEKT

Mrs. Barryworth is small and optimistic; but optimism in this ease was difficult to share, for had I not been condemned to death by four very expensive doctors? Manlike, I thought their syndicated wisdom was more likely to be correct than the hunch of a mere woman. Besides, even if I did survive and starve the unwelcome colonists in my poor old bellows, what could an actor do in the desert?

Here I was, in the fullness of my manhood, one of the best-known stars of the stage; risen in my work from property boy to playing Shakesperean roles and high comedy; big, and apparently as husky as ever. Yet I "had it"; and the desert was my only chance of survival.

WeU, I '11 say this much for women: their hunches make the frowning wisdom of the male appear like the center of a doughnut. The owl looks wise, but his brains would never give him a headache.

Besides, who knows as much about a man as his wife?

When Mrs. Barryworth defied the pathological pilots and took charge of the sinking ship, she soon had daughter and me bundled into a train and headed west. At Nogales we disembarked; and she immediately set to work and chartered a prairie-schooner, loaded it with provisions, and in three days we had set sail on the great American Desert. She had anticipated my starving estheticism by packing along paints, brushes, and small canvases; for I was to paiat my way across the great, gorgeous wastes of Arizona, until we reached California. Painting had always been my avocation, and now I was to indulge my soul to its limit.

I wUl not dwell at length upon this voyage, for it had little to do with the story I am about to tell. But I picked up immediately, and within a year I was apparently as well and strong as ever. When we finally landed in Los Angeles I had with me about forty canvases, which I immediately put on exhibition in a local gallery. Though the critics treated me kindly—or charitably—and I made a few sales, the result would scarcely have permitted my choosing painting as a profession.

Feeling that I had entirely recovered, I accepted the blandishments of a stock company, which flatteringly advertised my appearance as a momentous event in local dramatic circles. Within six months, however, I abruptly learned that I was not yet well enough to devote myself to the indoor confinement of the stage, and had about made up my mind to seek employment among the cow-punchers back in Arizona when Kirk

land called me into his office and urged me into a life of dramatic crime.

I gave my objection to this urge in the first paragraph; but Kirkland, with more vision, believed there was a great future in motion-pictures, and he was not at aU impressed with my very superior attitude.

"Don't get too sniffy, old top," he said; "it won't be many years before actors better than you will be cavorting before the camera. Films have already killed melodrama, and they '11 go after the big stuff, too. This fellow Dodds, who wants you with him, is going to do notable things with canned drama; and if you take my advice, you '11 jump in and grow up with him in this newest of the arts. Your shame can be temporarily concealed by sworn secrecy, and grease-paint."

After all, there seemed to be something sporting about the adventure; and I finally agreed to meet this chap Dodds, who was the director of a moving-picture company pioneering in California.

I found him a quiet, modest, gentlemanly fellow, and I was very much impressed with his seriousness and artistic optimism; so, finally, I accepted his offer. I was to begin anonymously in outdoor pictures, and was secretly to receive one hundred and twenty-five dollars a week. This was less than half of my salary when I was in my dramatic glory, but four times as much as the highest-salaried lead in the picture company. However, the roles I was to play would at least permit me to live in the open; and, beside, I almost shared Dodds's hope of a splendid future for the film drama. By occasionally using Mrs. Barryworth in character parts, and

my daughter as a juvenile, we all felt that we could at least live. Many people did not consider this important ; but we did.

EOUGH-AND-READT STUDIO METHODS

The climax studio was a strange affair—a few shacks, an office, a dressing-room, and a square platform without sides or top. The cast was made up of cowboys, Indians, and a few actors, real and alleged. However, they were aU adequate to the character of work the studio was doing, for the pictures were mostly holdups, train robberies, Indian fighting, and rodeos. Besides "Westerns," they were turning out comics—so called.

It was all lowbrow stuff, but purveying with profit to the taste of that period.

Contrary to the popular tenderfoot stories of the fiction writers, I was received cordially and generously. The cowboys did not think me a sissy because I could not bust an outlaw. Bronco-busting is as much a matter of special training as trap-shooting or billiard-playing, and the boys did not expect me to risk my neck in any vain four-flushing; in fact, I found them much better-mannered and more kindly than I had been led to believe from stories I had read of them. Furthermore, they recognized my particular excellence and would watch my dramatic teehnic with the wistfulness of children.

But I learned right away that good acting was not a first requisite in my new art, nor repression, nor quiet subtlety of expression. Action, action, all the time! The stories were usually violent or mawkishly sentimental ; but always tempestuous.

As our locations were usually in the mountains or on the desert, we had small use for "sets." The side of a bam, with a few borrowed pictures nailed on; a carpet laid on the ground; a couple of chairs; a table, and behold an "interior" of the sheriff's home! A volume of Dante's Inferno served as a Bible, a law boob, dictionary, and for purposes less polite, in all scenes where a boob was needed. Sometimes, when we wanted to be very splashy, we had a set painted by a real scenepainter. The men were "hired off" the legitimate stage; and, having worbed under its traditions and artificial lights, they did not change their technic to meet the fierce white light of day.

As we had no diffusers, our interiors were made in strong sunlight, which often resulted in shadows of the actors pointing east, while shadows on the scenery headed west. Instead of the painted mountains receding in atmospheric perspective through the open door or window, they loobed libe little painted mountains only a few feet away. Even when we attempted realism by sticbing a eucalyptus branch in the ground, libe as not it would cast a shadow on the sby!

These sets, painted on canvas, would shabe libe aspen leaves every time anybody opened or closed a door. An adobe wall or prison tower would suffer perpetual seismic disturbances whenever the action became at all rough. As we had no windbreabs, curtains and papers would fly about as though a tornado had come tearing through the transom.

"We built one set, on the top of a department store downtown, which consisted of four "flats," eight feet

high, with some tobacco advertisement tacked on the wall. This was an interior for a scene in a modem Carmen story.

To the film fans of to-day, used to the magnificent sets of the great feature plays, those of the early days would seem grotesquely inadequate and funny; yet they were most pleasing to the pop-eyed peasantry of that uncultured period.

I recall one picture made by a certain studio, which was incorrect in almost every conceivable detail. It was a Puritan story, in which the costumes ranged all the way from the Queen Elizabeth doublet to the powdered wig of the eighteenth century. The Puritans made the sign of the cross upon entering church, and when they were attacked by mounted Sioux Indians in war;bonnets, they staved off the enemy with rifles loaded at the breech.

Of course the least research would have informed the director that Massachusetts Indians shaved their scalps and had no horses. Even a school-boy should not have made the other blunders.

Those Western pictures, made in Eastern studios, where the cowboys used bang-tailed park-horses and English saddles, and the sheriff looked like a New England "constibule," got by east of the AUeghanies and in Europe; but out here they were howled at.

Scenario departments were yet unknown, every director writing his own stories. Actors were paid from fifteen to thirty dollars a week; and, as can be seen from our stage equipment, our overhead expenses were very small. Under these primitive conditions we began to turn out five or six thrillers a month, very few of them

costing more than four hundred dollars, and some as low as a hundred. A famous director, who, it is said, has spent more than half a million dollars on one story, told me that the first picture he directed cost just seventy dollars.

THE WHETSTONE OP ENDEAVOR

The queer thing about the terrible stuff we were making was that it sold like hot cakes, and our Eastern bosses frowned upon further elaboration, expense, or "highbrow" pictures.

I may say, in beginning, that you might have had better pictures sooner, if even these first directors— that is, some of them—had been allowed any expression of their real artistry. But always back East there were men grouped round a mahogany table who were interested only in cumulative nickels; they were the absolute arbiters of the stuff we made.

How we struggled and fought against the ignorance and inertia of our management! Dodds, for instance, one day tried some close-up stuff, only to get a letter from the New York office telling him not to repeat this offense. "Who ever heard of men talking when they were cut off at the knees? Show their feet!" At another time we made a whole story where the camera deliberately threw the background out of focus in order to concentrate on the figures; and the film came back with an order to retake eighteen scenes and see that every nail in the background showed plainly.

However, we managed to put one over on the New York office. We made Damon and Pythias, but in order to fool them we modernized it into a hair-pants story;

yet we retained the motive of the classic from which it was adapted.

I do not wish to imply that Dodds and I were the only ones who wanted to make beautiful pictures. There were several men struggling with their bosses and the public taste, and it is interesting to note that those men are at present at the top of the heap. The director whose first picture cost seventy dollars made even those cheap productions artistic; but he never really expressed himself until he was able to command his own money.

It is fashionable among certain directors to think that public taste is so low that it does not pay to address pictures to a higher appreciation. Most of the early directors believed this; but their estimate was based upon an abnormal condition, for a few companies absolutely controlling the market could give the people anything they pleased, and they had to take it. Only an open market could really determine what the public wanted; but competition in the early days was negligible.

Among the "wildcat" and "independent" companies stiniggling for existence there were a few men of vision —^more, I thiok, than we had in our dear little Trust; but they were unable to market their pictures profitably, while we turned out the worst pictures imagiaable and still made money.

"When, along about 1910 or 1911, the camera patents which had given us our monopoly began to lapse, independent companies came into the game, and with their competition there began the most brilliant period of motion-picture industry. Competition may be wicked

in the struggle for the staff of life, but for things of the mind and heart it is the whetstone of highest endeavor.

Pretty soon, all over the United States, companies sprang up overnight; any fellow with a few thousand dollars could hire a camera man, throw up a studio, and start taking pictures.

"With the multiplication of companies, which came like mushrooms, attendance increased, and during the next five years there was a veritable debauch of picture making. Everybody made money, and competition compelled spending it. Those were the golden days of the industry.

Dodds and I disloyally welcomed our new rivals, for we felt that competition would force our mahogany bosses to new and finer efforts. And, sure enough, we built a magnificent studio of concrete and steel, the finest, at that time, in the land. Then we started to spend money on equipment and personnel; and, the legitimate stage being in the dumps, we were able to corral a few fairly good actors.

We spent lavishly on everything except stories; these were supposed to be of little account. If we had a beautiful he-doll and a popular baby-doll, all we had to do was to provide a bunch of action in order to get a picture. This we did by ourselves. Dodds, being a busy person, usually unloaded this work upon my fair old back, and thus he was the cause of my becoming "one of the most prolific dramatists of the twentieth century." I sometimes wrote as many as three great dramas in a week! Any unusual occurrence would serve to hang a story on. I would often film the event and write the story afterward.

Once, while doing some pirate stuff on Santa Cruz Island, we learned of the wreck of the Santa Rosa, at Point Conception. So Dodds loaded me, with a hero, heroine, villain, and camera man, into a launch, and told me to beat it over and get some pictures. Neither the villain nor the camera man could run a gasoline engine—this was before the day when even the extra man has his "motah"; so little Stanley became the engineer of a fragile little craft that put to sea on the tail of a great storm. It was sixty miles across the raging main to the wreck of the coaster, and the only reason we ever got there was because of a special Deity who looks after fools. "We were very frightened, especially as our engine went dead about fifteen miles from shore and we began to drift toward New Zealand, seven thousand miles off our port bow.

REALISTIC HARDSHIPS OF THE SEA

Besides my function as navigator and chief engineer, I had also to work at my trade of dramatist; for it was up to me to write a scenario for our wreck picture. This was rather difficult, as I did not know whether I should have a hero or heroine with me when we made a landing. They were both so ill that I feared their prayers for death would be answered. The wrenching that those poor children gave their plumbing speaks wonders for the human anatomy.

The camera man also grew very white round the gills during those four hours when we drifted helplessly in the swell and wind. He lay on his back and looked at heaven, but said never a word. But the villain became more sinister every minute. He held his stomach, but

lost his temper. If he ever got ashore! Well, the things he promised are too terrible to contemplate; but the worst that could have befallen me was to have him beat it and leave me villainless, just when I needed villainy the most.

Having steered our course since sundown by the lights of Point Conception, and later by the fires the refugees had built upon the beach, we reached our destination at two a. m.

It's queer how everybody's point of view changed in the warmth of those fires and the thrilling stories of the folk about them. The camera man had come back to earth—^figuratively as well; the hero and heroine were glad to be alive; and even the villain did not want to desert his part.

At sunrise they were still taking off passengers by means of a tugboat and life-saving apparatus; so that was our chance. The sea had gone down enough to permit a trip to the steamer. We made about ten scenes aboard, even to the loading of the lovers into the breeches-buoy. Then we went back to the beach and made a bully one of the sweethearts coming ashore, while the villain rushed up and cut the cable, so that they went plunging into the sea. On this occasion the picture was made only up to the point where the villain starts to cut. The rest of it was staged six weeks later in the harbor off San Pedro.

That was one of the best wreck pictures ever done; even the story was pretty strong, for had I not put heart—and other things—into it? Chances to get scenes like this were rare, but we could always build stories round the laying of a corner-stone or a colored

funeral. Is it any wonder we never bought scenarios, when we could write 'em as we went along? To be sure, many of the stories were pretty punk, but so great was the public demand that even this tremendous outpouring of one-reelers was insufficient.

The comedies of this period had even less structure than the dramas. A tramp, dude, burglar, policeman, girl, boy, father, mother, yap farmer, and Chinaman were the dramatis personce of nine-tenths of the comics. Any two or three of this cast would start out with a camera man in the morning and, without the least idea of what the day would bring forth, would cut didos whenever and wherever a dido suggested itself.

The one motive in the lives of these alleged comedians was to pursue or to be pursued. All the jumpy slapsticking of the first two hundred feet was a mere prelude to the pursuit of the burglar, which, starting with a single householder, accumulated like a rolling snowball until the whole village—nursemaids, police, charwomen, and bankers—went tearing through the streets in the most undignified fashion. If the leading pursuer fell, the others, instead of running round him, piled up on his wriggling form like football scrimmagers. We all laughed at these sprightly races; and if the pursuing bunch ran into a scaffolding and spilled the mortar, or blindly ran off the end of the dock into the drink, we howled our heads off.

LOW COSTS AND HIGH PBOPITS

A company near us, which did nothing but comics, made arrangements with the fire department to turn in all alarms at the studio, so that in case of a picturesque

burning they could beat it out and make some foolish scenes. So enthusiastically had the neighborhood hookand-ladder company entered into the spirit of the thing that on one occasion they loaned all their rubber coats and helmets to the cut-ups; and when an alarm was turned in the actors arrived at the burning dwelling fully equipped for their comedy, while the firemen had to put out the fire with consequent singeing and drenching.

Another time a telephone call announced that the oil fields near Bakersfield were on fire; so there was a chance to pull some real diabolism. They sent a camera man and a villain over there at sixty miles an hour, and made a picture of the dreadful man setting fire to a well; which act resulted in the burning of the country for miles round.

These comedies superseded the old camera tricks, wherein the feathers flew back into the pillow and swimmers popped feet foremost out of the water and landed on the spring-board. Comics never ran more than five hundred feet and sometimes were as short as eighty. They were called split reels, and were usually tacked on to some drama that was shy the footage necessary to bring it up to the standard one thousand feet. Crude and elemental as these pictures were, they contained the germ of real comedy, as I shall show later on. The drama lacked story and structure, but it had the "punch"—^that quality which to the bourgeois mind is so essential in a picture.

These were the great days of the moving-picture! Life was full and splendid. As our work was only vaguely planned, we never quite knew what the immediate future held for us. It is true that art languished

and we were simple purveyors of punch; but our stuff was selling.

Selling? Why, pictures that cost only a thousand dollars would net the manufacturer twenty thousand dollars! And even though the Trust had been broken and independents everywhere were making pictures, we had the great plants and were still supreme, because of the momentum of our equipment and our names. When we began to make two-reel and three-reel pictures —features, so called—^we started to spend money and became wildly extravagant. Some of our stuff cost as much as a dollar and a half a foot! A three-reeler foi: twelve hundred dollars? Stupendous! And to think that in less than six years we should see productions costing close to half a million dollars, or forty dollars a foot!

But our little twelve-hundred-dollar pictures were the grand little money-makers. I happen to know of one that netted the company more than ninety thousand dollars.

It was these great profits that wrought such ominous consequences. Knowing that we were making fortunes for our bosses, we were not particularly careful of our expenditures. True, we had not gone into the expense of the tremendous sets of the present-day pictures, nor were salaries insane; but when we wanted a certain location we went and got it. A director would send a company of twenty-five a distance of two hundred miles to get a single scene. We bought properties, rented trains and steamers, with the utmost prodigality. Yet our earnings kept miles ahead of our expenditures.

The public had gone movie-mad; but its madness did

"READY! ACTION! CAMERA! GO!" 175

not make us a bit mad. "We wrecked trains, rescued maids, pursued burglars, upset apple-carts, with the most joyous abandon. Whereas before 1910 there were only about eight or ten manufacturers, with perhaps five or six companies each, by 1913 there were hundreds of them, some of the largest having as many as twenty companies. From whence, then, came aU the directors ? Actors could be recruited from the stage; but the stage could not possibly supply the thousands of directors who came into being almost overnight.

Well, they came from here, there, and everywhere. Of the five directors in a neighboring studio, one had been a cow-puncher, one a policeman, one a messengerboy, one an undertaker—curiously enough, he was making comics—and only one came from the stage. Others had gone into the game as extra men, scene-painters, camera-kids and publicity men; and, since there was a constantly increasing demand for more directors, they were recruited right on the lot. I actually know of a chauffeur, with no more experience than that of piloting alcoholic beach-parties, who was "chaufSng" one morning and directing the next.

Needless to say, drama that is purveyed by the butcher, the baker, and the candlestick-maker, is likely to have about the dramatic standards of those tradesmen; yet in all walks of life Opportunity sometimes raps on the door of one who is equal to it. A few of our most popular directors were rescued from these humble occupations and are now great artists. The success of some of them is one of the most hopeful things about democracy. Many mute, inglorious Miltons would not remain mute if they had an opportunity to siag.

176 FILM FOLK

I know of one chap who, only two years ago, was a butcher's boy, delivering meat at a certain studio. He went to the managing director and told him the Park Commission was going to drain a lake in one of the parks, and that he had written a story round it in which the villain would open the gates, allowing the water to escape, while he and the heroine would submit to being dragged through the black muck of the bottom by a rope from shore. The stunt sounded messy enough to be promising; so the director let the lad make the picture. So well did he do it that to-day he is getting two hundred and fifty dollars a week, and earning every cent of it.

Though uneducated and uncultured in the general acceptance of those terms, he had received a splendid education in the University of the Street, and knew human nature to a rare degree. Having a whimsical slant on the foibles of men, he now directs some of the most riotous comedies at which the world laughs.

DODDS'S END

But these men were uncommon five years ago. The average director produced pictures no higher than his brow, and many of them had brows like old Pithecanthropus erectus. Coarse and vulgar men abused their enormous powers shamefully. They would roar and swear, hire and fire, at their own sweet will.

Fortunately, at our studio, Dodds, who was an artist and a gentleman, had permeated the place with an atmosphere of joy and decency. In the most exasperating circumstances he never lost his temper or raised his

Courtesy of Artcraft Picture Corporation

Cecil De Mille coaching Mary Pickford

voice. Had lie lived, he would to-day have heen one of the great men of the profession; but alas! he was most tragically killed at the studio by a Japanese gardener who went suddenly insane.

This real tragedy, happening in a place where for two years we had been pulling stage violence of all kinds, had a curious psychological consequence. When the boy opened fire on Dodds, who was sitting at a desk, an actor who on the screen had always been applauded for his splendid heroics made his get-away faster than I am telling it. And the fellow who showed real heroism by jumping in and overwhelming the heavily armed murderer had probably been hissed at more than any stage villain of the time. He was 'way out by the gate, doing some roping stunts with the cowboys, when he heard the shot; but he knew by its sound that it was a ball cartridge, and with one bound he was in the studio, grappling with the Jap boy.

Among the women the same contrasts were noticeable. Several of them screamed and ran away in abject terror; yet one red-headed lass, who has since become famous for her nerve, daring, and art, sat perfectly still, though one of the bullets crashed through the window right behind her.

Dodds's death cast a gloom over the studio for many months. It had the effect of a stimulant upon me, however; for I was more than ever anxious to realize the ideals that the poor fellow believed were latent in the pictures. I had been cooperating with him for several years and had directed many stories in which I had acted the lead. Not from choice, however, as the dual role was

too strenuous; but the fact was, I had become better known as a lead than as a director, and the eastern office wanted me in the former role.

By this time, too, I had entirely lost my snippy attitude toward the pictures, and I rather proudly permitted my identity to become known. True, I received many letters and occasional visits from the co-stars of my legit days, and they usually expended much interest, but more pity, to find me sunk so low; but I had only a few years' waiting to find them, one after the other, rapping at the door.

I have said that the power of the director in the early days was almost absolute, and this was true in his relation to his producing force; but he had one serious check upon him, and that was the manufacturer. With us, this overlord usually lived in the East; so the friction was often most exasperating. The owner demanded a certain type of picture, and he, in turn, got his taste from the exhibitor. Of course the exhibitor got his point of view from his picture fans and was loath to try anything new.

These men insisted that their patrons demanded the rough stuff; so our bosses spent our artistic lives in every kind of violence imaginable.

It was a most hopeless inertia and conservatism that well-nigh made some of us give up in despair. I recall our first efforts to put over a two-reel story. The exhibitors fought us tooth and nail, and it was only after a most threatening controversy that we were finally permitted to make one. Then, as now, the manufacturers and exhibitors underestimated the public taste, for the two-reelers went famously; then three-reelers—four—

five; and now we have pictures in ten, twelve, and fourteen reels.

With the beginning of the multiple reel we had to have actual stories, two thousand feet of action not being enough to sustain interest; and we therefore found it necessary to buy scenarios and to dramatize popular magazine tales.

"Within a very short time the public taste had so changed, and the fans had become so sophisticated, that more and more care had to be exercised in all our productions. Painted scenery gave way to solid sets built of real material, and the cost of productions went up and up. Also, with the feature picture there came into the business the stars of the stage, at first the lesser lights and finally the greatest of them all. Some of the stars drew much bigger salaries than even the directors; nevertheless, we made money. Notwithstanding the fact that the stars drew more than we did, our powers were still supreme.

ARTISTIC WORK MANGLED

Though we were all-powerful, our troubles were manifold. We were, as yet, either writing most of our own stories or adapting those we bought; and often I would lie awake until the small hours of the morning, organizing in my mind the continuity of my scenario. Then I had to order and supervise all sets, choose my casts, and often seek my locations.

We might get a picture half made, when the weather would change, and we would have to dismiss the cast for a week or more, and then renew the taking of the picture. This was always dangerous, for costumes or props might

be mislaid, or the set was struck so as to make room for some studio stuff that could be taken in the rain. Then came the task of rebuilding the first set exactly as it was before; or, to cap the climax, the second lead would get his hair cut; or some other idiot would pi the picture in some outrageous way.

Perhaps we would employ some outside person for a certain character, because of his type, and he would do very well at first, and fall down entirely in the big scene; then we would either have to employ a new person to do the previous scene over, or skin down the part to nothing, with the chance of spoUiag the story. Often, after we sent the film Bast, we received most of it back for retakes, because the eastern laboratory would claim that the film was weak or scratched, for there was always a feud on between our eastern and western laboratories; or because the big boss couldn't see the feet of the hero in a certain scene; or somebody else couldn't read a street number a block away.

Never, by any chance, did we see our pictures run in positive, or with the titles. These were made in the eastern laboratory.

When, finally, we went to the theater to see our child projected on the screen, we would find that certain scenes had been cut, or new titles substituted. As if this was not enough to break our hearts, careless projectors would tear the film, cut out the torn parts and splice the ends together again, with the result that a person sitting at a table would suddenly jump way across the room. Projectors often even deliberately cut several feet out of a film, if they happened to be enamored of the girl in the picture.

Remember this, girls: Whenever your friend Harry, who projects down at the Excelsior Theater, gives you three feet of film of your favorite actor, the chances are that he has all but ruined a scene that was the result of infinite pains and labor.

Usually the whole artistic effect of a picture depends upon the tempo, and we would make and take our scenes with the utmost care that this might be correct. Imagine our esthetic joy in going to a theater and seeing our people go through their scenes as though the whole cast was on casters! This would be accomplished by projecting the picture faster than the standard speed, and was done for two purposes: one, to rush through the program in order to corral a new handful of nickels; and the other, to put pep into the show. Punch and pep; how I hate those words! I firmly believe they have been the greatest curse to our art. Think of putting pep into Hamlet!

SOME EARLY TROUBLES

Another of our earliest troubles was in getting permission to use certain locations. Before the films became "respectable," people were very tight across their chests about allowing their estates to be used as backgrounds for violence and rough-stuff comedies. It was almost impossible to get public officials to appear publicly or to gain their consent for any picture purposes. Ex-President Taft helped immensely in this respect. Seeing the historical possibilities of the films, and being too genial to refuse, he permitted the first official pictures to be made; and during his Presidency he often permitted directors to use the White House. Since then, the respect

ability he lent our business has opened the way to every reasonable demand we make.

But there are certain locations that are becoming harder and harder to get. At present it is the saloon exterior in California. "When the wet-and-dry agitation began there some time ago, the saloon men realized that it was mighty bad for their cause to permit the use of their places for moving-pictures, for the reason that they were almost invariably made the background for some form of crime or intemperance. Now we have to build our own saloons.

The success of the feature story soon began to make the one-reeler less popular, and almost every studio turned to the manufacture of the multiple reel. A feature story, at first, was intended to dramatize some well-known popular novel or stage success, or to exploit the personality of a famous star; but it soon grew to mean any film that was more than two or three reels long. Many of the so-called feature films of to-day are nothing more than the old one-reeler padded out; in fact, many of them are retaken from one-reelers the companies hope you have forgotten. But the exhibitors are feature-crazy, and it 's pretty hard now to sell a onereeler, no matter how good it is.

The feature film, however, gave the director the chance he had always longed for: a fine story, good actors, unlimited money, and time in which to make the picture. These were the grand old days for the reckless producer and still more reckless director.

Money was pouring in so fast that the cost of production was hardly considered. Great companies of expensive actors were kept on salary, and often would work

but a few days a month. Furniture was bought, huge sets built, and armies of men employed with almost insane recklessness. Trains were wrecked, real ships sunk; aeroplanes, touring-cars, and great buildings were tossed into the dump, just to get a few feet of realism.

I recall one instance of a fellow, directing in one of the largest studios here, who employed more than two hundred people for a ball-room scene. The script called for the tango, or some new dance; but when the orchestra struck up, it was found that only a few could dance modern steps. Rather than change to a waltz, which everybody could do, the director lost his temper, ordered the scene stopped, and then announced that the company was to report at the studio daily for a week, as he was going to have that scene if it necessitated employing a dancingmaster to teach the whole cast! This he did; and that one little thirty-foot piece of film cost the company six thousand dollars.

Another chap ordered thirty-six tons of coal for a mine picture. His assistant, hoping to save money, bought six tons for the foreground and thirty tons of crushed rock for the rest. This, when washed with lamp-black, looked exactly like coal. When the director was told of the deception—he never would have noticed it otherwise—he ordered the scene stopped and everybody sent away until he had real coal, by heck! That kind of realism is pretty expensive.

This condition could n 't last, for the sheer spending of money had its limits. Only companies of unlimited resources could finance the huge productions; and sooner or later the fans would cease to marvel at the big stuif and would demand quality rather than quantity. Even

the comic fellows are beginning to feel the reaction from useless expenditures, and are more bent now upon real comedy than the destruction of valuable property.

THE CUSTAED-PIE MOTIF

After the "pursuit" picture, directors were at their wit's end until the most famous impresario of knockabout fun invented the motif of the custard pie. A custard-pie bombardment has two very strong elements of humor concealed in its action: one is surprise; and the other is messiness. There are lots of "nice" people who think it is vulgar and outrageous to laugh at such elemental humor; yet there is something fundamentally funny in seeing a body's face projected through the soft goo of a custard pie.

If you do not believe this, try it some day on your neighbor when he pushes his head over the fence to say good-morning or to borrow the lawn-mower. Hit him full-on, butter side out, with a custard pie, and see whether the result is not funny—or tragic; a hair often divides the two. If you try this experiment, you will learn that only a complete bull's-eye is funny. If the pie should hit on the edge, or only partially break, the joke is held in suspense and spoiled; but if you "moon him," I assure you the neighbors for miles around will all laugh. My, the number of custard pies that we have wasted while one of the comedians perfected his technic and aim! A good custard-pie thrower is invaluable in the comics. It is queer that the pie must be custard.

This same director also invented the comedy police, who have had more trouble with the real police than any actors on the screen. The humor of the wild exploits of

these volatile officers of the law is based upon two motifs: one is the collapse of dignity; and the other is a kid desire in the hearts of nearly all of us to see authority get it in the neck.

There has been no great comic inspiration in the last few years; we can't laugh forever at the pursuit, the pie, or the police. So the comic studios, taking their contagion from the drama, have gone in to spend huge sums on sets.

The money blown in on a few feet of film is incredible. Only a month ago one of our directors was going to do a comic in which the fellow on horseback chases a girl; and just as he gets to the edge of a cliff she ducks, and the horse with his man-rider jumps over the cliff into the ocean. At first they could n 't find a jumping horse; and, as the authorities would n't permit pushing the horse off, they had to train one. It took two weeks in the big studio tank, going up a few feet each day, until the horse got to the high dive.

There is an old rumor that once upon a time a mouse ran up a clock. Our comic director, believing that the clock in question was on a lady's stocking, attempted to repeat the feat for a two-reeler he was making. For three days a camera man stood at alert attention while the lady sat in receptive horror and a foolish little mouse ran everywhere except up the clock. Every inducement was resorted to, so that the mouse might fulfill the nursery rhyme. Even a piece of cheese—^the kind that mice are reported to relish—^was balanced on the lady's knee; yet he preferred the lower altitudes. After all this labor and expense the result was finally attained by trickery.

THE DEARTH OF COMEDY MATERIAL

Bears and monkeys are sometimes put through months of training to get but one or two scenes. The sets necessary to show the flooding of a hotel from top to bottom, where the guests are all washed out into the sewer, are also very expensive.

And now in the comics comes the same reaction, from great expenditures and startling destruction to something less expensive, but with more brains. Comedies of situation are superseding the slapstick and the custard pie. Our greatest difficulty is in getting stories. We have the plants and we have the comedians; but where, oh, where is our boasted national humor ? A perusal of the scenarios sent to the comic studio is one of the saddest and most lugubrious experiences I have ever undertaken.

It is difficult enough, heaven knows, to get good dramatic stories. One reason, no doubt, is because situations are fairly limited, and the output of the studios in the last five years has been so enormous that there is mighty little left which has not been done. Good plays for the legitimate drama are difficult to get, and our problem may perhaps be appreciated when it is known that one studio will sometimes turn out in a month as many plays as New Tork produces upon the stage in a year.

But, if dramas are hard to get, comedies are even harder. Every script that comes in is put into all the test tubes in the laboratory to find even the germs of a good comic situation; if, perchance, one is discovered, the

author is encouraged with enthusiasm, hope, and money. Yet, because our comedians either do not understand the needs of the comics, or because their humor finds expression in some other way, the stuff sent in is almost hopeless. It therefore devolves upon the poor, worked-out director to frame most of his own stories.

Now that my place as an actor has been taken by any one of the great army of film favorites, and I have become only a publicly inconspicuous director, Mrs. Barryworth is anxious that I shall seek fresh immortality as a comicscenario writer; but alas! I fear I am just like the rest of my countrymen, whose wits seem brighter in repartee, exaggerated metaphor, and whimsical observation than when they take their pens in hand.

EGO-PERCENTAGES

Had I been seeking fame in this tumultuous old world of ours, I should never have given up my job as a leading man; for if there is any public interest in the affairs of the director, it has never come to my attention in the slightest degree.

The paiuts are far more interesting to the world than the painter. When I compare with my present correspondence the letters I used to receive as the ravishing hero of the hair-pants stories, I am forced to believe that romance and notoriety are not for us. It is sad but true that the only photographs of me which are still cherished repose upon the dressers of maiden ladies who have romantic hopes that are eight to ten years overdue. If the press-agent sends out a story that a certain film favorite eschews onions, all the fans in the country are worked

188 FILM POLK

up over the momentous news; while if it was learned that one of the directors used perfume on his pancakes, nobody would care a bean one way or another.

This does not mean that we are entirely overlooked. The trade papers keep our names quite prominently before the profession, and our mail is mostly from actors— ham and otherwise—^who remind us of their amazing qualities, with the hope that we will send for them at once. The love of the human paints for the painter is often very touching.

It is because the general public takes so little interest in our personalities that I have deliberately refrained from obtruding my own importance, and have laid more stress upon our failures, successes, obligations, and hopes. So it is a sense of proportion, rather than innate modesty, that makes me stand behind the camera while I take this picture of Movie Land.

Maybe you have heard that movie folk are modest. If so, that information is incorrect; for so well do we think of ourselves that we have reduced our especial worth to an elaborate system of mathematics. One of the sprightliest indoor sports that engages all studios where films are made is to figure the percentage of our relative values to the success of the pictures. Ask a leading man what he thinks of his work, and he will reply: "Well, I should say the actor is seventy-five per cent, of the picture, the story about fifteen, and the director ten." Some even go so far as to represent the director by a minus sign.

Then up speaks the author: "You fellows make me tired! I 'd like to know what you 'd do without a good story! The best director in the world can't direct you

beautiful dolls to do nothing! My table makes the author sixty per cent., the director thirty, and the actor ten."

At this point we produce our schedule, which makes the director fifty per cent., the story forty-five, and the actor five. Then the fireworks!

I '11 have to admit that in the last few years my branch of the profession has lost somewhat in importance, for when I first began in the pictures, the director was the whole works; he represented probably ninety per cent., the actor ten, and the story nothing. The story is the factor that has gained in importance. It is true that a few actors are so enormously popular that they can get by with a poor story and rather indifferent directing.

There is, however, another angle to this fact that seems to me to be pertinent. Often the management will get a spasm of efficiency and employ a star for only a few scenes; then it is up to the director to pad out the story so that by spreading the star very thin he can get the necessary footage. Or, on the other hand, the big boss, having an expensive star on the pay-roll, will want him on the screen all the time. So the director has to prune down every other part in order to accomplish this weird result. In either event the story suffers and the director's artistry is woefully handicapped.

I said in my estimate that the actor was only five per cent, of the film. Privately, I do not really mean this, but my modest figure always gets a wonderful rise out of the actors, and I love to hear them rave. The fact is, a film success depends upon many factors, the failure of any of which can ruin the picture. Given a good story, capable acting, intelligent direction, artistic sets, and fine

photography, the result will be splendid. But, oh, the temperamental storms that have raged about those percentages !

THE FEMALE OF THE SPECIES

So far as the director is concerned, there is really no standard by which the excellence of his work can be ascertained, except by the result. One obtains success in one way, and another by quite opposite methods. Some directors are excitable, some phlegmatic, some genial. We have one woman director who has arrived famously and has handled some of the greatest stars in filmdom. There may be no sex in brains, but there is in temperament; and there is no doubt that much of her achievement is due to her feminine point of view, especially her uncanny understanding of the male. This woman stoutly maintains that she has a masculine mind; but listen to this story:

Her lead in one of the pictures was a famous foreign star, and, starlike, she thought rather tenderly of one of the men of the cast; but alas! he was only second lead.

Now it happened that a very beautiful white costume was made, and the lead and the second both cherished it. Of course the lead had the first call; but what of the foreign lady? She wanted her boy to have it. After a great to-do and much talkly talk, it was finally put up to the director. She, femininely wise, walked over, whispered something to the star, and then answered:

"Of course Mr. Blank shall wear the costume; he is the lead and is entitled to the suit if he wishes it."

The star, having been tipped, acquiesced gracefully; but the second lead was very peevish and stood round

"EEADY! ACTION! CAMERA! GO!" 191

biting his finger nails and looking quite distraught. When the lead, radiantly triumphant, appeared in his gorgeous white velvet jacket and panties, the director eyed him critically.

"What 's the matter, Mrs. S ? Don't you care

for it?" asked he.

"Oh, yes," she answered; "but I think it is a little short in the knees, and the coat doesn't fit very well round the neck; it makes you look bottle-shouldered. However, it will do, I guess. Turn round. Well, the truth is, Mr. Blank, it is even a little worse in the back; but I can cut that scene where you have your back to the camera, though it 's a good close-up for you. Then, in that other scene, where you sit downstage, I can mask the legs by a table—"

The lead waited for nothing further. He was gone; and in ten minutes he returned with an armful of white clothes, which he tossed to the second lead, who sheepishly went off to his dressing-room and put them on. When he returned, the star lady from Russia fairly ate him with her eyes. Though he was exactly the build of his rival, the trousers, curiously enough, were "long enough," and the coat fitted "splendidly"! So, at least, the director said. And she insists that she has a masculine mind!

For several years this woman and her husband directed together with great success. To anyone who knows what a personal thing directing is, this feat is a startling accomplishment. The nearest score to their record is that of a man and wife in a Chicago studio who joined forces for just twenty minutes. They say that when he came to at the receiving hospital, and looked up and be

192 FILM POLK

held the nurse, he ducked his head under the bedclothes, as though the poor girl was going to strike him with a skillet.

ART IN HANDLING CROWDS

In handling the fragile temperaments of actors the female is more wonderful than the male; but when it comes to resourcefulness in a situation, the male is often remarkable.

"We were making some scenes at Eedondo one day and were trying to get a little girl to walk disconsolately along the beach, no one noticing her. After working for nearly an hour in an effort to get the people to walk by without stopping or rubbering into the camera, or at the little girl Ed Donlon, who was directing, called two of the men of the cast together and arranged that they should start a fight about fifty yards up the beach. The pugilists came from opposite directions, met, and began loud, vulgar abuse of each other. Needless to say, everybody parading the boardwalk looked over in the direction of the brawl, and the camera clicked off eighty feet of a disconsolate little girl, ignored by everyone, walking along the beach.

Street crowds are notoriously difficult to handle. They will never do what you want; and even when you are sneaking them, there is always some smart Aleck in the foreground who insists upon looking into the camera and cracking his foolish face.

On one occasion Donlon wished to get a close-up of a crowd looking skyward; it was to be used as a cut-in for an aeroplane story. To hire a lot of extras might have cost a couple of thousand dollars; so he took a chance of

getting what he wanted without paying for it. Knowing the psychology of crowds, Donlon took three cameras downtown. He set one on the sidewalk, for the purpose of taking a close-up profile of the crowd he was to assemble; one was placed in a second-story window, shooting straight into the people's faces; and one stood on top of the building, also shooting down.

"When all was ready Donlon stood in the middle of the street, with a megaphone, and began to call directions to one "Ben," who stood on top of the building. The crowd assembled immediately, and seeing the cameras, began, as usual, to rubber right into them. Then Donlon called out:

'' Is Ben ready to jump ?''

And Ben called back: "Just a minute, Ed. I 'm a bit nervous. Wait till that yellow car gets by. I think I '11 try for the top of that big Pasadena ear; it's wider.''

Back and forth they called excited warnings and directions, and the crowd was right on tiptoes. They did n't know what was going to happen, but it promised excitement. All this time the camera men clicked that fool crowd into celluloid immortality.

Just at the moment when Ben was going to jump, and the crowd's eyes were riveted on the sky-line of the building, a motor sneaked up quietly behind Mr. Ed Donlon and his camera man and they were in and off before the poor sillies could gather their wits together and express their chagrin. Ben and the other camera men made their get-away through the back of the building.

Another responsibility of the director is the safety of the actors; for in dangerous situations he assumes su

preme command, quite like the captain of a ship. A studio at Long Beach was at work a while ago making some scenes on a point of rocks well out in the ocean and entirely masked from the mainland by a large cliff, though easy of access at low tide.

The picture people had been out there for four hours and had just completed their work when, upon returning round the cliff, they saw that the tide had come in and they were isolated. A wind was coming up and the sea was beginning to run very high. The director knew the rocks would be entirely swept by the waves in another hour; so he ordered the men to take one woman at a time and start for shore. There were forty-two of the latter and only sixteen men; so each man had to make several trips.

Everybody was finally landed safely; but some of the men were all in, the pulmotor being requisitioned for two of them. The director, the last to leave, was so battered on the rocks that he went to the hospital for two weeks.

THE KALEIDOSCOPE OF FASHION

On other occasions elaborate precautions are taken, and then, curiously enough, no danger threatens. This same studio wanted to make a picture of two girls being pursued by a mad bull. After arranging for every possible contingency, even to the shooting of the bull, the girls were turned into the field. The bull paid no attention to them. They were then furnished with red parasols; but the bull ate on. Now they were directed to run toward the deadly brute; but the dear old fellow looked up in the friendliest manner and permitted the

girls to scratch him between the horns. Finally he ran away where he could be free from annoying humans, and the picture was not secured.

These are a few of the small and immediate problems that fill the life of the director; but we have other and larger questions that constantly keep us bucked up. One is the everchanging taste of the public. A type of picture that is fashionable this season will not be patronized next. So ephemeral is this curious public preference that often it will make most abrupt changes. A few years ago the play most in vogue was that of the dear young girl with the curls, who jumped up and down and clapped her hands in sweetest innocence—soft, sugary little plays, in which virtue was stressed with almost gooey intensity. The women, especially, flocked to these films, and sent notes, flowers, and lavender books to the girl who played lead, and finally voted her the greatest favorite of the films.

Then, out of a clear sky, came the vampire to spread vice and ruin in her dreadful wake. From the sweet incense of the outdoors, we suddenly landed in the heavy, sensuous atmosphere of the vampire trap. These wreckers of homes and miners of perfectly good husbands appeared in droves. They were tiger-women, wolf-women, tarantulas, and other dangerous carnivora. For a year or more these Miss Glums debauched the poor he-men of our fair land with their perfumed intrigues and domestic seditions. But thank heaven! this miasmic gloom is on the wane; the vamp made thistles while the sun shone, but her day was short.

We have about decided that it is the women who mold public taste, for they love the unregretted vamps the

most. But perhaps the excessive female patronage was due to the fact that men didn't like to go to pictures in which their sex always got the hot end of the poker.

It is not only in female roles that tastes change. A few years back the Western chap in hair-pants was the real thing. I directed no end of those Arizona devils who lassooed express-trains to save engineers' daughters. As these fellows did not seem to be rough enough, we framed up the lads from Alaska—great cave men who grew their own fur—and they went strong for a few years.

These northern, beautiful brutes always had romantic blots on their escutcheons, usually in the form of some squaw-lady whom they had sworn to cherish and obey, but whom they left on the slightest provocation. The provocation's slightness added immensely to the effectiveness of the final dissolve, which showed the two in a snuggly clinch silhouetted against the setting sun on top of the Great Divide.

Just when we were at our wit's end as to how to ring in new changes on the age-old motif of Beauty and the Beast, the public taste changed again. And now it wants the Donald Fairfaxes, who can ride polo-ponies, shoot big game, and disport themselves like real gentlemen in swell clubs and limousines; from the saloon to the salon, all at a day's notice. And we are supposed to keep even with the kaleidoscopic changes of our patrons.

One of the great discoveries of the twentieth century is the recognition of the personality of the child. Tomes have been written about it, the work of mothers and teachers, and other knowing Olympians who thought they

knew; but if Madame Montessori wants to be authoritative, she will have to direct a child in a moving-picture, for only in that way will she ever learn the real truth.

A mere man—one Harry Kay—has had this curious responsibility thrust upon his big, broad back for more than a year now; and what he does n't know about a child could be printed in bold-faced type on a cigarette paper. Baby Bernice is one of the youngest—just past five—and most accomplished juveniles on the screen to-day, and the villagers who nightly applaud her amazing acting no doubt thiuk she goes about it with the utmost ease and unconcern; but they little know of the extraordinary patience and care that the poor, harassed director went through to get those scenes. True, the child loves to act—what child doesn't?—but she cannot be left to her own devices or we should have a very strange result.

Like all children on the threshold of life, she wants to know. Every scene, no matter how carefully explained in advance, is interrupted by a perfect bombardment of questions. '' But, Mithter Kay, why do I have to frown at her? What ith she going to do to me?" Then the whole action must be stopped for ten minutes, while the poor soul explains all over again the reason for the frown.

TACT IN HANDLING A TINT STAB

Like her older sisters. Miss Berenice at times grows very temperamental; and right out of a clear sky she will announce that she doesn't wish to play any more. These are the times when the director must show his resourcefulness, for her refusal may tie up the whole plant

198 FILM POLK

for hours at a time; and, as the overhead charges against a picture may often be as much as a hundred dollars an hour, a delay of any length is a serious concern.

In order to meet these emergencies, Kay has resorted to all the old subterfuges and a few new ones. One that sometimes works is to pretend to totally ignore her; and, like some grown-up ladies—and men—she does not like this treatment. Then, simulating great excitement, he calls out: "Now all ready, folks; in your places! Ready! Action! Camera! Go!" Like as not, Miss Berenice is iu the foreground, doing her stunt.

If this trick fails, Kay pretends to feel all cut up; and, as the child dearly loves him, she will go up and pat him on the back, and tell him she was only fooling and will make the picture after all.

There are times, though, when she goes right up in the air; and then he has to resort to the meanest device in the whole arsenal of male munitions:

"All right, Berenice; I 've been thinking that you are not so well suited to the part as Minnie, and I 'm going to send for her to take your place.''

In a flash Berenice is downstage, as big and indignant as a grown-up leading lady. At that, many scenes have to be made over and over again; and often the story is cut, amplified, and rearranged, to fit the whimsical eccentricities of this high-salaried young star.

One of the sweetest things this dear little tot does is to cry in the scene where tears are necessary. One day they refused to come; so she went and sat in a comer for fully five minutes.

"Mither Kay," she said wistfully, "I 'th been trying to think of something thad; but I can't. If you would

thend for Mr. Jackson, and have him come and thpank me, I think I could cry." So much for her sincerity.

In proof that the director is often more important than the actor, I want to cite a specific case. A year ago I was handed a very beautiful young thing who had landed in our company through some hook or crook—I suspect it was the latter—and it was up to me to put her over as a lead. Her good looks carried her along pretty well in the small stuff, but when it came to the big scene her lack of training and her ingrowing brains made her hopelessly unequal to the part.

I struggled and labored a whole day and showed her how to act it, down to the last gesture. She failed miserably. Then I called in one of our character leads, a woman of splendid ability, and she took her through the scene time after time. We made twenty-two shots of that one scene, and finally it went off splendidly. The picture was a great success; and as some easy director thought the young lady was a comer, he employed her at a fine salary, and went to the bat to make his and her fame and fortune. He made one picture and blew up. The last I heard of the coming star, she was working as an extra.

Our profession is full of so many things that I have wandered along, hitting the high spots of interest; but now I must get down to the ground and tell of the crisis, the result of which will determine for many years the place the photo-drama will occupy among the fine arts. This crisis we are passing through has been brought about by several factors: Overproduction—one studio alone has more than four hundred thousand feet of film on its shelves; excessive expenditures; the open market

at home; and the closing of the European market, due to the war.

A few years ago, when the stupendous profits in motion-pictures became known, the financial adventurers, theatrical gamblers, and showmen began to jiunp in; and for the past two or three years the financial side of the industry has occupied the minds of many of the bosses to the exclusion of every other consideration. Companies have been bought and sold like mining stock; mergers and reorganizations have been effected; release companies formed, reformed, and dissolved in such kaleidoscopic succession that one scarcely knows from week to week with which company he is working.

This last year the industry has been in such a state of flux that everyone is frightened. Old companies have become suddenly conservative; new companies have splashed in one day and died the next; expenses are being cut and the whole industry reorganized.

THE HATED EPFICIENCT MAN

A furious contest rages about the conflicting aims of directors and owners. The latter are bent upon retrenchment, and the former feel that they must go on and on, or die. It is the same old conflict between art and business. In some places art is winning; in others, business; in a few there is evolving a happy marriage.

When men of business began to crowd into the pictures, they could not understand the apparent waste and appalling expenditures. "Why should pictures that a few years ago cost only ten thousand dollars now cost sixty thousand dollars?

"Why," they said, "do you insist upon paying one

thousand dollars a week to an actor who, on the stage, never made more than three hundred dollars? Why do you employ him for fifty-two weeks, and have him work only ten or fifteen?"

So they have hired experts—efficiency men—^to reorganize the business. These men have now taken hold and their results are interesting, for no doubt they have found fearful waste and leakage; but their remedies are not always happy.

Hurried and harried on every side, the old-time plungers are rebellious and indignant.

"Imagine," said one director to me a short time ago, "trying to get into the spirit of a story with a clear head, and every time you turn round having somebody question your expense or hand you a note saying you are half a day behind your schedule! Or saying that you must turn out so many feet a day! Or asking, 'Why did you employ So-and-So for five dollars, when you could have gotten So-and-So for three ?' All our studio wants is footage, cheap footage; it doesn't want good stories. And as for art; gad! what 's art to them ?''

This is given only to show the unhappy spirit of a director when he goes up against the new methods.

The truth is that only tentative estimates can be made of any picture, if the director is not to be hamstrung. Many uncertainties enter into the making of the simplest story—^the weather, accidents, an unsatisfactory cast, mistakes in scenery, sickness of a lead, unforeseen developments, and many other things beyond the power or clairvoyant vision of any director.

One day, for instance, a director found a beautiful brick wall covered with adobe and surmounted by red

tile. As it was romantically old and crumbling, he wanted it for a location in a three-reel story he was directing. After making seven of thirteen scenes he had to return for a week to the studio, as his sets were ready and the stage was needed as soon as he was through shooting. Imagine his chagrin when, on the following Monday, he went out to make the six other scenes at his garden wall and found that the owner had torn it down! After elaborate figuring, he decided it would be cheaper to rebuild the wall than to retake the previous scenes at another location.

Even after the most thoughtful preparation a scene may have lost its "punch"—^that ever necessary quality. What to do then ? Let it go, or do it over and have Mr. EfiSciency Man call you down ? Listen to my indignant friend:

"Now I 'U grant that these efficiency fellows have certain qualities; but imagination is not one of them, else they would see that a moving-picture studio cannot be run on the same plan as a canning factory, with so much footage a day, like so much tuna. Unfortunately you cannot can drama when the machinery breaks down, or when one of the canners gets a pain in the lap; and unfortunately actors and directors have silly stomachs, souls, and temperaments, quite unlike canningmachines."

This, of course, is the extreme statement of one who is trying to survive business efficiency.

There are other studios, however, with business men in charge who recognize the limitations of efficiency and of the human factor in making a picture. Fortunately, I

happen to be in one of the latter; and I am very strong for the business policy it manifests, for the reason that its efficiency is expressed in taking burdens—^powers, some of the old-time directors call them—from me, which makes my work infinitely less irksome and much more fluent.

In the old days it was my duty to write my own scenario, employ my cast, edit the wardrobe, superintend the building of sets, find my location, and, in fact, be personally responsible for all the annoying details of a picture, even before I began to direct it. Under the new business management, all I do is to direct. In other words, when I enter the studio I do so as an artist who has had all his materials provided for him, his canvas stretched, and his models properly costumed, so that he may begin to paint immediately.

At some studios where the old order, or lack of it, still prevails, they have sometimes taken from six to eight months, and even a year, to build a great ten- or twelvereel feature picture. With the smooth working of our wonderful business organization we are making them in a half or a quarter of that time. Our results are quite as impressive and our cost is amazingly less.

Let us watch Charles Mills for awhile and see how he directed the historical drama that was assigned to him.

Unlike some directors. Mills does not consult his actors in regard to the story. He calls them together and tells them what he thinks of it and what he wants! Turning to a great star employed for this picture, he said:

"Now no doubt there are ten ways of making love, and your way may be excellent; but as I have to carry the

psycliology of the entire story and the relation of one character to another, and the relation of both to the whole, I '11 have to insist that love be made the way I want it. That is why I prefer that none of you shall read the script; you might get ideas into your action that I should have great difficulty in changing. This picture has been given me to paint. I have the most wonderful colors that an artist could crave; but you must permit me to mix them as I see fit, for, after all, a picture must of necessity be the work of one man!"

Fortunately the stage stars had brains enough to see the point of Mills* statement. Our stock actors knew all this very well; so they all worked in joyous harmony and, in fact, soon recognized in him a great master.

"When the day arrived on which we were to begin the picture, everything, down to the last detail, was in readiness. Each department, jealous of its own efficiency, had prepared for every contingency with astounding foresight. We were to start on a series of small interiors; and, lest there might be fog or cloudy weather, the electricians had in reserve a huge battery of supplementary lights.

Now on the screen in a ten-reel picture you may behold the king in his antechamber perhaps twenty times throughout the story; but when we make the picture all scenes in that location are made at once, so that the set can be struck to make room for another. The scenes made by day are developed at night, so that the assistantdirector and camera man may see the negative projected in the morning; and, if necessary, a retake can be accomplished while the set still stands.

THE COUNCIL BEFORE THE BATTLE

We have many stages, and there are always half a dozen sets standing and others in process of building. To avoid any delay, the scene-men are supposed to keep four days ahead of the schedule. If a large set is delayed, we utilize the time in making outside locations.

The small interiors, with only a few characters, are much easier to make, and sometimes we do as many as eight or ten in a day; but when it comes to big scenes, the director has to use all the brains at his command and the different departments are put to the big test.

Take, for example, the great battle scene in the picture Mills took. Every evening for a week he motored out to the location, with his assistants and army men, and went over the battlefield in minutest detail. A complete topographical map was made; and finally, at a council of war, just as they have in Europe, the movement of the troops was arranged with absolute precision.

For several days before the battle the field was a scene of utmost activity and apparent confusion. Tents were pitched; the commissariat department set up its stoves and tables; corrals for the horses and dressing rooms for the actors were built; a hospital tent, with three motor-ambulances, was installed; camera stands were erected and masked; and platforms were built so that the knights, who wore armor weighing two hundred pounds to the man, could mount their horses. In fact, every need possible for the equipment and care of the two thousand soldiers who were to take part in the great battle was anticipated and provided for. The last thing to be installed was a complete telephone system, running

all over the landscape, so that Mills could be in communication with his assistants and camera men in every remote part of the field.

Truck-gardeners going to market early one morning last August were greeted with a strange sight. A great army of French and English soldiers emerged into the San Fernando Valley to do battle for their kings. They were clad in everything, from gay-colored jerkins to full armor, but were riding in automobiles of every description, from the humble flivver to the huge sightseeing busses and motor-trucks. "When, at eight o'clock, they arrived at the scene of impending carnage they found everything in readiness, from hot breakfast to grease-paint; and with Teutonic precision they got down to the business of the day.

By half-past ten everything was in readiness for the first rehearsal. It was decided that the first day should be entirely occupied with this necessity, and the real pictures would be taken on the morrow. Squads and companies of knights and soldiers were here, there, and everjrwhere, scattered over the scene as far as the eye could reach, and aU in command of army men, used to discipline and obedience. The order had gone out that the least disobedience meant immediate dismissal.

At half-past ten Mills, on his observation platform, with the telephone jigger fastened to his head, quietly gave the order to begia. At once troops started to move over that hill and around this; and so perfectly did every unit do its allotted stunt that the director suddenly decided to make the picture at once, and ordered the troops all back to their places and the camera men to make ready.

"EBADT! ACTION! CAMERA! GO!" 207

When everybody was at his post, he called up all stations and told them that the real battle would be fought immediately. Before anybody could express astonishment, he issued an order to station six to send the men out; then in rapid succession he called one station after another, directing the camera at number eleven to begin shooting, or camera number six to cease firing; and so on throughout the whole plan of action.

MASTEEY OF DETAIL

So completely had he mastered every detail that the battle raged with utmost violence and in perfect accord with the plans. The knights on horseback, having been correctly timed, arrived in a cloud of dust exactly at the moment they were due. And the men, realizing that they were being actually filmed, with small chance of a retake, plunged in with magnificent recklessness.

How any of them came out of that mess of plunging horses, jabbing lances, and swirling broadswords without injury is a marvel! Needless to say, many of them were hurt, some very badly, and the ambulances were not installed in vain; yet fortunately nobody was killed.

The greatest achievement was the splendid harmonious working together of many departments, which made it possible to take so great a scene without rehearsal. The smoothness of the system was no less remarkable than that of a great circus; and theirs is a daily routine, while this show lived but once.

After the big battle there were innumerable close-ups and many small scenes, which kept us on the battlefield for three days more; but a few years ago we—and many companies even to-day—would have required several

weeks to get the pictures taken during those four days.

But, with all our careful management, there is always the human factor looming up to edit our success.

Once, in one of the smaller battle scenes, Mills called to station seven, where some soldiers were standing at ease, and said:

"Present my compliments to the gentleman standing by the tree, and tell him that knights of the Middle Ages did not smoke."

I used to be pretty well discouraged when I was making pictures whose sole bid for popularity was their "punch," or the vulgar display of money in their making; then I fell foul of the adventurous theatrical gamblers, and what was left of my artistic soul was killed and quite indecently buried. But, fortunately for me, I had been a conscientious director, always struggling toward the stars; so I got to heaven.

And here I have been for a year, with all my dreams come true. Men of brains are my associates; real artists design the sets; plenty of money is intelligently expended; and when we get good stories we make notable productions—^the joy of our lives!

SUPES AND SUPERMEN (THE EXTRA MAN HAS OPINIONS)

EVEN for experienced travelers like Dune and me the surroundin's at the studio were quite strange. It seemed like there was a fete or a festival, or sunthin', goin' on, such gayety and joshin' and cuttin' up as there was. At other times I could n't think of en'thin' except a great big circus—^what with so much canvas, sawdust fillin' the mud-holes, folks in all sorts of bright-colored costumes, and fellas sellin' hot dogs, ice-cream cones, and things. It was a gay place, but confusin'. Everybody seemed to be doin' sunthin', or goin' to do sunthin'; but nothin' ever happenin'. To further remind you of the circus, every once in a while, when the wind was right, you got that Bamum & Bailey bouquet from the animal cages at the other end of the lot.

Dune and I were jest beginnin' to like the place when, with about fifteen other fellas, we were ordered into automobiles and set sail for Bear Valley 'way up in the high mountain. Now when you learn that Bear Valley is where they make all the snow pictures, you will understand how happy Dune was, who had come out to California to be warm. Though always cold. Dune is

?09

a game boy; and when he discovered this horrible fact he never batted an eye. This was pretty brave, for we had been told that we were cast for a coupla fool inmates of a sanitarium where the patients had to amble about in the snow, naked but for a towel.

TRICKS OF THE TRADE

The story was supposed to be a comedy; but the f eUa who wrote it must 'a' been a cold-blooded devil, for if you 'd 'a' seen ten or twelve of us poor wops sittin' round in steamer-chairs, in two foot of snow, with nothin' on but bath towels, eatin' icicles and readin' magazines, like we were at Palm Beach, you 'd 'a' thought that the human race had gone nutty. But that 's what we did; and, furthermore, we pretended to like it, for we were drawin' five a day, and we didn't want the director to think we were short sports.

Now Dune has a pretty grim sense of humor himself, and he pulled some good stuff, in one scene, usin' me as the butt; and the director liked it a whole lot. He told me on the way back that we made a right good team, and he guessed he could use us again in comedy.

It was rather rough for our first job, but the adventure was worth while, and we learned a lot about our new life. Also, we made friends with several of the other fellas that were workin' extra, and they tipped us off to no end of things that were valuable to know.

For instance, a few days later we were lucky enough to be taken on for a great big dramatic story that would be about four weeks makin'. In one of the interior sets the director called out: "Half of you guys beat it, and the rest stay on for a close-up." Old Man Purdy had

tipped us that if such a demand was made, to beat it; and we did.

"Always make an exit," he had told us; "for if you make an exit you '11 have to make an entrance, as they '11 need you for other scenes. When people exit from an interior set, the continuity demands a picture showin' 'em comin' into the street. But when a scene dissolves out, it is ended, and the services of those boobs remainin' for the dissolve are likely to be ended with it. You '11 notice that the new ones stick round, hopin' to be in the picture as much as possible; but the oldtimers duck. And, above all, side step the close-ups, for a close-up registers your face; and if it is once registered, you are liable to be canned for all subsequent scenes. Suppose, for instance, that you had appeared in a street scene in France, as a peasant; it wouldn't do to see the same face, a few minutes later, peerin' out of the Tower of London. No my lad; it would be a bum director that would have a French peasant sing 'The Marseillaise,' and then register the same mug singin' 'God Save the King!' If an extra is real keen, he can often work in every scene of a fivereel er. So we old wheel-horses shy the close-ups."

We soon learned that the extras had an elaborate code and technic of their own. Furthermore, they study their directors in a way that's amazin'! They get to know all their whims, dispositions, fancies, and weaknesses ; also, where they are strong.

"You can't pull en'thin' on Mills," a character-man said to me one day. "That son-of-a-gun can pick a sleeper out of a crowd of two thousand!" I learned the truth of this later, when, at last, I got on regular

at his studio. One day a fella came up and asked him for work in a picture that was startin' the foUowin' Monday.

ME. MILLS AND THE CUT-XJP

"Not for one foot of film," replied Mr. Mills. "I used you in that battle scene out in Griffith Park last August, and you laughed when they knocked your king off his horse. You thought, because you were one of five hundred, that I didn't see you. No; you won't do, young man; my work is too hard and serious to fool with any cut-ups like you."

It 's men like Mr. Mills, though, that make actors outa extra men; and if a fella has any ambitions higher 'n jest check-grabbin', he 's lucky to hook up with directors like him.

In a big scene last summer Mr. Mills wanted to show a crowd watchin' a woman bumin' at the stake. Some directors would 'a' let us rave and tear and sprain our faces tryin' to record horror. Not so with this director. He first addressed the crowd, and told us what was to happen, and what he expected.

"The fact is," said he, "that all those attendin' a burnin' would not show horror. Some would be fascinated, some pale and starin', a few would be made ill; and always at such times there would be several women faintin'. Now I put it up to each of you, individually, to show how you would behave in the face of such a gruesome tragedy."

That, of course, put us on our mettle and gave us sunthin' to think about. When he called for a rehearsal

I give you my word that, as he stood up on the platform beside the camera, shoutin' directions, he did not miss the expression on one face in all the two hundred before him.

'' That 's fine, madam; turn your head. It's horrible! Good, man; jest stare and bite your nails. Here, you in the yella jerkin, cut out muggin'! Mr. Ford, take out that man in the blue cape. Fine, men; fine! "Willie, step out of the picture; you don't seem to understand. Splendid, Harris! Hey, you! You in the red cloak: Do you think they are roastin' peanuts? Mr. Davis, tell those men in the doorway that it is their pay checks that are burnin', and perhaps they will show some interest. Great, Miss Harvey! Give her a hand there, boys. Can't you see that she 's all in?" And so on.

There 's one thing about workin' for Mr. Mills: you feel that you are learnin' sunthin'; and if you do good work, it will be noticed. But there are some directors that extra men don't respect, or jest naturally hate; and they look for any chance to make monkeys of 'em. These are the loud-mouthed, profane, or beUyaehin' kind, that keep bawlin' out the cast, or makin' them so nervous that they can't work. I 've seen girls cry themselves into hysterics when one of these mutts got temper'mental. You can't go bawlin' out a lotta fellas that are perfectly willin' to do the right thing, if they know what it is, without gettin' a lotta goats. Many a scene has been crabbed because the extra men were gettin' even with a director that had been abusin' 'em.

UP AND DOWN THE SOCIAL SCALE

Some fellas jest naturally go to pieces when they get roasted in front of the bunch. I 've stood beside men who were shakin' all over, they were that nervous. There are certain directors who realize that actors can't do well when they 're all worked up and excited, or mad; so they make it a point never to tip off their own nervousness or bad temper. The camera man is the guy that gets it then. I know one director who is apparently the most genial fella in the world, but, all the time he is smilin', under his breath he is growlin' and dam'in' us up hill and down to the camera man.

If directors were interested enough to know what the extras thought of them, they 'd learn a lot of things; but there are only a few big enough to ever ask us our opinion of a bit of action, or en'thin' else. In some Civil "War battle stuff a while back, the director had a young army capt'n assistin' him, so's to have the technic correct; and, because the capt'n acted in a know-it-aU way, he thought he was wise to the etiquette of soldiers at all periods. Now in the scene there were some old codgers from the Soldiers' Home, at Sawtelle, and they saw that the action was wrong in many ways; so one of them timidly went up and told the director that he 'd like to make a suggestion. He was dismissed very curtly, without a chance to say a word. If that fool director had listened, he would 'a' learned—in time to save a fifteen-hundred-dollar retake—that privates in Civil War times did not salute their officers at all as they do now; that and a lotta other things which his capt'n was too young to know.

The thing that surprised me when I broke into the pictures was that extras had a social caste quite as well defined as the stock actors and the leads. The fella who digs ditches or peddles fish, and occasionally kicks into the pictures in the mob stuff, is not considered an extra man; this is a profession in itself. Extra men carry their little kits, jest like piano-tuners and doctors —grease-paint, wigs, toilet articles, and what not. They go from studio to studio as the shiftin' needs require 'em; and, as they are known everywhere, they always get first call over the floaters that "want in" because they are in need of a few dollars.

Many extra men specialize on certain stunts, or in characters that they are specially fitted for. A fella like "Dress-suit Charlie," for instance, has almost a clairvoyant hunch where they are goin' to do ball-room stuff; and, as he is a doll-baby and a good dancer, he 's probably atmosphered in more society pictures than any fella in the country. The "soup and fish," as we caU the society stuff, pays five dollars a day. Then, a fella like Old Pop Purdy is in almost perpetual demand for judges and old-man parts. He 's specially good in the Si Perkins stuff, because he can take out his teeth.

This reminds me that there is a regular scale in this business.

The cheapest work is mob stuff. Crowds are usually furnished by the employment agencies; and, as no costumes are necessary, they go on jest as they come. The pay is a great, big, round, iron dollar a day, with sometimes carfare; and usually it includes lunch, which consists of a sandwich, pickle, wedge o' pie, and a cupa coffee. As I said before, these mob folks are not extra

people in our definition. The leads and stock don't think much of us socially; but, like the office-boy who had the cat to kick, we 've got one group lower'n us.

Before the war the cheapest regular extra work was the soldier stuff, payin' two dollars a day. These men were mostly recruited from the fellas that had served their enlistment in the army, or deserted it. In the big battle stuff, where they had to hire thousands, the regular soldier extra men were put in charge of squads to drill and handle; and for this work they got five dollars.

"Atmosphere" is the official name of the next group. These are the ones who work in costumes furnished by the studio; and the pay is three a day. Where a fella furnishes his own spangles, he hits the pay-check for five. Here 's where the boy with the dress-suit and the girl with the ball-gown cut in.

VABIOUS PARTS, VARIOUS PRICES

A small "bit" also gets five a day; but a good bit, such as a butler, draws seven and a half. There are some fellas so suited and intended for certain characters that they are always in demand for those parts, and nothin' else. I know one chap who does nothin' but buttle in the homes of the rich, and he 's always wantin' to be cast for adventurous parts.

It must be that when God makes a man, he sometimes says to himself, "Now this fella will be an umbreUa-mender, and this fella I 11 make into a butler," and so on; for there are some in this business who couldn't change from what God made 'em up for, with all the clothes and grease-paint in the prop. room.

There is an old colored fella, ownin' a bunch o' liver

ies, who has acted as coachman, footman, and manservant in half the pictures in the country. Old Pop Purdy is rarely outa work, though his dream is of the day when he will be taken in stock. The enthusiasm he has for his parts, no matter how small, is almost pathetic. Even when he 's jest doin' atmosphere, he 's in character—if he has to invent the part.

So well understood are the scales for the different kinds of work that extra people never talk of the characters they 're portrayin'. You hear one fella call to another: "What yeh made up for, Bill?" "Three dollars," he replies; "but to-morra I 'm workin' in five-dollar stuff, and next week I 've got two days at the Eureka doin' seven-fifty."

The highest-priced extras are the rare types and the dare-devils. These latter are the ones who will make bad falls and take hard beatin's, and do about en'thin' they are told to. The Climax has a fella who 's a daredevil and a half; for he told me himself that he was half Indian, half Mex., and half Chink. He 's not what you 'd call prepossessin' in appearance, but he 'd take a high dive into hell for a ten-doUar bill. He 's got long, black hair; so he often doubles for women who have to be handled rough.

A funny one happened last spring. Hawkeye was doublin' for a dear little baby-doll who had to be thrown out of a window by the villain; and it was necessary that he have his back to the camera during the whole action, for it was all downstage stuff. He did a back fall that was a perfect wonder, landin' flat up in a bed of flowers, right in front of the camera; but his attitude was such that— How will I say it? Well, anyway, ladies are

not supposed to wear half-hose garters; and the picture was spoiled, the worst part bein' that a retake was impossible because Hawkeye had to go to the hospital with a sprained back. That poor devil spends about half his time in splints.

A SHORT ENGAGEMENT AS UNCLE JOE

The other high-priced extras that I spoke of—the rare types—also draw down ten a day; but they are used only on unusual occasions. Once, when we were makin' a congressional picture, the director wanted a type that looked like Joe Cannon. After scourin' the whole town over for a week or more, one of the assistants dug up an old codger on the West Side who was a dead ringer for your Uncle Joe. He had spent his lifetime as a minister in the service of the Lord, but when he was asked to play the part of Joe Cannon, he got all swelled up on himself. Perhaps he was flattered to look like anyone so prominent, but most likely he was sufEerin' from the same itch that everyone has to act in the movies. If some one tells you that he once knew a fella who was so modest that he didn't want to see himself in the pictures, and if you 've got the patience to run down the rumor, you '11 find there is no truth in it; for— take it from one who knows—"there ain't no sich animal."

The fall of this dear old fella was complete. He got work for only two days, but those two days were enough to ruin him for life. After his hour of dramatic intoxication he simply couldn't go back to the prosaic job of herdin' human sheep in the straight and narrow path, specially as some of 'em had got lost in the mtovies.

No; a new wine had got into his veins, and it was goodnight flock and everythin'. He was a movie-actor now, by heck! And, s'help me, he 's been warmin' a bench at the studio ever since. I suppose he 's hopin' some day he '11 be reelected to the House.

Anyway, there he sits, day after day, without a chance in the world, while a lot of nice white sheep are gettin' all soiled up, jest because their shepherd has deserted 'em.

When this movie bug once gets into the system, it 's sunthin' awful! There are a lotta corkin' big brawny brutes who 've lost their usefulness as gas-fitters because they got on once in a mob scene, and are convinced that Hobart Bosworth is holdin' 'em out of a job because of his jealousy and his pull with the management.

"Dan," said Dune, one night when we were playin' cribbage in that dump we first lived in down on Temple Street, "let 's kick into this game seriously and see if we can't land somewhere. A lotta people think that the actin' job is a joke, but I 've come to the conclusion that anyone who can add any pleasure and joy to this miserable old world is a high priest. And when you see the number of ex-prize fighters that have deserted real drama and have made good in comedy, it would seem that we ought to do as well as a lotta infightin' welterweights."

So we determined to learn all we could, work like pups, save our money, and see if we couldn't attract some favorable notice First, we got us complete grease-paint outfits and began to study make-up. Dune developed some amazin' results. He is no Mary Pickford as to

looks, nor am I built like Annette Kellermann; but we got so 's we could give some of the professional beauts a battle. At first, my face had about as much mobility as an iron dog; but Dune would rehearse me by the hour in different expressions, until I got so 's I could register about every emotion a f eUa 's likely to have, and a few unlikely ones, such as bein' asked to play the lead in a five-reel feature. Gradually we began to gather a wardrobe—dress-suits, Western stuff, and such, hopin' some day to be equipped as well as the best of 'em. During the two years of our accumulations we had a good many ups and downs; but from the first, one or the other of us had sunthin' to do.

The greatest trouble in this game is holdin' up a decent wage scale. There have been all sorts of organizations and unions, but they usually end up at an employment agency, and then peter out. The low scale is due to the number of idle people who will work for almost nothin', jest to be occupied. Los Angeles is full of folks who have come out here for their health, or to sit in the garden and get warm. Many of them have small incomes, and don't actually have to work; but they want to be occupied, and what could be more fun than to act in the movies! Even rich society people crab our game by offering to work for nothin'; they consider it quite a lark. If a studio wants a buncha well-dressed atmosphere, like as not the assistant director wiU call up the social secretaries of some of the hotels and tell them to send over a eoupla loads of goldfish. The social secretaries will suggest the scheme to a welldressed bunch of rich ones from the East.

AN EXPENSIVE SET THEEATENED

Will they go? Lord, you couldn't keep 'em out with fly-screens! If they knew that perhaps they were holdin' out of a job some poor girl that had gone broke buyin' a wardrobe for jest such chances, maybe they wouldn't go takin' her job away from her.

Some of the cheap studios, knowin' that we can't organize, take advantage of that fact and make us stand even their own losses. "When we were new and ignorant at this business we got work jn a big picture that was usin' a whole lot of extras. One day we were all dressed for our parts, but the light was bad; and the director, after keepin' us standin' round until three o'clock, came out and said we were dismissed, and to report the next day. Right then there was trouble. A few belligerent lads, led by Dune, went up to the ofSee and told 'em if we did n't get our pay we would wreck the set—and we meant it.

Furthermore, we gave 'em ten minutes to do it, for we did n't want to get in a jam' with the police, and we knew that they could n't get out to the studio from town in less 'n half an hour. That set cost upward of thirty thousand dollars; so they thought it cheaper to pay us than to take any chances.

We were waitin' one day in the yard of a new studio, with about thirty other fellas, when a chap named Bernstein began tellin' us what dubs we were not to organize; and he got into quite an argument with a great big lobster called Squinty. While they were hot at it, the employment director came out and said he wanted twelve men; but all he could pay was a dollar.

Nobody made the slightest move for a long time; then Squinty stood up and, lookin' straight at Bernstein, said:

"I'll work for a dollar."

Well, it 's jest as well that he did his lookin' then, for two seconds later his lamps were trimmed and his face was otherwise all mussed up. When Squinty could finally distinguish between light and darkness, he made a very ashamed exit. The director stood there grinnin' while this was goin' on; and when calm returned, he said:

"I don't blame you fellas for that. I would n't work for a dollar, either. I was sent out to hire you guys for a dollar, if I could get you; but, seein' I can't, I '11 have to give you two.''

The picture we were drawn for was a modem, smalltown, street scene, and there was to be some sort of a row on the hotel balcony. Six were told off to go up and start roughin' it up, Bernstein bein' one of 'em. Now I 've done a bit o' travelin' and have seen some pretty rotten things pulled, but this here balcony stunt was the rawest ever. Imagine hirin' a painter to paint your house, and then you goin' out and puUin' the ladder from under him, and thinkin' it was a joke! Well, that's about what they did in this scene. The balcony was fixed with a breakaway, and when the boys were warmed up to the struggle, some one pulled the support out and down come the whole works. It made a corkin' picture, no doubt; but some of the fellas were badly hurt, one of 'em quite seriously. For the fall stuff the studios usually employ daredevils at ten dollars a day, who know how to fall from en'thin'. These guys

SUPES AND SUPERMEN 223

were jest cheap; and to save those few dollars they pulled that miserable trick.

If you remember, this was the bunch that refused to work for one dollar, stiU feelin' very 1776 after beatin' up Squinty. Bernstein started the survival of the fittest by lightin' into the director; and, as he seemed to be the guilty one, the rest of us jest stood round to see that he got a fair wallop at the bird. In a minute the whole place was in an uproar, and Bernstein made his get-away in the confusion.

Every now and then I read in the papers that Americans are softies and have lost their "militant spirit"; but there seems to be lots of punch in certain fellas out in this part of the world. Anyway, you couldn't convince the big directors that we can't raise the grandest army of roughbucks in the world.

MR. MEADE HITS THE PAVEMENT

Another time, in a Mexican story, a bunch of us were sittin' round waitin' to go on, when a camera kid I knew came up to me and said:

"Dan, I jest heard the lead talkin' to the director, and they are framin' one I thiok you ought to know about. The scheme is to have you all sittin' round the entrance of the adobe house, and Meade will roll off the roof right into the middle of the bunch, usin' you for cushions to break his fall. The director suggested that he might incidentally break your necks; but Meade said he 'd fix it to have nothin' but Mexicans.

When I heard this, I went and dug up the patron who bosses the Mexicans and tipped him off that this curly-haired brute was goin' to use his countrymen

224 FILM FOLK

as shockabsorbers for a pretty fall. I couldn't understand what he called out; but jest as Meade got to roUin' nicely, those boys opened up the prettiest hole you ever saw, and Mr. Gansevoort Meade hit the adobe pavement with such realism, that it loosened up about a thousand dollars' worth of bridgework. And the joke of it was he couldn't say en'thin' about it—if he'd had the breath, which he hadn't—without tippin' his hand. Anyway, he had that bump comin'.

The Mexicans are the queerest bunch that work extra. They are employed by a patron, and consequently take orders from him only. A director can shout his fool head off, even in bad and violent Spanish, but they won't do a thing until their pairon tells 'em to. They work best in the battle stuff, for they are naturally better actors and more dramatic than Americans. The lowestbrowed dub in the bunch has some artistic sense and will take a fearful drubbing for art's sake.

Strangely enough, they fight with much more enthusiasm just before lunch. The studio lunches are banquets to fellas who 've grown up strong on chili beans. I once heard a director tell a patron to tell his men that he was goin' to pay 'em five dollars for their day's work; but he expected 'em to earn it. Say, you ought to 've seen those black devils fight! They 'd liked to have killed one another.

So long as I have told you those rummy anecdotes, I 'm goin' to get another off my chest and then turn to pleasanter subjects.

"We were workin' in a picture one day at the beach, where the hero had to climb up a cliff by a rope, with four or five of us folio win' him up. When Edgar was

near the top, and the rest of us were danglin' below him like a rope of pearls, we heard some one up above call out to cut the rope. This cheerful direction was given without any warning, for naturally none of us would 'a' gone aloft if we had known that the rope was to be cut. You can imagine what a splash we made as we all pitched down, one on topa the other. They no doubt got some "swell film"; but a pinhead director could get a "swell murder" if he actually had a fella kill his mother in front of the camera. This was the first time that I 'd been caught in any of these cheap stunts, and my spirit was sorer than my old bruised hulk.

The first thing that occurred to me when I untangled myself from that squirmin' mess of men was to get my hands on the gent who said to cut the rope. I looked up to the top of the cliff, where the other camera was located, and, seein' the director peekin' over, I started up after him. It 's jest as well he beat it when he saw me comin', for I was not very amiable at that moment, and there 's no tellin' what a fella 's likely to do when he 's het up.

There 're at least two, and sometimes as many as four, sides to every question; and I don't want you to think that all directors treat their extras like these few I 've mentioned. Then, too, there are no end of extra people who are entitled to little consideration. Check-grabbers, who stall every minute they can, are a fearful expense and a darn nuisance. At some studios it got so that a fella would go to the ofSce and get his ticket; then, at the first opportunity, beat it off the lot, but turn up in the evenin' to get his ticket cashed. Nowadays you get your

card, go to the costume department and get it pimched for the spangles and props; then, when you return the stuff, get it punched again; and then, finally, you must get it signed by the assistant director—^who knows whether you 've been workin' or not—^before you can get it cashed at the office. Even with such precautions, many of these dubs find ways of beating the companies.

This trick is easiest to pull where there are many people engaged, and the scene is spread over a lotta country. In a big Babylonian ten-reeler we were makin' last spring, there were so many people in the picture that they stalled by hundreds. In one very excitin' night-scene, where everybody was supposed to be in the picture, I saw at least forty Babylonian warriors playin' cards and smokin' cigarettes on the walls of Babylon, while the Persians were thunderin' at the gates. No wonder they got in. A bunch of these fellas were caught and had to give up their tickets; but, at that, there was a pile o' money lost.

Check-grabbers who sneak off into the brush to smoke or sleep durin' the big outdoor scenes are called squirrels. Most companies have horsemen for no other purpose than to jest ride round and stir them out. In a Civil War picture last month some powder-monkeys went out to plant dynamite under an army wagon, and, for some reason, they decided to overturn it first. When they did so, out rolled five squirrels!

The rottenest thing about the check-grabbers is that they crab the game for all of us. No matter how honest and ambitious a fella is, he is open to the same suspicion as these guys.

The greatest pests in the game are the cheap skates

who try to "make paper" with the directors by flatterin' 'em. They stand round within hearin' distance of the director and tell everybody what a wonderful fella Mister So-and-So is. Then they are always buttin' round askin' the boss whether their make-up is satisfactory.

Some directors love this kind of cheap flattery and are always trailia' a bunch of worshipin' favorites round with 'em. There are others who are bored to death with these sticky slobs and think up all sorts of picturesque ways to hand it to 'em. A favorite one with Goodhue was to start a fella runnin' out of the picture and forget to tell him to stop.

One day a man named Haney got Goodhue's goat so hard that he grew pretty peevish; and I figured that he was framin' sunthin' excitin' for Mr. Haney. Sure enough, when we were about through Goodhue calls him over and says:

"Haney, I want you to load on your minin' kit; and, startin' by this tree, I want you to walk straight out of the picture. And don't turn round for en'thin', because I 'm goin' to try a long-distance slow dissolve. I want to get one of those lonesome effects of a chap headed for the settin' sun."

In less than a minute Haney had grown six inches and a -half round the chest. To be picked for the final dissolve! This was fame that came to but few.

"We aU stood round, watchin' to see how the camera man would work his shutter; but when Haney had gone beyond hearin' distance, Goodhue, with his fingers to his lips, ordered the cameras struck, and motioned us all to our machines. By this time Haney had gone about

a mile, and he never so much as turned his head. Take a chance of spoilin' such a picture? Never!

This comedy was enacted up in the San Fernando Valley, where the distances are perfectly magnificent. To'rd the west, as far as the eye could see, stretched a limitless waste. After we had been ridin' for about ten minutes, Goodhue ordered the machines to stop.

"Boys," said he, "I never saw such a sunset; let's wait for a minute and drink it in."

It certainly was grand! And 'way, 'way off yonder we could jest barely see a little black spot on the horizon, which grew less and less, and finally disappeared. It was Haney dissolvin' into the settin' sun.

HOW TO BREAK IN

If you read the movie magazines, you 've discovered by this time how all the leads broke into the pictures. They love to tell of the way they struggled against fearful odds and then arrived by their own superb powers; or else how the director went over backward the first time he saw 'em, and, as soon as he recovered, got 'em to sign a contract for a measly three hundred dollars a week that they had a fierce time breakin'. They also assure you that, if you are as handsome, intelligent, and persistent as they are, you can also make the grade to film fame. As competition with their physical splendors and splendid brains is too hopelessly discouragin', about all that's left for most of us is persistence.

As very few of the supermen arrive via the extra job, their stories are more interestin' than helpful. So I 'm goin' to tell you how the ninety-and-nine break in.

First of all, it is absolutely necessary to appear in person. You '11 never get a job by writin' for it, or thinkin', because you 've mailed your certificate from the Correspondence School of Expression, that they '11 send for you. If you 've had any experience, state it, and make your statement strong; leave a photo of your fair young face; and then be sure to live on a telephone. Now if you have a good, strong wife who 's willin' to work, perhaps you can stick round for eight or ten years waitin' for the director to send for you, as he said he would; but if you want to get action before you are good for only old-man parts, you 'd better keep makin' the grand tour of the studios.

It 's a pretty tiresome job, for they are far apart; but after awhile you '11 begin to get tips where work is likely to be had. If you hang to it long enough—and this will depend upon your wife's ability to keep you in that station of life which will assure a good front and enough fuel so 's you can make the rounds—perhaps some purple day you will be called.

If you once start out after this movie job, you can't work elsewhere; for the very day you 're off the job is the day they want you. That's where a good, strong wife can tide a fella over. I knew one chap who waited at a certain studio continuously for six weeks; then one day he tried his luck at another, and while he was gone the director came out and asked for him. One of his friends called the lad up that night and told him about it, so he hot-footed right over the next mornin'; but the director gave him a bawlin' out for not bein' round when he was wanted.

A pull works in this business the same as in any other.

Great men often have lowly acquaintances; and a bellhop who gets very friendly with the director who lives in his hotel will stand a lot better chance of landin' a job than a fella without any friends on the inside.

Extras are hired by the assistant-directors; or, as some studios make a separate job of this, by the "talent man" or "employrn' director." In order to hold their jobs these feUas have to show good judgment in their choices; but, after all, they are jest as human as the rest of us, and often will fix it so 's some fella they like can make a few dollars.

The extras that come from the stage seem to make the grade easier than the others, not because they have more talent, but because they have more crust. They think a lot better of themselves than ordinary folks, and have a way of stickin' round until they impress the talent man that they are the goods. There isn't a doubt that there is a lot of fine, smolderin' talent lyin' round on the benches outside the office, but the owners haven't got the front to go with it; and, b'lieve me, this is no game for modest violets.

FAILUKES WHO HATE SUCCESSES

As Los Angeles is the terminus—that's a softer word than finish—of many a road company, the town is full to overflowin' of "artists" who are "restin'." But no real artist wants to "rest"; so he offers his services to the studios, and if there is a ghost of a show, he wiU get it, while the ordinary humans are readia' special articles on How to Break In.

Dune and I landed because of astrology, or omens, or sunthin'. We fortunately began in comedy; and

Dune, bein' a real eomedian, pulled some bully gags that cinched our jobs for a while, at least. He worked them all with me, our physical contrasts bein' funny to start with.

I don't much blame the police for forbiddin' our pictures where they have the power of censorship, for our portrayal of these dignified guardians of the law was not such as to command the respect that they think is their due. I 've found that there are three classes of people who can't take a joke: school-teachers, ministers, and the police. These professions seem to put a crimp in a fella's sense of humor.

I was remarkin' this to Dune the other night, and he agreed; but he said I ought to include extra men.

"It 's my observation, Dan," said he, "that the bum actor is the most serious and egotistical ass in our social cosmos. Nine tenths of the dubs we work with think they are really good, and that the fellas at the top are a bunch of prunes who have landed in the headlines because of some drag. Jest go down to the Kampau Bar some night and hear 'em rave.

" 'Griffith?' says one. 'Why, I knew Griff when he didn't have a bean to his name! Met him down in Menfis one time, tryin' to beat a hand-out; and I slipped him a dollar. Now he does n't even know me!'

" 'Walthall an actor?' pipes up another. 'Ah, ya make me sick! He was nothin' but a punk super when I was playin' opposite Edna May!'

" 'Arbuckle funny?' comes from 'way down the bar. 'He 's jest as funny as an ulcerated tooth! You know why he holds his job, don't you? Well, the big boss don't dare to fire 'im. Why? Well, this is jest

between us; but they say that Arbuckle knows where the girl is buried.' And so on.

"It 's queer," Dune continued, "how all the leadin' men of the good old days are now workin' extra. To hear 'em talk, you 'd think Mansfield would 'a' been carryin' a spear, if it hadn't been for their splendid support. No, Dan; these guys are anatomically shy a funny-bone. And vain? S'help me, I b'lieve an extra man's dream of heaven would be to drive through town in a pink automobile with his name painted on the side!"

Of course Dune puts it a bit strong, even if there is some truth in what he says. I myself think the extras are funniest when they begin to tell you of the scenarios they 've written. They always cast themselves for the lead, but they never send their script in. Why would they? The studios, they always say, would only steal the ideas and send them back. That has been the experience of so many—^to hear them tell it—that they guard their secrets jealously. Unless you should ask them; then you are in for a bad two hours. It's a shame that these great dramas are doomed never to dram; but that 's always the way with genius!

You might not think, from lookin' at some of them, that they would worry Francis X very much; but that's because you 've never seen their pictures. Where they get 'em is a secret of the dark-room, for it is hard to b'lieve that science could be so inaccurate. Yet they will flash carbon prints on you that would make a marshmallow taste like a quinine capsule.

The reason that the "still men" all go crazy is due to the pesterin' that these fellas give 'em. After a

moving-picture is shot, the still man always sets up his camera to take a picture, which will be used for advertisin' purposes; and if a fella can crowd into a good close-up alongside of the star, he '11 beg a print off the still man, which he will carry until it is worn out, showin' everyone how important he was in that story. And if they can some day get the poor man to shoot a still of 'em all alone, they have got photographic proof that they were playin' at least second lead. Oh, but best of all, if they can nail a few inches of film showin' 'em in a close-up, their immortality is fixed. What manicure-girl wouldn't be impressed to see her cutie in a close-up with Wallie Reid?

But, after all, I don't b'lieve that the stock actors and leads are very different from the extra man in these respects. I hear 'em all puUin' pretty much the same patter. We 've got the largest If I Had That Fella's Chance Club in the world.

It is n't everybody who knows his limitations as well as Dune, and it isn't everybody who will listen to another's estimate of himself as patient as I do.

"Dan," said he to me one day, "you 're not built like the ApoUonaris Belverdere; nor have you a face like Lillian Russell, but you make a good heavy; and when you wore the tin cans in that Joan of Arc picture, you were the grandest knight in the bunch! And in comedy you are sure funny! But that's God's fault, not yours. So, don't, I beg of you, ever spill this stuff about not havin' a chance to show your art. If you 're goin' to be an actor, try and be original."

That 's my number; but I knew it before Dune called it. I am perfectly resigned to stay within my limits

—some day I '11 enlarge my limits; but that 's another matter—and I 'm happier for it. At least, I don't suffer the shootin' pains of egosipelas, that dread disease which claims so many of my brother artists. No; Dune and I decided that our physical and educational limitations forbid us ever settin' the world on fire. But that reminds me that we come pretty darn' near doin' it once, anyway.

FIGHTING ENOUGH FOR ALL

Late in the summer of '15 we went up into the Great Tejunga to make some battle pictures, and we sure did have the battle of our lives.

It was fearful rotten judgment that ordered a battle picture in such a place before the rains had come. Here was another place where the director could 'a' learned a pile from the extras, for among them were hundreds who knew the mountains well, and they freely predicted the trouble we were in for. But, as unconcerned as though we were pullin' stadio stuff, the powder-monkeys were ordered to plant powder-bombs all over the bloomin' landscape.

After the battle started, because of the dense smoke from the bombs, the director did not notice that the brush was afire in several places until it had got a fierce start. When he saw what he had done, he ordered the picture stopped and for us to turn in and fight fire.

Even on an apparently calm day there is likely to be strong air drainage up those canons, and in less than ten minutes the fire got started up the valley, and all the devils from Cork to Connaught couldn't 'a' stopped it.

"When the director saw how futile our efforts were, he told off some of the men to round up the scattered members of the company, and the camera men were ordered to kick in and get some good fire stuff. But the opportunity to get this wonderful film was denied us, for we 'd no more 'n got started when four rangers rode up; and, polite as en'thin', one of 'em said he hated to put us to any trouble, but that our Uncle Samuel gave him authority to impress all able-bodied men into his service to fight fire.

The director argued about the expense of his two hundred men, and how he simply had to get back to the studio; but the ranger was cold-eyed and firm, and the young cannon he toted in his belt was no prop.

So off we went in squads of fifty, under the leadership of rangers, to see whether we could stop what we had started. By this time it looked as though the whole world was on fire; for miles the woods were burnin' with a roar that was downright terrifyin'. Pretty soon we were joined by other rangers, comin' from different directions, and the way they went about their business was inspirin'. If you 'd 'a' seen that fire and the handful of men who set out to stop it, you 'd 'a' thought there wasn't a chance in the world. But fire-fightin' was their business, and they didn't seem a bit discouraged. The rangers knew exactly what to do, and went off with only a word from the head ranger.

THE MADNESS OP MR. MEADE

The thing that tickled me was the way the ranger handed it to Meade, our leadin' man. Meade was mad and indignant over the whole thing. He didn't think

the work was his social equal; and he didn't want to soil his ridin'-panties and pretty putties. He beefed so much about his troubles that the hard-hearted ranger jest naturally picked him out for the hot stuff. The way that poor milk-fed boy swat and swore kept the rest of us good-humored all night.

I learned later that the studio had a fierce time squarin' itself with the Forest Service for havin' started the fire. Nowadays we 're not allowed to pull any of that stuff without the presence of a ranger to show us where to head in.

A mighty good feature of this studio is the Suggestion Department; for, besides payin' a fella for any notions he might have, it calls the attention of the management to your work. I made fifteen dollars one month and twenty-five another by suggestin' some new gags for the comedy stuff.

It's curious that studios have personalities, jest like cities. Dune and I beat it round for two years from one to the other, and no two of them was alike. One of the first places I worked in was well organized, efficient, and apparently clean; but for some reason the women didn't care for it. I made a pretty good guess at the answer when I got acquainted with the manager. Falstaff looked like a Saint Francis, by comparison. Some studios are laid out like small fair-grounds, with parks, walks, and gardens all round; then there are others that look like the pictures of model towns—^fine concrete buildings, all in rows; automatic sprinklers, and clocks to punch. These latter are the cannin' factories; efficient as the devil, but about as inspirin' as a boilershop.

Perhaps the most excitin' studios are those thrown up by some new-rich fellas who are breakin' into the pictures for the first time. Every gambler who ever made any money out of a film success right away thinks he is a producer, and, after roundin' up a million dollars or less from his stock-jobbin' bunch, lands in Los Angeles, leases ten acres, wishes together a big ramshackle studio, and starts takin' pictures. The pickin's for the actors and directors are fine while they last; but unfortunately—or fortunately for the public—the company goes fluey about the third release.

Dune and I worked for six weeks at one of these mushroom studios in a big American war drama; and it was a riot. The directors were mostly dubs, and the extras put it all over 'em. You may wonder how a fella who was editin' a trade-paper last week, or a well-bred 'rah-'rah boy right outa papa's office in New York, could jump in and start takin' pictures—even bad ones! Well, it's the camera man that does it. They, of course, must know the technic of a picture, and they have to quietly coach the director, or the result would be an awful mess. Whenever you see a new director standin' close up to the camera man and talkin' as though he was givin' him instructions, you can make a fair bet that he is askin' the boy who turns the crank what he thinks of the action.

THE DIRECTOR GETS THE HOOK

I 'm afraid I was responsible for the cannin' of one director at this studio. He was a vain devil, ignorant and abusive, and thought he had to show everyone in the cast how to do the least thing. The trouble came

because about forty of us who were workin' in a big scene couldn't help laughin' in the presence of death. After all, it 's human nature to cry at weddin's and laugh at funerals; so there was no particular reason for him to get so miffed.

The king had been eatin' too many tarts, or sunthin', and was lyin' in a great canopied bed, sufferin' from royal cramps; and, while thus indulgin', he was supposed to cash in, with all the chamberlains and chambermaids of the royal apartments standin' round registerin' royal grief.

"Well, the king gent didn't seem to be pullin' his demise as the director thought a king would, and he became angry and abusive. "Don't you know how to die, you great big fish? Well I '11 show you!" he screamed, and rushed over as though he intended to punch the head of our beloved monarch; but instead of that, he jumped into bed, shoes and all, kicked the king out on the far side, and then gave his ideas of the croakin' of a king.

His Highness looked so pathetically absurd, standin' there takin' lessons in deathcraft from such a mad and excited near-corpse, that we all burst out laughin'. This made the director so furious that he jumped out from under his royal tent and bawled us out most scandalously. He ripsnorted round until his buttons were aU over the place.

When he had us all properly squelched, he started the scene all over again, and the poor old king did his gol-damedest to die accordin' to the script. When he got to the final spasm and began to roll his eyes, I thought of how funny the director looked in bed with

SUPES AND SUPERMEN 239

his boots on, and I let out a little snort. Some one else giggled, and we were all howlin' again.

The director jest turned white and began to rave, stompin' round like he was in a padded cell. Then he pulled a line of profanity that no woman should have heard; so I drilled up to him and told him that he 'd have to cut out that talk; that it wasn't nice. Then he turned loose on me.

Jest at that moment the general manager, hearin' the noise, came along; and, seein' the director's rage, called him aside and says: "I 'm afraid, Mr. Weldon, that you are temper'mentally unfit to handle men. I '11 ask Mr. Davis, your assistant, to finish the scene, and you come with me until you are feelin' calmer." We heard next day that he was fired.

After our first start on this business, Dune and I decided to move along slowly on legitimate lines, rather than to go after the swollen wages of the daredevils.

WHEN DAREDEVILS AKE HURT

Some of the daredevils are in the garage most of the time; but, of course, the company has 'em all insured. If a fella is hurt doin' ten-dollar stuff, he gets ten dollars a day for two weeks; after that he draws sixty-five per cent, of the wages he was workin' at for fifty-two weeks, if he 's in the hospital that long. Then they stand suit for damages, or settle. If a chap 's killed, no doubt the studio will buy him a handsome satin-lined wooden overcoat; but as yet few have attained that raiment.

Here 's a funny one: A fella, whose name I 've forgotten, was notorious for his daredeviltry, and, curiously.

240 FILM FOLK

had never once been to the hospital; but one beautiful summer day he was quietly drivin' his girl to the beach when he was run into by a speediu' flivver, and darned if he was n't killed, though the girl did n't get a scratch!

You must n't get the idea that all the dangerous stuff is done by professionals. Some of these poor extra devils get so hard up that they become desperate and will offer to do en'thin' for a few dollars; and they are usually the ones who are hurt. I 've seen no end of 'em jump into the ocean when they couldn't swim a stroke. They 'd take a chance o' drownin' before they 'd lose that three dollars.

I remember one wild-eyed fella who offered to do a fall from an aeropleine for five dollars. "Fact is," said he, "there are two things I can do before I starve: One is to risk my life for a picture, and the other is to steal. As my life doesn't seem to be worth a damn, I think I '11 take the risk. Besides, the finish would be finer!"

"Whenever we do water stuff some of us find out those who can't swim, and then we arrange to have good swimmers go in close by, so they can help 'em to a landin'.

The cowboys are another type of daredevil; but, as their risks are rare, they either work on regular salary or as ordinary extras, gettin' extra pay for any dangerous ridin' or falls they have to make.

They are the hardest-workin' and most conscientious extras in the game. They tend mostly to their own business, but will do any darned thing the management asks them. They 've got no highfalutin' notions that manual labor will ruin their art. They are also the

happiest bunch on the lot, doin' a pile of skylarkin'.

Cowboys are used in all parts requirin' good horsemanship—cavalry, Cossacks, and even polo-players; and, of course, doublin' with the leads in all dangerous ridin'.

Some time ago, when the studios had cowboys on regular salary, they got from thirty to forty dollars a month, and found; but those were the days when everyone was makin' Westerns. Europe bein' the biggest buyer of this class of pictures, there has been a big slump in Westerns since the war. Nowadays the cowboys are free-lancin' it, jest like the others.

If a Western picture is bulletined at a studio now, it's very amusiu' to see how the ordinary extras will try to break in. They 'U tear downtown, rent a pair of chaps and a big hat, turn up at the studio chewin' tobacco or roUin' brown-paper cigarettes; and then stand round bow-legged, hopin' that they look like regular cowboys.

"If your face was your fortune, Dan," said Dune one day, "you 'd be in the hands of a receiver. But, at that, you need your old pam to stick grease-paint on, so you 'd better shy the daredevil stuff. And as neither of us has ridden en'thin' but the brake-beams, I guess we 'd better not imitate the cowboys."

No, siree! We two old battle-axes stuck strictly to our knittin'; and we were goin' to arrive, if my good health and Dune's brains were worth en'thin' to us.

DATS THAT COULD NOT LAST

The copy-books also say that excellence will tell; and in this great big, seethin' bunch it ought to be easy

242 FILM POLK

to hear it, if it tells ever so little. When I saw that most extras were jest check-grabbers, and when I 'd sneak up on about forty, loafin' and smokin* in the scene docks, I thought to myself there was a good chance, even for a coupla fellas like Dune and me.

Once in a while a guy breaks into the extra game who has education, culture, and all the trimmin's that go to make a success. If they get a chance, they do well, too. But they don't get many chances, for the directors know the type well. The trouble is booze. They are not dependable, and this business requires that quality above all others. I met one, an Eastern college fella who 'd been in the shippin' business in Boston, but had gone to the devil with liquor. He 'd come all the way to California to work outdoors, thinkin' the state was goin' dry.

Mr. Mills, the big director of our studio, took me aside the other day and gave me some valuable tips. He says I 've got a fine picture sense, and could work into the technical department if I had more of an education. Well, a lot of people have got an education when they were much older than thirty-three. When I see the care and trouble that the Eesearch Department goes to in order to get accurate sets, I realize that a fella 'd have to be mighty well-informed to hook up with them.

If you are observin', you can learn no end of things right on the lot. Think of havin' the whole world come to you—foreign lands, streets, houses^ anilnals, and people, absolutely true in every detail! I 've gone from Greenland's icy mountains to India's coral strand— all in one day.

And, to prove that the copy-books are right, my

SUPES AND SUPERMEN 243

perseverance has landed me in stock at thirty-five a week. This is all the more notable, for of late the studios have been cuttin' down their stock. At present most of 'em are employin' only a few leads and character people, and hire a whole new crew for each picture.

That's why workin' extra has become so respectable of late. We used to look with awe—if not admiration —up to the stock actor; but nowadays the ranks are so full of 'em, who are glad enough to work for even a few days, that to work extra no longer means social inferiority.

No doubt the present arrangement is good business, but it 's pretty tough on the actors. But, alas, those gorgeous get-rieh-quick days couldn't last forever.

VI

"MOTHER, MAY I GO IN THE FILMS?"

(THE STUDIO MOTHER TELLS OP THE EXTRA GIRLS)

MANY people consider the discovery of scientific motherhood the one triumph of this gloomy old century. Certainly it must be obvious to anyone who reads up-to-date literature on the subject that our grandmothers were perfect pikers at bringing up children. We have become the splendid folk we are despite our mothering, not because of it. Take me, for instance. Here I am, putting it all over the old woman who lived in a shoe; for if I didn't know exactly what to do with my threescore children, I could n't hold my job for thirty minutes. A studio mother has, at times, as many as three hundred daughters to look after, and their wellbeing is a complex responsibility that no old woman could possibly encompass, however sprightly.

Her position grew out of the necessity the big companies were under to pull order out of the chaos that accompanied the mushroom growth of the moving-picture industry in its early years.

The Big Fish were so excited over their profits in those fairy days that they did not interest themselves in the local management of their studios. The employ

244

ing and chaperoning of the girls, for instance, was left to the individual director. If the individual happened to be a gentleman, well and good; but in my recollection of the directors of that period there were very few of them who would have been medaled for gentility. In fact, so shameless was the behavior of some, that ministers investigated, women's clubs whereased, and uplift ladies went snooping about. We were in a constant state of "in bad" with the board of education and the probation officers of the juvenile court; but the real blow came when one notorious character from a very unpleasant studio was run out of town. Then all the managers sat up.

My appointment as studio mother did not come as an entire surprise to me, for I had been acting unofficially in that capacity for some time.

When musical comedy petered out, some eight or ten years ago, George and I beat it right for the coast to work in the pictures. Those were the dear old days of the hair-pants stories; and as George was built like these boys of the clothing advertisements, he made a perfectly grand Eastern hero for the Western stuff. But alas! his poor little blond wife was not designed for riding bucking broncs or brake-beams, and she could be used only at those times when they wanted a sugary little thing from the city to emphasize the splendid heroism of the Girl of the Golden West.

THE PKOPESSIONAIi CHAPERON

Where George ever got his elaborate knowledge of sin he has never satisfactorily explained; but when I was finally taken in stock, and began by natural instinct to

mother the girls, George would kick in with an almost psychic understanding of what was going on, and he would give me the number of every man on the lot. Then I, in turn, would warn the older girls and try to protect the younger ones.

When the storm of public protest came, George went to Mr. Graham, the manager, and suggested to him the creation of the job of studio mother; and he did not omit to state that Mrs. George was the natural selection for the post.

Calling me into his ofiSce, the big chief said:

"Mrs. Baron, do you think you could handle the girls of the company, if I should give you full authority ? George says you are the only one here qualified for the job, and I 'm inclined to agree with him."

"Well, Mr. Graham, you may think that I just hate myself, but I agree heartily with both of you; in fact, it was I who suggested the scheme and appointed myself to the position. So, if you will ratify my plans and incidentally adjust my salary to its new responsibilities, I '11 promise that this studio will suffer no further embarrassment in the public prints."

Thus began the first position of this kind, I think, in the moving-picture world. Since then every studio has adopted the scheme in greater or less degree.

The greatest power placed in my hands was the exclusive employing of all women of the cast. This was an awful blow to certain directors who constantly surrounded themselves with favorites. I recall one fellow who, while waiting for a set, would preen and strut about like a popinjay, his little court paying homage to him wherever he went. Sometimes he would become

very thoughtful; and while he paced back and forth across the stage, his girls would sit round and raptly listen to the workings of his great mind. When shooting a picture, he directed with all the magnificence of the Sultan of Doodad uttering ukases to his court puppets. Seated in a great chair, he would order his court ladies to range themselves in a semicircle round his feet; and as he directed the picture he would carelessly play with the golden locks of one worshiping favorite.

Imagine, then, his horror when he learned that his selective powers had been usurped by a little, timid woman! Br-r-r-r-r-r-r! He 'd resign—and a lot of other horrific things! But he didn't.

No girls other than recognized actresses are engaged except through me; directors and actors can no longer employ any foolish young girl who happens to take their fancy.

The first thing I did as employer of the girls was to demand very minute credentials. If a girl was a ward of the juvenile court, I consulted with the probation officer ; and, unless she was hopelessly bad, I gave her every chance to make good and saw that she reported to the court at the appointed times. Other girls had to have permits from their guardians or parents, or, if they were over age, were required to furnish sponsors.

THE LITTLE RED SCHOOL-HOUSE

Youngsters of school age had to bring permits from the board of education; and, on my part, I had to see that they received the proper school training of four hours a day. For this purpose we erected a little red school-house on the lot, with a regularly certificated

teacher in charge. Though we paid the teacher's salary, the school was under the supervision of the board of education. The board insisted, for instance, that the school hours should be from ten to twelve £ind four to six; so directors using minors had to accommodate their shooting to those hours. Two or three young girls who have since achieved stardom attended this little studio school during the years of their minority.

Next to their employment, the chaperoning of the girls while on the lot was the most important job of the studio mother. Men were absolutely forbidden to go near the women's dressing-rooms; and after the girls were made up, they had to report to me for inspection.

If I could not personally chaperon a certain set, I appointed one of the older stock women to perform that function.

So many employees about a studio are engaged in capacities other than acting that the employment of all the members of a family is made very easy; and the more enlightened managers encourage it, since it tends to stability. I know of one manager who has none but married people in his employ. Thus, some of the companies —especially the older ones—become like one great family, happy and loyal, but with all the heartaches incident to such an arrangement. One of the leading women in a studio where I worked for a year was the wife of the laboratory superintendent; her daughter played second leads and her son was a camera kid. Very often a man and his wife, or a brother and sister, are working at the same studio.

I also encouraged the girls to invite their mothers to the studio, and there were always a few of them in at

tendance. If I had to send a bunch off on location, I sometimes signed checks for a few mothers, so that they could go along as part of the official cast. They would take their sewing and spend a delightful day in the country, while the girls cavorted before the camera.

One winter, at night, we rehearsed two hundred and fifty girls for some dancing scenes in huge sets; and for this work I needed very elaborate chaperon assistance. To show the amazing cost of modem productions, I might parenthetically remark that, after paying the salaries of the participants and twenty-five dollars a night to the dancing-masters, the picture was on the screen for less than half a minute.

Another duty I usurped was the selection of girls for dancing, bathing, or other scenes where their figures were an important part of the beauty of the picture. In the old days girls often went on location and were asked to do unwise or dangerous stunts. I made it my business to know whether every girl was fit before permitting her to do anything that might jeopardize her health.

After six months of this regime I was able to change the whole atmosphere of the place. I got to know all the extra girls in town, weeded out the most objectionable, and by a few drastic examples made the women realize that any excessive vulgarity or rough stuff would mean immediate dismissal.

These first few months of my new job were full of intense interest to any one who likes people. The human procession that passed my window contained everything in the feminine gender, from pale little babies to the great inlaid dowagers from the big hotels. But having to refuse ninety-nine per cent, of all applicants finally

began to pall upon me. Being naturally affirmative, the role of sublime refuser depressed me. Often in desperate cases my maternal instincts were so roused that I felt compelled to "dig"; but George came down hard and soon convinced me of the utter futility of my charity.

AliL KINDS OP APPLICANTS

At last, by very careful selection and cataloguing of the girls' attributes and capabilities, I had a system of registration that included all the studio's wants; and I could then send for extras as we needed them. This relieved the employing bureau of eighty per cent, of its former task.

The form of application the aspirants made out will explain the way we catalogued the potential Juliets. It contained blanks for name, address, telephone, line of business, age—oh, the years that were shed in those spaces!—^height, weight, hair—changed upon the slightest hint that it would not photograph—eyes, chest, waist, nationality, ride, swim, drive auto, dance, fence, specialty, wardrobe, and experience.

The filling in of these blanks is the brightest spot in the day's work. We do not expect them to tell the truth about their ages—it's against nature; so we always write in the age we think they are. Only yesterday a dear old lady, whom I would have sworn to be sixty-five, wrote herself down as forty. When I told her to tell the truth and then perhaps I could use her, she looked flabbergasted. She was sixty-eight, and imagined that she could never land at such an age; but she didn't know that old ladies with sweet faces, if they can act ever so

little, are quite rare types, and that the studios often seek them in vain. There is something all wrong in a world that sends to my window so many old faces full of sadness or the hard lines of care.

If I saw only the tragedy of my children, I never could have stuck so long at my job; but it has its humors, too. Under the head of "specialty" is where the greatest fun of the application blanks comes in. One underscores the fact that she can wiggle her ears; another can eat glass; while a third can make a face like a fish—"Good in comedy," she adds. There is no end of those who can weep, and you 'd believe it if you could see the poor things; in fact, many of them demonstrate it when they are refused. One young lady recorded, under the head of specialty, that she was "twins"; another's accomplishments were vicariously expressed with a trick dog. I have one card which insists that the singer, a girl of fifteen, swam the Golden Gate; another's specialty consisted in a relationship to a certain politician; while a woman of fifty-two claims ability to stay under water three minutes and eat six bananas while so enmoistured. Several creatures can handle snakes; and every girl can dance, including one that my old George insists has a wooden leg.

When it comes to writing down their experiences, some of them must have been to school at Occultonia; for reincarnation only can explain how one young lady of twenty-six could have understudied Agnes Stone in the Original Bostonians. Another was with Edna May in the Belle of New York. If she was there in this life, she must have been a whopping infant!

Prom the application blanks, registration cards are

made out and filed away under various heads, such as matrons, young girls, children, chorus types, fat, thin, Japs, Mexicans, models, acrobats, dancers, cow-girls, character women, and so on.

Notwithstanding that we have these lists, applicants come in droves, many of them thinking their personal appearance will help land a job for a few days' work. Every morning at eight o'clock, when I open my window, I steel my heart for the great refusal. The first, a little pale-faced woman, will read it in my eyes, and pass on without a word; next, a great big hundred-and-seventypound doll, cinched up so that she can breathe only from the face out, will want to know whether there is anything in "soup and fish," as she has some swell clothes. Nothing doing!

A giggling kid, with molasses-candy hair and a sport coat, splashes up with aggressive buoyancy. She has brought her grips and is ready to go right to work. Flashing a certificate from the Feature Photodramatic School of Bird Center, she titters:

"Oh, Mrs. Baron, I 'm so glad to see you at last! I 've come all the way from Indiana to act in movingpictures. I have a letter to you from Mr. Filmflam, my dear teacher. I 'm one of his best graduate expressionists, and he says I make lovely gestures."

"I 'm sorry, dear; but I never heard of Mr. Filmflam, and human certificates are the only ones this studio honors. The fact is, I have over one hundred and fifty girls of your type already registered; yet we rarely use them, because we have a preferred list of about twenty who have first call on all pictures.

"You had better not go to any other studios until you have consulted with Miss Kingdon, our city mother. She will advise, and perhaps help you get work. Here, take this card."

THE PARASITE MOTHERS

Next comes one of the parasitic mothers who live upon their young. She exhibits a commonplace little child, all gooed up with paint and peroxide, who is to be started young; for the mother thinks, in the back of her poor little head, that the youngster will put the family on Easy Street.

"We are using no children this week, madam."

"Next week?"

"No; I'm afraid not."

But what's this, looking up from under the edge of her rakish lid? As I live, another veimp. And only eighteen years old! How pale and white she looks! And see those sad and sinful eyes, sleeping in their seagreen sockets!

"Child, I 'd be afraid to turn you loose upon the lot in that make-up. You might vamp the boss, and then the studio would close down and we 'd all be out of jobs. Now run right home and wash your face. You '11 never get anywhere with that one."

"Good morning, Carrie! No, dear; not to-day. Mr. Condon is starting a costume picture next week, and as he is partial to your type you probably can get on. I '11 let you know."

"Ah, Carmelita! You got my message? Mr. Goodhue is starting a picture called A Romance of the

Mission, and he asked me to get him some pretty Spanish girls. Run along and find Josefa and Ynez, and return.''

"Mrs. Baron? Mrs. Baron, I 've thought over my life from every angle and I 've come to the positive conclusion that I have a moving-picture soul. I only want a chance."

"Madam," I reply, "you are suffering from what we call cinemasipelas; but in your case it hasn't got very far. Now run right back and wash the dishes, do the housework, and when the children are off at school throw yourself on the bed and have a good cry; and if you cry hard enough, you may cry your movie soul out, and then you '11 be weU. I 've known hundreds of women in your fix, and they aU tell me that when they are cured they can make better marmalade."

There is probably nothing that so clutters up the making of moving-pictures as souls a-boming. We develop a new one almost every day; and sometimes in the big mob scenes you can hear them popping all over the lot. Occasionally a man gets a soul; and when he does he 's the most awful spectacle imaginable, and his usefulness usually ends with its birth. "Women's souls are not nearly so beautiful as men's, but they occur oftener.

About half the women who apply for work are suffering from soul birth and "simply have to act." They have been called by funny noises in the head; and therefore they write or come in person in answer to the call.

If you want to know what dreadful ogres the keepers of the gates of Movie Land are, just ask any of these

"MOTHER, MAY I GO IN THE FILMS?" 255

soul-encumbered ladies. "We are "fixed"; "play favorites"; are "open to bribery"; "don't know talent when we see it"; and other delicious things. But this we do know: the actor with a soul is a pest; and, rather than have the director come and kick us on the shins for unloading, one on him, we try to administer the chloroform at the window.

There are, however, more sordid reasons that prompt many women to apply. Some, though apparently well cared for, simply wish to be independent of their husbands: "Harry is a perfect dear, and gives me everything ; but I want to earn some money for my very own. But he must n't know what I am doing, for he 'd be dreadfully cut up if he thought I was working in the pictures."

The most puzzling applicants are those who come asking for work and hoping they will not find it. I had two such cases in one day last week. The second one quite audibly said "Thank heaven!" when I told her there was no work. Even George can't give me the answer to this conundrum.

With many of the applicants, though, it is a case of serious necessity; they simply have to find work. And if they do land, they are very much more reliable than those who come in through pull. A short time ago a tall, capable-looking woman of about thirty came to the window and demanded work. She said her husband, who was in Alaska, could n't get money to her until the boats got through in May. We were just putting on a snow picture up in Bear Valley, and as she could handle dogs and run snow-shoes, we took her on; and she proved to be a crackajack.

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A DANGEROUS EPIDEMIC

It 's queer how much more persistent in applying for work the women are than the men. Women will argue, plead, lie, and resort to every feminine trick to get work; but if the employment director merely shakes his head, the men will pass right on. I sat in with Mr. Gersted the other day, and I could n't fail to notice how much simpler his job was than mine. As the men filed by he would shake his head, or simply say: "Nothing to-day. Miller." "They are using old men at Fox this week, Pete." "Sorry, Smith; nothing doing." "Here's your cheek, Rubinoff. Eeport to Mr. Davies. Western stuff." " Nothing to-day, Kuiz; but bring your little boy round at three o'clock. Mr. Lamed is making a hospital picture." "Sorry, Piatt. I did not get a very good report on you from San Francisco. They tell me you got drunk on the boat going up. I wouldn't waste time coming here any more."

Here is another factor that limits the chances of the outsider wishing to break into the extra class. At least fifty per cent, of all people now working extra are relations of the directors, camera men, stuges, carpenters, and other workers on the lot. It is perfectly natural that we should want to land the good jobs for our families and friends. Furthermore, the studio encourages the practice, for it tends to stability. And as for a girl, if it is known that her father or brother is working, she has a protection that no studio mother could give.

The accusation is often made that we favor the relations and friends of the directors, and that their sisters

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and cousins and aunts always draw down the big checks, while the rest of the bunch have to be contented with the two-dollar and three-dollar stuff. This is largely true. As my job is to furnish a satisfactory cast for the director, who am I to deny him if he thinks his sister ought to have a "bit"? If the picture is 'rotten, it's his fault; and if he wants to risk his judgment, he is perfectly privileged to commit artistic suicide.

The desire to act upon the screen is, however, by no means confined to studio towns. It is nation-wide; it has, in fact, assumed the proportions of an epidemic.

A girl works joyfully in a soap factory or the basement of a department store for ten happy hours, and in the evening goes to a picture show. Here she sees a new world of romance, adventure, and fun. Before her eyes passes a kaleidoscope of pretty clothes, automobiles, gay suppers, beach-bathing, and a million other things she suddenly realizes she has missed. Her life seems now to be gray and dull, and she begins to dream and mope.

GIELS WITH MOVIE SOULS

But we must not let the sympathy we feel for this poor child apply to her gum-chewing sister in the music department ; for the urge of this chicken-minded youngster is simply vanity. She is firmly convinced that the late movie favorite is a dub, and if she had only half her chance, she 'd show the fans some real actmg. When her soul develops to the proper size, she hies forth to a near-by town to enter a moving-picture school that guarantees to place all of its students with some famous company.

When one of our leading women made a well-advertised auto-trip across the country, she was overwhelmed at every stop by hysterical kids like this, who wanted to kiss the hem of her dust-coat, or be taken along. Some of them even jumped on the running-board and had to be torn from the fairy chariot by sheer force.

It is just as well that Los Angeles is so far away; for if every girl who feels this thrill could make the grade, our city would soon become the center of population. As it is, enough of them arrive to overwhelm the studios and embarrass the authorities.

Letters come in such quantities that many studios have given up any attempt to answer them; so I am going to take this opportunity to tell my poor soul-stirred sisters the truth about this business.

The fake schools about the country are responsible for most of the trouble. They "graduate" hundreds of girls, who come out here without a chance in the world.

A unique feature of this city is its "mothers." There are ten, I think, appointed by the mayor for the purpose of looking after our girls. These city mothers chaperon the municipal dances, attend all juvenile-court proceedings, take care of delinquents, and in every way mother the dependent girls. So serious became the problem of handling the girls with movie souls who flocked here that the mayor appointed one of our leading actresses as a city mother just to look after these cases. In this capacity she advises with the girls, gets them jobs in the shops or as domestic servants, or arranges with the authorities of their home towns to send them back. By a tireless campaign of speeches she finally enlisted the cooperation of certain civic bodies, which succeeded in

driving out the fake moving-picture schools advertising in the East and Middle West. The effectiveness of her work is shown in a marked degree in the decreasing number of these girls who have become public charges. However, there are yet so many such schools about the country that a knowledge of their methods may save many heartaches to unhappy little girls.

A favorite mode of operation is somewhat as follows: The school agrees, for a certain sum, say, twenty-five dollars—^sometimes more—to prepare anyone for the screen. A lack of natural ability and "a face that only a mother could love" are no handicaps. When the victim has kicked in the twenty-five dollars, she is lined up with the others and is given her lessons. These consist in distending their foolish faces in vain efforts to register fear, anger, surprise, love, sorrow, and other human emotions ; if you ever catch Minnie mugging before a mirror, you will know she has cinemasipelas and is probably attending a movie school. After a few weeks of this futile bunk the "director" takes a few feet of test film and, with this and her certificate, the future movie queen is loaded upon a train for Los Angeles. Both of her credentials are, of course, worthless.

New slants on the old fraud are constantly developing. Here is one that just came to me: A fellow went into secret partnership with a photographer, and after starting his so-called school, the fee of which was so low that no end of girls bit, he started teaching his students make-up; but, in order to find out whether the results were photographically good, the victims had to have their pictures taken by the silent partner. By the lure of a great pageant, which he was shortly to produce, he man

aged to hold their interest. Passing out the script, he had them all competing for the leading parts; and those who photographed best would, of course, get the plums. The photographer did one whale of a business; but as the pageant was constantly postponed, the aspirants either grew tired of waiting or their money was gone; and, one at a time, they all dropped out.

One of the meanest tricks came to light a short time ago through the testimony of several girls under the care of the city mother. A handsome traveling-salesman for some prosperous company, who wished to lighten up his evenings, evolved this snappy little plan. Having some cards printed proclaiming him to be George Henry Soand-So, director of the Bunkoscope Moving-Picture Company, of Los Angeles, he would attend the big department store of the village at the rush hour and prowl about "looking for types." "When he found some goodlooking kid who appeared vain and easy, he would go up and, while he presented his card, begin to rave. He would tell her that she was exactly the type he needed to play the lead in a new story the company was about to produce. All that afternoon the child is delirious with her dream. She meets George Henry for supper; and then—well, it 's the same old tiresome tale.

NO ROOM FOR GLADYS BADEGG

It is bad enough to have every notoriety-seeking girl who gets into a jam claim that she is a moving-picture actress; but to have these gentlemen unloaded on us is too much. So the studios are endeavoring to have legislation passed making it a criminal offense to claim connection with a moving-picture company, unless the claim

ant can prove the company's existence and his connection with it.

In order to look after the girls already working in the pictures, a few of the leading women of the industry organized the Hollywood Studio Club, a branch of the T. W. C. A., where all the girls can meet and get acquainted with one another. It 's a godsend to the kids who have no place to go except to bat round the town. "We have teas, garden parties, studio dances, and all kinds of stunts that bring the bunch together; and if a girl gets down on her luck, she can stay at the club until she lands on her feet again.

These little heart-to-heart talkfests exhibit a very curious difference between men extras and women extras in their attitude toward their work. "When a bunch of men get together they seem to be interested only in what they are earning, and talk only about their pay-cheeks; and though these material souvenirs mean more to women than to men, yet they gossip entirely about their parts, clothes, make-up, and other things pertaining to their "art."

There are some, of course, whose only thought is of clothes. One girl came to me who had spent a thousand dollars on her wardrobe and expected to break ia with it. She will never get beyond working as atmosphere in the "soup and fish" stuff, for her clothes are her only capital; she can't act for beans!

There is occasionally a loose-minded creature who believes the suspicion that there is but one way a girl can surely land. One came to me last week and announced that if I knew a director who would put her over, she would "pay anything."

"My dear young idiot," I replied, "directors are not fools. And one who would try to star a girl with no more to offer than you have would absolutely end his usefulness. Directors have no cinch on their jobs, and hold them only so long as their work comes up to the standard of the studio. Besides, I employ all the girls on this lot; so you 'd better beat it before I call the policewoman."

So persistently does this stigma hold over from the old days that we are especially alert to the game. Mr. MUls, the director-general of this studio, is so particular that he cans a person who is in the least suspicious. On various occasions he has employed detectives as stage carpenters or extra men, to watch the crowds and weed out the rotten ones. He claims that good work cannot be done in an unpleasant atmosphere.

It is even a rule of our studio that the cast cannot frequent the cabarets and public dance-halls. We don't want people pointing out our girls and saying : '' There's Gladys Badegg, of the Filmart Studio!'' These are hard days for the Badeggs to break in.

Even after a girl has satisfied us as to her character, ability, and health, she has one more obstacle to overcome before she is taken on. No matter how pretty she is in the flesh, she may photograph badly; so we always make tests of her in different scenes and under various lights. Often, if the candidate seems promising, we make as much as a thousand feet of film. These tests sometimes compel us to turn down a girl with exceptional talent and stunning beauty; but alas! it will be the kind of beauty that will not register.

THE SAINT VITUS SCHOOIi OP ACTING

A good, thorough test is a mighty trying ordeal to the poor girl who is in for it. An interior set may be used first. The nervous hopeful takes her place, and then the director says:

"Now, Miss Blank, you are discovered sitting before the fire in thoughtful reverie; you hear a noise; and, slowly turning the head, you notice a face at the window; you stand up horrified; rush to the door; find it locked; look in despair toward the window, but, ah, there is the telephone! You rush for it and, facing the camera, call up 31046; while waiting, you register great agitation; it is too late! The man is in the room. As he advances you rush to the door again; and, finding it still locked, you drop down in utter collapse. Now let's run through this."

If the young lady's work is satisfactory, the director will then take her to the glass studio and put her through some quiet, sentimental scene under the ghastly yellow lights there. A few feet, out in the sunlight, will complete the test.

I recall one dynamic young thing who had never acted, but claimed that she could do emotional stuff.

"AU right," said the director; "let's see you weep." Then he went on: "I am your husband, and I 'm leaving you for the tall blonde who is waiting outside. Now let 's see how you 'd behave.''

Well, that 's the last time this director ever suggested such a scene, with himself playing opposite the neglected wife. The embryonic Duse began to scream and yell until, even in a place inured to strange and awful noises,

she brought frightened folk from every corner of the lot. They came running from all directions, only to behold one of the most dignified directors on the lot being hauled and mauled all over the set. The young lady evidently had breakfasted on firecrackers, for when she was touched off she was an emotional set piece. Her ravings and pleadings became so hysterical that even the director, appreciating the joke, let her rave. After she had nearly torn the clothes off the poor man, he managed to make his exit; and then she began to register despair by ripping at her own stuff, actually tearing to shreds a perfectly good hat that had probably set her back fifteen dollars. She would have been glorious ten years ago, when the Saint Vitus school of acting was so fashionable in the movies.

Sometimes, but not often, a girl will break into the pictures simply by outwitting the opposition. One of our youngest stock actresses told me how she bombarded a New York studio every day for six weeks and never so much as got on the lot. She thought if she could just get inside, she might make her presence felt. Her frontal attacks having failed, she tried strategy. So one morning she walked right past the waiting line and started through the gate. The monster in charge stopped her, of course; but she explained to him that she had worked there the day before and had left a pair of gold slippers in the dressing-room, and just wanted to run in and get them, as she needed them at the Wachimacalut Studio, where she was working that day. Suspicious old nut that he was, the gatekeeper fell for the stall and let her in.

Once inside, she took off her hat and coat, and loafed round as though she was waiting to go on. About ten o'clock a busy, nervous sort of chap bounced up and asked her with whom she was working.

'I don't think Mr. Thorp is going to use me after aU," she said truthfully; "so if you want me I 'm pretty sure it would be all right.''

"Then beat it right over to the property room and get a long rain-coat and a hat-box, and then run out and get into the third machine by the north entrance. We ought to have left here an hour ago.''

Having been registered in several scenes that day, she was told to report the next morning; in fact, that picture kept her on the lot for two weeks, during which time she was able to cinch her job.

I think, for real intelligent persistence in landing a movie job, the prize should go to a little girl who is connected in an odd way with our studio. Three years ago she was living in far-off Bohemia, dreaming that she had a moving-picture soul and deciding in her little heart that she was some day to be a movie queen. She had seen several of our pictures and determined that she was destined for this particular studio. The story of her two-years trip to Los Angeles was not unusual—steerage to New York, where she had relatives; six months learning the language and working in domestic service; then Chicago, Salt Lake City, San Francisco, and finally Los Angeles. There is nothing in this that deserves especial comment; but the way this young foreigner planned her assault upon Movie Land is unique in my very extensive observations.

THE END OF MINNIE'S DREAM I

"Wien she landed here she knew nobody, but through the municipal employment bureau got a job in domestic service. For several weeks she just studied the lay of the land, but never once went to the studio. After learning that many of our actors and actresses lunched at a place nearby, she watched her chance and one day got a job waiting on the table at this place. Here, sooner or later, she was bound to get acquainted with some of the leads.

This she did; and so well liked was she that, when she offered her services to Miss Kingdon as lady's maid, she was taken on at once.

At last she was within reach of her goal. Her new position brought her to the studio every day, and after she felt well-enough acquainted, she confessed her secret ambitions to me.

"Minnie," I said, 'you are not pretty and you probably can't act a bit; but some day I '11 use you in mob stuff, and then you can see for yourself."

Shortly after this conversation we were putting on a French Revolution story, and as Minnie was a good "type," I sent for her.

Miss Kingdon told me afterward that Minnie came tearing into her dressing-room all excitement and said she was "about to become an actress." She grabbed Miss Kingdon's grease-paint, rouge, toilet articles, and all, and began to make up in hysterical joy. When this was accomplished, she threw her arm round her fairy god-mother's neck and told her how sorry she was to leave her service; but her prayer had been answered and

she must go. So Minnie plunged into the "drayma," as the culture-club ladies call it.

That day the little Bohemian girl's dream of many years had come true. She had reached the heights, achieved the Ball of Gold; but alas! it was clay. Sore of feet and tired of body and soul, she returned to her dressing-room and threw herself down to cry. All day long she had rushed through the streets of Paris without lunch or rest; she had been struck by pasteboard rocks, turned her ankle on the rough cobbles, and was finally thrown into the moat, where she nearly froze. It was enough to puncture the enthusiasm of even a stronger girl than Minnie.

That night she timidly opened the door of Miss Kingdon's bungalow and said: "I 've come back, Miss Kindum. I don't want to be the movie queen. I tink I rather be queen of your kitchen." If you ask me, I believe her renunciation of the dough was as intelligent as her achievement of her cake.

It would be a good thing if all film-mad girls in the country could be put through one of these rough scenes. It is downright physical labor and suffering for the extras, and often for the principals. When, in this picture, they stormed the Bastille, droves of women were thrown into that moat, full of water—"Piped straight from Greenland," as one of them said. They fought and struggled for more than an hour while they made the big scene and innumerable close-ups, and after it was over I could see the girls huddled together in groups, shivering as though they had the ague.

Despite my warning, many of them had come without any change of underclothing and had to go home wet to

the skin. Outside of the many accidents that the studio had to look after, I suppose there were over fiftyeases of grippe, developed as a consequence of that scene.

NO HEART FOR ROUGH STUFF

Among the men, daredevils—professional, high-priced thrillers—do all the dangerous stuff, even doubling for women in most eases where the latter are supposed to take risks. But we have one girl of twenty-six who wiU tackle anything a daredevil will do, and a few besides. It was she who led the mob in the attack on the Bastille and it was to her courage and utter recklessness that the success of the picture was largely due.

There is a curious psychologic difference in the attitudes of the men and women toward the pictures, especially in the dangerous stuff. A down-and-out man will, of course, often take a desperate chance; but, as a rule, the men will rough it up only when they are promised a large return. On the other hand, women think only of the glory of their work, and will do their best just to get a good picture.

Some time ago we were making a picture of the Mont Pelee disaster; and one of the scenes, staged at Long Beach, showed the inhabitants of Martinique runniag and jumping off the end of a pier that extended far out into the ocean. To one standing on the end it seemed as if the turbulent sea was miles below. A great many men and women had gone over and were picked up by waiting boats, and the scene was to fade out on one last girl runniag down the pier, with all her bundles, throwing them into the water, and then, turning round to register

horror at the volcano, she was to utter a scream and jump in.

The girl had done splendidly at the studio, but this was the first time her nerve had been tested. All went well until she was about to jump, and then she became frightened and refused to go. The director peevishly ordered the action over again, and a second time the girl got as far as the edge, where she stopped and began to cry, "Oh, I can't do it! I can't do it!" The director gave me the high sign; so I walked the girl up the pier, where I had a little talk with her.

"How far do you expect to go in the pictures, dear?" I said. "For if you haven't the nerve for this job, you '11 have mighty little to do. Even if you can't swim, we are not going to let you drown! Be a sport and show these men that you are no cry-baby! It's a swell part; and, just as you jump, think how corking it will look on the screen."

It was this latter suggestion that brought the light into her eyes; and as she defiantly gathered up her bundles, I patted her on the back and kissed her.

Down the pier she went the third time and, reaching the edge, turned to register the horror she actually felt, hesitated a minute, and then jumped.

The poor child was so frightened that her take-off was bad; and, landing flat on the water, she tore a terrible hole in the ocean. She was stunned, but not hurt. However, she wouldn't do the scene again for a thousand dollars.

There is a girl whose limitations will confine her work to "soup and fish." She is a swell dresser, but she has n't the heart for the rough stuff.

The pathetic part of this game is the number of women who will sign up for anything, just to have work. They will lie outrageously, saying that they can ride, swim, or drive racing-cars; and then risk their foolish necks trying to make good with the directors.

It would perhaps have been more entertaining to have told only the lighter side of this life; but it would not have been fair. Such a glamour has been thrown about it by enthusiastic writers who have seen only the high spots, that many hopeful girls have been misled into believing it is their one chance to fulfill the dreams of romance, joy, and adventure which their lives have missed, yet craved so eagerly.

If I have been stressing the pathos and tragedy too much, it is because those are the aspects of the extra girls' lives that confront her oftenest. There is, of course, a happier side; but it is largely composed of anticipations and hopes, most of which are never realized. The one moment of utter sublimity comes when, after weeks and weeks of hard work and delicious anticipation, they go to a first run and see themselves upon the screen.

There is no doubt in my mind that the pictures mean more to women than to men. Most extra men, as I have said, care only for their pay; and I know many of them who rarely go to see the results of their work. There is one cowboy at the studio who boasts that he has never seen himself in the pictures, and doesn't want to.

The premier performance of a great ten- or twelve-reel feature picture in the center of filmdom is one of the most unique events in the dramatic life of the country. In legitimate drama it is, of course, impossible to see the

"MOTHER, MAY I GO IN THE FILMS?" 271

performers at once upon the stage and in the audience. Neither is it possible on first nights to have aU the rival actors in attendance. "When we have a first run every member of the cast, down to the six-hundredth extra— stuges, carpenters, costumers, scenario writers, camera men; in fact, everybody who has had any hand in the building of the picture—is there with bells. Besides these, come the directors, leads, and publicity men of the many rival companies, with only an occasional outsider who manages to squeeze in. It is one grand family party, different in its composition and psychology from any other in the world.

WHAT HAPPENED TO POOR SADIE

Downstairs, ia the dollar seats, it is all "soup and fish." The men are irresistibly arrayed in evening clothes, right down to white gloves and the personal idiosyncracies affected by most actors; while the women are dressed within an inch of their snappy lives—^which one must admit is very stingy dressing. The sartorial gorgeousness gives a brilliancy to the audience that even the grandest opera could not call forth. The film celebrities are there; everybody knows everybody, and they bow and chatter and wave friendly recognition as though they were at some private garden-party.

In the gallery and the balcony are the extras and lesser members of the cast, come to see themselves perform, and to applaud or knock the work of the others.

It is not a good time to determine artistic merits of the picture, for the interest of this audience is essentially egoistical. Thunderous applause greets the initial appearance of each and every member of the cast as he

272 FILM FOLK

arrives upon the screen. The favorites, of course, get the larger share; but even an inconspicuous extra often has enough friends to bring forth quite a hand when he comes on, announcing the waiting carriage. Most of the leads have seen the picture before, projected in the cutting room; but for the extras this is the first time they have had a chance to observe how their work has registered.

Little squeals of delight from scattered groups announce the recognition of someone.

"Oh, there I am, Madge—in the short skirt, just behind Wallie Reid. Is n't Wallie grand? The other dayhe says to me, 'Rosie,' he says, 'you look swell to-day, and I want you to work well downstage.' And I

says " "Yea, Bill," pipes up a friend of William's,

a few seats back. "You did that bit swell, kid!" chirps a camera kid, proud of the cutie by his side. "Say, where do they get this Blanche Sweet stuff? You 've got her beat four ways from the ace. When I get to

directin' I '11 show these " "That 's me! That 's

me!" ungrammatically vouchsafes a big "arm and hammer" dame to her lady friend. "That 's number six grease-paint I'm usin'. Doesn't it give me a swell skiQ? Say, wait until you see me 'iris in' now on the third reel! Holy cat! What 's happened ? If that fool director has n't cut out my best stuff! Wait till I "

One girl who has worked three weeks in the picture brings her whole family to witness her dramatic triumph. They wait and wait, only mildly interested in most of the picture, but with the liveliest expectations for Sadie's debut. At last she clutches her mother's arm and squeals: '' Oh, there I am! There I am!" But, before

the family have been able to sort her out of the wild mob, Sadie is gone, never to appear again. One hundred thousand feet of film were shot, and then cut to ten thousand; and alas! poor Sadie was mostly in the ninety thousand.

But Sadie's will not be the only disappointment in the gallery this evening—or in the orchestra, for that matter. The cutting room of a studio is the slaughterhouse of vain ambition. No more cruel torture to highly sensitive people was ever invented than the cutting of film. To have the work and hopes of weeks assassinated by a heartless director! To sacrifice nine-tenths of one's work—and it 's always "the best"—^just so "the leads get all the footage," is a tragedy that only the film artist is called upon to suffer.

THE GIEL WHO WENT BACK

Technical things that no unsophisticated audience would ever notice also come in for applause. For instance, the leading man lights his pipe from a candle, and as he does so, the illumination upon his face glows up and down with each draw that he pulls. Wild clapping for the camera man! For this is a new stunt!

During the intermission the audience flocks out into the lobbies to see one another and, better still, to be seen. The director and the leads hold veritable receptions; rival actors strut about, giving the extra people a treat and the performing leads a pain; ingenues, vamps, and character men stand round in attitudes and little groups, discussing the play; and the extra people whisper their recognitions in more or less awesome admiration.

"There she is, Sid! Say, she's got a face like a

274 FILM FOLK

prune; but she certainly does photograph swell." "What do you think of the show, Bill?" "Great! Great! I think it beats The Kinsman." "Well, wait till you see the second half. I 'm in that!"

When the great drama finally dissolves out on some sublime allegory, there are loud cries for the director. With a "few well-chosen"—and rehearsed—words, the real hero of it all bashfully and with immodest modesty conveys his "heartmost felt," after which the happy mummers beat it out to their inconspicuous pink and lavender twin sixes and twos. Then to the chocolate shops, cafes, and beaches, or maybe—^home.

Notwithstanding the fact that every woman has at some time in her life longed to play Juliet, and that the younger generation all aspire to vamp or purr in the pictures, yet we occasionally find one to whom the vanities and excitements of this profession make no appeal.

A few years ago a great advertising campaign was carried on in order to find the most beautiful girl in America. The winner was to be given a leading role with a well-known company.

A young lady working as a stenographer in a large Eastern city won the great prize; and, with all the trumpets and bands playing, she was brought to Los Angeles.

She remained just one week, and in that time decided that she didn't have a moving-picture soul. The last we heard of the strange young woman, she had gone back to her stenography.

I have her picture in my office; and the other day, while I sat looking into her beautiful and intelligent face, I was wishing that her thirty million American sisters had her good sense. A rap on my window caused me to

"MOTHER, MAY I GO IN THE FILMS?" 275

look up; and there stood a young mother, with a baby in her arms and a little boy hugging her skirts.

*' Oh,'' she said, " I 'm so glad to get here! I 've come all the way from Kansas City. I 've left my husband. . . . Yes; he 's a fine fellow, but he doesn't understand. A psychic seeress told me I had a moving-picture soul; and I "

"Wait just a minute!" I interrupted, as I reached for the telephone. "Say, Clara, connect me with the City Mother's office. ... Is that you. Miss Kingdon? . . . Well, can you run up here for a minute ? . . . No—^yes; I have a beautiful package of nuts for you!"

VII

THE BELL-RINGERS

(THE PUBLICITY MAN ATTEMPTS THE TRUTH)

IF, as the philosopher says, Truth lies at the bottom of a well, she may stay there, for all of me. I prefer to do my lying above-ground. Time was when I was quite under the influence of the bright and fascinating lady; but that was when I was in college—and before I met Art. My professor in journalism, who years agone had owned a truthful and unsuccessful newspaper, so stirred my admiration for Truth that, one dream-day in June, I swore to love, honor, and obey her until death us did part. All during Commencement Week she and I sat on the banks of the raging Huron and discussed the future. Hand in hand, we were to go forth from our Alma Mater, shedding light into the darkness of the outer world, and charging so much a kilowatt column for the light. Truth agreed to furnish the torch, if I 'd come across with the oil and gasoline.

My bride selected the Los Angeles Trumpet as a fitting post for my beautiful white soul, because that paper, above all others, addressed itself most strongly to verity. Eight above the editorial column it boldly and grandly proclaimed: "The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth!" As we detrained at the Set

276

ting Sun, Truth squeezed my hand and said: "Harry, we are going to be very happy and congenial on the Trumpet." "Women are so hopeful!

The stout, bald city-editor smiled eerily upon my enthusiasm for his motto, and set me to work at fifteen dollars a week. Thinking that I should find more truth at the beaches than in the more dressed-up walks of life, I went down there in search of my first story, and got a very good one. It was about a little, homely manicurist who had stepped on a stingaree; and the weird thing had pierced her foot right through. Her shrieks caused a tremendous excitement; but she was finally got off to the hospital. It was a good tale and I told it truthfully. "When the city-editor read my copy, he shook his head sadly.

"I thought so!" he said. "Sit down, lad, and listen to your Uncle Dud. Our first loves are romantic, but not always wise. The type of lady you have picked is popular with scientists and philosophers; but she 's a little too cold and solemn for the newspaper fellows. If you wish to be happy in this business, you 'd better hook up with Art. At any rate, I want to introduce you to a different kind of beauty."

WHEN TRUTH JUMPED INTO THE WELL

I blush to say that I fell for Art's charms immediately. She was so much more vivacious and happy than my college widow.

"Harry," said she, when we were alone, "your story is true, but very dull—and dullness is the unpardonable sin of journalism. Brighten up your tale with some entertainment. Art is eaimed joy; make it artistic.

Above all, have your manicurist 'a beautiful movingpicture actress,' doing a bathing story for the Clingstone Comedy Company. Right away you have touched the pulse of universal interest. The stingaree stuff is good; but while the bathing beauty is thus impaled, have an octopus or other horrific fish biting her on the knee.

"Finally let her be rescued by an Eastern tennis star. Fade out with the rumor that the tennis chap is spending all his afternoons at the Good Samaritan Hospital. The essential truth of your story is still there; but, by adding a touch of art, you have made the girl deliriously happy; your readers love romance and the movies, so they are happy; bright entertaining stories sell the paper —that makes the editors happy; you write the stories and they give you a raise, and that makes you happy! Now sit down and see how much happiness you can pound out of that typewriter."

When the city-editor read my rewritten story he clapped his hands for joy and raised my salary to twenty dollars a week. Next day the manicure-girl limped into the ofSce and bought fifty copies. Everybody was happy except Truth, but she is so darned literal, uncompromising, and utterly humorless! When she read that snappy tale she jumped out of the window and beat it up the street as tight as she could. A fellow coming in from Tripieo said he saw her do a high dive into a well out near Gas Station Twenty-three. Far be it from me to disturb her in those poUiwoggly depths! I am happier with Art, anyway.

Art knew. The movie people were—journalistically —the most popular folk in town; so I began to hang my stories on them. All the dips and porch-climbers, under

my inspirational touch, became moving-picture actors and film favorites; and when a grand old badger worked her classic game on a leading merchant, I generously gave the lady a good character part in a local company. That was the story which landed me in the movingpictures. The Climax, when it offered me twice the salary the paper was paying, frankly stated that it wished to use my talents inside the industry, rather than outside. And Truth used to tell me that Art didn't pay!

For four years now I have been bell-ringing for this hectic and hilarious picture world, and I have never regretted my second choice. The carnival lives of the make-believers are iafinitely more interesting than the bra^ien intimacies of publicans and politicians. To be the poet laureate to a lot of silly actors may not seem like a very high artistic expression; yet we make thousands of people happy—and that is a holy mission in this dour old world. Then there are some of us who would celebrate the lives of a corral full of nut farmers for the wages we get, or expect to get.

The first shock I received when I became minstrel for the movie mummers was to learn that there was a very serious, businesslike side to the publicity department. My idea of a press agent had been gleaned from the old-fashioned advance man, who, going out ahead of a show, would drop in on the Ann Arbor Argus, buy the bunch a round of drinks, and then unload his rainbow fiction. He was a picturesque figure in his gay shirt, litter of lodge buttons, and exaggerated cordiality; but alas! he has gone the way of all our granddads' inefiiciencies; he has been superseded by system.

The film publicity man of to-day sits in an austere suite of offices in New York, completely surrounded by braias, adding machines, and photo-mailers, conducting his business by long-distance telephone and special delivery. He wears horn spectacles, smokes too many cigarettes, and is as opinionated as an almanac—^his estimate of the exhibitor being the most inflammable.

These New York ferrets are more or less interested, at least academically, in truth and the mechanical distribution of publicity; so their work is not nearly so exciting as reporting from the studios. They are the psychologists and strategists who plan the great campaigns of advertising that call attention to our wares.

A publicity campaign undertaken by these men in behalf of a great historical feature play is an amazingly complex affair. The trained writers prepare a great mass of copy from the stuff we send in, which they whip into shape for the Press Book. This unique bibelot contains a series of articles, beginning with strongly adjectived announcements of the coming attraction, to be used for a week or so in advance, followed by interviews with the stars, stories of the special music, historical accuracy of the plot, human interest, and quoted opinions of the film. Short two, three, and four paragraph reading-notices are included for further ammunition.

SHEEZA BABE IN SWEET SIN

An enormous number of photographs accompany this dope. And rotogravures for lobby displays must be made; lithographers and show-card printers set to work; and sample copy is set up for every possible purpose,

from programs and hand-bills to seven-column newspaper displays. Matrices of the latter are cast to save the repeated cost of expensive type-settiag and the shipping of half-tone cuts. While all this constructive work is being done by part of the staff, others are arranging, districting, and cataloguing newspaper lists of cities of particular populations and different sizes, and laying out a complete plan for each division of the work.

When everything is printed, contracts are signed, the time-table is filled, and the ball is set to rolling; after which the work becomes largely automatic. The result of a carefully planned, systematic campaign of publicity is justified by the fact that, in every city where the picture appears, the copy sent out is strictly adhered to; and for very good reasons—it saves the exhibitor the expense of an ad writer and is very much better than any local reporter could do it. Thus has come into the film industry, for the first time, the principle of national advertising.

Day after day the fans read in their favorite papers sympathetic and flattering accounts of how "Sheeza Bare is packing the Picturetorium by her vampings in Sweet Sin, the Jazz Company's great five-reel masterpiece." We must, under all circumstancjes, get the names of our star, story, and studio into everything we write, if it is only a paragraph. And if one of these fans is observant, he will wonder how Jimmie Geegan, the film reporter on the Evening Wheeze, could possibly write such bully stuff and ring in so many charming changes in the same boost every night for two weeks. Of course James couldn't. Nobody but a high-priced, high-browed literary highbinder could sustain such high

quality enthusiasm for Sheeza so long as that. The fine literary flavor of your daily critiques is due entirely to the fact that they were written by a fellow wearing horn spectacles in New York.

So much for the newspapers. The New York office must also supply the trade magazines with stories, pictures, and advertising; it may plan window displays, street parades, or photographic exhibits for the public schools, but it reaches the real artistic heights with its stunts. One of the most effective of these ever put over in New York carried not one mark of advertising. For a week preceding the release of a great historical film two girls in shining armor, riding white chargers, paraded the streets. Nothing could have been more conspicuous than the metallic and colorful brilliancy of these whitemounted figures as they majestically moved down Broadway, while the black traffic of the metropolis swept by them in both directions. The character part was instantly recognized without explanatory labels.

One press genius, whose talents had been developed in the service of some circus, arranged a "triumphal return" from California of a young movie queen, which was so well planned and planted that, when the pretty child set forth, her train was met by thousands; and by the time it reached Chicago her ovation had become a triumph, ending in a great public reception by the university, and having the day named in her honor.

Another good stunt was planted when a press fellow induced two thousand members of an actors' club to parade the streets in costume, on their way to witness the debut in the films of one of their members.

Besides the spectacular advertising of the feature

pictures, there must be got out a regular weekly grind concemiag the ordinary comic and short dramatic releases. This is in the form of a weekly bulletin containing personality stories, jokes, and all sorts of guff, which the papers are urged to quote as freely as their consciences—or our advertising—will permit. This sprightly sheet is enlivened with wonderful half-tone cuts of our trained animals, which may be had upon application.

A SPONTANEOUS OUTBURST

Certain newspapers have an idea that printed news must necessarily be dead; so for them we get out the same dope in the form of mimeograph letters, and, though the postage is very much higher, the news looks fresh and the alert editor uses it.

By a thorough system of card-cataloguing the kind of stuff used by each editor, we soon learn the shape of his head; and we shoot copy appropriate to each one's particular taste.

In looking over the cards we learn, for instance, that the Toledo Buzzer likes "bathing-girl pictures and personal gossip"; the New Orleans Oracle asks for "funny stills"; the Little Rock Lamplighter prefers "action pictures of pretty girls"; the sporting editors like "shooting stars" or "fisher-maidens"; the women's magazines want "domestic happiness" and will grab pictures of the movie queen baking beans or doing the herringbone stitch.

One editor on our list is mushy over children, and another will take "anything with a dog in it"; and— oh, oh, oh I—^there are eight papers in this country that

have unblushingly—I might say insultingly—asked us for risque pictures! If I told the names of those papers, their readers would probably all stop taking them. Sometimes we can land on the sporting pages of the big papers by framing a good action-picture of our leading man putting on the gloves with the momentary champ, or going to the mat with a Terrible Turk. '

To plant a picture of a he-pet is one of the triumphs of publicity. Those papers which have not an absolute rule against men's pictures are at least so much more cordial to the female fagade that it is easier to shoot over a pretty "still" of Mamie Capers, who plays the part of the maid, than it is to ring in the godlike beauty of Jackson X. Kerriman.

Nowhere in the world is the pretty girl worshiped as she is in America. I used to think the magazines witless because they were everlastingly plastering their covers with chocolate-creamy young ladies. One of them, which for twenty years has had scarcely anything but "kissy covers," is constantly taunting us for our clinching fade-outs! But I have come to the conclusion that art editors know quite well the national weakness. We are utterly unable to satisfy the demand for pretty-girl pictures. Oh, for some new poses! And I am grieved to say that the demand for bathing girls is quite depressing.

"When we are uncertain of an editor's taste we send him both kinds, and then observe which he uses. If he plays up the domestic-happiness picture, we waste no more "bathies" on that paper.

Another regular function of the publicity man is to keep his bosses informed about the affairs of other

companies and the photo-dramatic possibilities of significant, everyday occurrences. Each morning the general manager finds on his desk a statement that the Eureka has signed Miss So-and-so; that there have been food riots in Battle Creek; a rush for citizenship papers; and what not. These latter items may suggest timely themes for feature pictures.

Besides the routine of office work, the staff often has definite, concrete problems to meet. At the premier performance of a great photo-drama in Boston, the lead—who was also a famous opera singer—^was sitting in a box. At the height of the evening's enthusiasm she leaned a little forward and was recognized, receiving a tremendous ovation for her success in the film play. Suddenly the orchestra struck up the Star-Spangled Banner; and, as she stood up and sang the first two stanzas, the audience broke out into the wildest kind of patriotic demonstration.

This event was unique only because many people had been led to believe, from certain current stories, that this otherwise popular American was an anti-patriot. If the story went on, the result would soon bring ruin to the boxoffiee, so its effective counteraction was put squarely up to the publicity department. Simple denials would not do; advertising signed statements are expensive and ineffective; so the only thing that seemed adequate was to stage some spontaneous episode that would prove the girl's patriotism aaid be dramatic enough to gain wide publicity.

Knowing that this actress would be a party to no frame-up, the p. m. had to frame one on her. He banked all his hopes on the psychology of a moment. Arrang

ing for some flowers, which, when sent to her box, would disclose the star's presence, he instructed the orchestra to strike up the national anthem as she received them; and he then hoped that the enthusiasm of the moment would sweep the singer to her feet, and she could thus publicly refute the slander of her un-Americanism. He won splendidly; the newspapers flashed the dramatic episode all over the country, with the result that the^ lady is completely rehabilitated in the estimation of those countrymen of hers who had been poisoned by the first story.

IN THE CITY OF HOPE

The activities I have thus far described emerge from the main editorial office, in New York. The horn spectacles there have a feeling of devilish importance because they edit the stuff we reporters send in, but to me they are like a lot of little old ingrowing jewelers sitting in stuffy offices, polishing and setting the dramatic and personal pearls that we daring and adventurous divers bring up out of the filmy depths. There is a lot more fun and excitement in catching tuna than in canning it.

One experiences a curious kind of exhilaration in this kaleidoscopic world of pretty girls, wild animals, and handsome he-dolls. Life is full of movement and color; and though the antics of the participants may seem somewhat superficial, yet we find here all the lights and shades of human loves and tragedies. The vainest wretch who hogs the camera has for four years been paying a doubtful debt of honor of his father; many

of the little girls are not nearly so bad as they are painted; and even my terrifying boss has a charming weakness for giving jobs to old men and cripples.

But the real joy of association on the lot lies in the hope that bums in the heart of every member of our miniature city. In many of our greatest institutions employees often show a gray monotony of interest, or a resigned hopelessness; but out here! The ingenue hopes for a lead; the extra girl looks forward to a "bit"; the boss dreams of the capture of another star or the newest thing in mergers; the grips and stuges are writing scenarios; and the publicity man looks hopefully toward a boost in his check on the first.

True, we also have a certain routine in our work; but it necessitates no such cloistered life as that of the editorial "homed toads" of the eastern office. I make the rounds of each department twice daily, looking for dope; and I do not search in vain. There is so much, in fact, that my job consists in sorting out the best and getting it in such shape that the h. t.'s in New York will think it worthy a place in dramatic literature.

And here is where my artistry comes in. Our solemn bosses—with their tongues in their cheeks—are constantly hollering for "unvarnished tales"; but, of course, we do not take them so seriously as they sound. If we did n't apply a little shellac to some of our stories, it would be mighty embarrassing to a lot of people—^not excluding the boss himself. What they really mean is that we must not be too raw and make our stories up out of whole cloth—^unless our day has been particularly dull. We truly do not need to invent much, for we

have such a colorful bag of ragged truths to pick from that a little artistic trimming and embroidery are all they need.

Perhaps I have been too hard on Truth; she does not appear nearly so dull in Movie Land as she does outside. I really get a lot of help from her; and I am not such a bigot that I won't admit it.

It is curious that a number of true tales a fellow may send in are not believed. This is particularly so in the case of the trick dogs and precocious children. There is a vacuous disinterest shown in this type of story; but let me cut into the delicious privacy of some film favorite's life, and you can knock the readers' eyes off with a stick. Human interest in one's neighbor— or one's neighbor's wife—is strong enough; but if that neighbor happens to be an actress, the interest shown is shocking. The greatest appetite is for stories of the lady's amours, and what she does with her money. So, if I insist that Sheeza, the vamp., spends six dollars a day buying chili sauce, which furnishes the fuel for her warmest scenes, or that Jack Van Arsdale—^who has been five times happily married—is a lonesome bachelor, living with his "sister" on an orange ranch adjoining the studio, what of it?

We have three kinds of personality stories, catalogued under the heads: Philosophy, Gift, and Anecdote.

The philosophic opinions of movie actors on love and marriage are often too quaint to print, and we must revise them for publication. However, occasionally one of them has a near-intelligent estimate of his "art" that will get by—^with help. But when Bessie

Plopit is quoted as uttering profound platitudes anent the part she is playing, you may be sure the dope was provided by a recondite publicity man. Philosophy stories are not particularly exciting and are rather hard Jo put over.

The second classification is the gift story. "The great film feature, Cheops' Daughter^ was lately projected, by royal command, before the Khedive of Egypt; and so entranced was His Highness with the splendid work of Dot Dalrymple that he sent the famous Jazz favorite the largest obelisk on the Nile"; or, "When Miss "Willie Work arrived from the East she was delighted to find that the Eureka had presented her with a beautiful bungalow, furnished down to silver safetypins and a Chinese cook. A canary-colored runabout, with her name modestly stenciled on the doors, awaited her at the station." The gift stories go pretty well, but our generous wits are nearly exhausted. Everythuig from trained pogsnoggles to the keys of the beach cities has been laid at the fair young feet of our popular queens. A cemetery lot has not been thought of; but perhaps such a gift would be misunderstood.

THE GIFT OF THE SULTAN OP GUMBO

An Encyclopedia of Useful Knowledge certainly is useful in our office. I was reading the other day about parasols. Unpromising press stuff, you say? Not "a-tall!" I decided that news should go forth to the enhungered fans that Bessie Plopit possessed the largest collection of parasols in the world. What, thought I, is there to prevent the Sultan of Gumbo from sending

his film favorite—ah, her fame is universal!—a very rare parasol made from the skins of the bongo? Nothing—but the severe illness of Art.

Silly stories? Perhaps; but you seem to like them. I enjoy some of them myself. Anyway, they are fun to write. If you are bound and determined to hear stories of your colorless little pets, it is up to us to entertain you.

And this reminds me that, though most of our dolls are dead ones from the publicity point of view, others are perfect gold mines. "We have one leading lady whose life is about as colorful as that of a minister's wife; yet she has an insatiable appetite for press notices. But the poor creature never does a blessed thing; and yet will not allow us to furnish stories for her. I could pass over her objections to bathing stuff, if she would only walk barefoot through the begonias for her complexion, or take midnight baths on her secluded roof. But what is a poor p. m. to do with a woman who keeps a nursemaid for her child, loves her husband, and would get a headache if an idea or opinion ever crept into her silly little bean?

These negative nobodies are always pestering us because we are "favoring" their rivals with more publicity than is awarded to them. I have two comebacks when they become too churlish: "Why, Marie, I've sent in no end of dope about you; but those darned horned-toads in New York must have canned it." Oh, wicked and useful h. t.'s! Or, "How do you know how much publicity you 've had ? If you 'd loosen up and subscribe to a clipping-bureau you 'd find out.''

In the case of the rip-snortin' he-actor who comes

gunning for me because he thinks his song has gone unsung, I wait until he has blown up; and then I say, "Bill, I saw you in the Convict's Cutie, down at the Badley last night, and your work was simply great!"—and so on. As I pour on the sirup, a beatific smile appears where a moment before a storm raged; and I leave the dear fellow purring in the sunshine, happy as a bubble.

THE CAREER OF MARGUERITE MARIGOLD

In the good old days we had some dreadful lemons given us to promote. The boss, or director, would take up some chicken-minded, pretty pinhead and make her a lead; then he would push it squarely up to the publicity man to put her over—second-class brains wasted on fourth-class ability! Efficiency—^not! We shot a good many beautiful rockets up in the air like this; but most of them came down—naturally—like sticks. Only a few, after their first big boost, floated off into stardom; and those few had potential talents when they bargained for their start.

When a girl becomes enormously famous in the pictures, and brings a great fortune to her boss, his business rivals are on the alert in search for a counterpart type, hoping thus to cut in on the tremendous earnings of the favorite.

In a New York studio a director one day noticed among the extra girls, in a scene he was shooting, a face that caused him to drop everything, rush into the office, grab the boss by the sleeve and stammer "Hen, I 've got a Clarkford out here! For the love of Mike, come out and see her!" And sure enough, when the boss beheld the sweet young face he figuratively went

right over backward, for he saw behind it many men putting hoops on barrels and barrels of money.

Next, to capitalize that face. The whole machinery of the studio would be turned to that purpose. If money and help could make a star, the proper nebulae were forming. Lulu Gatz and her mother, Mrs. Gatz, window-washer at the Elite, suddenly found themselves transplanted from the gas-tanks to an apartment facing Kiverside Drive. The coming star was provided with a maid, a school-teacher, and a dancing-master; the best director on the lot was turned loose to develop her teehnic; and after two months of the hardest kind of work, in which the youngster did exceptionally well, she was handed over to the publicity department.

First of all, "Lulu Gatz" would never do; so, by looking through the rich nomenclature of our sleeping-cars and a few pretty valentines, the p. m. decided that Lulu should go before the world under the floral nom de fillum Marguerite Marigold. "How I became a film star" always gets over; and in the case of Marguerite it was especially exciting, for did she not step right out of a home of wealth and culture into stardom?

But how? "Well, the story went out that Director Stanley Barryworth was up in Boston on location, and every morning for several days he noticed an exquisite child, with her armful of books, crossing the Common. Seeing the amazing picture possibilities in the youngster, he followed her to school one day—^whieh was, of course, against the rule; and he learned from her teacher that she belonged to one of the Backest Bay families in Boston. To break through the aristocratic objections

of the proud parents was a great tribute to the high standing of the Filmart Studio. Oh, the moral and spiritual safeguards included in that contract—a story in itseK!

And the joke of it is that Lulu Gatz arrived, for she had fair ability and the best chance ever given a girl. And this was great good fortune for the Filmart, because this experiment has not always ended so happily. Many a fortune has been spent trying to capitalize a pretty face; but if there is nothing behind the face, good night, bank!

Some people have an instinct for publicity. Extra girls occasionally are crackajacks, though they rarely film up to their advertising; and we use them to boost the studio, or else we hang their stories on the less picturesque leads. "We had one girl, however, of national prominence as a movie queen, who had never appeared in a picture except as atmosphere or ia small parts, but who, by perseverance and intelligent hard work, made good on her fame.

Miss Kingdon had ridden in aeroplanes, raced fhe world's famous drivers round the Santa Monica track, and, as a last sensation, had motored alone across the continent as the Filmart Girl. Speaking in the movie theaters en route, she had become so well known that the studio found it embarrassing to answer requests from her admirers as to when and where they could see her pictures. So it was up to the Filmart Studio to show the girl on the screen; and she went to the bat with a good director and literally learned how to act. "With her native wit, and the help and encouragement of everybody on the lot, she soon rose to star propor

tions, and we were able to send her forth on the silver screen without disappointment to her admirers.

The appointment of Miss Kingdon as city mother in Los Angeles was originally a publicity stunt; but the joke was on us, for the young lady took her responsibilities seriously and worked so effectively that she has become a most useful member of the company and the community.

Some of our stars, feeling that they may be neglected in studio publicity, employ personal press agents, who devote their exclusive time to chanting their pets to fame. These writers usually do feature stuff and try hard for the magazines. One of them will laureate his vampire's hypnotic eyes, while another vsdll prove by half-tone and diagram that his heroine is architecturally identical with the Venus of Milo. Stories on the dietary eccentricities of some ample queen, or the physical culture of our he-god, appear from time to time, to remind us that these famous filmers are not unmindful of the power of money in publicity. It may be interesting to know that the owners of dogs are quite as hungry for press notices as the most ambitious character actors.

THE SERMONS OP BILL JONES

There is one poor chap in Los Angeles whose fame is destined never to spread much beyond the spoken word. In his biggest parts his name does not even appear on the program! As he has specialized on religious characterization, his roles include everything from the saints to the deities; and, as the central figure in most of the great allegories, he has become familiar to all

the fans in the country; yet not half a dozen of them know his identity. It has taken the fellow years to cultivate the natural make-up for these majestic parts; but even the most agnostic would be a bit shocked to see the name of a deity followed by Bill Jones on the program.

"What gets my goat," Bill whined one day, "is that if I was a-playin' one of these mush-faced hero parts, you publikkity guys would be writin' your fool heads off. But, even if I 'm only doin' a Boodish priest, you won't mention my name, for fear of offendin' some goldarned Turk! Ah, ye make me sick!" And Bill indignantly blew great rings of smoke that rose in incongruous halos over his stained-glass head.

Freak contracts are good publicity, as these alleged agreements often contain amazing clauses. One I recall demanded that the young ingenue should always have a chaperon in attendance, live three miles from the studio, and be in bed every night at nine-thirty. Another, that of a famous vamp., bore a strict injunction against the dangerous creature's marrying, dining with men in cafes, or appearing anywhere in public unless heavily veiled. And the joke is that the vamps, are. particularly anxious that their devotees should believe they are "really very good"—so much so that they are constantly seeking domestic-happiness publicity.

The mail-box offers another very fruitful avenue of publicity and is an indication to the office of the star's popularity. No? Well, we sometimes get letters ourselves, and they shed much light on the volumes of mail that come to and about doubtful stars. "Dear Mr. McGrath," one read to-day, "I have just received a

note from Miss Flopit asking me to write and tell the studio how much I appreciate her work. I regret that I cannot do so, for I have never seen her, except in one film; and in that she was pretty poor." We mean old publicity men get to be uncomfortably suspicious of lots of boost letters which come to the studio.

THE PET dolls' MAIL

Over at the Climax there is a girl whose mother is a perfect bear at this letter game. She answers in full every scratch that comes to daughter, of course signing her off-spring's name. She files and card-catalogues all correspondence; and when Easter or Christmas comes, every one of her six or seven hundred devotees gets a card or note of seasonable greetings. Are they glad? How would you feel if your god or goddess should choose you from all her admirers to send you a personal message? Mother also sees to it that all of daughter's fans are informed as to where and when Gertie's pictures are to be released; and the only embarrassment to the mater is when one of Gert's vicarious correspondents gets romantic and comes bounding on to Los Angeles to woo her. It is then that the domestic bean, in the form of the big he-husband daughter supports, must be spilled. At that, mother is a genius, and we ought to have her in our department.

And this reminds me that all film pets must be unmarried. If, perchance, there is a he-and-she episode, the male end of the sketch is always her "brother." The number of movie queens who share a home with their brothers speaks eloquently for the strength of the American family tie.

Even when the romantic maiden learns that her hero is sewed up in a matrimonial bag, that fact does not always deter her from amorous longings. One charming miss, who had familiarized herself with the Borgian means of cyaniding one's side partner into innocuous desuetude, suggested the pretty poison plan to our prize doll, and then offered to share with him her fortune, which, upon inquiry at the bank she quoted, was found to be certainly very alluring.

A most refreshing personality among those who have come my way in this world of human vanities is this same pet doll. Probably the most beautiful male on the silver screen, he gets more "mash notes" than any two actors in the country; yet he absolutely refuses to read one of them. They all come to me, and my stenographer does her best to answer their inquiries and sign photographs for him. When I receive a really good letter, like the one from the cyanide girl, I stand him in a corner and read it to him; but he just laughs and lets me keep it.

Most of the photo-players, unless their mail is too voluminous, prefer answering their own letters; and one can't blame them, for the inclosures are often quite exciting, and include everything from hand-stitched handkerchiefs and crocheted ties to money. A letter came to one of our leading men which contained a hundred-dollar bill and a request that he jump on a train and come at once to his little sweetheart. This chap has a grim sense of humor, for he keeps all the money that is sent him and never reciprocates by so much as a photograph.

Only a few studios furnish photographs for this pur

298 FILM FOLK

pose; so one scarcely blames the actors for feeling tight when one sees the alarming demands made upon them.

There was a fellow at the Mammoth whose contract stipulated that the studio was to pay all the expense of his correspondence. On the day of his leaving he brought into the office two thousand letters to be mailed to his personal fans. Very thoughtlessly he had failed to seal three of them, and a naughty stenographer in the office read one; then she read two. And then she ran away to find the big boss, whose first indignation at his clerk's perfidy faded as he, too, read the letters; for in all three of them the Mammoth was referred to as "a dump," and the boss was ungallantly labeled "a dub."

Henceforth, if "My dearest June," "Hortense," or "Clara" wished to view the godlike proportions of her hero, she must needs look for him under the label of the hated Climax. The intelligent boss made a twothousand-to-three guess that the remainder of the letters would not be good publicity for the Mammoth; so I fear there are now two thousand palpitating little hearts that wonder what has become of the blessed boy of their dreams.

So alert have become the collectors of film-favorite pictures that we now have to be very careful of rubberstamp or office-boy signatures. The photograph fans evidently get together and match John Hancocks; and if one of them suspects forgery, she will roar like Niagara.

Since actors are gradually learning that requests for their photographs do not necessarily mean popularity, they are beginning to shy—^unless there is an inclosure. Thousands of school-girls now collect film favorites quite

as impersonally as I used to corral tin tags and cigarette pictures; they are just trying to see how many they can get. So they write by hundreds to the poor, flattered actor; and, if weak, he indulges in the expensive pastime of adding to their collection.

TOU GET PICTURES, MAC GETS KISSES

My pets should get together and match letters. They would find, to their amazement, that little Maizie, who was simply "pining away" for Hubert Eawling's picture, was affected in that identical way by longing for Spencer Grandon's. In fact, if the truth were known, sixty-two actors had felt so flattered by Maizie's devotion that each and every one sent her his best carbon print—some quite tenderly inscribed—with the result that Maizie has the biggest collection of movie-pictures of any girl in Lincoln High.

She is a short sport who won't send in two bits for a picture of her hero, signed by him, or, better still, by me. The men are fairer than the women in this. We have one fellow in NashviUe who, every three months, sends five dollars for the latest picture of his girl; and you bet he gets a good one!

Ministers, as a class, are not very worldly; yet even they have their favorites. Sometimes one will stall along with spiritual advice; but sooner or later he comes right out and asks for her picture. We had one shepherd in Minneapolis who went mad over our vamp.'s eyes; £ind his praise was so good that her personal press agent used it. His alleged Reverence said he would sue unless the company paid him five hundred dollars for having furnished such a good story! We offered him a job.

I may be shot by a jealous admirer, but, for the sake of many soft-hearted correspondents, I am going to put at rest any amorous hopes they may cherish for these movie girls. Boys, you have n't a chance in the world— with me on the job. Some of these women may regard their husbands not unkindly, but really I am "the dearest fellow" on the lot. One young thing—probably the very one you have been mooning about—is so delighted with any little press notice I take of her that she shamelessly rewards me with a kiss for everything I write— and I have to write quite often. Mrs. McGary, who has mixed sympathies for her sex, is having me measured for fly screens. She says: "I '11 be darned if I '11 have Harry vamped by every jade on the lot simply for doing his duty!" And duty is one of the very best things I do.

You may be sure I have to be careful not to show any favoritism. Every one of these people thinks I am boosting the other. "Do you notice, Madge, that Mr. McGary has little enough to say about me, the best character woman in Hollywood? But look at the stuff he puts over about that kissy kid! I guess he 's flattered; baldheads always are when the chickens notice 'em. But this pretty doll 11 kiss anything and anybody, from the camera kid to her husband—so Mae needn't feel so flattered."

If Benny Bernstein, one of our cut-ups, sees me talking to Hen Barker, a rival custard-pieist, he comes snooping over and tells me a little story about himself; and if ever I should be seen visiting with a twinkling star for any length of time, leave it to his or her rival to see that the tete-a-tete is interrupted.

We once tried handling two captive vamps, at the same time. Never again! When one was working in a set, the other would go and sit behind the camera and "cat" her rival until she completely captured the lady's goat. After several weeks they both demanded and were permitted inclosed sets; but, like as not, when the performing vamp, was working herself up to a point where she could artistically claw off her sweetheart's ear, she would look up and behold the green eye of her rival peering through a hole in the canvas. If you have ever seen how the vamps, make up their wicked eyes by painting the sockets a ghastly green, you can realize how disconcerting it must be to a great artiste to behold one peering at her from ambush.

Another delicious role of the publicity man is that of Father Confessor. Our tremendous power over the destinies of the performers is often associated in their minds with omniscient wisdom; so the oppressed and sore of heart come to us for consolation. I advise them in love and business with equal impartiality, and those who have followed my suggestions have produced astonishing results.

So that we may ring our bells intelligently, the p. m. is supposed to know all about his wares. Therefore we keep on file a secret, signed confession—called the '' Obits.''— of every actor on the lot. In this curious document are many blanJis, to be filled in with the name, birth, incidents of youth, parents, schooling, positions, theatrical experience, sports, hobbies, and so on; but the three questions that bring out the spice of the confessors' lives are:

7. What was your greatest adventure?—^not necessarily a love affair.

9. What are the things in your life of which you are proud?

16. What is there of further interest about yourself? Do not be bashful; all of it is useful to this department and to your welfare.

It is easy to understand why most actors should not hate themselves; but the things that flatter their pride are sometimes baffling. Under this head one chap says he was a member of a certain band of international crooks and had spent four years in the Ohio State Pen.; the pride of another fellow's life was that he won fortythree dollars from "Henry de Wolfe"; and one girl told of a job of high-grading she was in on during the gold rush in Nevada, and how, when the game was pulled, the men intrusted twenty thousand dollars to her; and she made her get-away with it.

A NEW SLANT ON MOTHEEHOOD

The "Do not be bashful" was an ironical injunction to add to the last question in the Obits.; for in answering it the autobiographers showed how they loathed themselves. One mother, filling in the blanks for her chUd wonder, made the poor little one appear to say that she attributed aU her cleverness, wit, and beauty directly to her mother. A story of the admiration of that child for its female parent would stir the heart of every fan in filmdom. I regret that on the lot the little one does not live up to the claims of her legal biographer.

The mother stuff goes over strong; and often, out of sheer kindness of heart, the publicity man provides his dramatic derelicts with beautiful parents. Over at the

THE BBLL-KINGBRS 303

Climax one of the ingenues has a really-truly mother, who trails her daughter at all times. Her liveliest interests, however, lie in Marie's pay-check and the alarming possibility that California may some day go dry. I wish the writers of Mother Songs would convene out here next time. They 'd get a new slant on motherhood. Some of the youngsters have a hard time bringing up their parents into positions they are not used to. Marie has offered up many bone-dry prayers for her dear mother's sake; but their answer still awaits. "What "business is it of a lot of longhairs if a lady wants to drink?" Mother is alcoholically very 1776.

One serious blunder that must be avoided by the publicity man is incorrect billing. If we send out a story in which the title of the play is in larger type than that of the actress, we had better be quite sure we have read the lady's contract or we may be letting ourselves in for trouble. Some stars have contracts that read: "The name must appear alone upon all advertising; and in news copy it must be three agate lines larger than the title." Bless your heart, some of our pets carry rulers and yardsticks, and run about like tapeworms, measuring aU the printed matter they see!

"We have a few leads who are generous enough to share headlines with their co-stars; but others insist upon their contractual rights, and if one of these is appearing in a picture with a lead of the opposite sex, she insists that she shaU be "merely supported by Tom Sentous."

A rather remarkable case of modesty—or was it intelligence?—^was that of a famous star who demanded that his name should appear simply along with other

304 FILM FOLK

members of the cast; and that the title should be the point played up.

On the other hand, we have a leading woman who, though her contract does not so specify, refuses to appear as a co-star with any man. Some time ago she was cast with a beautiful male in a fine part; but when she found she had to share the screen with him, illness overcame her. The sets were ready, so the picture was taken with a substitute; and after it was well started the sniffy lady recovered. Then it was announced that, because the substitute was very, very bad, the picture would be made all over again, with our dashing lead playing opposite our handsome Edgar.

But what do you think? She had a relapse! Then the boss blew up and issued an ultimatum to the effect that if she was not well enough to appear in the picture by Monday there would be a broken contract, and the lady could just naturally climb a tree and look for another job. The picture was made; and, furthermore, we learn from the exchanges that the man "stole the show"—^which is vulgar slang, meaning that he put it all over the woman.

THE FRIEND OP THE PBX)PLE

But, with all our tender care and solicitude for our children's temperaments, we are in a constant state of turmoil because some exhibitor, caring nothing for our feelings, decides to feature his favorite. Of course it's none of our business; and, if a showman wishes to ring a bell for an extra girl, it is his privilege—and we get the kicks.

Last fall one of our fragile queens nearly lost her wits

because a local theater featured a fellow on the same bill with her. Lese-majeste? You bet, and more! Why, a publicity man would be shot in his bed before breakfast if he did such a thing; but nothing could be done M the theater monster except to try to persuade him to Bee the light. "When I pictured, with humiliating gestures, the gentle lady's wrath, and how she was likely to wreck the studio—and mayhap the industry—I touched his pocket nerve; and he relented.

Then out into the night with a gang of nasty billstickers goes Harry McGrath—publicity man by day for the Filmart Company—and plasters out the offensive name of our nicest hero. If a certain admiral had been a movie admiral, rather than a deep-sea one, he would never have made his famous epigram: "There is glory enough for all!" Not in this business!

Another great embarrassment occurs when our highestfaluting actors load up with big three-cylinder names which take up so much room that the compositors won't follow copy. We 're to blame for that, too. So, though at times we are most encouragingly kissed, at others we are kicked on the shins.

The ambition of every publicity man is to frame a story that the Associated Press will carry. Of course it must be convincingly true to the A. P. man, and of national rather than local interest.

When the greatest mermaid in captivity was a little minnow her press man says she had infantile paralysis; but by sheer perseverance and athletic training she overcame it entirely. So, when it was announced that the beautiful swimmer would address the poor, stricken children of New York at a special matinee, a hard-work

ing p. m. sat hopefully tight. Then the horrid old Health Department, having more interest in the physical welfare of the Gothamites than it had in a good story that would have gone all over the country, called off the meeting.

On another occasion a presidential candidate was touring the West; and, as we had a character man who was a bear at make-up, we tried to put over a good joke that would appeal to our national sense of humor. A delegation of prominent citizens was on hand one morning to meet the candidate's special, scheduled to arrive in Los Angeles at 10:20 A. m. Just as the train was due, a tall, dignified man, in square gray whiskers, who, with a group of silk-hatted satellites, had been hiding in the baggage-room, came through the wicket. A reception committee hurried the party past the cheering throng to waiting automobiles, which immediately set out to the hotel for a big public reception.

To the horror and amazement of the gaping crowd there gathered, the "friend of the people" removed his dignified foliage, while his high-hatted intimates howled with laughter. Fortunately for the honor of a great cause, the train was late; so the reception committee had ample time to meet the real distinguished guest. Perhaps, because of the delicacy of the political situation in California, the old A. P. refused to send out the story.

A mean trick practiced sometimes by theatrical writers on newspapers is to steal our stories and credit them to rival actors. If one of these unconscionable wretches has occasion to boost a fellow, and is shy of dope, he will, like as not, grab off a good story belonging

to another chap and hang it on the hero he is celebrating.

The advertising of moving-pictures has attained such universal interest that purely local stories are utterly futUe. There was a time when we furnished film stars to open bazaars and sell tickets for all sorts of affairs; but the local public worked this cheap bell-ringing to death and the advertising it brought was negligible.

Once in awhile, however, we stage something spectacular enough to break into the press of the whole country. All this winter—the word winter is used solely from habit; we press fellows wiU boost California, even at a funeral—as I started to say, all this winter the various civic organizations have been giving bazaars and shows for the Red Cross, and some made quite a little money. "When it came our turn we turned loose all our publicity departments, with the most pleasing results:

"A Great Ball Game between the Comedians and Tragedians of Movie Land! Eighteen Famous Film Stars at the Bat—Eighteen!"

For inside ball and excitement the players made the Big-League fellows look like a lot of Irishmen on the eighteenth of March. The rules had to be somewhat changed to accommodate genius. When the heaviest custard-pie hitter in the world sliced a ball back over the reporters' stand, and immediately set out for second base and return, the umpire, one Mr. B. Oldfield, appeared quite dazed with the unusual procedure; but something prompted him to call "Foul!" This instantly brought down upon his head the syndicated clubs of some notorious police, who then keystoned the

poor chap all over the diamond. Evidently the famous Ump saw some new lights, for he reversed his decision, and Mr. C. Chaplin was given a home run. For sheer spontaneous fun this unique game beat all the celluloid comedies ever filmed; and the story went all over the country.

WONDERFUL DOUBUNG

At a banquet held the same night the plainest comedian in the world—and that is fame!—sold kisses for a dollar apiece. And, to show the sacrifices American women will make for their country's good, every miss and missis at the board made her silver sacrifice. Result: seven thousand five hundred dollars raised in a single day! Thus it is demonstrated that even the ignoble game of publicity may be turned to noble purposes.

It is fashionable for business men to laugh at writers, and such; but when we get our little engine running it makes all their efficiency experts look like defectives. Early in the winter a huge petition was started in New York, and the securing of signatures was turned over to every big organization in the city—^police, fire, street-car companies, hospitals, department stores, and moving-pictures. "We worked through our publicity departments; and before these other outfits had even organized we had turned in more signatures than all of them subsequently obtained. Monday—Organized; Tuesday—Had slides made and solicited every theater in New York; "Wednesday and Thursday—Theaters ran announcement on slides between all shows; Friday— Petition was passed and signed by every film patron at

tending in New York. Result—Two hundred and fiftythousand signatures in a day!

The unique trick of doubling, which occurs only in the art of the photo-drama, often extends to the publicity stories and pictures of leads. Pretty girls of the comedy companies have very little to do except to pose for publicity stories; so it is not uncommon for one of them to eke out an honest living by doubling photographically for some lead who hasn't the qualifications for certain pictures. I know one popular leading lady who, for anatomical reasons best known to herself, will not don a bathing suit; but she does not wish to miss this form of publicity, for it is scandalously popular. So she just hires a Clingstone Beauty, who types her well, to do it for her.

There are many faces familiar to movie-magazine fans whose fame lies in the "still." And a professional beauty does not need to act to get into the moving-pictures; she may romp round with some studio's famous beauties on the beach, or appear as a coquettish cloakmodel in the fashion footage of the weekly news bulletin. Incidentally, when we are simply stuck with a charity bazaar request, these are the famous film favorites whom we send to sell chances on the automobile.

McGinty, of the Eureka, framed a unique stunt of doubling a while ago in which he deceived the profession itself. Returning from San Francisco one day, he learned that his pet Eastern star had left very suddenly for New York. Having planned a tremendous farewell for the popular Miss Willie, he was temporarily disturbed when he learned that she had sneaked off and

killed his story. But only temporarily. He 'd give her a farewell, anyway; nobody knew she had gone; so why not?

HAVING PUN WITH VISITORS

'' On the afternoon of her departure Miss Willie faced half the population of Film Land who had come to see her off. Literally buried in flowers, she stood on the back platform of the train and waved her hands and threw kisses to all her admiring friends." Mary Jane Barbour, sometimes called "little" Willie, who did the doubling, told me afterward that she really felt quite a thrill, even though she knew the affair was intended for another girl, three thousand miles away.

Every visitor to California, both multi-millionaires and those without distinction, wishes to see how movies are made; and they all make their way to the Mammoth, the only plant open to the public. The place is thronged all day with convention delegates, rubberneck tourists, rich goldfish from the hotels, and distinguished visitors. While the conventions and tourists lend themselves to certain publicity, it is the distinguished visitor upon whom the p. m. pounces.

The most austere statesman will soon melt in the carnival spirit of studio life; and the alert p. m., seeing that the Big Squeeze is getting kittenish, nurses him along, and presently he has him out for a lark. He will then do anything suggested. If, on the screen, you should some day see Madame Schumann-Heink suddenly emerge from the Salvation Army and begin to sing "Hallelujah! I'm a bum"; or if you go to a good old nickel slum picture and see Fritz Kreisler

fiddling in a cabaret, do not think that these great artists are working extra in the movies. Those scenes were mere incidents of a happy day at the Mammoth. It is to be hoped the gentle Russian anarchs will understand our hospitality when they behold Count Tolstoi blandly sitting in a den of lions.

As a poetic reminder of the Chicago World's Fair, the villagers of that sentimental city may some day see a picture of their somewhat respected mayor riding a camel through the streets of Cairo; and as a public tribute to the seaworthiness of a certain type of jitney, the peace-loving owner was driven madly over our "prairie," while one of our best cowboys roped a "mad steer" from the front seat. Famous statesmen, soldiers, and pickle kings have appeared in roles that were highly amusing to themselves and duck soup for the press fellows.

One of the great merchants of America, out for a wifeless holiday, became so hilarious at the studio that the p. m. on the job manoeuvered him into a set with his most ferocious vamp. The merchant prince thought it great fun, at first; but when the naughty girl, at a signal from the p. m., began to vamp him all over the stage, he had to call for help. Though the poor man blushed considerably, he seemed not entirely to have disliked the experience. It would be interesting to be on deck the day wifey happens into the theater showing that film.

Convention delegates are immensely helpful to publicity. After adjourning they pour out to the Mammoth and indulge in bank runs, bread riots, and milk banquets, or as simple rubbernecks. They spread the fame of the studio to all ends of the world; and for

weeks after a bunch of delegates has appeared—even as atmosphere—^the office is bombarded by letters askiag when and where the film will be shown. Ever afterward these people feel a personal interest in the Mammoth label.

The publicity that stirs most people to their sordid depths is the question of salaries. "Do the pinheads get it?" "Of course they don't! That's just the same old Barnum-Bailey press bunk." "Say, if that guy is getting ten thousand a week, then I 'm worth a million!" "Great heavens! What is our civilization coming to when we pay a clown six hundred and fifty thousand dollars a year, while our ministers starve!" Time was when we lied outrageously about the wages we paid for dramatic sin; but nowadays we don't have to. Tes, those awful salaries are true; more than true, but whether they are a curse or a blessing to the industry only time will tell.

Anybody who doubts that an actor can earn half a million dollars in a year—I use the word earn in its business definition—^should get out his slate and do a little figuring. A high-class theater will play to two or three thousand dollars for a two-weeks run of a good drawing picture; so it is reasonable to expect that it will gladly pay a thousand dollars for the film. Now suppose there are one hundred and fifty first-class theaters in the U. S. A., all featuring the same picture for the same first run. That means one hundred and fifty copies at a thousand dollars each. And suppose the actor's contract calls for the making of twelve pictures a year; this means that the man's films earn one million eight hundred

thousand dollars. This is to say nothing of the second and third runs.

It is beside the point to say that nobody is worth half a million dollars a year; the fellow's films earn it, and even a "dub actor" may capitalize his earning capacity. After paying this huge salary, great sums for production, and thousands for publicity, there still remain, out of the one million eight hundred thousand dollars, enormous profits to the promoters.

I was commissioned by my company a while ago to offer a certain favorite two hundred and fifty thousand dollars a year on a two-years' contract; and he came back with the statement—and the proof—that another studio had offered him nearly twice that amount. Four years ago the chap was earning only forty dollars a week, and his sudden rise to such film favoritism has quite flabbergasted him.

"When they offered me this fortune," he said to me, "I told them frankly that the thing was a joke; for, as a measure of artistic success, it made me about twenty times as good as Henry Irving. But if I was earning the money, why, I guess it was coming to me.

" 'Well, the truth is, Bill,' they replied, 'you will not quite earn your contract; but, having no other big stars, we are going to use your name to pull for the studio.' "

A few years ago there was but one man and one woman—^woman ?—a mere girl!—who were earning over ten thousand dollars a week. Now there are probably eight. A very strange change in the public taste is indicated by the increasing popularity of the men. It was not many years ago when the studios were wit-ended

to know how to popularize their male dolls. The best of them were used mostly as foils and beautiful cuties for the more popular movie queens.

But now we find three or four men in the ten-thousanddollars class; and the strange—and hopeful—thing is that not one of them is a pretty boy. Sheer genius for comedy is responsible for one; another has arrived because of his bounding joyous personality; another, rawboned and as plain as an old shoe, seems to have touched bottom in the sentimental hearts of his admirers; while a fourth has won out because of a certain pensive sadness and artistic repression.

There seem to be no stars of the second magnitude in the pictures. We drop abruptly from the supersalaries down to the thousand-a-week class. Think of calling a thousand dollars a week a drop!

Though there is much disagreement among the bosses as to the wisdom of paying great salaries, they all now agree that the publicity of them has worked a great injury to the industry. The public resents such abnormalities; and the companies themselves, by outbidding one another with greater salaries, are often beaten at their own game.

Suppose, for instance, a studio spends a fortune in developing, training, and advertising a star, like Marguerite Marigold. Just as she has become popular and is beginning to pay back something on the investment, lo and behold, another studio bobs up and offers her five hundred dollars a week! When, in turn, this studio has spent a mint on her, along comes a third and offers her one thousand dollars. By this little game of starstealing every company loses its original investment;

THE BELL-RINGERS 315

for when a star leaves she carries her prestige to the new studio, and the old one has to discover and develop a new favorite.

This suicidal warfare has led to queer protective measures. Some studios are now copyrighting names that the struggling young actress is glad enough to start with, just to be in the movies, but which she cannot take with her after the company has spent a fortune upon it. This is particularly true of the baby stars; they soon grow out of babyhood, and all their advertising would be lost if the same name could not be passed along to another infant.

Another policy is to stress the studio label in all advertising and play very softly on the personal note. "Stars may come and stars may go, but the studio goes on forever!" paraphrases one corporation.

On the other hand, one of the great picture corporations believes in and capitalizes the drawing power of names.

"I don't care how much I pay a star if we can make ten per cent, off his picture," says the president, "but star salaries are going down from now on. Due to the great investments in plants, the cost of production is constantly going up; and more, very much more, will have to be paid for stories if the art is to survive. Directors and"—oh, goody!—"publicity men, and all those who contribute to the stars' success, must have a greater share in the earnings."

It may seem strange, in a country which largely measures the merit of things by their cost, that this studio forbids the mention of money in all its advertising.

"Boys," said the director-general one day in the

publicity office, "when a woman who has been working over a tub of suds all day goes to see Marie play a pathetic little part in rags, she is emotionally touched; but when she learns that this same child is earning six hundred thousand dollars a year!—^twelve thousand dollars a week!!—two thousand dollars a day!!!—^she is made very resentful. There is a natural indignation in the hearts of all hard workers over the very unequal distribution of the goods of this world; but when a mere slip of a girl draws wages of fifty thousand dollars a month, the underpaid women will never like her quite the same. No, lads; we must cut out all reference to cost of production; sheer money does not mean a good picture, and our salaries are vulgar enough without advertising them."

These conflicting psychologies had been puzzling me for a long time, but I had just about concluded that the Mammoth was right: Advertise the label!

"Blanche," said I, as she snuggled up alongside me in the protecting dark of the projecting room, "I think in a few years we shall be advertising our wares just the same as automobiles. After all, 'the play 's the thing.' "

"But, Harry," peeped up my exasperating wife, "the play certainly is not the whole thing! You '11 never be able to eliminate personalities so long as people would rather go to see Sarah Bernhardt in East Lynne than to see Bessie Flopit tackle Juliet. I 11 go to see Spencer Grandon in any old film! If it was n't that I love you, despite your old bald head, I 'd be simply mad over Spencer. He 's got the grandest hair and "

Truth often makes herself felt in the protecting dark of the projecting room.

VIII

PLOTS AND COUNTERPLOTS

(THE SAD STORY OF THE SCENARIO WRITER)

I AM a scenario reader for the Pilmart Feature-Picture Company.

"Aha!" you say. "The fellow who stole my story! At last the son-of-a-gun has been smoked out! Let's see what he has to say for himself."

Well, here goes, fellow-countrymen of mine! I '11 tell you the truth about this business, let the ax fall where it will. 'Tis no uneasy conscience that urges me on, for, to speak frankly, I have been insulted so long I have become quite shameless. To get from ten to twenty J'accuse letters a day finally makes the soul callous. Calling a fellow a thief and a porch-climber is not very respectful; but a kidnapper! I believe we lynch them, do we not? Yet scenario readers go on, day after day, stealing the intellectual children of their fellow-artists and bringing them up as their own. Monsters!

Now, mind you, we of the Burglars' Union care little for the asparagus that is cast upon us in our daily mail; but unfortunately—I mean fortunately—we have wives, and wives somehow do not like to have the villagers insulting their hubbies. Besides, we good, union burglars on t^e inside have grown to feel a great contempt for

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318 FILM POLK

the little non-union thieves on the outside. That old, old scab trick of the petty Larsen mixing in the crowd, crying "Stop thief!" as it spills through the streets, makes us smile wanly. But our wives! It is well that most of the J'accusers live a long way off.

Louise Belden, my favorite and only wife, was looking over some submissions the other day and asked permission to reply to one of the many that ended this way: "If you reject this scenario, what assurance have I that you wiU not subsequently use the idea?" And she replied as follows:

Deab Sib: We have used the plot many times already; but a great respect for the memory of De Maupassant would forbid us using it in the dress you have chosen without giving credit to the Guy who really wrote it.

You see now that this article is likely to contain as many violent accusations as snappy confessions; so let's be off.

SUCCESSFUL IMPROMPTU DRAMAS

I came into this game in the wet autumn of 1907 after having fiddled round in newspaper work for several years, occasionally landing a short story in a magazine of diminishing popularity. My first job with the Chicago studio of the Climax was doing publicity; but that was merely incidental, for in those days we were all supposed to do everything, from splicing film to taking parts. Within a year I found myself working a camera for that grand old director. Bill Condon. It is fashionable nowadays to speak slightingly of the old

PLOTS AND COUNTERPLOTS 319

time directors; but there were some of those boys who had delightful wit and extraordinary resourcefulness. At that time we had no scenario departments, every director making his own stories—often as he went along. For instance, one day the big boss came to Condon and said:

"Bill, I 've hired that Wild "West Show for to-morrow at a thousand dollars, and I want you to go out and shoot a good one-reeler out of 'em."

"Cowboys in Chicago, eh?" thought Condon out loud. "I gotcha."

The next morning we made a lot of ridiculous scenes of cowboys in automobiles, on railroad trains, and tearing through the streets on horseback; and, in the afternoon, a bunch of close-ups at the studio. These, when spliced with some good stock film of Western rodeos, evolved into a corking tale of a chap who went West, became a cowboy, returned East to inherit a fortune, became bored and lonesome, and finally—as a joyous joke—^telegraphed for the whole ranch to come East at his expense.

The behavior of these cowboys at the home of their millionaire friend would not have found acceptance in any book of etiquette. The story was logical, bright, and full of excitement; and its release made many thousands of dollars for the Climax. Some of the best of the early photo-dramas were made under just such inspirational methods.

As spectacular action was the backbone of most of our pictures, we constantly kept loaded up on stock film of fires, accidents, auto races, floods, parades, and

320 FILM FOLK

big crowds; and, having a lot of good punches on ice, we wrote our stories round them. Some of the greatest pictures of the past were made for very little money, the studio shots being inconsequential, while fortuitous circumstance furnished the big scenes for next to nothing.

WHEN THE VILLAGEBS ASSIST

A queer communication, protesting against the "wanton waste of burning down a five-story dwelling just to get a picture," came to us one time from a civic organization. This was high praise to our convincing use of stock flashes. I '11 tell you how the picture was made:

An interior—studio—shows a young lady reading by the window. She suddenly hears fire-bells, jumps up, runs to the window and looks out. Cut-in, showing fireengines coming down the street—stock film. Young lady turns and registers horror as smoke is seen through the window—studio. Fire-engines playing hoses on burning building—stock. Young lady runs into hall; runs back into room, suffocating—studio. Cutting back and forth from the real fire to the scenes made at the studio, we got the characters so identified with stock film that the continuity fooled even a high-browed civic club. There was much more to the story than I have indicated, but that is enough to show how stock film may be used.

Whenever we got an emergency call, if possible we took along a hero, heroine, and villain, and registered them in the actual scene. This made the studio continuity much easier. Ten years ago the unsophisticated villagers often quite misunderstood our antics when out

on location, and we had to be very alert lest they crab our action. One time Tom Sentous—^base wretch!— tried to lock Beatrice Hunter in a burning building down in Clark Street, and the crowd broke through the police lines and set upon Tom like a pack of wolves, while a couple of perfectly strange heroes broke in the door and rescued Bee.

"Keep crankin', Sam," said Condon. "I thought this might happen; so I doped my story to use either way. . . . Now go and get the name and address of the guy that 's gotta holt of Bee. I may want to use him in the studio.''

On another occasion Condon and I were nearly mobbed because this single-minded director tried to get a hero and a heroine into a railroad wreck when every ablebodied man on the job was working like a slave to get out the dead and dying.

Even the stock film of the travelogue stuff was often grabbed off by these instantaneous scenario writers. Harry McClure, who went round the world getting educational film, would dramatize his traveling companions; and some of the stories he wove round seemingly commonplace incidents were downright masterly. When Mac was filming a court reception of the King of Siam, a very beautiful young girl fainted in the arms of a handsome chap beside her, and had to be carried from the presence of the king by court attendants. Was the maiden overcome by the solemnity of the great Presence ? She was not. She and her brother were simply naughty children who had gone into cahoots with Mac to make a king appear as "atmosphere" in a photo-drama. A parade of white elephants next day gave the conspira

tors a chance to get some perfectly bully atmosphere for their snappy little story.

The using of stock film, round which to build stories, has produced startling results. Some of our most prominent men who have been shot for the weekly news service would be delighted to know that their noble sconces are sometimes used to dignify a movie murder trial. The Climax one time bought about three hundred feet of Ex-President Taft, which we thought we might want to use to get heroes out of jail.

Stock film, which in those days was the "punch" round which alert directors built their scenarios, now serves a secondary purpose. For instance, if we should be doing a good story—with a real plot—of circus people, we could, no doubt, make most of it right on the lot; but, in order to enrich the local color and to give the picture completeness, we use some stock flashes of circus parades and big-tent exteriors. What was once considered the big stuff we now use merely as atmosphere.

IN THE OLD DAYS

It was not many years, in the life of the pictures, before all the day's accidents and spectacular happenings had been done to death, and the studios began buying ideas. Five and sometimes ten dollars was the stimulus that started the ferrets digging up punches, and some were alert enough to nose out as many as twenty ideas in a week. This naturally led to the employment of the most facile idea-mongers on regular salary; and thus began the first scenario departments in the moving-picture business.

I often think of that scenario room, with my former colleagues up to their ears in the back files of old magazines, snooping round to find ideas. Little did they dream that they were starting a habit which would be hard to break, and a reputation that we shall never live down. In perfect innocence they pursued this ethical pilfering; nobody cared. Furthermore, the stories were not actually stolen; only the punches, round which new stories could be written.

Then one day a momentous thing happened—small enough in itself, but epoch-making in its consequences. The Climax announced, with great advertising gusto, that it had bought the film rights to a certain wellknown story, and had paid the author a large sum. Bingo! Right away every publisher, author, and magazine clamped down hard on his copyrights, and in the future we could just naturally pay for the stuff we used—or steal it.

As a consequence of the closing down of the gold mines, writers began submitting stories, and we bought them as cheaply as possible; but there were many studios which had burgled so long that they thought it a perfect outrage to pay for a story. What was a story, anyway? A good director and a popular baby-doll did n't need a story.

In any event, why pay for it, when all you wanted was the idea ? And a bright fellow could get that while he was reading the story and handing it back as "not available."

Those were the days, and they were not so long ago— I have a childish suspicion that with a few second-class studios they are still present—^when grand larceny was

at its grandest. A chap told me that he stood and saw a typist copy his story word for word and page by page, and the next day his MS. was returned to him as "unsuitable. '' Some studios actually had synopses made of every story that came, pasted them in scrapbooks, and then permitted their directors to read them at their leisure.

Now, in all fairness to these jolly pirates, it must be said that they were allowed very little money for such a secondary purpose as stories; and if they spent too much, the bosses would think they were witless and would hire some one "who could write his own stuff."

When we first began to buy stories from famous writers, I went one day to see a picture written by an author I knew quite well, and it was very poor; so I wrote to the advertised offender and asked him how he could write such a rotten scenario. He replied as follows:

Beab Sam: I didn't. One day I paid a visit of curiosity to the studio, and a fellow in the scenario department handed me a synopsis of an Alaskan story and asked me what was the matter with it. I glanced hurriedly over the copy, made a commonplace remark or two, and was about to leave, when he handed me a check for a hundred dollars. My " professional opinion was worth it," he insisted. I thought it was just another example of movie insanity to spend money, and was right pleased to have him pick on me to give it to; but I see that the hundred carried with it the foster parentage of that terrible tale. You are in a delicious business, Sam. I commiserate you.

As the story gained importance as a factor in the photo-drama, and particularly as the whole field of free fiction had been plowed to the limit, the studios finally

decided to pay for everything. This looked hopeful for the author, but, alas! he didn't get his hope; there was another way his brains could be used and not paid for. "If the company insists upon paying for the story," said the old-time director with his glorious record of individual achievement, "all right; they will pay me, for I prefer to write my own." But, one might ask, did these men never run dry? How could they keep it up?

A NEW SET OP EULES

The fact is, they did keep it up. It is true they would occasionally stroll over to the absurd scenario department and glance through the submissions, just to show a little interest in the children there. One of them would sometimes spend a whole morning reading the "rubbish"; and when lunchtime came he would emit a bored yawn and say, "Piffle—^nothing but piffle! Well, I guess I '11 have to write my own, as usual." I have often wondered what the authors of those piffling stories thought when they saw them upon the screen so very thinly disguised.

When Mr. Lewis became manager of the Mammoth in Los Angeles, he found that the directors, besides earning salaries of from fifty to three hundred dollars a week, were being paid as much as five hundred dollars for their "own" scenarios. In the great upheaval of the moving-picture industry at that time, the new men who came in found they had inherited, in addition to business chaos, questionable honor and naive ethics. The most persistent accusation against the companies

was this charge of stealing stories; and to live down this unpleasant heritage remains the hardest task before them.

I was reading submissions, and occasionally writing scenarios, when the storm hit us. After the big chief had the plant running with some degree of order and efficiency, he turned his cold, Scotch eye on our happy little department. The first cruel order stated that no employee of the company would henceforth be paid aught but his salary. If he had a grand idea that was keeping him awake nights, he could kick in with it— but with no pay. Furthermore, if any member of the company was discovered selling scenarios elsewhere, immediate dismissal would follow. This order hit a lot of those directors right between the eyes, and several of them left in high indignation.

As an added protection to authors, directors were forbidden to direct their own stories, even though they were "contributed." Thus, the greatest offender was rendered harmless, for now he had not the slightest incentive to steal stories. It would seem that the last chance for theft was, therefore, gone, and the poor struggling scenario writer could submit his stuff without having it burglarized; but we highbrows must not be overlooked. We were the original thieves, and had become the law-proof plagiarists par excellence. What was there to stop me, for instance, from reading a submission, returning it, and swiping the idea, which I would turn into a scenario of my own? Nothing; absolutely nothing but my conscience, and that wasn't always working as nicely as it should. It is true that I should draw no extra pay for the thing itself, but my

extraordinary fertility of mind would be worth a large salary from the company.

Again the red-headed big boss came to the rescue of the absurd authors. Now he divided us into sheep and goats. The sheep were to read submissions, but were not allowed to write; while the poor goats had to write scenarios from the stuff we accepted. That suspicious old boss also thought it best to divorce the sheep from the goats; so we were given widely separated offices and no intercommunication was permitted. I was a sheep, and after this change in our arrangements I never used to see the goats; and the new ones I hardly knew by name.

When a scenario is now submitted it is bought or returned on its merits—as understood by the readers— by men and women who have no possible interest in it beyond the hope that it will be useful to the studio. If it is accepted, it is turned over to the goats, who whip it into shape for shooting. The chances of theft at our studio, and others that have adopted this system, are so remote as to be a negligible factor in an author's consideration. While I was there we paid from fifty to a thousand dollars for every idea and story we used. There are a few large companies that still permit their readers to write; and, though they are gradually installing high-grade people, it will be much better when even unconscious plagiarism is impossible.

The prevalent idea that moving-picture companies still steal all their stuff is shown to be absurd when one looks over the cost sheets of the many pictures we turned out. To appropriate twenty-five thousand dollars for a five-reel picture and to steal the story from which it

is made ? No, indeed! So desperate are studios to get good stuff that some time ago one of them offered to pay one hundred thousand dollars for one hundred acceptable stories. On the contrary, it is the knowledge that movies are paying big money for scenarios that has brought down the deluge which is upon us.

WHERE IDEAS COUNT

When the joyous news that we were paying real money leaked out, and the happy recipients of our cheeks exhibited them to every passing stranger, the bombardment began; but when the trade magazines took up the cry, and wonderful schools of scenario writing were established, and there came into existence agencies that guaranteed to dispose of scenarios from the pens of anybody, "without education or previous training," the dramatic eruption became volcanic. Yet, with the avalanche of so-called scenarios that daily pour in upon us, there is very, very little that is worth a tinker's damn; and if you have ever heard a tinker, you will know I could n't say less. I should say that, of the two thousand submissions a week that came to us, not one half of one per cent, was available for any purpose. If we relied on our free-lance contributors, we should have to shut down. Most of our wants are supplied by certain well-known photo-dramatists and short-story men, and the few goats we keep in captivity right on the lot, where we can pick on them when we think their stuff is particularly puerile.

The task of a scenario reader is more difficult than the same position on a magazine; for in the latter case the

reader can often tell, almost at a glance, whether the stuff is available. A fellow may have a bully idea, but as the magazines are not running schools of short-story writing the MS. may be returned without further perusal if the diction is hopelessly bad. But in the case of the scenario the idea is the whole thing; so we cannot afford to neglect reading the most illiterate story that comes to us. We read them all with avidity, in the hope that perhaps the author has somewhere concealed in the middle of his muddle an idea worth developing. It is because we sometimes find poor material by new writers that we have a staff that can work it over into something worth while.

Hope of financial gain does not alone explain why every man, woman, and child is writing scenarios— or is about to. We receive hundreds of stories with the authors' compliments, and many are not even signed. One director is at present making a corking comedy for which his company will gladly pay the author a thousand dollars—if they can find him.

No; it must be the universal human cry for expression that prompts motor-men and supreme-court judges to submit scenarios. An art is practiced in direct proportion to its understanding; and, as the photo-drama is by far the most democratic of all the arts, everybody wants to contribute, either as an actor or a writer. If the gang understood music, poetry, and painting, they would all be drumming, drooling, and daubing; but to most people the fine arts are closed professions. Here is an art, however, that a child or a Chinaman can understand, even though the titles are unintelligible to

them. It was Aristotle, I think, who said that the most elemental intellectual quality was the power to recognize familiar objects.

THE PEOPLE WHO WEITE

Whatever the reason, the whole world is writing for the screen. We get stories from Europe, Asia, and South America. Some come in Pidgin-English; while one chap, fearful that some one might beat him to it, sent up his shorthand notes. One came a few months ago from a Japanese Freshman up at Berkeley; and it is too bad that it is a tragedy—oh, a very tragic tragedy! If we could film it with his naive subtitles, it would be a scream. For instance, when the unhappy wife repudiated her husband for her lover, the title read: "He is not my connubial partner. He possession only my corpse. I bestow not my personality."

There is always a part of the population, working indoors or in dark places, who could not participate in the picture play; but there is nothing to prevent them from writing scenarios; and apparently nothing does. I know only one motor-man who is not writiag a romance or a drama. In the depths of the canning factories and in the cellars of the office buildings are thousands of burning geniuses who are writing—on one side of the paper only, according to scenario requirement—of escapades that would test the nerve of the best of us.

Shopgirls turn out romances by tens of thousands that would make the Perils of Pauline seem safe and tame; and if our actors took some of the chances the stenographer^ and elevator men frame up for them, every hospital and morgue in the place would be filled to overflow

ing. It is so easy, in the safe seclusion of the boilerroom, to write: "The hero falls headfirst from the third-story window, but is saved by striking the angle of an awning, which turns him over, so that he lands uninjured on his feet."

Of the Americans, I should say that newspapermen and short-story failures are the most prolific contributors. Close to the head of the literary pageant come the professionals—^ministers, judges, psychics, and healers; then the clerks and paying-tellers; propagandists, cranks, and plain nuts. And bringing up the rear come the old vets; they are the employees, from camera kids to the bosses in New Tork, their wives and sweethearts, aunts and uncles. Perhaps the most ferocious writers are the actors themselves, who simply cannot find stories adequate to their peculiar and splendid personalities. It 's a dam shame that scenario writers insist upon showing more than one person on the screen; for if they would only consult some of the author-actors, they would learn that a good five-reeler consists of five thousand feet of close-ups of the leading man.

A curious fact—the reason for which I shall leave to the psychologists—is that women contributors are vastly in the minority; yet they send in most of the morbid stuff.

There are persistent writers who come back month after month for years without selling a thing. One girl in Vermont always intersperses her synopsis with quaint personal parentheses. Here is a fragment of one: "It is the night before election, and John Borden is seen sitting at his desk marking his ballot (I hope, Mr. Editor, you voted for Mr. Wilson) and as he makes his last

mark he pours himself a glass of beer (I want the villain to drink beer, for you know, Mr. Editor, beer is very degrading), then he rises and leaves the room."

There are thousands of burning geniuses who are having their wicks trimmed at the scenario schools; and we can tell, from so-called studio patter, just where each of these scholastic scenarios comes from. It is as absurd to attempt to learn the technic of the photo-drama without the stage, camera, and laboratory as it would be to take a correspondence course in seal-training. Most of the jargon learned in many schools is wrong, or of purely local use, and only clutters up the idea the poor student is submitting. I know of no large company that does not prefer a straight, short-story synopsis.

And what of the plots ?

One morning at breakfast Louise read me a real story from the one paper that has dedicated itself to Truth— so the editor asserts. The piece in question was about a burglar who had entered a house in Pasadena; but instead of finding rich loot, he came upon a poor mother in great distress because her child had croup. This was too much for the burglar; for it seems he had three little burgs himself, all of whom he had nursed back to health and burglary, and he was, therefore, the grandest croupist in Kern County. So for the nonce he gave up crime; and running out to the kitchen he started the hot-water kettle, and when it was boiling he fixed up some steaminhaling device, and Hortense got well. It was a right smart story, true to life and full of heart interest.

"Sam, how many scenarios will that story bring in?" asked Louise.

"Fifty in thirty days," I replied.

Two weeks later my sleuthhound wife came in with the news that, between three other companies and ourselves, ninety-two submissions had been received from California alone. As the story traveled East they kept coming from all over the United States; and even after the lapse of ten months I sometimes received as many as three in a week.

Infantile paralysis was another cheerful subject that yielded an amazing harvest. Then along came Mexico, with its crop of Villas; and now we are simply overwhelmed with the "patriotic" story. There aren't enough smoke-pots and bunting in the world to picture some of the splendid dreams of our photo-dramatic patriots.

THE KIDNAPPED KIDNEYS

Besides these rather obvious sensations, the newspapers inspired other strange crops. A few years ago, when Doctor Carrel was doing unusual surgery at the Eoekefeller Institute, certain sunny dispositions saw delightful plots in these anatomical miracles. One happygo-lucky lad sent us a story of how a young broker, suffering from Bright's Disease, got even with his rival by stealing his kidneys. The hero hired two surgeons and a first-class kidnapper; and, after capturing and chloroforming the old crab, they brought him on the table and opened him wide. Meantime the young broker was having his defective plumbing removed.

When all was ready the kidnapping surgeon kidnapped the kidneys of the rich man and sewed them into the broker, while the other surgeon took the bum set and fastened them into the old crab. Then both the principals

were sewed up and taken home. After that the young broker gained so much in strength that he was able to push the rich man to the wall, whereas the old crab lost his nerve and always walked with a limp; and he never knew that his downfall was due to his wearing the indisposed organs of his young rival.

It is interesting to know that there are fashions in villains. A few years ago the swart Mexican was the vogue; then the Japanese became fashionable. In the patriotic stuff they were indispensable as spies and conspirators. If one of them went out to photograph a circus parade, certain newspapers got the fidgets and proclaimed, in hectic extras, a very yellow peril, while others kept us scared to death lest our Japanese truckgardener might have a rifle concealed among his onions; and what the newspapers said always found expression in our scenarios. The reader may have one guess as to the nationality of our present villains.

However our tastes may change in heroes and villains, the same old plots go on forever. If I were asked which of these was the greatest favorite, I should be puzzled ; for the popularity of some of them is inexplicable. One that wiU recur twenty times a month is about the brother and sister who separate in youth, meet later in life, fall in love, and—just as they are about to marry— discover the relationship. By some queer perversity, if the submitter is a woman she usually permits the ceremony to proceed.

The black-and-white mesalliance—called the tarbrush plot—is also very common; another—the dear little locket that hangs about the child's neck, from the cradle to the big scene, unobserved by the nurse-maids of

PLOTS AND COUNTERPLOTS 335

her youth or the osteopaths of her maturity, is always the source of happy denouements. Kidnapping is fashionable with everybody but the censors; and we get Charlie Rosses and Dorothy Arnolds by the hundred, on whom the censors would never hang their tags.

Little things like the physical limitations of the camera give nary a care to the light-hearted photodramatist, and we get all sorts of disquisitional and metaphysical plots that couldn't possibly be canned on celluloid. Weird double-exposure dream plots by the psycho-analysts are now beginning to come in from the New England States. Another snappy plot, which offers some camera difficulties, solves the murder mystery by finding the picture of the murder upon the eye of the murderer.

I have talked to several readers and they all agree that the most persistent stolen plot that comes to our desks is De Maupassant's Diamond Necklace. I used to get it on an average of ten times a month. The plots of 0. Henry come next in popularity; and trailing behind are the stories of all the popular writers of the day. It wouldn't be so bad if the kleptomaniacs would disguise their pilferings, for that is about the only originality possible to them. But most of these people don't take that trouble; and if we bought half of this stolen dope, we should go broke paying damages to the copyright owners.

There are several freaks of law that, when heard for the first time, always send the novice scurrying off to his typewriter. A pretty regular one is the law that frees a wife from testifying against her husband, even though she married him subsequent to the crime. You 've

336 FILM FOLK

thought of it. Of course; everybody has! The girl was the only witness to the killing of the villain and the state will hang Harold on her testimony. What shall he do? Have her killed? No; he will marry her. She is smuggled into jaU. as a nun; and you are ready for the big punch-—the confusion of the state in the courtroom scene. This plot has all the ingredients of popular success—action, mystery, blood, love, and a happy ending for the murderer!

Oh, I nearly forgot amnesia, the most prolific of plot in the whole gamut of human idiosyncracies. Mr. Newlywed goes down to the club to celebrate his happy conquest, and during the brawl somebody beans him with a bottle, or else he runs into a lamp-post on the way home, and instantly the light goes out from him. When he recovers, his memory has deserted him; and off he goes, forgetting everything, if not by his creditors forgot. For twenty minutes on the silver screen we follow him through the ensuing years; and when, in later manhood, he returns, with a set of furs upon his jowl and deep furrows in his brow, he gumshoes up to the old homestead and, peering through the window, sees his wife happily married to another.

This story used to be ended by the husband's going off—Enoch Arden stuff; but nowadays they usually have the new husband run over by a jitney, so that the ending will be happy for the amnesic husband.

THE TROUBLES OP THE READERS

Now perhaps it will be conceded that we poor readers bear some pretty heavy crosses. It is difficult enough, heaven knows, to have to wade through the tons of junk

that comes to our desks; but when, after finding an occasional pearl, we later discover that it has been stolen, we sit right down and have a good cry—or would if we were not strong men. Most studios now have some old literary wheel-horse who has read everything in the world and remembers it; else we should be constantly held up and asked to pay for counterfeits. At that, we occasionally have to dig up five hundred or a thousand dollars to the holder of the copyright, after having paid the burglar who first turned it in.

Some of the tricks that are tried on us would themselves make pretty good scenarios. One girl mails in a nice, cleanly-typed, literary fragment, and incloses with it a letter to her from a famous author of best-sellers. In the letter the kind author says: "I have read your scenario and I think it is perfectly splendid," and so on. Now who am I, to contradict a great author? Yet I thought the story particularly punk—another amnesia plot—and structurally hopeless. My first suspicion was roused when I noticed that the precious letter was very soiled, and my second bobbed up when I recalled the insistence with which the young lady wished the return of that letter.

Well, I returned it all right, story and all, and then tipped the other fellows to watch for it; and, sure enough, it turned up later at the Bioscope with an entirely different story. That poor old letter has more than fulfilled the hopes of the great author. It might not be out of place to suggest to famous boosters that they write the title of the thing they are sponsoring in the body of the letter of recommendation.

Another chap sends in a story and naively says that

in reality he is a well-known magazine success, but that he has bet a friend the studios care nothing for names and buy stories only on their merits. I wrote and told him he had won his bet—^that was why I was returning his scenario. On the other hand, one day I received the most ignorantly written scenario I had ever seen.

Some of it was in pencil, some penned, and much of it was printed in illiterate characters; several kinds of paper had been used, including a generous piece of butcher's brown. Yet I bought the story, because it was a crackajack.

In response to a check for two hundred dollars, I received a letter from one of our best-known authors saying that he, also, had made a bet that the studios would pay for a good story, no matter whence it came.

While on the subject of great authors, permit me to pay my disrespects to a lot of them. They are the loudest in their denunciation of our "piffling" stories; yet many of the most ferocious denouncers treat us shamefully and send us all the junk they cannot sell to the magazines. Notwithstanding the fact that we have met the highest prices in the market, they still refuse to take our profession seriously. Some of the worst stuff we' get comes from men with great names.

Last week we received a scenario from one of our best-known authors, the plot of which revolved about a diamond that always turned blood-red in the presence of a murderer! Little child's fairy-tale stuff. I urged the studio to buy, shoot, and then advertise it as the rottenest story we had ever received, and let the author's name be proclaimed in letters three feet high. Another Best Seller wrecked his hero in the North Atlantic, and,

after drifting about for a few days, had him fetch up on a cannibal island! Some geography, eh? No; these great authors should be stingy with their brickbats while they send us in such bunk and junk.

The delightful fiction that we are immensely impressed by big names has caused some of the agencies to try a very silly trick. I received a colorless tale one day from a fellow whose stuff I had bought before; but in this case I found it necessary to return it. A few weeks later I was speaking to a friend in another studio about the affair, and he told me he had that day received the same story from a certain agency, but that it now bore the names of a pair of famous authors.

The authors were, no doubt, quite innocent of partnership in this crude effort of salesmanship.

There are a number of fake agencies that are pests to us and worthless to the patrons. A small few of them, however, seem to exercise some degree of intelligent selection. In any event they send in nice, clean copy. At that, most studios prefer dealing directly with the authors.

AS TO COPYRIGHTS

Another interesting peek into the minds of the scenario writers comes from the cashier's office. The clerks tell us that the old writers cash their checks immediately, but that new ones sometimes keep them for months, and the dirt and thumb marks show eloquently with what pride they have been exhibited to the popeyed villagers.

Notwithstanding the fact that big, responsible companies are paying for everything they get, there are a

great many suspicious geniuses in garrets and garages who will take no chances; so they have all their precious children copyrighted. I know of a ease where an automobile salesman brought forth such a lovely plot that he would not even trust the mail. He jumped on a train and went right down to "Washington to attend to his own copyrighting. It was an expensive trip, but he learned many things—among the most important, that one cannot copyright a plot or situation. One may copyright a story in fiction form; or, if turned into a photo-drama, the finished cinema production may be protected by registering a few inches of film from each scene.

This inability to hold tight to one's little situation simply proves to some minds that the enormous wealth of the studios has been used to corrupt our lawmakers, so that we can go right on with our stealings. But these indignant fellows ought to realize that, if Congress had permitted the copyrighting of plots, the whole industry would have been tied up years ago and about twenty men would be supplying our entire literature. Think of owning the copyright to this idea: A big brute of a man falls in love with a fragile little woman, who fears and dreads him. He carries her off and, by force or compromise, compels her to marry him. As time goes on she discovers great nobility in the heart of her cave-man and ultimately grows to love him. If that idea had been copyrighted we should have been denied several splendid books, a dozen or so of our best photo-plays, and one of the finest dramas of the age—The Great Divide.

There is no doubt that many of the plagiarisms we receive were unconsciously made, for the writers are too obviously sincere. A fellow has read a book or seen a

play a long while ago and has quite forgotten it, when one day an incident conies into his life that awakens in his subconscious mind the old plot. No one is more surprised than these same writers when they find they have developed plots quite the same as the originals. The earnestness and enthusiasm with which many writers send in the Diamond Necklace plot is too genuine to suspect them of deliberate theft. The same phenomenon occurs right on the lot. We ourselves have some amazing examples of unconscious—sneer, gol-ding it, sneer!— plagiarism.

WHEN HUNDREDS THINK ALIKE

Another fact that should be considered is this: A hundred million people, living under the same physical and psychological conditions—like the high cost of living and war, for instance—are likely to be thinking in very similar terms, with the result that at any given time hundreds of people will be writing about the same thing; and it would be strange indeed if many of them did not cover the same idea.

"We were making a five-reel picture a while ago that dealt with the life of a war baby, grown to manhood. "We had no sooner started the first scenes than we received a submission from a fellow in Brooklyn that dealt with the same theme in almost the same way; and, more remarkable, the locale was identical. This latter resemblance made it absolutely necessary to purchase the Brooklyn story; for, though we might have entirely changed the treatment of our plot, we could not go to the expense of painting new sets.

Last autumn the manager of one of the large studios

wrote to two of his regular scenario writers, living miles apart in the East, to send him stories on the subject of youthful military training. When the scripts arrived it was discovered that both authors had taken the boyscout idea and had developed it almost identically. He was going East at the time; so he invited the authors to meet him for lunch in New York. One can imagine their surprise when each read the other's story. With the best of good sportsmanship, they "shook" to see whose story should be accepted. If either scenario had been used without this literary show-down, the loser would have felt convinced that his story had been stolen.

So it can be seen that the studios have a fine job on their hands in convincing suspicious authors that they are not the burglars their past reputations seem to justify. There are really so few plots that only in a new treatment can anyone claim originality; so, unless a writer sees his story on the screen, situation for situation, and with a succession of local details that could not be coincidental, he should be very careful in his cry of plagiarism.

Ever since Milestones appeared upon the stage and Intolerance upon the screen, we have received many of the so-called epoch stories. We turn them all in to the "puzzle" department. If, in the greatest example of this new dramatic experiment, one was sometimes fearful lest Belshazzar should be run over by an automobile, one can imagine what would happen were the several parallel themes handled by a lesser genius. We have one tangle that the continuity fellows take out and play with just as other people play chess.

One of the hardest tasks of the scenario department

is in demanding true stories of true life from the authors, and then having to reconcile them to the demands of the boss for happy endings. True life does n 't always end thus. Then, again, most of our bosses are firmly convinced that all human motives spring from sentimental love of lad and lass—at least, no story is complete without the goo stuff.

I once O.K. 'd a scenario that was unique in that it had not a woman in it. The story told of a degenerate Mexican boy, of early Californian days, who was won back to his faith by witnessing the good works of the padres. It was a simple tale, with strong dramatic situations, lots of color, some fine lost-in-the-desert mirage stuff, and a splendid chance to show the Old Missions in the height of their glory and usefulness.

We bought and shot the story, and the author came out to see it projected at the studio. You may imagine his chagrin when the first scene opened with a bunch of beautiful senoritas! Then strange things followed. Three whole reels of the wildest adventure had been introduced, just to show how Pedro had become bad; thus is a simple two-reeler padded out to make a feature picture. When at last the story began, the poor little author found that the padres and the missions had become merely atmosphere, and the lad would be saved from sin by the sensuous-eyed Delphiana. Then, in the last reel, came the wedding-bells and the same old clinch for the final fade-out.

When the broken-hearted author remonstrated with the boss for reducing his story to the common denominator of the other ninety-nine, this intellectual giant replied:

"We think we know our business, Roberts; and your story wouldn't have got over to the boneheads in the front seats. There 's only one safe subject that always gets across, and that 's the love stuff."

"But," said the struggling one, "love may express itself in many ways. Men will die for their country, for political ideals, for sheer adventure at the North Pole, for their inventions, and lots of things besides romantic love."

"Not at our studio," answered the Intelligence.

"When Mr. Lewis became manager of our company, this great purveyor of the photo-drama left and became the head of a rival company. A scenario man over there told me that when one of Charles Dickens' stories was under consideration at the studio, the boss had ordered him to cable Dickens to see whether they could buy the picture rights! Is it any wonder that much of our photo-drama seems to have been addressed to "the boneheads in the front seats"?

It is a notorious fact that many good stories have been fearfully mangled by mediocre-minded men in positions of authority. But forward-looking companies, recognizing the supreme importance of the story, are seeking out high-grade men and women for this work. The days of the jolly robbers—or, what was esthetically worse, the single-track minds—are happily near an end.

A MOTION-PICTURE SCHOOL

When I came to the Filmart I found a whole new conception of the moving-picture business. Charles Mills, the director-general, and his brother William, scenario editor, were well-known dramatists before they came

into the business; and, though they brought with them a vast knowledge of the stage, they recognized that here they were confronting a new art form. So for two years they very carefully felt their way along, whUe evolving this promising organization.

It was their modesty that saved these men from the disasters of many a jaunty novelist and playwright who thought the making of pictures was a child's art. The discovery of the amazing complexities of this curious mixture of all the arts made them decide that, if men were ever to write intelligently for the screen, they must have a profound knowledge of its technic. So a photo-dramatic school for writers was established in connection with the studio, right on the lot. Our schoolrooms are in a little row of bungalows way over in a quiet, shaded spot, away from the noise and turmoil; no telephones, cigarette borrowers, story-tellers, or other pests of the usual scenario department, bother us. I often wonder now how we ever knew what we were reading or writing in those awful dramatic boiler-shops of other days.

William Mills is our prex; and attendiug his little school are three of the best-known dramatists of America, one famous novelist, three short-story writers, two dramatic critics, and several exceptional scenario writers who have grown up in the business. Besides these very high brows, there are several of us ferrets, with queer heads like cantaloupes, who read the submissions. As strange a bunch of students as ever wrecked a bar!

What is our curriculum? Well, first of all, for a month or two the student just follows a director about, watching him shoot. Here he learns the action on the

narrow stage; the dramatic and pictorial use of the close-up, the distance of registration; how to time scenes by film footage; the best lengths for different purposes; how to register letter-writing, telephone conversations, and the innumerable pantomimic stunts that have demanded entirely new dramatic symbols. Finally he will learn from the director the fine art of carrying continuity through scenes that are not made in their proper sequence.

Next comes work in the mechanical departments. In the laboratory he will learn the marvels of the dark room—^how double exposures, dissolves, fade-outs, and the various camera tricks are made. Then he goes to the camera, where he studies the various shots and distances, and how the speed of the action can be altered by changing the speed in camera-cranking. Next the student must learn how scenes are lighted—the use of the different lights in the various combinations. He must even go out on location and see how carefully the lighting is studied and recorded, so that it will correspond with the studio shots. His hardest and most complex mechanical job is learning how continuity of action is made and arranged in the cutting room.

THE PUZZLE DEPARTMENT

After a few exciting months at this outside work, the embryonic playwright is finally landed in the "puzzle department,'' where he learns the bewildering technic of writing continuity. This is the final working script from which the picture is shot and cut; and so complete is it— at least, at our studio—that every direction which goes to the making of a picture is included. The action, all

business, different camera shots in the same scene, the dialogue the actors speak, and even the lighting are so minutely given that the director has merely to follow the script.

When a student has been "graduated," it is supposed he is qualified to take an ordinary story and translate it into photo-dramatic terms that will be perfectly understood by every department on the lot. And it is these graduates, mates, that scenario-ize your deep-sea tales; and you ought to be glad they fall into such capable hands. And, furthermore, it is because most of you know nothing of all this technical stuff that the studios— all that I know, at least—urgently desire that you send your stuff in short-story form or in a simple synopsis. If your story survives the handicap of the scenario form and continuity so glibly taught by many schools, it will have to be done over again, for no two studios have the same technical working script. So well understood is this fact, that even the best of our writers first send us nothing but synopses.

One can't learn studio technic while sailing the deep blue sea; so most of you will have to submit your masterpieces to the hands of trained translators—Whence, our school. And I want to repeat, so as to make it good and strong, that you are darned lucky when your story is translated by trained men and women of education. Most writers, if they only knew, would be mighty proud to have these well-known artists as collaborators. I have accepted some rather doubtful stories that became masterly productions when they had gone through this particular mill.

And there is no use in getting all worked-up because

you don't know our language. The fact that a man writes a good short story does not mean he can write for the screen. Novelists have rarely been good dramatists for their own works; and even the dramatist, though much better equipped than the novelist, cannot write a film play without understanding this new art form. A story written in narrative form becomes, on the screen, simply a series of illustrated subtitles, and a modem conversational play would be mostly subtitles, with an occasional picture. In the films, characters are not described, but must be established by the things they do; and the plot cannot be developed or unfolded in conversational dialogue, but must be told, as nearly as possible, in dramatic action. Factors like these make the photodrama an art form differing from the story, stage, and canvas, yet borrowing much from each; so it is silly for the dramatist and story-teller to object to our translations of their arts to the screen. Music written for the clarinet is not played upon the violin.

So it is in our unique little school—^which has within it the seed of the future academy of photo-dramatics— that we are gradually training a group of men and women from whom we hope to get our best plays.

What chance, then, you ask, has the free-lance writer to sell his scenarios? Every chance in the world. The staff writers could not possibly fill all the needs of the studio, and it would not be desirable if they could, for they would soon grow stale; so we go right on buying all the good stuff we can lay hold of, and cry for more. But this must be remembered: the story we purchase may be greatly changed by the time it appears upon the silver screen; and this is bound to be the case until more of our

photo-dramatists know their profession from its production side.

So starved are the studios for good stories that, if we find a writer with the faiatest promise, we nurse him along by advice and criticism, often endeavoring to sell his stuff to other studios if it is unsuitable for our own. If he improves a whole lot, we may send for him; but if he shows big-league ability, we just buy him outright, slam him into school, and then hope for the best. I might parenthetically remark that the other members of our company are jocularly jealous of our school; and because of our very exclusive isolation they have dubbed us "the educated lepers!" This is high praise, however, compared with some of the names we get in our daily mail.

GOING THROUGH THE MILL

Just for fun, indignant author, let's follow your accepted story through our particular Mills, and see what happens to it when it is revised by William and shot by Charles. First of all, as scenario editor, William Mills writes commentary notes on the dramatic action, psychology of the plot, and the larger factors; he then turns the story over to two other trained dramatists—without his notes—and they each write their criticisms. The three then meet to find, if possible, a common base. When this is done a trained author is called in; and, after a thorough going over with the three editors, he goes off to write a reconstructed story. After this is accomplished the author again meets the three editors, and if the reconstructed story is satisfactory, he goes off again, this time to make a more fully developed tale. When this is

O. K'd by Mr. Mills, the director is next called into consultation with him and the author. As the director is the one who paints the picture, his suggestions are sympathetically sought and always adopted, unless too violently opposed to the author and the editors.

Outside authors are always furiously indignant because we don't shoot their stories exactly as they are written. Well, here is something they must all reconcile themselves to: it can't be done. Even if the author writes his own continuity, directs the picture, and acts the lead himself, he will be surprised to find how different the finished picture will be from his original visualization of it. After having everything possible indicated in the script, the director's work is still highly creative, for it is largely a matter of dramatic emphasis and inflection. Two violinists may each play the same melody and get in all the notes, yet one will be music and the other noise. Two directors may each exactly follow the same script, but one will produce a work of art and the other "just a moving picture."

It is almost impossible for two men to visualize the same pictures from a particular story. The author may have a consciousness of how it would look to him, but he cannot possibly make anyone else see this. If a musician should play a piece called The Babbling Brook, the brooks evolved in the imaginations of the audience would differ with every person. This will perhaps explain the surprise that many scenario writers experience when they go to see a picture they have sold.

But to return to the mill: After full consultation with the director, the author takes the story and writes the continuity. In our little school we are taught that

continuity is to the synopsis what lines of spoken play are to its construction; consequently the writing of it calls for the highest degree of dramatic ability and psychological knowledge, and should, therefore, be done by a real author—preferably the one who has been in consultation throughout the grind.

Attached to the continuity are the scene plots, props, locations, costumes, cast, estimate of cost, and every necessary item to start the huge machinery of the studio at work to build the picture.

It has taken weeks and weeks to get to the point where the picture is to be shot; and, though the author is given full credit for the story, it can be seen, from what I have told, that its dramatization has been the work of many sets of brains.

The travel of the story through all this elaborate machinery will be strange news to the jolly writers on elevated trains, who think that all one has to do is to jot down a plot on the back of an envelope, send it in, and see the picture run just that way.

The old-fashioned directors blow up when they are confronted by the new order. They think our directors are nothing but glorified camera men. This, however, as we have seen, is not the case, for the director was consulted about the story and helped largely with the continuity—the point being that, when the last detail is decided in advance, the whole plant can be set at work on a schedule, and the picture made better and in much less time than under the old inspirational and temperamental methods of the individualistic directors. If ever there was a social product, it is the film drama. So important is the smooth running of the elaborate machine.

that no director is now allowed to change the script in any noticeable way without consultation with the scenario editor and the continuity man.

This reading of scenarios is just like mining—there is always a delicious hope that one is going to find gold. Sometimes we strike a lead that peters out; once in a while we dig up a little low-grade ore that is worth smelting; and then, about once a month, we clap our hands for joy when we come upon a shining nugget. But, alas, it often turns out to be brass! Let me flash one on you which is very much like the others, except that it is a little bit brassier:

Editoe Scenaeio Depabtment,

Filmart Studio.

Dear Sir: You will see by my letterhead that I am a success in magazine work. Have decided to do scenarios. Am prepared to furnish you—on forty-eight hours' notice—two or five-reel dramas, eight-reel features, one, two and split-reel comedies, or anything else you may desire. I will also write subtitles for educational films that will put a punch in them. As I am a business man, I wish to know your terms in advance. And what guaranty can you give me that my stuff will not be appropriated without compensation?

Sincerely yours,

J. GOODBICH Cbust.

These beautiful promises, whose fulfillment would have meant a permanent vacation to our poor overworked staff, were crowded way down in the comer of a letter that was otherwise occupied by a splendid half-tone likeness of this gelatin genius, garlanded about with reproductions of magazines that had been honored by his pen; then, spilling down the sides in modest tones of red, lav

ender, and green, were quoted clippings which told of the rare approval his stories had evoked.

TO TOM, DICK, AND HARET

We just love these efficiency authors, though we rarely buy their stories; but this chap was so promising that I sent him a night-letter asking for samples and agreeing to put up a bond of five thousand dollars that we would not take any of his stories "off him," no matter how great the provocation. But, unlike his brother advertising authors, he never even replied to our generous offer.

So, after aU our golden hopes have gone up in smoke, we have to get right back to Tom, Dick, and Harry. And, in order that you three old stand-bys may work a little more intelligently, I am going to give you a few rules and suggestions for your guidance:

Tom: For the love of Mike, write about Dick and Harry. Don't think you must go to Rome or Rio for your story. There are tales right in the shirt department, across the aisle, that would go big on the screen— if you only knew what they are. I have a hunch, from things I 've heard you say, that your boss, though perhaps not so colorful, is a worse pirate than ever roved the Spanish Main. Go after him; he may be good for five reels. Whatever you do, write about the places and people you know; and if the tale is a bit rough, leave the happy ending to us—^that is the best thing we make.

Dick: Forget your silly copyrights—^you can't stop our stealing if we should get another spell; cut out the "scenario form"; don't dare attempt continuity, but write us a simple synopsis of five hundred words, or a

short story of five thousand—with a synopsis. If you do this, we won't have to use the divining rod or employ a staff of clairvoyants to locate your idea. But remember this: A bunch of episodes is not a story; nor is a series of loosely related incidents that fail to work to a climax. We sometimes buy simple ideas for a fair price and keep them in stock, just as we do film. We pay no royalties, except to famous authors; stories are bought outright— that is, the film privileges are bought. If you think you can sell your story to the Bird Center Bugle after we have shot it, go to it.

Harry: Don't send dour tragedies to a studio that employs thirty companies of exclusively custard-pie throwers; nor to the companies who have never made a slap-stick in their gelatin lives should you contribute comedies that would necessitate the employment of a regiment of pastry cooks. Throughout the foregoing tale I have purposely used fictitious names for scenario editors and studios; so do not address your stuff to them. You will find that most studios advertise their needs in the trade magazines; so, if you would save us perspiration and yourself postage, just shoot at the right targets.

THE LION STUNT

However, I want to warn you about farce comedy; it 's easy to write, but darned hard to sell. One of the biggest comedy companies in the country has not accepted half a dozen scripts in the past year. They write all their own. Comedies of situation are, on the other hand, the rarest jewels we seek, and a good one will seU instantly. Another tip, Harry: Unless you are an animal trainer don't send in the jungle stuff. The fact

PLOTS AND COUNTERPLOTS 355

that you may be a little wild in spots, or have even tamed a vamp, doesn't qualify you to write the animal stuff. These stories are always written in collaboration with the feUow who trains the savage leads.

I know of but one animal picture that was made from an outside idiot's scenario. This chap, to show how the girl won the heart of the king of beasts, had her pull a thorn out of his majesty's paw with her fair young teeth. Now anybody who knows aught about the cats will tell you that you may put your pin-head in the lion's mouth, but he won't put his paw in yours—not while he lives. And the joke on this author was that we made the picture because we happened to have a dead lion at the time. After getting a little footage of the girl fooling with the live boy, trying to get hold of his paw, we then shot to a close-up of the girl clutching the leg of the cold-storage lion and pulling the thorn out with her teeth. The claws were made to open and shut by manipulating the muscles of the foreleg. But don't hand us another, Harry, for we can't kill a thousand-dollar lion to get an impossible story. Remember, we have dramatized everything in the Zoo, from elephants to trained

And to all three of you I would suggest that you do not ask for criticism of your work. We cannot afford to ran a correspondence school; and, besides, you wouldn't like us if we told you the truth. After all, a check is the most satisfactory critique we could offer. And, above all, I beg of you to choke back that distressing impulse to suggest that we might steal your story while we have it in our treacherous hands. You would be absolutely amazed at the amount of stuff we don't steal.

356 FILM FOLK

The other evening, at dinner, Mrg. Belden made a curious observation.

"Sam," she said, "the schools and colleges are always asserting that their greatest function is to develop selfexpression. If this is true, the moving-picture industryis the grandest educational institution the world has ever seen. From the janitors in the bowels of our officebuildings to the solemn owls of our supreme courts, all the human earnivora are writing for the screen; and, even though they never sell a single scenario, just think of the practice they are getting in self-expression!"

THE END