The Silent Movie Blog

     Well, this week I thought I'd crack open the ol' postcard album, and share a few unusual cards with you.

     Now this isn't anything earth-shaking, but many of you are familiar with Niles, California. It's where the Chicago-based Essanay company had a studio, and Chaplin worked there for a few months in early 1915. G. M. Anderson owned about half of the company and presided over the studio, starring in dozens of short westerns as "Broncho Billy." He even found time to manage the studio's baseball team. 

     Here's a postcard view of the town, as it looked then:



     A guy named Jack bought this penny postcard, jotted a note to the folks back home, and mailed it off. It was postmarked August 2, 1914.

     On the back, he mentions a baseball game, and that he "met the wonderful G. M. Anderson." And across the face of the postcard, you can just make out the pencilled remark, "went thru the S & A studio."  

     So who was Jack? Was he just passing through, or did he have business to conduct concerning the studio? 

     The message on the back of the card begins "Dear Folks," and the card was addressed to Mrs. E. D. Doud of Ben Lomond, California. More than that... I don't know.

 


     By the way, this is what that street scene looks like today:






     Speaking of Essanay, here's a Charlie Chaplin card from the summer of 1915. (He'd left Niles at this point, and was working in the Los Angeles area.)  

     This is one of a good handful of images that Essanay licensed for sale on postcards. This particular card must be a bootleg, because somebody erased the Essanay Indian-head logo out of that box in the lower left corner before printing the card.)



     Every other card in that series is from an easily-recognizable Chaplin film, like Work, The Bank and A Woman. But this scene doesn't appear in any film. Is it an out-take, from By the Sea, perhaps? Or did somebody just happen to ask Chaplin to hold her baby and to smile for her camera? We may never know.

     The sloppily-retouched face of that man standing at far left gives me the creeps. Otherwise, it's a cute card.




     Now here's another Chaplin card, a photo of his studio as it looked in the early 1920s.

     I found it at a postcard show for four bucks, and I snapped it right up, because I love a mystery. Read it for yourself:



  
     At first glance, the writer seems to be a tourist. ("Saw Charlie Chaplin / He is Strange guy"). But the writer is "staying here at [the] studio," as if he (or she?) were a guest. And there was a good-sized house on the studio property; it was already there when Chaplin bought the lot, and his brother Syd moved into it.

     The writer also mentions an excursion to Santa Catalina Island, which happened to be a favorite getaway of Chaplin's in those days. And there's lobster... and a boar hunt. The writer seems less like a tourist and more like some sort of VIP, at least in Chaplin's circle. On the other hand, the writer is hoping "to get work soon."

     But... who was this "Lee"?

     Don't ask me. I don't know!


The Charmingly Suggestive Photo of the Week


Yes, that's really her, and I was lucky enough to buy this card cheap from a dealer who hadn't begun selling on eBay yet. Why in the world is Louise in that outfit? Why is she shackled up like that? Once again... I don't know.




     Well, that's the end of the reel already. Come on back next weekend!


 

     During a 1923 interview, Claire Windsor discussed the male "vamps" she knew in Hollywood. When the interviewer mentioned her former flame Charlie Chaplin, she exclaimed, "Oh, he is the most insidious of all! He is the most dangerous he-vamp in the world!"

     She explained, "There is no deep feeling under it all. Any little thing can change him toward you in a moment! But he can seem so thoroughly in love for the time being!"

     She concluded, perhaps diplomatically, "I really believe he is capable of deep friendship, though."

 

(Movie Weekly, "Male Vamps I Have Known, By Claire Windsor," article/interview by Grace Kingsley, July 28, 1923, page 30.)


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Now I've got to dig up this issue, and see how her baby made Mae Marsh a better actress.


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     Ah, Movie Weekly. One of my favorites.

     There were plenty of fan magazines during the silent era, but Movie Weekly was something special. During its early-'20s heyday, this tabloid offered absolutely nothing of substance. But every all-too-thin issue was packed with gossipy stories beneath loopy headlines. 

      Those irresistible headlines get me every time. Here are some of my favorites:

"Are Bow-Legs a Barrier to the Screen? YES! Says George Melford" (January 26, 1924)

"Why the Public Does Not Mind Bad Pictures," by director John S. Robertson (July 7, 1923)

"Hollywood is a Hick Town, Says Conrad Nagel" (April 7, 1923)

"Why a Prudish Girl Can’t Be Popular," by Claire Windsor (June 2, 1923)



"Lying in Wait to Shoot Up Harold Lloyd," by still photographer Gene Kornman (July 15, 1922)

"Does a Comedienne Make a Good Wife? NO! Says Louise Fazenda" (July 7, 1923)

"You Use Too Much Rouge! Says Lillian Gish" (July 21, 1923)

"Why I Love Money," by Mae Murray (June 9, 1923)

"Are All Women Gold Diggers? YES! Says Hope Hampton" (October 13, 1923)

"Why Was Thomas Meighan Stoned in Chinatown?" (January 19, 1924)

"Lewis Stone Tells How Women Can Be Fooled" (February 24, 1923)

"Rudolph is Not Bald! Says Mrs. Valentino" (January 19, 1924)


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"Movie School Students Forced to Endure Petting"?! Come on... how could you NOT want to read that article?


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     A lot of the fan magazines had regular "Answer Man" columns, where fans could ask how tall May McAvoy was, or whether Theda Bara was married. Movie Weekly did that too, but what set it apart from the rest was its willingness (its eagerness, even) to give out the private home addresses of the stars. Here are a few examples:

Tom Mix: 5841 Carlton Way, Hollywood

Madge Kennedy: 82 Riverside Drive, New York, NY

Jack Mulhall: 5857 Harold Way, Hollywood

Jack Hoxie: 1325 North Hobart Boulevard, Hollywood

Wesley Barry: 4634 Santa Monica Boulevard, Los Angeles

Norman Kerry: 1745 McCadden Place, Los Angeles

Kenneth Harlan: 1327 Le Moyne Street, Los Angeles

Buck Jones: 1954 Crasena Drive, Los Angeles

Irene Rich: 703 North Gramercy Place, Los Angeles.

Dorothy Davenport: 8327 De Longpre Avenue, Hollywood

Jack Mulhall: 5857 Harold Way, Hollywood

Colleen Moore: 7119 South Grand View, Los Angeles

 

     Charlie Chaplin, the last of the silent stars to talk on screen, may have been the first one to talk on the radio.
 
     He made an appearance over station WOR in New Jersey in 1923, introducing himself to an audience that had never heard his voice before.
      
     After some introductory remarks, he announced that he would imitate a violin. At that point, a studio violinist played a bit of music. Then Chaplin announced he would imitate a saxophone, and another studio musician played a passage on the sax. Chaplin then announced he would imitate an entire jazz band, and an entire jazz band promptly played a burst of music.
    
     Finally, he advised his audience, "If you have nothing else to do, go to see my new picture, which I directed, A Woman of Paris."


(Leonard Maltin, The Great American Broadcast, page 9.)


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Centenary: Lita Grey
April 15, 1908 - December 29, 1995


Lita Grey was Charlie Chaplin's leading lady in The Gold Rush (1925)... or at least she was until she got pregnant and had to be replaced. She did win the role of Mrs. Chaplin, but that didn't last very long either. Here, he bids an enthusiastic farewell as his 18-year-old wife sails for Honolulu without him (November 1926). They divorced in 1928.


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     Chaplin’s divorce from Lita Grey was so nasty, and full of so many shocking and intimate disclosures, that it threatened to derail his career. 

     It was feared that his films would be banned in some parts of the country, and the Hays Office considered disciplinary action against him. 

     But "Charlie Chaplin’s domestic troubles are none of our business," conceded a Hays representative, who also admitted that Hays held no authority over the comedian. "Chaplin is not even a member of our organization," he admitted. "Neither is the United Artists releasing firm, which handles Chaplin’s films."

(Motion Picture Magazine, March 1927.) 


 
Chaplin Studio manager Alf Reeves owned a nominal stake in the company, and here's the stock certificate to prove it. It's even endorsed... by Alf Reeves.


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     Harry Myers, the film comic and supporting actor best remembered for playing the millionaire drunk in Chaplin’s City Lights, was a real-life hero. 

     Back in 1913, while playing a scene at the Lubin studio in Philadelphia, a fire broke out on the set. Myers’ quick action saved the life of his co-star, Rosemary Theby.
 
     The following year, another fire broke out, this time in Lubin’s main film vault. The blaze consumed much of the Lubin studio and the surrounding neighborhood. Once again, Harry Myers was credited with saving a life, pulling a young boy out of harm’s way.

(Rob Stone, Laurel or Hardy, page 18.)


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This little rarity popped up on eBay nearly a decade ago: a candid snapshot of Chaplin and crew on location. I need my fellow Chaplin buffs to help me out here. Which film were they shooting?


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     Linda Wada announces the publication of a new book on The Sea Gull (1926), also known as A Woman of the Sea. That rather mysterious film was produced by Chaplin, directed by Josef von Sternberg, and starred Edna Purviance. Chaplin disliked the finished film and didn't release it. He did save a print throughout his life, but his widow Oona seems to have destroyed it, so we'll never get to see it for ourselves. 

     Happily, Edna saved over 50 unseen production stills from The Sea Gull, and those have been combined with the text of the film's intertitles to create the closest recreation of the film we'll likely ever see. Visit http://ednapurviance.com/ and take a look.



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Centenary: Virginia Cherrill
April 12, 1908 - November 14, 1996


That's right, she and Lita Grey were born only three days apart. Virginia Cherill played the blind girl in Chaplin's masterpiece City Lights (1931). She was also briefly married to Cary Grant (1934-1935), a union that only lasted a quarter as long as Chaplin's disastrous marriage to Lita.


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     The original publicity photos issued to promote City Lights had this message rubber-stamped on the backs: "Charlie Chaplin as he appears in the greatest picture of all time, City Lights."


(Motion Picture, September 1931, page 16.)


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The Silent Era Ended Here


A few years ago, my friend Gerald Smith discovered the exact location where the famous closing shot of Modern Times (1936) was filmed. And when John Bengtson was preparing an entire book of Chaplin Then-and-Now locations, I visited the site to snap a pic for his project. (And thanks to David Totheroh and Bonnie McCourt for taking me there!) Want to visit the location yourself?  Check out John's amazing, fascinating and delightful book, Silent Traces, for all the details.


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Gone 50 Years


Estelle Taylor, who passed away on April 15, 1958: a glamorous star of the 1920s, and the wife of boxing legend Jack Dempsey.


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Charmingly Suggestive Photo of the Week


Madge Bellamy, queen of the Fox lot.


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     That's the end of the reel for another week. See you again next weekend!

 
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     If ever a film had a curse upon it, it was Cecil B. DeMille’s The King of Kings (1927).

     The film was a hit at the box office and with the critics. But nearly everyone involved in the film suffered some sort of calamity within a few years of making it.

     By 1931, actors James Neill (James), Robert Edeson (Matthew), Rudolph Schildkraut (Caiaphas), and George Siegmann (Barabbas) had all died, as had assistant director Frank Urson, casting director William Crothers and business manager Lou Goodstadt.

     Others found their marriages finished by that time, including actors Dorothy Cumming (Mary), Jacqueline Logan (Mary Magdalene), Joseph Schildkraut (Judas), and cameraman Peverell Marley.

     DeMille himself wasn’t immune. Shortly after finishing the film, his house was robbed, and soon after that, his palatial yacht burned to the waterline.

 

(William H. Swigart, "The Death Films of Hollywood," The New Movie Magazine, October 1931, pages 60-61.)


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Charmingly Suggestive Photo of the Week


Here's Mae Busch, and it's all the fun you guys are going to get from this week's blog. It gets real depressing real fast. Get ready!


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     Another great silent proved to be a wellspring of misery: King Vidor's The Big Parade (1925).

     It was a huge hit with the public, out-grossing everything that had come along up until then (except possibly The Birth of a Nation), and kicking off an entire cycle of films about the First World War. 
    
     It also catapulted several of its players into brief, bright stardom. But after that stardom flickered out, a lasting darkness overtook each one of them.

     Karl Dane's performance as "Slim" so pleased M-G-M that he was teamed with George K. Arthur for a whole series of successful comedies. But troubles began mounting almost immediately. A broken shoulder on the set. A failed relationship. A nervous breakdown. Even before the studio let him go in 1930, a swift decline was well underway for a man who'd already endured a lot of unhappiness in his life (one example being the 1923 death of his wife and baby girl in childbirth).

     Dane continued to take movie jobs when he could get them, but he realized that he needed to find something else. A solo vaudeville act flopped. A fledgling mining business went broke.

     A 1933 venture was sad enough to become Hollywood legend: operating a hot dog stand outside the M-G-M studio gate. This too ended in failure. Attempts to get work as a carpenter or a waiter were unsuccessful. He offered to play bit parts, even to work as an extra for a few dollars a day, but he was rejected, probably because he was just too large and distinctive-looking to melt into a crowd scene.

     In April 1934, a pickpocket lifted eighteen dollars from him. It was almost all the money Karl Dane had left in the world. The next day, April 14, he sat alone in his apartment, next to a scrapbook of mementos from his screen career. There was a gun in his hand. He raised it to his head and pulled the trigger.

     His body lay unclaimed at the morgue until actor Jean Hersholt stepped in and arranged for a burial.



Karl Dane, in happier days.

     The Big Parade had been the turning point for Renee Adoree, too. The part of the French girl was a natural for her, as she'd grown up there herself. M-G-M put her in leading roles immediately, often teaming her with Ramon Novarro or her Big Parade co-star, John Gilbert.      
    
     A loan-out to Universal for Back to God's Country prompted an unexpected tragedy. The events that set the stage (if there were any) are unknown. But on February 25, 1927, the film's director, Lynn Reynolds, arrived home after an exhausting three weeks of location filming. Friends were over for dinner. The director's wife, the former actress Kathleen O'Connor, needled him about his attention to Adoree, accusing him of having shared his lunch basket with her. Mrs. Reynolds later claimed these remarks were made in a light-hearted way.

     The two began arguing instantly, and left the room together. The argument turned physical. A dinner guest got up and followed the sounds of battle to a sunroom in the rear of the house, where he found a puffy-eyed Mrs. Reynolds on the floor, pleading for her life, her husband above her with a .38 in his hand. Reynolds turned the gun on himself, raising it to his head and firing. He died in the hospital the next day, and Irvin Willat finished Back to God's Country.

Lynn Reynolds, a specialist in westerns. He was promoted from directing Universal's Hoot Gibson series to make Back to God's Country. His wife Kathleen O'Connor had acted in films with Marie Prevost, William S. Hart and Larry Semon.



     After that, Renee Adoree returned to M-G-M, and soon she was working with John Gilbert again in The Cossacks for director George W. Hill. (Hill would later commit suicide too, in 1934.) But it was clear to the front office that her stardom was fading, and her contract would not be renewed.

     But she had a bigger problem; or, more literally, a microscopic one. After what may have been many years of latency, TB bacilli in her body overcame her immune system, and she developed a very active case of tuberculosis.

     She entered an Arizona sanitarium for treatment. After three years or so, she seemed strong enough to live in her own home again, and returned to Southern California. But she soon relapsed, and death came on October 5, 1933, just a few days after her 35th birthday.

     At the funeral service, a song was sung that she had written herself, "What You Don't Know Can't Hurt You." Her sister, Mira LaFonte, told the Associated Press that Renee's wish had been for her ashes to be scattered over the Pacific. But they reside to this day at Hollywood Forever Cemetery.



Renee Adoree.

     Another actress from The Big Parade was Kathleen Key, who was a featured player in the mid-1920s without ever really finding stardom. Relatively little is known about her private life, apart from a violent confrontation with Buster Keaton at his bungalow on the M-G-M lot in February 1931, a rare case of the studio failing to keep an ugly event out of the newpapers.

     Keaton and Key had been having an affair; both of them being hard-drinking, unstable people at the time, it was bound to end badly. Marion Meade's often-but-not-always-accurate Keaton biography says that Key was given $10,000 to go away quietly. The money didn't last very long. She died at the Motion Picture Country House in 1954, just 51 years old.



Kathleen Key.

     When a man kills himself with a gun, everyone calls it suicide. But if he does it with alcohol, somehow that's different. John Gilbert's slide into oblivion is already pretty well-known, so I won't go into a lot of detail here.

     Legend has it that Gilbert's decline began after a run-in with Louis B. Mayer, at the wedding of Big Parade director King Vidor. That altercation probably never actually happened, though. Another legend has it that audiences hated his voice in his talkie debut, and that his fall began right then, but I don't really believe that either.

     Gilbert's career was already a little shaky before the talkies began. Routine silents like Twelve Miles Out (1927), Four Walls (1928) and Desert Nights (1929) had generated little interest. Tod Browning's macabre The Show (1927) is interesting, but wasn't very well-received. The tragedy Man, Woman and Sin (1927) is a superb film, but again, it wasn't what audiences wanted from the hero of The Big Parade. 
    
     In talkies, Gilbert could deliver excellent work; Downstairs (1932) is one of his best films, but by that time, hardly anyone was paying attention. He was announced for the lead in Red Dust (1932), but was replaced almost at the last minute by Clark Gable, who vaulted to stardom in the role.

     Gilbert would spend the 1930s watching a different big parade, one that was passing him by: life itself. Again, this story's been well told elsewhere, and it's a bleak one, punctuated with the tragic ends of friends and associates. His Man, Woman and Sin co-star Jeanne Eagels went into convulsions in October 1929, and suddenly died; an autopsy blamed an overdose of chloral hydrate. Gilbert had been directed by Lynn Reynolds and George W. Hill, discussed earlier. His close friend, the writer and M-G-M executive Paul Bern, was found shot to death in September 1932, officially a suicide (though that verdict seems questionable to me). Gilbert had been best man when Bern married Jean Harlow earlier that summer. He would attend his friend Renee Adoree's funeral the following year.

     Gilbert's one-time reported lover Lupe Velez would commit suicide in December 1944. But by then, Gilbert himself had been long gone. His heart failed on January 9, 1936, after too many years of too many drinks, too many heartaches, too much lonesome brooding, and just too many losses. He was 38 years old.



It ended here. Vintage postcard of John Gilbert's Beverly Hills home.

(Sources for this essay include David K. Frasier, Suicide in the Entertainment Industry; Marion Meade, Buster Keaton: Cut to the Chase; Movie Classic, September 1932; and Laura Petersen Balogh's excellent Karl Dane website (http://www.karl-dane.com). The only worthy John Gilbert biography is Leatrice Gilbert Fountain's Dark Star.)


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     That's the end of the reel for another week. See you next weekend! It won't be so depressing next time. I promise.



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