Talking pictures : how they are made and how to appreciate them

OCIATION OF CIKE TECHNICIANS

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TALKING PICTURES

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Air view of a famous studio

TALKING
PICTURES

HOW THEY ARE MADE

AND HOW TO

APPRECIATE THEM

BY

BARRETT C. KIESLING

gcmfcon :

E. & F. N. SPON, Ltd., 57, HAYMARKET, S.W'.i.

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BOOK LIBRARY

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CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE

1 MOTION PICTURE APPRECIATION' I

2 HISTORY OF MOTION PICTURES I O

3 A SINGLE-MINDED COMMUNITY 24

4 DREAMS WANTED 35

5 THE STORY IS SELECTED 48

6 WHY STORIES ARE CHANGED 57

7 THE SCENARIO WRITER 70

8 MOTION PICTURE RESEARCH 8 I

9 THE SETS ARE MADE 92

10 PROPERTIES I OI

I I COSTUMING THE PICTURE 112

I 2 STRANGE JOBS I 1 9

I 3 THE CASTING DIRECTOR I 2 7

1 4 STARS 138

I 5 MAKING FOLKS OVER 1 48

I 6 THE DIRECTOR I 5 5

I 7 THE STAGE IS SET I 64

V

Contents

chapter page

1 8 "lights! camera!" 175

19 "going on location" 184

20 sound recording 196

2 i music in pictures 200

2 2 editing the film 2 1 6

2 3 developing the film 22j

24 social influences 236

2 5 the short subject 245

26 in home and school 256

27 the film abroad 265

2 8 the road ahead 273

appendices 293

glossary 3oi

INDEX 323

VI

ILLUSTRATIONS

Frontispiece

AIR VIEW OF A FAMOUS STUDIO

Following page 4

AN AVENUE OF TALKING PICTURE STAGES

ENTRANCE TO A FILM STUDIO

STUDIO WATER TANK

AIR CONDITIONING PLANT OF A LABORATORY

Following page 20

THE TRUCKLE RIVER NEAR LAKE TAHOE

SHERWOOD FOREST

AN OPERATIVE CAMERAMAN

KARL FREUND INSPECTS A SETTING

Following page 36

SAND DUNES NEAR YUMA, ARIZONA

NORTH CHINA COMES TO CALIFORNIA

THE FAMOUS BUSCH GARDENS

Vll

Illustrations
Following page 52

MAKE-UP IS RENEWED
SOUND RECORDING ENGINEERS

Following page 68

GLOBES FOR ILLUMINATION

CAMERA LENSES

STOREHOUSE FOR OLD SCENARIOS

WHERE SCENARIOS START

Following page 84.

ALABAMA HILLS, CALIFORNIA

SEACOAST FOR LOCATIONS

PLASTER EXPERT

SILVERSMITH

Following page 100

UPHOLSTERERS PREPARING FURNITURE

STUDIO PLASTER ARTIST
PROPERTY MAN CHECKING INVENTORY

Following page 116

WARDROBE

Vlll

Illustrations

REPAIRING COSTUMES
LIBRARY OF HAIR

Following page 132

ARCHITECTS IN A STUDIO

CENTRAL CASTING CORPORATION

SUPPORTING PLAYERS

Following page 14$

MAKE-UP EXPERT

LUISE RAINER BECOMES CHINESE

WIG EXPERT

Following page 16^.

THE CHINA SEAS

JEANETTE MacDONALD IN THE FIREFLY

ELECTRIC SWITCHBOARD

Following page 180

SOUND ENGINEER
SOUND -BOOM" MAN-
FOCUSING A SPOTLIGHT
'BABY" SPOTLIGHT

ix

Illustrations
Following page 196

VOLUME CONTROL

PLAY BACK MACHINE

LIGHT RAY RECORDING MACHINE

Following page 212

STENOGRAPHER TYPES DIALOGUE
CUTTER ASSEMBLES SCENES

MOVIEOLA
ASSEMBLING THE PICTURE

Following page 228

AUTOMATIC FILM PRINTER
ADRIAN, NOTED GOWN DESIGNER

Following page 260

CUTTER INSPECTS SEVERAL "TAKES"
CANNED ROMANCE

Following page 276

A PRECISION MACHINIST
PROJECTION ROOM

FOREWORD

So complex is a production for the screen, so many
and varied are the elements involved, so great is the ex-
perience, the judgment, the skill required, that no
adequately critical appreciation of a motion picture is
possible unless there is knowledge and comprehension
of the problems involved.

This book should lead those who read it to a truer
and more thoughtful consideration of the cinema. It
should give them a better understanding of what it
means to catch and hold on a strip of film the best in
art, the best in music, the best in acting, the best in
drama, and the best in literature. It should teach them
something of what is required to provide amusement
for the village and the citv, the nation and the world.
It should show them new values, sharpen their dis-
crimination, and stimulate their imagination.

In giving the public facts upon which to base a fuller,
sounder estimate of a universal amusement art, it seems
to me that Air. Kiesling has done a fine and useful piece
of work.

WILL H. HAYS

XI

1

MOTION PICTURE APPRECIATION

"Say, I could make a better picture than that!"

"Why, it isn't like the book at all!"

Was it not only last night that someone made these
two remarks in the lobby of your favorite theatre?

They are familiar to the attendants of the 52,175
commercial talking picture theatres of the world. And
they are heard, likewise, in the thousands of colleges,
churches, and clubs which are equipped to show silent
or talking films.

The ever increasing millions of film fans may differ
from one another radicallv concerning preference for
Greta Garbo or Katharine Hepburn; Fredric A larch
or Clark Gable; Norma Shearer or Claudette Colbert.
They may prefer slapstick comedv to romance but they
all seem to agree on two things: first, that pictures are
absurdly easy to make and require no special training
or aptitude; second, that motion picture producers in
their treatment of books and stage plavs bought for
film productions are like little bovs taking clocks apart
and putting them together again. They apparently make
changes without good reason.

In the two quoted remarks above, one feels the need
for a new and different approach to the subject of how
to appreciate a modern talking picture.

The belief that talkies are absurdly easy to make

[1]

Talking Pictures

("Say, I could make a better picture than that!")
arises from a very natural source. Motion pictures
sprang from nowhere, like a mushroom growing over-
night to the height of the Empire State Building, to fill
a need for mass relaxation in a highly keyed world.

Today the resources of immense studios employing
thousands of workers are tapped to produce photoplays
which flash across the screen in a little more than an
hour, smoothly, easily, with no jars, no waits, no delays.
This smooth progression is necessary in a motion picture.
The public, seeking to be amused, want this operation
completed, for them, in as easy a manner as possible.

And it is proper that they should wish this, for they
usually come to the theatre to relax after a day of hard
work. They are resentful if a clumsily handled story
breaks the even flow of their enjoyment, or makes them
uncertain of the exact relation between various elements
of the plot. They demand a clear, concise presentation.

Very early the public learned that the interruptions
of the stage (scenery changes) and of the novel (turn-
ing pages) are not needed to tell a motion picture story.
More and more, as the public have become expertly
critical of screen entertainment, they have demanded
of film producers a technique that grows seemingly
more effortless each vear.

This easy forward development of the best motion
picture stories has created a superficial public impression
that the actual making of a twentieth-century photo-
play is quite as easy as its familiar steady movement.
The average "movie fan" is amazed when he is told that
making a talking picture is by all odds one of the most

[2]

Motion Picture Appreciation

complicated jobs in the world and that 276 different
professions, arts, industries, vocations, and avocations
are involved.

Observing from the purelv physical side, one may
see that no other world activity draws as heavily from
so many different countries. Close your eyes. Walk
to the map on your wall. Blindlv extend the index
finger of your right hand and touch that map. It mat-
ters not on what body of land your finger may fall, or
how remote the immediate point may be from so-called
civilization: a trained motion picture technician can tell
you of something specific obtained from that locality
to make a certain motion picture. This is one reason
why it is suggested that the ordinary approaches to
photoplay appreciation have been inadequate.

Most of these studies have been splendid in their
analytical discussion of the story concerned. They have
been correct, often inspiring, in their discussions of the
motives behind the author's handling of his plot and
of his characters. But, somewhere along the line, they
lose force and authenticity.

Perhaps this is caused by many writers overlooking
the fact that, unlike the other arts, a successful motion
picture story cannot successfully be studied apart from
its construction, its method of presentation. The two
things are inseparable. No one can possibly judge the
various values of a completed motion picture unless,
first, he knows thoroughly each one of the different
creative arts which goes into the film of the present
day; and second, he understands the differences between
the stage play, the novel, and the photoplay.

[3]

Talking Pictures

The first point concerns the sentence with which
this chapter and this book started: "Say, I could
make a better picture than that!" The second is tied
with the second sentence: "Why, it isn't like the
book at all!"

For these reasons it seems essential to interrupt the
easy flow of that scene you have just witnessed, to
break it into its component parts. Only in this manner
can a motion picture ever be evaluated accurately.

During the latter part of the seventeenth century,
Antonio Stradavari, an Italian violinist working in
Cremona, designed over a score of violins which rep-
resent the work of a genius. Some of these rare treas-
ures are in existence today.

When a great violinist like Heifetz runs his bow
across the strings of a Stradivarius, two major elements
are involved. There is first the magical power of a
long dead Italian violin maker to breathe extraordinary
sound reproducing quality into a few pieces of wood
and a few catgut strings. And second, there is the God-
given, instantaneous reactions within the muscles and
subconscious mind of the artist himself.

In this case, and in that of a painting by Rembrandt,
allotment of praise is relatively simple. But in a motion
picture the problem is more diffuse. A photoplay is a
mosaic of many different arts and vocations, to be exact,
276. Take but one tile from this mosaic, the perfected
work of a single artisan, and we detract from the charm
of the whole.

In the basement of one immense laboratory in which
one hundred fifty million feet of film are processed

[4]

An avenue of talking picture stages
Entrance to a nlni studio

■'•-•Bh

A studio rank stores water for film development
Air conditioning plant for a laboratory processing 600,000 feet of film daily

Motion Picture Appreciation

annually, there are huge tanks of developing fluid. In
each of these tanks one finds a complicated mechanism
of wires and chemicals. The purpose of this device is
to keep that developing fluid always within two tenths
of the same degree of temperature. Were that device
to fail by two tenths of a degree, a love scene on the
screen would lose its brilliance; carefully calculated
lighting effects would lose their appeal to the visual
sen/e.

The reason for this is that the creation of the final
pictorial image on the finished film is a chemical process.
The film, as it enters the camera, is coated with chem-
icals called an emulsion. This emulsion is sensitive to
light, or rather the light causes changes in the chemicals.
These changes become permanent when the film is run
through a bath of other chemicals called the "developer."

In Canada there is a keen critic who for fortv happy
years has reviewed stage plays, the opera, paintings, the
novel, and motion pictures for an influential newspaper.
I quote him because I consider his wise, considered
statements applicable to this discussion.

"Air. Kiesling," said Augustus Bridle of Toronto,
"you will have noticed that for years I have not used,
in any of my motion picture reviews, the expression,
'This is a bad motion picture.' Instead I prefer to say
'This is an imperfect motion picture.'

"Unlike a book, a painting, or a concert by a great
musician, praise or blame cannot be clearly allocated
in evaluating a film.

"I have seen many a motion picture in which I felt
that the leading lady, for example, was miscast. But in

[5]

Talking Pictures

that same motion picture there would be a gem of a
setting by Cameron Menzies or Cedric Gibbons. The
lady in fault would also be carried to new heights of
physical beauty by the gown creations of an Adrian
or an Orry-Kelly. The lighting by some unknown
electrician, the photography by a William Daniels, a
Karl Freund, an Oliver Marsh would be exquisite.

"And in like manner we have all seen the perfect
acting of a perfectly chosen cast in a deft, well-directed
story, robbed of its full values by unattractive sets,
incompetent research, faulty sound recording — dozens
of different but equally important elements.

"It is absurd to use the unqualified adjective 'bad' in
connection with an art that will always be mosaic in
its character.

"It is absurd, further, for anyone to try to criticize
a motion picture with no more knowledge than he
needs for the criticism of a book or play.

"In other words, you can't really evaluate a motion
picture unless you are able to take the whole thing
apart, and then reassemble it, accurately, correctly."

This is not only true of motion pictures. One cannot
understand a poem unless he knows the background of
the poem and something of the author's life. Nor can
one find the inner meaning of a picture by Leonardo
da Vinci or of a great cathedral unless he knows what
actual vision, insight, and power went from the artist
or the architect into his work.

To accept a thing blindly indicates a narrow mind,
a limited outlook. If we are to understand anything
and to form a sound opinion of it, we must analyze it,

[6]

Motion Picture Appreciation

weigh its various parts, and see their relation clearly.
In a process as complicated as making motion pictures,
in which hundreds of people and many arts and crafts
contribute to the whole, it is necessary that we should
know the part played by every man, the contribution
given by each craft.

In approaching the subject of motion pictures, one
naturally considers Hollywood. But we must not over-
look the fact that movies are made, and successfully, in
New York, London, Berlin, Paris, Bombay, Mexico
City, China, Japan, and many other places. But in
Hollywood about 70 per cent of all the world's success-
ful commercial films are made. In this community we
shall find the largest single assemblage of trained men
and women, and adequate materials.

In Hollywood we shall see stories being chosen and
written. We shall watch them as they pass through
every process until the completed photodrama emerges
from the laboratory in the shape of a narrow strip of
celluloid ribbon, thirty-five millimetres wide and over
a mile and a half in length.

We shall see scores of people doing different, fas-
cinating things. We shall look into the future of the
film industry and judge whether it is going up or down
in the scale of importance during the next two or three
decades. Beyond its place as an entertainment medium,
we shall see what it offers to ambitious people with
intelligence, courage, and imagination.

To some it will come as a surprise, and a challenge,
to find themselves rubbing shoulders with so many
different kinds of scientists and artists, working, experi-

[7]

Talking Pictures

meriting, straining their nerves and their minds to carry
forward still further this new art which has achieved so
much in so short a time, which has before it still more
alluring vistas.

The simplest way of impressing this fact would be
for us to go physically to Hollywood, or any other
picture making center, and actually visit a studio. But
this is not practical. It will take only a few incidents
to show why visitors are not welcome; why it is that
the studios have uniformed officers to guard their gates.

The story is told of that day when Cecil B. DeMille,
noted director, was filming The Ten Commandments.
The scene was in the palace of the Pharaohs. Moses,
played by the late Theodore Roberts, had come to
plead for the release of the enslaved Israelites. Hun-
dreds of men and women were in the setting. A score
of cameras had been set to get every detail. An entire
day had been spent in careful rehearsals and in placing
hundreds of big lights. Finally, late in the evening,
everything was ready for the first actual "shot." The
director called "Camera," and the sensitized film began
to pass behind the lenses of the cameras.

Suddenly a taxi driver, in full uniform, appeared
standing in the scene, near a group of bearded Jews.
Coming to pick up a customer, probably one of that
very group, he had stopped to view the scene and, not
being able to see well from behind the lights, he had
stepped in front of them. DeMille roared with rage.
So far as is known, the young man is still running!

And there was a young lady who did not see a cable
lying at her feet while Norma Shearer and Clark Gable

[8]

Motion Picture Appreciation

were playing a love scene. She tripped over the long,
writhing wire, and every light on the stage went out!

One day, on a Marx Brothers set, a vigilant assistant
director noted a visitor, a prominent, dignified banker,
obviously about to break into a loud guffaw while the
cameras wrere turning, while the recording microphone
was "alive." The assistant director quickly stuck his
right hand into the man's mouth and wound the left
arm tightlv around his throat. When the scene was
over, there was not a thing the banker could say in
protest. The assistant director was completely within
his rights.

Such incidents, threatening thousands of dollars of
waste in lost time, have made it necessary for the film
men to close their sets to all except those who have
actual business there, those trained to strict production
discipline.

In Hollywood we shall meet scores and scores of
interesting studio folk of whose existence few have ever
dreamed. We shall chat with girls who have nothing
to do but see ten complete motion pictures each day!
We shall be told of a man with rubber clothes who
takes a huge fortune in silver every year from dirty
developing fluid. We shall meet a man so deft with
powder, with dynamite, that he can blow a wall from
behind an actor on a set and not disturb the crease of
his trousers or the flounces on an actress' dress. We
shall find most interesting the job of a woman whose
duty it is to tell to just one dozen men the three hun-
dred stories written each year which she considers
most adaptable to the motion picture form.

[9]

HISTORY OF MOTION PICTURES

Terry Ramsaye has named his excellent standard
history of the motion picture A Million and One
Nights. Ramsaye's reference is, of course, obvious.
If we enjoy the anthology of the Arabians, The Thou-
sand and One Nights, glamorous, romantic, exotic,
filled with the uncertain and the unexpected, Ramsaye
asks that we stop for a moment and consider the origin
of the motion picture. It has a truly remarkable
dramatic and scientific heritage.

Out of the past of the motion picture we may find
some of the reasons for its present amazing vitality.
American history would be meaningless without Wash-
ington, Lincoln, and Jackson. Similarly, no one can
know the present stature of the photoplay or attempt
a prophecy of its future without understanding its past
and the parts played in it by pioneers like Muybridge,
Armat, Lumiere, Edison, Laemmle, Griffith, Zukor,
Mayer, Thalberg, DeMille, Zanuck, and the Warners.
But, long before these pioneers, there were men who
had made inventions which played an important role
in motion picture development.

In 1640 Athanasius Kircher, a Jesuit, showed his
Magia Catoptrica, or magic lantern, before an audience
of Roman nobles. His single shadows on the walls were

[10]

History of Motion Pictures

very much like those presented by the more modem
magic lantern of today. But he also showed in his book
Ars Magna Lucis et Umbre (The Great Art of Light
and Shade) a method of changing from picture to pic-
ture by the use of a revolving drum. He approached
closely an understanding of the optical illusion which is
the foundation of the motion picture, but his goal was
not quite achieved.

The inventions and discoveries available today wrere
unknown to Kircher, but to him came one of those
flashes of inventive prevision without which we would
not have our remarkable, mechanical world of today.
Kircher lit a small match which became the blazing
conflagration which is the modem motion picture.
What would the world have done without its Kircher;
without its Watt, discovering the principle of the steam
engine from the action of a tea kettle on a table in his
English home; without Franklin, who with his kite and
his metal key brought electricity from the lightning-
streaked heavens?

Every industry of today has its imposing biography
of genius. Ford, Chalmers, and Kettering are but a few
names along the highroad which led to the 1937 auto-
mobile. Edison, Steinmetz, and Marconi wTe recognize
as leaders in the field of electrical science.

In equal measure the motion picture has its parade
of genius. After Kircher the next genius of great im-
portance to emerge was Peter Mark Roget, author of
the widely used Roget's Thesaurus. But Roget was
also a scientist and in 1824 he appeared before the
Royal Society in London and read a paper entitled

[n]

Talking Pictures

"Persistence of Vision with Regard to Moving Ob-
jects."

Roget had caught in his mind a concept of the next
step beyond Kircher's Magia Catoptrica. He pointed
a way whereby the single picture consecutively pre-
sented by Kircher, or anyone else, could be made to
seem to move. His theory, and it is the scientific basis
of the billion-dollar film industry of today, is that if
pictures of persons or objects are passed before the eyes
in separate consecutive stages of movement, the eye
tends to remember the last picture as it passes on to
the next. But Roget merely expressed this theory in
words.

It was Sir John Herschel who noted that when a
shilling was spun on a table the face and the obverse
were blended. Hearing of this incident, Dr. William
Henry Fitton — a geologist, chemist, and physician —
prepared a demonstrating device. It was a little disk of
cardboard with strings attached to twirl it. On one
side was a drawing of a bird, on the other a cage. Re-
volve the disk, and the bird appeared to be in the cage.

Dr. Joseph Antoine Ferdinand Plateau, of the Uni-
versity of Ghent, Belgium; Dr. Simon Ritter von
Stampfer, Vienna; the great Michael Faraday; Lt.
Baron Franz von Uchatius, Vienna; William George
Horner, Bristol, England — these, and other scientists,
developed still further the possibility of showing objects
and persons in motion through the Law of the Per-
sistence of Vision.

At the same time Louis Jacques Mande Daguerre
and Joseph Nicephore Niepce were carrying forward,
separately, the invention of single picture photography.

[12]

History of Motion Pictures

December 14, 1829 saw the birth of a process to make
light record its images through a lens on a treated metal
plate.

February 5, 1861 marked the emergence of the term
"cinema." Coleman Sellers, mechanical engineer of
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, patented his Kinematoscope
and gave to a great modern industry its basic name. The
Kinematoscope did not present photographed motion,
for the plate of the day was chemically too slow for
consecutive photographs. But Mr. Sellers took sep-
arate poses of his young sons in consecutive steps of
action. These pictures were mounted on a device sim-
ilar to a paddle wheel. Observed when revolved at
a proper rate of speed, an impression of motion re-
sulted.

In 1863 the Phasmatrope of Henry Hevl, of Colum-
bus, Ohio, and of Philadelphia, presented such an effect
bv means of a magic lantern. Thin glass positive pic-
tures of Heyl's waltzing with a partner were mounted
radially on a wheel. They were exposed intermittently
to the light ray of the lantern. Of these Ramsave writes:
"This machine had a shutter and a ratchet and a pawl
intermittent mechanism which produced all of the
mechanical effects necessary to the proper projection
of pictures, even by today's standards." *

The years moved on until 1872. Governor Leland
Stanford, of California, horse breeder and statesman,
contended with two doubting friends, James R. Keene
and Frederick McCrellish, that at various gaits a horse
at full speed took all of his four feet off the ground at

1 Ramsave, Terrv. A Milium and One Sights, Vol. I: p. 19. Simon &
Schuster. New York. 1926.

[13]

Talking Pictures

once. The controversy brought about a wager of
twenty-five thousand dollars.

To settle the wager, Eadweard Muybridge, a San
Francisco photographer, was employed. Muybridge's
first efforts to get a series of action photographs failed.
The plates of the time had a speed of only one twelfth
of a second.

In 1877 the experiments were resumed. The photo-
graphic plate was now fast enough to record the move-
ments of a speeding horse. But shutters and lenses and
the photographer were too slow. Muybridge got many
photographs, mostly of fast-moving noses and tails!
One vague picture, however, showing a horse with all
four feet off the ground, spurred Governor Stanford
on in his experiments. He decided to try to get various
sections of the horse's stride by using a row of cameras.

The camera shutters were connected by strings which
the horse was to break as he ran. But the strings broke
at the wrong time and frightened the horses. Stanford
controlled the Central Pacific Railway. Arthur Brown
was chief engineer of the road. When Stanford wanted
things he just asked his boys to deliver. Brown took
Engineer John D. Isaacs from an important bridge job
to help Stanford win his big wager.

Isaacs developed a method whereby the steel tire of
a trotting sulky closed electrical contacts which operated
each shutter of each camera in turn. The final number
of pictures to a set was twenty-four. Ramsaye states
that Stanford's expenditure was "something like
$40,000." 1

Despite the mechanical part played by Isaacs in

1 Ramsaye, Terry. Op. cit., p. 37.

[14]

History of Motion Pictures

making the result possible, fame came to A luy bridge
for years as the "first action photographer." He was
feted in Europe and later employed by the University
of Pennsylvania for photographic research. He wrote
a book entitled Descriptive Zoopraxography, or The
Science of Animal Locomotion.

Inspired by the Muybridge pictures, Jean Louis
xMeissonier of France developed the Zoopraxinoscope.
The theory of Persistence of Vision in Moving Objects
was steadily developing in various hands toward prac-
tical motion projection, if not photography.

But now a giant step was to be taken.

In 1886 Thomas Alva Edison was perfecting the
phonograph. To him came the idea of making the
invention appeal to vision as well as to hearing. He and
an assistant, William Kennedv Laurie Dickson, de-
veloped a cylinder-recording camera which photo-
graphed "start and stop" pictures fortv-eight times to
a second. For some years, motion photography was
standardized at sixteen pictures to the second. This
rate has been increased to twenty-four pictures per
second for talking pictures, largely for sound record-
ing reasons.

Edison's pictures were very tiny. Thev were pho-
tographed in spirals around a cylinder. But while his
camera wTorked, it was obviously not practical. Edison
had never tackled such a vexing problem.

Then came the notion of slotted strips of film being
fed to the stop motion device, for motion pictures do
not "move" steadily. They stop and start. The illusion
in one's eyes, because of the Law of Persistence of
Vision, does the rest, as we have seen. The size of the

[15]

Talking Pictures

motion picture frame today is exactly that which Edi-
son measured out in 1888 on strips of sensitized celluloid
furnished by John Carbutt.

Meanwhile, George Eastman of Rochester was work-
ing on a process to supplant glass plates in photography
with cheap flexible roll film. When Edison saw the
first Eastman film on September 2, 1889, he cried,
"That's it! Now we've got it."

The first goal of all these experiments was a camera,
the Kinetograph, and, Ramsaye says, "the Kinetoscope,
a peep show machine in which Edison's pictures were
exhibited. There was an inadequate unnamed projector
at the time, but Edison's general manager wanted to
sell the peep show machine, which was ready."

The Kinetoscope "fired the gun" for a race which
was to take picture projection from the peep show class
and put it on the screen. Experimenters were simul-
taneously at work in England, France, and the United
States. They included Woodville Latham, Robert W.
Paul, Louis Lumiere, C. Francis Jenkins, and Thomas
Armat. The latter was a particularly vital figure whose
efforts, states Ramsaye, "really did the most to take the
motion picture out of the peep show."

Edison himself improved his early device and intro-
duced the Edison Projecting Kinetoscope. But he never
achieved the practical talking picture he sought and his
interest waned.

Out of this state of affairs, legal tangles were to be
expected, and suits were filed by various claimants. A
decade of dispute ensued, to be settled December 18,
1907, when conflicting factions, represented by the

[16]

History of Motion Pictures

Edison, Biograph, Yitagraph, Lubin, Selig, Essanay,
Pathe, and Alelies companies, pooled their patents and
claims to special rights in the Motion Picture Patents
Company. The General Film Company became the
distributing arm for the members of the basic company.
The most powerful single concern the motion picture
has known had been born.

The motion picture took enormous strides forward
on the impetus of two events which gave it extraor-
dinary publicity. Edison would not hurry. His Kineto-
scope was too late for the World's Fair. But on No-
vember 3, 1899 Biograph filmed the Jeffnes-Sharkey
fight, and in 1 906 motion pictures of the San Francisco
earthquake riveted more attention than all the dancing
and "chase" and scenic pictures which had been pro-
duced.

But several independent producers resented the ef-
forts of the General Film Company to control their
destinies. Included in this fighting group were such
pioneers of the film of today as Carl Laemmle, Jesse
Lasky, Adolph Zukor, Cecil B. DeMille, and Samuel
Goldwyn. Had a struggle not been necessary, it is
possible that a number of cinematic advances might
have been many years delayed. Struggle made keener
the minds of ambitious men. And eventually these
leaders soared above the General Film Company, which
has long since been forgotten.

A familiar form of early picture theatre was a rail-
road coach into which audiences were lured under
promises of "A Trip to China." The name of the de-
vice was "Hale's Tours."

[17]

Talking Pictures

Then came the "store show." Usually, it was sim-
ply a store with a few folding chairs. Early theatre
operators, who were certain that "movies are just a
passing fad," made no effort to keep their "theatres"
either clean or comfortable.

But here and there about the country were far-
seeing men who looked ahead. Among these was a
young Canadian, Louis B. Mayer, who had purchased
a store show at Haverhill, Massachusetts. He cleaned
it, installed comfortable seats, and offered as his open-
ing picture From the Manger to the Cross, a religious
film made in Italy and far more ambitious than any
American product of that time. From vision of this
sort came the modern motion picture theatre, well
lighted, well furnished, a welcome aesthetic addition to
a community.

Credit belongs to D. W. Griffith for first proving that
the public would accept long continued stories played
by capable actors. His Birth of a Nation was a flame
that set the whole cinema world ablaze.

Griffith and Cecil B. DeMille are credited with the
creation of such routine photographic effects of today
as the close-up, the flash back, and the backlight. These
represent considerable advance over the drab, unre-
lieved flat lighting of the very first pictures.

DeMille tells an amusing story of his first attempt to
get away from the use of "flat" lighting. He fash-
ioned the first rude "spotlight" and, in a scene of War-
rens of Virginia, he snowed for the first time an effect
now familiar, a man with his face strongly lighted on
one side, and heavy shadows on the other. The effect

1.8]

History of Motion Pictures

emphasized the dramatic value of a certain war scene.

But from DeAlille's New York office came a waii
from a too practical executive, "We pay these actors
well. Why show onlv one half of their faces?"

De.Mille answered quickly, "Don't you ever look
at great paintings? That's Rembrandt lighting1."

The New York executive thought the phrase stronglv
descriptive. The picture was advertised as "the first to
have Rembrandt lighting," and motion picture photog-
raphy with its present emphasis upon artistic content
had been born.

Under various producers and directors, the silent film
advanced steadilv in importance until 1927. Clever
men found endless ways to make effective pantomime
and inserted written titles to take the place of stage
dialogue. Stage producers noted with alarm that it was
increasinglv difficult to get experienced actors. The
best had crone to Hollywood or to the first Eastern
studios established at Fort Lee, New Jersey. In New-
York, silent motion pictures scored greater success than
most stage plays. The Big Parade ran for more than a
year on Broadway.

The silent picture era developed some magnificent
films. The following will probably always be remem-
bered: The Birth of a Nation, The Ten Command-
ments, Seventh Heaven, Broken Blossoms, The Covered
Wagon, The Little Minister, The Hunchback of Notre
Dame, Ben-Hur, The Four Horsemen of the Apoca-
lypse, Quo Vadis (Italian), Cabiria (Italian), The Three
Musketeers, Eyes of the World, Queen Elizabeth, Car-
men, Civilization, and Abraham Lincoln.

[19]

Talking Pictures

But, with the year 1927, a new era opened. A singer
named Al Jolson sang and talked for part of a photo-
play, The Jazz Singer.

The talking picture had been born!

Edison's dream had at last been realized. Speech and
sight were united. Stories whose merit depended on
delicacy of dialogue could now be made successfully.

" Action," all-important word of silent days, was still
important. But now the subtle characters of Charles
Dickens could really come to life, and Shakespeare on
the screen could emerge from the written word to a
pictorial reality.

Now in its second decade, the talking pictures can
rightfully point with pride to such accomplishments as
David Copperfield, Romeo and Jidiet, A Midsummer
Night's Dream, Trader Horn, Sequoia, A Tale of Tivo
Cities, Story of Louis Pasteur, Les Miserables, Little
Women, Anthony Adverse, Last of the Mohicans,
House of Rothschild, Henry VIII, Rembrandt, May-
time, Naughty Marietta, The Good Earth, Captains
Courageous, Mr. Deeds Goes to Town, Grand Hotel,
Little Lord Fauntleroy, and Lloyds of London.

The screen has its faults, but during its short life it
has achieved more aesthetic expression per year than
any other art. It has been the only art to make a con-
certed effort by itself, and in itself, to raise general
standards of taste.

But physical growth does prove solid popularity.
Available figures indicate clearly that the photoplay is
no illusory fad, no will-o'-the-wisp, but an integral part
of the life of today, and the life of tomorrow.

[20]

f?rP>" : .

—

hm

The Truckee River, near Lake Tahoe, furnishes mountain and forest scenes
"Sherwood Forest," U.S.A. style, has been the site of many pictures

1

An operative cameraman adjusts his camera. Cover, or blimp, keeps
in sound of camera mechanism

Karl Freund inspects a setting through a blue glass, with which he
can judge cinematic color values

History of Motion Pictures

It has not supplanted the stage nor can it ever, for
the stage has a place distinctly its own. And the stage,
instead of being harmed by the photoplay, has grown
in stature. Stage technique, spurred by motion picture
accomplishments, has made great strides. The finest
plays of the modern theatre have had a new vitality and
originality, since the advent of the motion picture.

In the '8o's and 'go's, and even into the present cen-
tury, stage plays followed a tradition that a play must
be presented in three or four acts. Shakespeare, of
course, had many scenes in his acts but as the theatre
became a more massive structure of wood and stone,
the changing of numerous sets became too costly, and
stage producers sought economy by urging playwrights
to tell their story with fewer acts and scenes.

Compare the plays of forty years ago with those of
today. Plays still stay within three or four acts, but,
because of revolving stages and more portable settings,
six to ten or twelve scenes to a play are common, and
plays have been presented with as many as twenty
scenes. Of course this number of scenes, if they can
be changed quickly, is an admission of the stage pro-
ducer that the shift of locale germane to the motion
picture provides a special advantage over the stage form
of presentation.

For years, only the stage play was studied in schools.
Today the screen drama is being included in high school
and college curricula. Young people of the new genera-
tion are seeing and hearing motion pictures. It is their
right to have answered the questions which arise in
their minds about this art.

[21]

Talking Pictures

Thirty years ago a few hundred thousand feet of
film were sufficient for a struggling "plaything," looked
upon with contempt by people of the stage and not
viewed with enthusiasm by its own adherents. Most of
these cynically considered it a passing fad from which
they could make a few thousand dollars and then get
out. Today the industry in America alone requires two
billion feet of film a year.

Thirty years ago if a film cost two thousand dollars
to make, producers threw up their hands in horror.
Today to spend two million dollars to make an ade-
quate film presentation of Gone "with the Wind is con-
sidered a normal expenditure.

Today in the United States alone 28,000 persons are
employed in the production of moving pictures and
nearly 300,000 in their distribution and exhibition. More
than 150 different industries are stimulated by Ameri-
can motion picture expenditures, representing an
amount of $200,000,000 a year.

The motion picture is rated by many observers as
being among the first ten single commodity industries
of the United States. It pays the government over
$100,000,000 in taxes annually, spends $30,000,000 for
insurance, and advertises to an amount of $77,000,000
a year in the United States and $33,000,000 annually
in other parts of the world.1

These figures are not offered with any idea of arti-
ficially stimulating the importance of the film industry
in the minds of those who read them. The figures given,
and others, are available in standard books of statistics.

1 Statistics supplied by Association of Motion Picture Producers.

[22]

History of Motion Pictures

The past of the motion picture, exciting as it is, is so
short that the great accomplishments of the film form
lie ahead, not behind. Undoubtedly this is one of the
reasons why film making is an important interest and
study for young people.

Film making is not set and established in its ways. It
has traveled only part of its road. It is flexible, and
alluring new vistas stretch in all directions from it.

[23 1

3

A SINGLE-MINDED COMMUNITY

In order that we may understand the making of
a picture today, we must know the past, and that we
have reviewed. Let us assume that we have decided to
visit Hollywood and that we are traveling on a plane
westward bound from Chicago. Arriving in California,
we pass over an enormous natural barrier, the Sierra
Madre Mountains. We rise over their jagged peaks and
coast down through lower levels into long, fruitful
valleys.

We speed over orange groves, over little towns and
farms scattered here and there. We come to Los An-
geles, which, geographically, is said to be America's
largest city. Like a carelessly thrown blanket, it spreads
from the mountains to the sea. Some loose folds stray
up canyons which cut deeply into mountains; others
stretch to the edge of the blue Pacific. At the upper
end of the blanket, sheltered by rolling foothills, lies
Hollywood. We see palm trees along its streets, its
mansions, and its little houses, many in Spanish plaster
and red tile.

From the air, with the exception of its distinctive
California atmosphere of Spanish houses and semi-
tropical flora, Hollywood is very much like any other
well-planned residential community. In fact, it is such

[24]

A Single-minded Community

a community. A very small proportion of its inhabitants
are picture people. Lawyers, doctors, and business men
occupy most of the houses. Many Angelenos live for
vears without knowing that their nextdoor neighbor has
a "face known round the world."

It is told that, one dav while strolling near his home,
Clark Gable met a middle-a^ed man living in that vicin-
itv. Gable introduced himself.

"Gable? Gable?" said the man. "Are you by any
chance a relative of the fellow that's in movies?"

But now we shall land at Hollvwood. Hollywood
is not the only place in the world in which moving
pictures are made. It is not the onlv place in the world
in which good moving pictures are made. In fact some
poor pictures have come from this rambling suburb of
Los Angeles. But the definite excellence of others has
advanced the whole industry into the realm of higher
art. Hollywood deserves its place in this volume because
more pictures are made here than elsewhere, and 80 per
cent of the greatest motion picture technicians live in
and around Los Ansreles.

This much-discussed subdivision of a large city is at
once the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow and a
port of frustrated desires. To it many come, but from
them few are chosen. It gives rewards to a handful of
persons. It says "No" to thousands. It is one of the
world's most interesting and glamorous communities.

Where else, for example, could you find a case of a
Robert Taylor?

In 1933 this personable young man appeared in a
senior class play at Pomona College. Seen by a talent

[25]

Talking Pictures

scout, he was signed as an apprentice actor by a large
studio. As late as the winter of 1935, his top salary
was about fifty dollars a week. Today, and by the
week, his salary is in four figures.

But let none be misled by such examples. They rep-
resent only the rare Aladdin's lamp qualities of Holly-
wood, not its basic realities.

As students observe the details of motion picture
making, it is understandable that many of them should
wish to be a part of a business which is so unusual, so
varied, so romantic in its implications. But general
education and personal charm mean relatively nothing
in Hollywood. A good architect, a fine dressmaker,
or an expert trainer of fleas has a better chance of
getting a position than the most delightful Bachelor of
Arts who ever received a college sheepskin.

For example, a graduate of a large western university
applied for a position. He spoke of his majoring in
English and his work in the college dramatic club; but
his recital left his hearers cold. As he was about to
leave his audience with a man who hires and fires, he
casually mentioned his hobby. He and his father were
collectors of firearms. From the age of fourteen, he had
been an expert on guns of all nations and times. He
was given a job immediately.

Today, he has been in his studio five years and has
studied very carefully. Undoubtedly he will, sooner
or later, have an excellent place in the production de-
partment. But he was given his original entree, not for
his general knowledge, but for an almost forgotten
hobby. He had mastered a valuable and specialized
study.

[26]

A Single-minded Community

The constant demand of the film industry for more
differently trained hands than any other industry, art,
or vocation is something the casual observer of filmdom
never seems able to grasp at first sight.

When one thinks of motion picture making, his
mind flashes to actors, directors, and writers, but
numerically they are only a fraction of the whole. One
year one house painter made a contribution considered
far more significant than any single "bit" of acting
and direction or writing. He invented a type of enamel
paint which looked as if it had a hard surface, but it
was really porous, and sound could pass through it.
This eliminated bad sound recording effects when
sounds "bounced" off the old type flat enamel.

"Windjammers" went off the high seas years ago,
with the arrival of the modern steamship. But every
studio has its expert sailors who can rig and sail sailing
vessels of every description from a small schooner to
a great brigantine of the early eighteenth century.

Actors and actresses, however, comprise less than 8
per cent of the so-called motion picture colonv of
Hollywood. Acting offers fewer immediate oppor-
tunities to the ambitious than its related vocations.
Paper hangers, cosmeticians, hairdressers, sculptors,
mechanics, or chemists are more frequently needed than
actors themselves.

But, because a Robert Tavlor, a Fernand Gravet, a
Jean Aluir, or a Deanna Durbin appears out of thou-
sands, every good-looking young man or young woman
in the country seems to think that the quickest road to
film fortune is through a nice figure, beautiful teeth,
and a lovely smile.

[27]

Talking Pictures

One recalls the lament of a famous casting director.
After a long day spent in looking at applicants and
trying to fill a certain blank in the cast list of a picture
about to be made, he said in some desperation, 'Til
trade you twenty Grecian profiles for one good case of
St. Vitus's dance!"

He was absolutely serious. He had a part in which
this particular physical affliction was necessary to estab-
lish a certain character point. While good looks, both
masculine and feminine, were a drug on the market,
what he needed for his purpose was a case of St. Vitus's
dance.

Many are deceived by the notion that beauty is essen-
tial to success in Hollywood. It is not. Talent is the
chief prerequisite, and it is, as we shall see, an elusive
quality. Those who wish to enter the film industry
should consider carefully two famous Hollywood
"don'ts" for would-be actors or actresses.

Don't come to Hollywood unless you have real abil-
ity in acting. Scouts from the studios are constantly
traveling in all parts of the world. If talent appears
in little theatre or amateur performances, they will find
it and give it an opportunity.

Don't come to Hollywood unless you have enough
money for a year's stay. There is little chance for those
who disregard rule one, but there is less for those un-
prepared for self-maintenance.

We find that the studios in Hollywood are widely
scattered, clinging to the fringes of residential districts,
like other manufacturing enterprises. Once, when
Hollywood was smaller, there were studios in its very

[28]

A Single-minded Community

center. We see a huge, flat, open space, the first site of
the big Paramount Studio, now situated two miles away,
next to the big RKO plant. Todav this ten-acre tract
is surrounded by twelve-story skyscrapers. Fifteen
years ago there were two straggling half-painted board
buildings in the center of a profitable orange grove.

In 191 3 two ambitious young men, Jesse L. Lasky
and Cecil DeAiille, had rented the carriage house which
once stood at a corner of this grove. Here thev estab-
lished their studio. They had money enough to rent
only half of the barn, and when the owner decided to
wash his carriages in the other half, the water flooded
under the partition into the "studio."

But regardless of handicaps, DeMille and Laskv
started what is, today, one of the greatest companies
in the business. These men had imagination, energv,
and foresight. They possessed the qualities which as-
sert themselves in the face of handicaps, and thev were
pioneers in an industrv which will alwavs value pioneers.

In fact, as one considers the earlv leaders in the
motion picture industry, one sees a direct parallel to
the men who made the first achievements in all the
other great industries.

The DeA lilies, the Laemmles, the Warners of the earlv
days of pictures dared financial ruin because thev saw a
vision of the future in this strange new art development.
We have said previously that most of the earlv day
investors in film companies were cvnical about the
very business in which they were engaged. Thev saw
in it only a chance to make a little "quick money" from
a fad which would pass.

[29]

Talking Pictures

But these men passed out of the business long ago,
and present-day studio workers cannot even remember
their names. But they do remember the real pioneers,
the men who risked everything because they had faith
that the weak thing they took in their hands would
grow from a sickly baby to the stature of a giant.

The old Warner Brothers Studio, now seldom used
because of their newer, finer place twelve miles away
in the sprawling San Fernando Valley, is the nearest
of the big studios to Hollywood proper. Another studio
within Hollywood, the old "Fox lot," is at present
used only for emergencies, the newer Fox plant having
been built in Westwood Hills, miles away.

Just outside of Hollywood is the United Artists
Studio where "Doug and Maty" made their greatest
pictures. What seems to be a little village of English
houses is Charlie Chaplin's Studio. To the north, sev-
eral miles distant, are the rambling buildings of "Uni-
versal." This is one of the oldest studios. Among its
historic landmarks still standing is the old Notre Dame
cathedral set used in the production of The Hunch-
back of Notre Dame. Near this plant are the new
Warner Studios.

In the center of Hollywood, an old setting is being
torn down, a setting used in the production of The Four
Horsemen of the Apocalypse. This will transform the
acreage of the long unused iMetro Studio into a build-
ing to house the more recent art of radio broadcasting.
Miles away to the northeast, among old-time sets, one
sees a gaudy building studded with lights. A cabaret
now stands in the center of the former Mayer Studios.

[30]

A Single-minded Community

A merger of two great companies caused the close of
these smaller plants in 1924 and the removal of their
personnel to the eighty-two-acre Metro-Gold wyn-
Mayer Studios at Culver City, ten miles southwest of
Hollywood. Not far distant one finds the reproduction
of Jefferson's plantation, "Monticello," which hides
behind its colonial fac;ade the stages of Selznick-
International. Further still, down a wide boulevard are
the Roach Studios, laughter headquarters of the juvenile
"Our Gang."

It has been said that Hollywood, both in the resi-
dential and the business sections, resembles any other
American city. But there are differences.

One goes into a restaurant and he may see posted
there a typed "directory" of telephone numbers. One
number permits us to get instantly in touch with the
owner of "Joe, the best trained brown bear in captiv-
ity." Another man can deliver "any required number
of one-armed or one-legged men." A plastic surgeon
"guarantees to reshape a too-large nose within three
weeks, and with no pain or discomfort."

For nearly a mile on one long street there are sub-
stantial buildings. They are the offices of "agents."
These agents keep actors, directors, writers, producers,
and the higher-paid cameramen, sound engineers, art
directors, and other workers in jobs. Salesmanship of
"talent" is their profession.

Perhaps the most pretentious fac/ade in Hollywood is
that of an internationally known cosmetic concern.
Thousands upon thousands of dollars have gone into its
imposing marble front and its luxurious interior. This

[31]

Talking Pictures

concern does not sell one tenth of one per cent of its
output in Hollywood. But its products are good and are
used by stars, and its facade, and its Hollywood head-
quarters, make excellent advertising.

Down Hollywood Boulevard, a street on which, if
one stands long enough at one corner, he will see all
the "great" of filmdom, comes a highly polished delivery
wagon with barred sides. It is filled with yelping dogs.
Its owner is a professional animal trainer, and he can
deliver udog actors" by the score, on a minute's notice.

What is that terrific report? It is a huge five thou-
sand watt light globe which has rolled from a pass-
ing truck. It was on its way to be used in a night scene.
Look at any light globe used in homes. Think how
that globe would sound if it were broken. Then recall
that the one just heard is about the size of two water-
melons.

Nowhere in the world — in the early morning, at
noon in cafes, at night on the way home — can one see
so many hundreds of people wearing grease paint,
beards, and mustaches. But no Hollywoodian gives such
people a second glance. They are as much a part of
the local scenery as workers in blue denim overalls are
at the time of any change of shift in the vicinity of the
Carnegie steel plant at Pittsburgh.

Here is a huge warehouse, one of several that holds
film for use at the studios — a total of two billion feet
for a single year, or a little less than thirty-eight thou-
sand miles, or one and one-half times around the world.

A modest plaster building proves to be the head-
quarters for a company which sells camera lenses. A

[32]

A Single-minded Community

salesman can display on a table before us a dozen com-
plicated pieces of glass, the total value of which will
be many thousands of dollars.

In an enormous twelve-story building, some thirty
thousand different costumes of every known historical
period are stored. x\nd this collection, the largest, is
partially duplicated in smaller ones held by individual
studios.

In street scenes like these, in unique collections of
almost every description, in the great variety of peoples
representing practically every nationality, Hollywood
differs from every other city in the world. In any city
in which films are made — London, Berlin, Paris, Bom-
bay— similar materials are in greater or lesser degree
available, but onlv in Hollywood is there such a pro-
fusion of the strange, distinctive, fantastically varied
impedimenta of picture making.

Having flown over the city, having walked through
its streets, and having had a kaleidoscopic view of its
life, we are now better prepared to studv the actual
work of a studio.

Where shall we start? With some outstanding star?
Not at all.

"We hear much about stars and certainly they are the
most visible evidences of picture making, but much must
happen before they can step before the cameras with
their contributions, and before we can meet them. Be-
fore the start of a picture, the first thing to be sought
is a story.

Stories, appealing, interesting, enthralling stories, rare
examples of human life caught at high tide, stories rang-

[33]

Talking Pictures

ing from Shakespeare to Dashiell Hammett, from the
nonsense of a Marx Brothers comedy to the tense drama
of The Good Earth, these are and will always be the
cornerstone of the film business. Without fine stars,
sensitive supporting players, even the greatest story
cannot come to life on the screen. But without fine
stories not even the greatest and most popular star now
living could continue his popularity for six months!

Hollywood depends upon stories. No studio could
continue its work without an ample and varied supply
of stories from which to draw. These, the result of
man's most fanciful dreams and most inspired visions,
must be discovered and adjusted to the need of the
studios.

Dreams! Remember that word. In a sense novels
are merely some man's dreams, put into written words.
Plays are dreams transformed into actors walking to and
fro across the physical stage of a theatre. Motion pic-
tures are dreams transmitted to a metalized screen, there
to be seen by more millions than can be reached by
almost any other means of communication.

All phases of literary art are closely linked with
dreams which spring up like the Phoenix in the mind of
some man or woman. All stories are integral in the
warp and woof of the photoplay fabric, and they pro-
vide the reply to Hollywood's perennial request,
Dreams Wanted.

[34]

4

DREAMS WANTED

Have you ever awakened in the night, thrilled over
some marvelous dream which came to you in your
sleep, enthralled by its drama and its promise of riches
and glory? Of course you have. When we were very
voung, about the time when we still believed in Santa
Claus, we looked forward hopefully to a repetition of
the same dream; and then again the same dream on a
third night. For, says an old legend, if we dream the
same dream three times, it will come true.

Back of our delight in dramatic dreams is man's age-
old desire to leave his immediate environment, if only
for a few moments, to mingle vicariously with people
doing unusual, exciting, and thrilling things. Motion
pictures are not unlike these dreams. They afford an
escape from a possibly drab or monotonous environ-
ment. They serve as a magic carpet which transports
us from commonplace realities to a realm of romance
and imagination. They bring foreign lands and customs
into our lives, take us back into the colorful past, and
lead us into the future.

We smiled tolerantlv because Woodrow Wilson, col-
lege president and War Executive of our nation, loved
vaudeville jugglers and "pennv-dreadfuP detective and
mvsterv stories. Indulgence in these things in no man-

[35]

Talking Pictures

ner affected his learning. They provided for him a
needed relaxation.

Every absorbing story is a dream which some clever
man or woman draws from his imagination and puts on
paper. The "story scouts" of a big, modern motion
picture studio might very well be called "dream
hunters," for they roam all over the world searching
for stories.

One story was read in a native magazine by a sales-
man traveling through Czechoslovakia, and his sug-
gestion led to its purchase and the filming of a success-
ful picture. In an Italian theatre a woman attended the
performance of a new play by an unknown author. She
rose from her seat and went to a cable office. There
she wired a studio. Within three days the play had
been bought for picture production.

In New York City, large film companies employ
staffs of readers who go over new plays and novels
in manuscript before they are produced or published.
The best of these manuscript stories and of new maga-
zine material are sent to Hollywood for final reading
and decisions concerning their availability.

Two comments sometimes heard amuse professional
story editors. A person will say, naming a great play
or novel of past popularity, "I wonder how the movies
overlooked that fine story." The chances are ioo to i
that the files of every studio in Hollywood, London,
Berlin, Paris, or Rome contain a synopsis and a reader's
full report on this particular tale. In similar manner
professional story scouts smile when they receive hun-
dreds of letters immediately after a new novel is re-

[36]

&

Dunes near Yuma, Arizona, have often doubled for the Sahara Desert
California terrain is transformed into North China for The Good Earth

'■.•;v;

i .. ' . iZS

The famous Busch Gardens in Pasadena, California, about twenty miles
from the studios, often used for picture locations

Dreams Wanted

leased, or a new serial story has begun publication in a
magazine.

This happened before the picture / Loved You
Again, from a novel by Octavus Roy Cohen, was pro-
duced. The story had been received with favor by
readers when it appeared in a popular magazine. Scores
of letters had reached every studio suggesting various
stars for the principal roles. But the story had been
bought from publisher's proof sheets months before the
magazine appeared on the newsstand. By the time the
general public reads a new novel, the chances are 500
to 1 that in the files of every studio there is already a
synopsis of it and a complete analysis of it in a reader's
report.

When the play Grand Hotel appeared on the New
York stage hundreds of people wrote suggesting its
possibility for motion pictures. But it had been bought
for motion picture production months before, and it
was film money that had financed its New York stage
presentation. This was the end of a two years' search
by a studio reading department.

The late Irving Thalberg had expressed a desire to
produce a picture of large physical scope which would
be so constructed that it would give excellent parts to
not one or two stars but to several. When a studio
reader discovered a note concerning a German novel
which was about to be made into a stage play, she
scented the end of a long chase. The novel and the play
were sent for and translated into English. It proved to
be the exact work Mr. Thalberg had in mind, and nego-
tiations were put under way by cable for the picture

[37]

Talking Pictures

rights. It then developed that before these could be
obtained, the play must have a New York stage pro-
duction, so the play was backed by the company which
later produced the screen version. Both were inter-
esting milestones in theatrical history.

The keeper of the story files in the largest of the
American studios boasts that no one has ever named an
author whose full dossier she does not have in one of
her steel cabinets. And no one has ever succeeded in
naming even short stories published in obscure maga-
zines of small circulation of which she does not have
a record. In this one library alone there are two mil-
lion stories carefully filed.

Attached to each story is a short synopsis prepared
by the reader and his report on its availability for pic-
ture use. There is also an elaborate cross index listing
the plot structure, the dramatic possibilities, and the
characteristic comic or tragic elements of the story. A
study is made of the characters in the story and their
relation to the available stars and featured players.

Suppose we should want a report on the desirability
of filming one of the various plays of Shakespeare.
Within two minutes this woman could and would
place in our hands a carefully typed file card (the same
kind of card a grocery store manager might use to
keep track of an inventory of canned beans and smoked
ham) , listing every play Shakespeare wrote and referring
to a separate file which has a synopsis of each play and
a reader's report concerning its essential screen values.

This was tried once on a distinguished British novelist
who came to America to convert Charles Dickens'

[38]

Dreams Wanted

David Cop per field into a screen play. When he was
shown his own card he pointed his finger to the last
item.

"But," he said, "the proofs of that story were struck
off bv the printer onlv a week ago."

The head reader answered mildly, "We use the air
mail!"

Motion picture writing is definitely one of the hard-
est forms of composition. It requires an intimate knowl-
edge of the essential craftsmanship of both the stage play
and the novel. But it must pass beyond this, not only
into an understanding of, but into a genuine sub-
conscious instinct for, the intricacies of motion picture
technique.

.Many amateur writers, failing to get their contribu-
tions accepted for publication in either a "pulp" or a
"slick" magazine (a distinction based on the class of
paper used bv two distinctly different classes of period-
icals), turn to the studios with the mistaken belief that
the requirements of the motion pictures are less strin-
gent. Unfounded plagiarism suits find growth in such
soil.

It has become the general practice for studios not to
read unsolicited manuscripts wherein the writer has not
given himself the usual legal protection bv copyright,
either directly or through publication. In 1936 there
were 525 feature photoplays made in the United States.
In the same year, the world around, more than twenty-
thousand short stories, novels, and plavs were accepted,
in a score of languages for magazine use, stage produc-
tion, or book publication. From the publication or stage

[39]

Talking Pictures

production alone this gives the talking picture studios
an enormous choice of 40 to 1 .

These twenty thousand manuscripts form a reservoir
of vibrant ideas whose dramatic force has been tested
in an important manner by means of publication or
stage production. And there are forty of them for every
photoplay! It is not strange that the studios protect
themselves against unfounded plagiarism suits filed by
untrained amateurs, by refusing to open or read any
manuscript which has not been legally protected, or
previously solicited.

When stories originally planned for the screen are
accepted, they have generally been written by trained
writers, playwrights, or novelists, working directly
within the studios. These ideas may be generated by
such trained writers themselves, or by a producer, or a
director, or a star. The percentage of stories originally
written for the screen compared to photoplays adapted
from published material varies, but a fairly normal per-
centage is about 30-70.

Frequently a screen play originally conceived for the
screen deals with some movement or dramatic situation
current in daily news. At the time of a wave of news-
paper publicity about prison reform, The Big House
was written by the thoroughly competent Frances
Marion. Or such an original may be about a period
or happening of which the fiction supply has not been
entirely adequate, or properly focused for cinematic
use. An example of this is seen in the most successful
commercial photoplay of 1936, San Francisco. This
was written originally and directly for the screen by

[40]

Dreams Wanted

Robert Hopkins and Anita Loos, author of Gentlemen
Prefer Blondes.

Current events frequently influence the selection of
motion picture stories. Just before the coronation of
King George VI, one studio released The Prince and
the Pauper, an adaptation of a story by Mark Twain.
It brought to an interested public the pageantry and
ritual of an English coronation.

Original stories are often founded upon some his-
torical character whose biography lends itself to dra-
matic presentation. The Story of Louis Pasteur and
Rembrandt, the latter produced in Great Britain, illus-
trate this usage. The question might logically be asked,
"If the studios make original stories based on historical
characters, could not an amateur prepare a film play
on the life of such a person and have it accepted?"

A negative reply must be made because there is prob-
ably no more expert and difficult writing job in the
world than the transformation of biography into the
medium of exciting drama. It is a harder task than writ-
ing fiction. In fiction, the imagination may roam un-
checked, but, in fitting biography into the medium of
the screen, one is bound by inescapable facts. These
must be deftly woven into the framework.

To do this requires long literary training and that
quick instinct for the dramatically right and wrong,
which becomes second nature to a competent profes-
sional writer. Contrary to general opinion, writers are
very seldom "born." They are developed from sheer
perspiration, hard work, and long experience of trial
and error. Before he sold his first story, Rupert Hughes

[41]

Talking Pictures

collected so many rejection slips* that he claims he
"could paper the side of a wall" with them.

The central ideas sought by studio story readers are
strong, realistic, pictorial, and human. Lack of a
focused central dramatic idea is the major fault of most
amateur stories. If that idea, or basic story situation, has
novelty and force, and if it can be expressed pictorially
in an interesting manner, development into a fine photo-
play is possible and probable. It matters not whether it
was adapted from a play or a novel or conceived initially
for studio purposes.

Action is the password of all drama and most espe-
cially of moving pictures. If a photoplay does not move,
if its forward dramatic progression is halting or broken,
it is of little entertainment value. It takes a trained mind
to construct human conflicts which in their consecutive
passing through a story give the illusion of reality.

Most amateur writers lack this ability, and it is a
common fault among them to try to disguise weakness
of plot by a recourse to beautiful description. An ex-
perienced writer like Sir Walter Scott could balance
his materials so that the long but very beautiful descrip-
tion of a forest glade in Ivanhoe enhances his plot de-
velopment without retarding action. The average ama-
teur, however, resorts to description usually because he
has nothing more vital to offer.

One director threw down the last of forty manu-
scripts he had read in one week. Disgustedly, he said,
"I will trade you forty gorgeously beautiful Hawaiian
sunsets out of all the collection for one good sock in
the jaw!"

[42]

Dreams Wanted

Victor Fleming, the director of Captains Courageous,
Treasure Island, and many other successful films, began
his film career as a cameraman. Today he seldom looks
through the finder of a camera.

"I know," he said, "that if I do I will instinctively
start grouping my people to get the most charming
pictorial composition. What I must do is to interest
folk in the action of my characters, not scenery or set,
which, no matter how beautiful, must remain unob-
trusive."

Thousands of stories, and every short story of every
monthly or weekly magazine of high or low degree, are
read by a corps of trained readers. A large room, fitted
with comfortable overstuffed chairs, is the headquarters
for the readers of one typical studio. These are former
dramatic or literary critics, or advanced graduate stu-
dents in literature. They must in general be very fa-
miliar with literature of all periods.

These readers submit each story to five fundamental
tests. First, do the central characterizations fit one or
more of the stars or featured players under contract to
the studio? Second, will there be difficulty in adapt-
ing the story to the talking picture form? Third, does
it have reasonably attractive pictorial elements? Stories
with a monotonously drab background may be inter-
esting reading when written by a genius, but they are
likely to prove faulty for pictorial presentation. Fourth,
is the story of a type that has a wide public appeal?
Fifth and finally, can it be exhibited within a limit of
two hours?

Reading professionally is hard, concentrated work.

[43]

Talking Pictures

Undoubtedly, it could be unalloyed pleasure if the
readers had only to read the best stories and plays
which are published each year.

"But," said one of them, "we must read everything,
and out of twenty thousand stories a year, some of
them are bound to be rather terrible."

Readers, of course, have ambitions like all of us. Most
of them employed in the work follow it as a stepping
stone to creative writing. An example of a reader grad-
uated to writing is Claudine West, responsible for the
scenarios of The Barretts of Wimpole Street, The
Guardsman, Smilin' Through, The Good Earth, and
many other strong photoplays of genuine literary merit.

To those interested in the qualifications for a studio
reader, a portion of a letter is offered. This letter was
recently sent by a prominent studio story editor to an
applicant for a position:

"All of our readers have taken one university or
college degree, some two. This background is
essential. I find my best readers are drawn from
families who have lived always with the finest
books. . . . Almost all of them read one or two
foreign languages as well as they read English.
Some of them have had fine experience before they
came to me, reading for the great publishing houses,
or play producers. It is the critical, analytical mind
that makes the best reader. . . . The essentials are at
least four years' study of English literature in a
fine university, and a reading knowledge of one
foreign language at least."

[44]

Dreams Wanted

Nothing could be more intense than the application
of a studio reading department. If a good novel or plav
is overlooked, the discarded story would be quickly
bought by a competitor. If one of these proved an out-
standing success, the oversight would stand as a blemish
on the professional name of the reader or head of the
story department.

But studios do not discourage the efforts of new
writers. They take great delight in the discoverv of a
new writer of exceptional merits. No barrier is raised
against the work of anyone whose method of presenta-
tion shows that he has passed the primary grade in the
art of writing. Studios, however, are too busy making a
regular succession of pictures of high merit to teach les-
sons in writing. They seek, rather, writers who have
proven their ability by publication, and such tested
authors find their work treated with eager, absorbed
attention.

Players and directors watch closely even' move of a
competent story department, for their livelihood and
their professional reputations depend on the selection
of adequate stories. Every night as thev leave the studios
they have scripts or books under their arms.

After Mutiny on the Bounty was bought bv the late
Irving Thalberg, not a copy could be found in a Hollv-
wood book shop, for all had been bought by ambitious
he-men actors of the dozen big studios. The book shops
were sorry when finally the main parts were allotted to
Charles Laughton, Clark Gable, and Franchot Tone,
for sales of the volume fell off at once!

No purpose would be served in listing here the hun-

[45]

Talking Pictures

dreds of great authors who have contributed to the
screen. It is evident that the screen has taken adequate
advantage of its ability to draw from the novel, the play,
and the short story. From Shakespeare to Marc Con-
nelly, from Dickens to Clarence Budington Kelland,
from classical writers to the contemporary, the screen
in its resort to the finest writers has shown evidence of
an approach to literary maturity.

The studios are to be commended, for they have not
been provincial or narrow in their story search. They
have taken prodigally from the greatest literature of all
the world and of all time. Stories from Germany, from
France, from England, sent out to the enormous audi-
ence of the screen, greater than that of any other art,
have emphasized that all great art is not national but
international.

Partially because it is easier to pay a few dimes to
see a motion picture than it is to pick up and read a
heavy book, thousands upon thousands of people are,
through motion pictures, being introduced to fine lit-
erature for the first time. Many of those who went to
see the picture, Anna Kareninay did so because they
were attracted by the name of Garbo over the entrance.
But once in the theatre they discovered Tolstoy.

Between the time that the picture production of
David Copperfield was announced and the period of its
exhibition, the public library of Cleveland was forced
to buy seventy-four additional copies of the book. The
school librarian of a large city system reported that he
added four hundred copies of the work to his school
collections during the same period.

[46]

Dreams Wanted

When a film company announced in the fall of one
year that the photoplay, Romeo and Juliet, would be
ready for exhibition by summer of the following year,
scores of high school English teachers arranged their
courses to bring the study of this play closer to the re-
lease of the picture. Thev did this as part of the grow-
ing recognition by educators that the presentation of
great works of literature on the screen inspires students
to read these works with more intense interest.

Libraries have grown more and more sensitive to
the public interest in filmed literary classics. The Min-
neapolis Public Library reported exceptional interest in
a special file it keeps of the latest reviews on the best
motion pictures. The Cleveland library, previously
mentioned, and others provide tables of supplementary
reading for those whose imaginations have been fired
by the project of translating a literary classic into screen
form.

Let us assume that the impossible and unusable mate-
rial has been taken from twenty thousand possibilities;
that several scores of excellent stories are ready for in-
spection by the executives. Let us follow these stories
into a "story conference" and see the next step in the
important activity of selecting and preparing a talking
picture for actual production.

[47]

THE STORY IS SELECTED

There have been times when an individual star,
financing his own company, has had the last word in
every phase of production. A few directors have taken
this great and heavy burden entirely upon their own
shoulders. Sometimes, noted writers have attempted the
task of making a picture entirely by themselves. These
efforts have met with both success and failure. There
will always be artists capable of efficiently supervising
a picture singlehanded.

But for the general bulk of production, a formula
has been effected by the result of trial and error through
the years, a formula that seems to get the best values
from each artist. By this generally accepted method the
head of the studio — he mav be a Louis B. Maver, a
Charles Rogers, a Darryl Zanuck, or a Jack Warner —
stands at the dividing line between the financial and
the creative sides of picture making.

It is his job to sense the commercial values in any
particular story. He must weigh these values against
past evidence and make a decision. He must decide
whether the story in mind has sufficient public appeal
to return the cost of the investment it represents.

Directly aiding the head of the studio are from six to
twenty associate producers. They form the immediate

[48]

The Story Is Selected

connection between the "man at the top" and the direc-
tors, busy at their work of creation on the stages. In-
asmuch as he seldom gets publicity and is much less
known to the public than the director, the function of
the associate producer is rarely understood by persons
not actually en^a^ed in film making.

The associate producer is the one man in the studio
who follows the picture through even' stage, from the
initial purchase of the story, to the shipping of the last
prints to "exchanges" conveniently placed at key geo-
graphical points, from which they are rented to theatres
for exhibition.

An associate producer must be a combination of a
shrewd business man and a sensitive creative artist. He
must be sensitive to the enthusiasms of his writers, his
directors, and his stars, and yet he must remain conscious
that pictures have to be made within a cost limit, that
great literarv classics cannot continue to be made if their
cost is so great that their theatrical exhibition does not
return the investment.

Usually an associate producer has several pictures in
preparation or production at one time. Because his work
is so similar to that of the editor of a large newspaper,
his contribution never gets the attention, praise, or credit
it rightfully deserves.

The most popular job in a studio is that of a director.
The director is not responsible for everv tile in our
mosaic; but he does control the artistic values of more
of them than any other single individual in the studio.
His work is definitely, often spectacularly, creative.

That the differences between the director and the

[49]

Talking Pictures

associate producer may be clear, we may note that the
associate producer works in his office, that the director
works upon the stage.

The director might be compared to a chef. He takes
varied emotional ingredients and blends them smoothly
and deftly into a delectable story concoction. If a pic-
ture be well directed, its audience should never be con-
scious that there was a factor of direction.

A good director does not burden his star with worries
of tempo changes between scenes. These he adjusts
beforehand, leaving the actor free to study the creation
of each scene. Both the director and the star have more
than sufficient duties of creative import. The details of
a production must be executed by a staff of helpers.
This is why the associate producer system evolved.

Few directors could read the enormous mass of stories
which pass through a studio story department and still
give to direction the concentration it requires. The
added worry of production costs interferes with their
directorial abilities. Therefore, a director today, except
in a close advisory capacity, does not start with a photo-
play until after the story is purchased. Neither does he
follow the picture through all the complications of
cutting and editing after the last scene is "shot."

Selection of stories and the supervision of costs and
editing are among the responsibilities of an associate
producer. There are several methods of placing se-
lected stories before associate producers.

Some producers make their selections by reading the
full stories themselves. But such men, under stress,
rarely find time to make more than a very few pic-

[50]

The Story Is Selected

tures a year. Others have private readers who consult
with their chief concerning possiblv suitable stories for
his particular type of operation.

Many observers consider most effective the system
which has reached its best fruition in the hands of a
charming, gray-haired woman named Kate Corbaley.
Her method is su^estive of the time when earlv sultans
called upon their storytellers for diversion during idle
hours. But storvtellin£ in studio stvle is not the diver-
sion of anvone's idle hours, but serious business.

Mrs. Corbalev, a Stanford graduate, represents per-
fectly the kind of trained story- technician most success-
ful in studio work. Family conditions placed on a young
wife the full responsibility for four infant girls. A tal-
ent for magazine fiction kept the wolf from her door.
After this she spent vears in writing screen stories in the
early days of the motion picture.

But it soon developed that Airs. Corbalev, fine crea-
tive writer that she was, possessed a much more valuable
talent than writing. She had a "nose" for "picture
values." She could read a storv, quicklv analyze it as
it might appear, and translate it first into the silent, then
into the talking photographic medium. Thus developed
the system of telling kev stories to associate producers.

A three- or four-page svnopsis of a long novel is
usually pedantic. A producer, responsible for several
millions of dollars in costs each vear, is seldom able to
read each of the three hundred best stories chosen from
each year's supply and give attention to other equallv
important executive duties involving the expenditure of
millions of dollars.

[51]

Talking Pictures

Of course a producer must know their dramatic
values, for they provide his livelihood. To insure this,
the "story conference' ' was evolved. It frequently fol-
lows a breakfast attended by the associate producers.

Mrs. Corbaley sits in the center of a ring of men. She
takes each story and tells it, not as it was written in its
original form, but with suggested variations that might
make it particularly acceptable for pictures. She has a
finely trained, well-modulated, low voice. Through
long practice she knows the best selling points of each
story and she stresses them.

By this method she exemplifies what the minstrels
knew centuries and centuries ago, that for storytelling
the printed word is inferior to the human voice. Long
before the art of printing was developed, people re-
ceived their information from the few who could read.
Often these men went from court to court and told the
news of the day or sang of some heroic achievement.

In ancient Greece the early poets sang to the accom-
paniment of a lute. In the Middle Ages, the trouba-
dours of France, the minnesingers of Germany, and the
strolling minstrels of England entertained the courts
with their songs and stories. They served as a means of
communication. Even the few nobles and priests who
could read preferred to get their daily news and fiction
from the strolling minstrels. The work of the modern
studio storyteller carries out in twentieth-century form
the psychology which made the work of these early
minstrels so popular and so effective.

The dozen men who listen to Mrs. Corbaley are all
specialists. Each is an authority in a different line. One

[52]

William Powell and technicians wait while repairs are made to
the make-up of Luise Rainer

f

)

■/

WM

Sound recording engineers with portable recording set placed in a large
truck. A rural talking picture location can be seen.

The Story Is Selected

is attuned to music. Another is keenly sensitive to strong,
direct, melodramatic conflict. Another, his lips often
curling up at the ends, has an irrepressible sense of
humor, an immediate instinct for the comic. Another,
dapper, exceedingly well-groomed, of Continental
background, knows best the stories of a sophisticated
kind. Another revels in complicated mystery stories.

Discussion of each story immediately follows the
conference. Each man raises points from the back-
ground of his special field. Out of this general conver-
sation surprising things may evolve. A story originally
considered tragic may develop an overwhelmingly
comic slant. And one believed quite sophisticated may
prove to have its best values resting on a solid, home-
spun, realistic basis.

Results seem to have proven the efficacy of making
verbal decisions concerning the drama. This svstem has
produced in the past a variety of pictures such as Grand
Hotel, Trader Horn, The Thin Man, Naughty Mari-
etta, and many others, all of which have been suc-
cessful.

After tentative selections are made of possible stories,
each associate producer discusses them with his direc-
tors and with the stars best suited for the principal roles.
If all are satisfied, negotiations for the purchase of the
stories beorin.

The process of story selection may require months,
but competition for the more popular properties some-
times assumes the speed and excitement of a thrilling
horse race. When it is known that several companies
covet a certain story or play, action comes quicklv. De-

[53]

Talking Pictures

cisions are made about the values of the story for the
production program of each studio, and bids are placed
by telegraph. In some cases contracts have been sent
by wire photography to hasten a purchase,

Often purchases develop strange complications.
Lullaby, a stage play by Edward Knoblock, was made
into the picture The Sin of Madelon Claudet. This
won the award of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts
and Sciences for its year. Knoblock was traveling in
Europe at the time of the purchase, and a studio rep-
resentative followed him over a considerable portion
of the continent before obtaining his signature to the
contract.

It took four years of work, 1929-193 3, to clear the
many legal tangles surrounding the talking picture rights
to The Merry Widow. The musical rights belonged to
Franz Lehar, easily reached, but the libretto was col-
laborated upon by several men whose rights had fallen
into various hands. To trace them all took many years
and a sum of money which amounted to a goodly per-
centage of the sales price of the musical success.

Luck alone saved a lengthy delay in the purchase of
the Arctic book Eskimo. A representative sought
eagerly for huge, brawny, one-legged Peter Freuchen,
most spectacular in appearance of all Arctic explorers.
He caught him just as he was leaving a Paris cafe for
a new exploration cruise to the North which would
have kept him from civilization for four years.

When the search leads to a successful play, such as
the London stage mystery success, Night Must Fall,
there are usually no bars — except price ! Producers ex-

[54]

The Story Is Selected

pect to pay a high price for a current stage hit, for it
has already proven its ability to attract and to entertain
people. The next question involved, is, "Will it make
a good picture?"

Some books are "naturals." They have the pictorial
quality, the breadth of action, and the variety of char-
acter essential to any good motion picture. The Good
Earth and Anthony Adverse are examples. People were
familiar with these novels. Their stupendous sales guar-
anteed public interest. For such inspired, extraordinary
stories, there are usually no complications, except those
of competitive bargaining.

With stories not protected by modern copyright,
stories in "the public domain" by virtue of exceptionally
long life, the problem is different.

A registration office in New York makes almost non-
existent among American producers the possibility of
several versions being produced at the same time.

Suppose three producers simultaneously decide to
make a story. They write, or wire, to the registration
office and their request is stamped with the day, the
hour, and the minute of its arrival. If three requests
are received during the same day or the same week, the
producer first making the request is given the right to
film the story.

Every studio, like a good farmer, stores away some
portion of his "story crop" for a rainy day. Each studio
must do this in order to protect itself from the uncer-
tainty of the market; hence, all stories purchased are
not used immediately.

The story market fluctuates, for authors are uncertain

[55]

Talking Pictures

individuals. Sometimes there is a feast of stories for
months. Then for no accountable reason a famine oc-
curs, and for this reason it has been found a wise policy
to leave an adequate margin. Story departments must
buy in advance of their needs.

For example, a studio which uses only fifty stories
a year never permits its stock to go below one hundred
and fifty. Further, a story which is mediocre for an
existing star, may prove a flaming "ball of fire" under
the inspiration of some new comet-personality. No one
thought much of a story called Three Smart Girls until
along came a girl called Deanna Durbin. For her the
story fitted like a beautiful gown and seemed to reflect
her own charm.

Weeks, months, sometimes years of work and con-
ferences involving many minds are required to find and
select stories. When the picture version is made, people
leaving the theatre often exclaim, "Why, it isn't like the
book at all!"

Experienced producers, hearing such remarks, shrug
their shoulders in mock resignation, for it is difficult to
explain that the screen play is a different expressive
medium, related to, but unlike either of its distant
relatives, the stage play, or the novel. The casual visitor
to a photoplay seldom understands these differences.
But in them one finds the reasons for the amazing
growth of the photoplay, its present solid place in
public esteem.

r 5<5 3

WHY STORIES ARE CHANGED

The novel, the stage play, and the talking picture
demand three different forms of writing. They are
alike only in that each uses words to s^ain emotional
effects and to establish an illusion of fiction, or to give
a rational presentation of fact.

The novel and its miniature, the short story, are con-
fined to the written word. The effect of these forms
must be secured entirely by the emotional reaction of
the reader to printed symbols. It is not necessarily bound
by restrictions of time or place, plausibility or possibility,
a fact substantiated by the enormous popularity of Jules
Verne's Twenty Thousand Leagues wider the Sea and
of the Tarzan novels. The most successful novels
have strong action and clear plots. Occasionally, so
powerful is a pen in the hands of a great writer that
stories with weak plots succeed because of brilliant
word imagery.

It would cause controversy for one to name ten Eng-
lish classics which will never be seen on the motion
picture screen. But they exist, and any student, teacher,
or amateur expert in English literature could easily pre-
pare his own list. The stories in mind are excellently
written, but beneath their words there remains an un-
substantial shell. In such stories, great as thev are in

[57]

Talking Pictures

their own genre, there is not enough flesh and blood
to fashion men and women who dramatically love, hate,
and fight. Beauty of words in the photoplay cannot
take the place of pictured reality.

A stage play is more closely akin to a picture than
a novel, but as we shall see, the play is now, and always
will remain, a much more distant cousin of the photo-
play than is commonly believed. The play, or drama,
is a combination of words and movement spoken and
acted by actors and actresses, who are before us in flesh
and blood. This secures for the drama considerable
psychological advantage.

But for twenty-odd centuries this advantage has been
offset by disadvantages, the major of which is the matter
of movement. Everything that happens must take place
within three walls, and within the stage area of the
theatre being used at the moment. For companies travel-
ing between theatres this area may shrink one third, or
be quadrupled. Before a new sequence may start in a
new setting, action must halt, and the curtain drop.
The audience then waits while the set is changed.

The methods of staging contemporary plays have
been greatly facilitated by revolving stages, by modern
lighting devices, and by more portable settings. But the
stage, despite the modernity of its technique, must de-
pend largely upon the unities of time, action, and place,
laws concerning which are an inseparable part of its
heritage from ancient Greece, from the schools of
drama. The screen is almost wholly free from the
various compulsions of these laws, and, because of this
fact, has developed remarkable dramatic devices exclu-

[58]

Why Stories Are Changed

sively its own and which can be used by no other art
form.

The instantaneous flash back, the cut-away to other
connected action, the quick return to the main scene
have made possible the presentation of dramatic situa-
tions without pause, without awkward delay. This
achievement has been one of the greatest contributions
of the screen to the principles of the drama.

The talking picture has many of the assets of the
stage and the novel, but it adds to them several distinct
advantages of its own. Its fluidity, its ability to tell a
story steadily and consecutively in human terms, with
mounting force and with no break, gives it a power
uniquely its own.

Note that the expression "human terms" is used. For
lack of flesh and blood, the author has not used the
term "flesh and blood." The direct stimulus which
exists between actors on a stage and their audience is
not possible for the screen, and undoubtedly this is the
screen's one great disadvantage.

But, as the stage's possession of flesh and blood is
offset by its lack of fluidity, so is the screen's disadvan-
tage of "disembodied shadows" made relatively unim-
portant by its pace, by the great variety of emotional
effects which can be secured by close-ups, flash backs,
''montage" shots, "process" shots, and various other
methods.

The screen is like the novel in that it has great
breadth of vision. Where the novel describes a scene
in words, the talking picture shows that scene visually.
Charles Dickens accomplished one of his greatest feats

[59]

Talking Pictures

of writing when he described, in page after page of
deathless prose, the flight of David Copperfield from
his cruel stepfather to the haven of his aunt's arms in
her little cottage on the Dover cliffs. But protagonists
of the picture form will always consider even more
emotionally effective the pictorial montage from the
film David Copperfield which expresses Dickens' words
in pictorial terms of a little boy lost in a busy city street,
a little boy almost run down by a farm wagon, a little
boy caught in a fearsome rainstorm. The rapid succes-
sion of these events was a pictorial achievement com-
parable with the written description.

To recapitulate, the screen is like the novel in that
both have a canvas of unrestricted size. They can roam
where and when they choose. But the screen's great
advantage is that it can present persons and scenes
visually ; the novel can only describe them in words and
illustrations. The talking picture has the vitality of
verbal conversation which is lacking in the written
dialogue of the book. A realization of the differences
in form which exist between the various forms of writ-
ing and of the drama is the key to the matter of accurate
photoplay appreciation.

Too many people criticize a motion picture without
complete data. They may know the novel and the
stage play, but far too many do not know the photo-
play. They do not understand why and how it differs
from the novel and the stage play. Therefore, to those
familiar with the screen, the photoplay criticism of
uninformed people seems absurd.

Frequently, such criticism is in the same category as

[60]

Why Stories Are Changed

that of the engineer of a transpacific Diesel motor ship
trying to tell Captain Alusick of the transpacific air-
plane China Clipper that the manner in which he
operated his compact, powerful internal combustion
airplane motors was wrong. The engineer and the cap-
tain each depended for motive power upon a product
of crude petroleum, but one common experience af-
forded no basis for sound criticism.

Without attempting to establish them as exact rules,
four generalizations with respect to criticism are made.

The first two refer to the adaptation of the novel
and of the drama to the motion picture form. The
third indicates the necessitv for adaptation. The fourth
states the attempt which the motion picture industry
is constantlv making to improve its own standards and
to achieve a greater emphasis upon good taste and good
art than hitherto has been possible.

The first of the generalizations is this: novels, because
their width of canvas is similar to that of motion pic-
tures, require the least change to enter the motion
picture form. The main changes from the novel are
for condensation. For example, Anthony Adverse and
David Copper-field have more material than could pos-
sibly be crowded into a two-hour picture. But fre-
quently a novel is so near to the picture pattern that it
requires few changes and it is lifted to the screen prac-
tically as it is. This was true of Pearl Buck's The Good
Earth.

To have filmed David Copperfield exactly as Dickens
wrote it would have required thirty -seven reels. Among
the scenes of the book, there are many which, while

[61]

Talking Pictures

they are written beautifully, are insufficient in forward
pictorial action to be effective on the screen. As ex-
amples, episodes of David at school and a number of
scenes at Yarmouth concerned with David, Steerforth,
and Little Em'ly were not included in the picture. In
such instances, a shrewd screen writer preserves in his
script a skeleton framework of the intent of the omitted
scenes, and when one sees the picture he gets the illusion
that he has seen everything he has read. A number of
people have been asked, "What episodes of David
Copperfield were left out of the screen version?" The
stumbling answers proved the high efficiency which
screen writing has attained in making deletions and
condensations.

On the other hand, comparatively few changes had
to be made in the screen version of A Tale of Tvoo
Cities. In this classic there are fewer central characters,
and fewer dramatic situations than in David Copperfield.
It is written with broad, bold strokes, rendering its
translation into screen form a comparatively simple task.

Mutiny on the Bounty presented a problem because
for picture purposes the story "breaks wide open" at
its climactic point. Direct physical pictorial conflict is
a requisite of the photoplay form. In Mutiny on the
Bounty, Christian and Midshipman By am are separated
from Bligh at the time of the mutiny. Shortly after-
ward, Christian leaves Byam at Tahiti and sails on to
remote Pitcairn Island.

To restore dramatic connection between the charac-
ters, the scenarists made their first major deviation from
the story. To bring Bligh and the midshipman into

[62)

Why Stories Are Changed

direct conflict and to keep them there until the time
of the dramatic and historical court-martial, the sce-
narists had recourse to dramatic license. They inserted
Bvam into Blisrh's amazing voyage to the island of
Timor. The trip covered three thousand miles in an open
boat. This kept dramatic cohesion between the two
and gave cumulative point and force to the final trial
in England. As there was no way to bring Christian
into these relations, the picture, unlike the book, does
not take us to Pitcairn. It relieves Christian of the
dramatic burden, placing it upon the other two.

The author questioned five booklovers who had read
the story and then seen the photoplav. He asked them
to name the differences between the book and the screen
play. All picked out one or two minor changes, but
only one saw that portions of the second book of the
Bounty trilogv, Men against the Sea, had been worked
into the picture, and that Bvam had been transposed
into the open-boat voyage. But to photoplay experts
these changes will alwavs stand as conspicuous examples
of how, when deftly done, alterations can add dramatic
values to the new art form not possible to the old.

Our second generalization deals with the plav. In
most stage plays changes have to be made. These
usually do not affect the central theme or the main
dialogue, but thev provide the necessarv connection by
means of which the screen avoids the scene-change in-
terruptions of the stage.

One of the best ways to tell the difference between
stage and screen technique is to see an early talking
picture. In the first days of talkies, before this medium

[63]

Talking Pictures

had developed its own technique, stage plays were often
photographed almost as they were written. Action
which seemed striking on the stage was dull, too full
of dialogue and too slow in forward movement on the
screen. Today, in order to give the screen version the
advantage of screen fluidity, stage plays are carefully
altered before screen use. Students might well see the
stage version and then the film version of Night Must
Fall. Even the veriest tyro in dramatic analysis can see
where the alterations necessary for screen form created
a more powerful dramatic onrush than that possible for
the original stage play.

For The Barretts of Wimpole Street the changes were
by two stage craftsmen, Ernest Vajda and Donald
Ogden Stewart, and a screen expert, Claudine West.

The final script, in an effort to make the story ade-
quately pictorial and yet retain all the charm which
made the stage play successful, deleted some dialogue
and added new scenes. One scene, with its dramatically
mounting camera shots, its swift flashes back and forth
between the faces of Mr. Barrett and Elizabeth, serves
as an illustration. This is the sequence in which Mr.
Barrett exerts his will to make Elizabeth fail in her brave
effort to climb a long flight of stairs. Delightful added
love scenes in the greenhouse of a London park are
brilliant with atmospheric color. To create greater
suspense, the marriage which starts the fourth act of
the stage play is held to the end of the screen version.

The plays of Shakespeare afford one great exception
to this generalization concerning changes required to
bring stage plays into the talking picture form. In the

[64]

Why Stories Are Changed

spring and summer of 1936, the author made a speak-
ing tour embracing forty-three American cities. The
subject, "Better Motion Pictures," was discussed before
educational and club leaders. This tour was ended
with a lecture before the Secondary Division of the
National Education Association Convention at Port-
land, Oregon. In these talks much interest was aroused
by the statement that William Shakespeare was "a
natural born scenario writer." It was pointed out that
practically no changes had to be made in the Quarto
of Romeo and Juliet.

Professor William Strunk, Jr. of Cornell University,
literary advisor for the photoplay, is authority for the
assertion that the film version of Ro?neo and Juliet
provides practically the first chance for this play to be
heard and seen almost exactly as Shakespeare wrote it.
It is a fact that far more changes were required for the
various stage versions, particularly the Cibber version,
than for the photoplay.

Shakespeare began his career under crude stage con-
ventions. He played in inn yards and in comparatively
unequipped theatres like the Swan and the Globe. He
had little constructed scenery. We know how humor-
ously he satirized the stage delinquencies of the time
in his play within a play in A Midsummer Night's
Dream. He did not confine himself to the traditional
three or four acts of the classical drama. He made
many scenes. He changed his locale swiftly whenever
it advanced his dramatic purposes, and, because of this,
many of his plays have the fast pace, the fluidity, of a
modern motion picture.

[65]

Talking Pictures

This fluidity was reduced when the theatres of
Shakespeare's time were replaced by modern buildings
with set footlights, curtains, drops, all the familiar im-
pedimenta of the current stage. And David Garrick,
Sir Henry Irving, Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree, Edwin
Booth, Sothern, Marlowe, Lawrence Barrett, and
Katharine Cornell have found it necessary to alter
Shakespeare's original text to fit the physical limita-
tions of the stage of their times.

Critics of the motion picture, whose study of the
medium has been insufficient, frequently confuse their
readers. They dwell at length on a change in dialogue,
often not important to the meaning, and miss the sig-
nificance of a plot change necessary for the film medium.
Frequently, critics do grave injustice to a fine piece of
transitional writing when they say, "It is very like the
play," overlooking subtle changes which had a large
part in the creation of a successful photoplay version.
Too many appropriate changes are not given the
recognition they deserve.

With this in mind a third generalization is submitted.
No story reaches the screen without changes. Even if
the dialogue remains the same and the essential dramatic
sequences are unchanged, there still remain important
physical changes which mark a definite dividing line be-
tween the appeal of the story in pictures and in its
original form. Of this, Grand Hotel and Romeo and
Juliet are good examples.

Not many changes from the stage form were re-
quired for Grand Hotel It is one of the few modern
plays that was almost perfect screen material. It is an

[66]

Why Stories Are Changed

exception proving our second generalization. But critics
were unanimous in calling the screen version far superior
to the stage version.

Why? Because in this story the huge bulking luxu-
rious hotel was the star. The people in it were secondary.
Vicki Baum established the theme that anything and
everything dramatic in the world can happen in a great
hotel. The physical bulk of the hotel was a vital factor.

This could only be suggested on the stage, but it was
actually achieved on the screen. Do you recall that
amazing shot looking down inside the hotel from the
top floor, past seemingly endless balconies, to the clerk's
desk two hundred feet below? To competent critics
these physical changes of the screen play made it
superior to the stage version.

In the same manner, the author sincerely believes
that the screen version of Romeo and Juliet for the
first time in dramatic history achieved that for which
William Shakespeare longed when he wrote the play.

Romeo and Juliet is painted on too broad a canvas
for efficient stage use. The play starts with a quarrel
between the retainers of the Montagues and the
Capulets. However effectively suggested on the stage,
this illusion remains difficult to set up with a few
supernumeraries and a small setting. On the screen
the Plaza at Verona could be reproduced in full size,
and the fight in the photoplay is comparable to many
struggles which actually took place on it during feudal
times.

The balcony scene presents considerable difficulty
for the stage. Its height can only awkwardly be sug-

[67]

Talking Pictures

gested. The garden, or "orchard," can only appear in
small part. The visual reality of the screen adds
dramatic values to stories, values which are exclusively
their own and which are not possible to either the novel
or the stage play.

When searching for reasons why the studios change
stories, another important element enters. It should be
kept in mind that the screen has voluntarily bound itself
to certain rules of good taste and good form. It is the
only art which has bound itself to complete internal
self -regulation of moral and aesthetic factors. The in-
dustry film review mechanism under the direction of
Joseph Breen affords a means for this. Situations and
scenes which do not come within these rules, called the
"Code," are automatically rejected.

Among other things, the Code bans the use of
profanity, demands respect for the clergy, and elim-
inates allusions which are considered objectionable in
common conversation. In other words the Code is
a canon of good taste which is applied to a picture
while it is being written. Under this practice no
scenario can go to a stage for production without
meeting set regulations. Films are sometimes criticized
on moral grounds. Undoubtedly, commercial film
producers, faced with a public taste which is not always
on the highest levels, encounter problems in maintain-
ing high standards in their stories, and at the same time
in pleasing the public who pay to see screen attractions.

Now we offer the fourth generalization. No other
art has so thoroughly cleaned its own house. No other
art has offered so many great and beautiful achieve-

[68]

Globes for illumination of motion picture sets
Motion picture camera lenses

Storehouse for old motion picture scenarios
Where scenarios start — studio mimeograph room

Why Stories Are Changed

ments in proportion to the few years of its life. No
art of the present day, except the motion picture, makes
any concerted, unified effort to keep its standards high,
to educate the public to follow it upward as it raises
these standards.

[69]

7

THE SCENARIO WRITER

Scenario writing is a characteristic and unique de-
velopment of the motion picture industry. It is one art
which is almost totally governed by its immediate en-
vironment. It has a few basic rules of its own, but a
competent scenario writer is usually one who has long
been in his studio, long affiliated with one, two, three,
or four directors or stars. He translates a story into
terms of human and physical materials as they obtain
in his own plant.

For example, a scenario writer preparing a photoplay
which he knew was to be photographed by Karl Freund
would be likely to write differently if the assigned
cameraman were less expert in effect and "trick"
photography. Freund (Parnell is a picture from his
camera) is an acknowledged expert in getting extra
dramatic emphasis by the use of out-of-the-ordinary
photographic angles and compositions and with unusual
lighting effects.

If the picture were an outdoor epic and the cinema-
tographer Clyde de Vinna, the scenario writer would
again have a special writing guide post, for De Vinna
can, above all others, make a Hawaiian sunset a poem
in photography. The scenario writer must also shift
and change his technique for the director who will

[70]

The Scenario Writer

handle his script. Different writing is required for the
hammering, dynamic Van Dyke of After the Thin
Man; for the suave, quiet, sculptorlike Sidney Franklin
of The Good Earth; and for Aiervyn LeRoy, an expert
in melodramatic qualities.

It is certain that Anita Loos, in collaboration with
Robert Hopkins, would have attempted neither the
original of San Francisco nor the scenario had she not
known in advance that her studio had under contract
an amazing technician capable of reproducing the San
Francisco earthquake.

The scenario is so related to the phvsical facilities of
the studio concerned that new writers are rarely, if ever,
asked to write the final scenario. The ability to write
a final script presupposes at least three or four years of
actual studio experience.

Screen writing is a threefold structure. The first and
last parts of this structure are known; the first is the
basic story or play; the last is the completed scenario.
Between these two is perhaps the most important work,
and yet one rarely sees it mentioned in discussions con-
cerning the art of writing for the screen. This step is
"the treatment."

Here the magazine writer or plavwright receives his
first initiation into the differences between his art and
the newer art of screen authorship. Frequently, the
treatment is also written by the scenario writer who
makes the final script. But often a writer who has been
a successful novelist or a playwright is contracted by
a studio to prepare a screen treatment of his material.
Norman Reilly Raines did this with his "Tugboat

[71]

Talking Pictures

Annie" stories which appeared in The Saturday Evening
Post.

When a writer begins a treatment, he reads the orig-
inal story many times. He then writes in sequence the
action of each succeeding scene as he visualizes its ap-
pearance on the screen. He does it by paragraphs which,
to make changes easier, are not given arbitrary scene
number as designation. He merely makes a preliminary
chart of the action in simplest possible terms.

If this treatment has dialogue it is only in brief
sketch, for treatments are not supposed to be fine,
finished literature. They are usually rather bald and
direct. Their sole purpose is to set up a framework for
the story so that those who work with it may see if
there is a possibility of a final plot which will move
rapidly and logically, and which will be pictorially
interesting.

This treatment is first discussed with the associate
producer and the director, and, frequently, with one
or more other writers. Its weak structural points are
recognized and corrected.

Later, a second treatment is made with more character
detail and more dialogue. Special experts in the writ-
ing of dialogue frequently begin work here. From them
the treatment goes into the hands of the scenario writer.
This technical expert takes the running series of se-
quential paragraphs and fits them into scenes, indicates
the dramatic possibilities for close-ups, medium close-
ups, long-shots, and effect-shots.

At the studios her associates tease Anita Loos by
saying that she wrote the most expensive single sentence

[72]

The Scenario Writer

in entertainment history. At the right point in the
scenario of San Francisco she blithely wrote: 1

Mary (softly)
Yes, Jack.

Burley, putting his arm about her, leads her
down a short flight of steps toward door leading
into ballroom, camera trucking with them.
when o. s. [off stage] a strange, low, protracted
rumble. They stop. The rumble increases.

CUT TO:

That paragraph and those descriptive of the earthquake
which followed brought six months of headaches to
scores of technicians, stars, directors, sound men, set-
builders, effect makers, and cameramen.

The scenarist must use the specialized knowledge of
his own studio resources as an organist uses the many
keys on his console. He cannot proceed adequately
without this special knowledge, and this takes years to
acquire. While academic courses in actual scenario
writing are interesting, they cannot be of such direct
value to one ambitious to write scenarios as the late
Dr. George Pierce Baker's Yale workshop course was
to embryonic stage playwrights. Whatever academic
background might be secured would have to be altered
to fit the actual facilities at the studio in which the
writer might find employment.

The scenario writer usually knows the stars for whom

1 Screen play by Anita Loos and Robert Hopkins. Owned by
Metro-Gold wyn-Maver Studios.

[73]

Talking Pictures

he writes dialogue, and this makes possible a closely
personal quality in his work. He is familiar with the
technique of his director, and he knows the possibilities
of the various departments of his studio. He must know
also localisms and idioms of particular communities, so
that when a film is made of a particular locality he can
be exact in his usage of words. He must be able to see
a symphonic connection between the various agencies
which constitute the studio.

It is from the writing of treatments that many stand-
ard novelists and playwTrights go into actual scenario
writing. Donald Ogden Stewart, Anita Loos, Hugh
Walpole, Morris Ryskind, and Alice Duer Miller have
wholly or partially abandoned the novel and the play
for the scenario. Other authors do not like scenario
writing. They prefer to write stories.

And there are still others, once only scenario writers,
who have developed so great a flare for original creation
that original stories by them are in constant and high-
priced demand. An example is Frances Marion. Miss
Marion's first director-boss, Hobart Bosworth, who paid
her $25.00 a week, is the character-actor star of the
present day.

As a stenographer on the set with a director in the
early days, Miss Marion showed a mind so attuned to
photoplay needs that she was promoted to writing sce-
narios. She then tentatively submitted a few of her
original stories. Overnight she became the most con-
sistently successful and the highest paid author in pic-
tures. She made treatments and scenarios of Stella
Dallas, Humoresque, and Min and Bill, and she reached

[74]

The Scenario Writer

the heights with such originals as Emma and The Big
House.

Grover Jones is another successful combination
scenarist and original author.

Related to the stage, and yet quite a special part of
the film set-up, are the so-called comedy "gag men."
These men are usually trained and successful authors
of stories or plays, but they have minds particularly
attuned to the comic.

Comedy scenes are very much a matter of timing and
humor values. Comedy stories are usually assembled as
a rough skeleton ; no attempt is made to get more than
basic humor into the original continuity. When the
scene actually starts on the set, one or more "gag men"
sit with the directors and the Marx Brothers, the Ritz
Brothers, Herman Bing, Hugh Herbert, Harold Lloyd,
Joe Brown, or any other of the accepted comedians of
the time. With properties and settings before the group,
the gag men begin to suggest the throwing of this, the
moving of that, a seemingly unpremeditated fall, a sub-
stitute or funnier line of dialogue.

Gag men are strange individuals who prefer to be
called "comedy constructionists." It has been said that
writers are seldom born, but are almost always made
from sheer hard work. But surely gag men are born.
The extreme sensitivity of the late Al Boasberg to
comedy seemed innate. It is a quality seldom acquired.
Certainly no school in the world could teach a person
to be a "comedy constructionist."

Screen comedies are so dependent on separate funny
sequences joined together to make a coherent whole,

[75]

Talking Pictures

that preparation for a comic picture has one important
deviation from the technique used to build a dramatic
photoplay. In drama, romance, and tragedy a writer
can accurately judge in advance how the public will
react emotionally, but laughs are a more difficult prob-
lem. They come, or they fail to come, on the presence
of, or lack of, an accent of the voice, a split second in
timing an action.

For this reason the most successful screen comedians
test the reactions to the "gags" they propose to use
later in a picture before actual audiences. They fit these
gags into a stage show and travel with it to several cities.
Their "gag men" accompany the show and stand in the
wing with hand adding machines to "clock" the num-
ber of laughs. By the audiences' laugh reactions they
lengthen or condense a gag, or discard it entirely. The
Marx Brothers have used this device successfully for
several years, and Eddie Cantor's coming films will be
preceded by similar "in the flesh" tours.

If the reader has attended classes in any one of the
thousands of high schools regularly using the "apprecia-
tion manuals" prepared for the best pictures by rep-
resentatives of the National Council of Teachers of
English or the National Education Association, he
knows that dialogue on the screen can only be about
half as long as that on the stage before being broken
by action or by shifting of close-ups. He is able when
attending a motion picture to sort the good touches
from the mediocre, and to form in his own mind treat-
ments for pictorial reproduction of stories he has read
or plays he has seen. He will know that action upon

[76]

The Scenario Writer

the stage and action reflected upon the screen require
different timing.

But he who really wants to contribute eventually to
the screen must love it for itself. The screen has suffered
and its growth has been checked at times because of the
necessity of eliminating those who are not sincere in
their affection for it. It was inevitable that in a new
art which suddenly began to shower considerable finan-
cial rewards, many should have been attracted who were
interested only in the rewards.

A number of playwrights, novelists, and technicians
came to the studios interested in the money offered, but
not really in the medium itself. They wrote for the
screen, but they did not give themselves to it, and they
reserved their best thoughts for the art in which they
had started. As a result they contributed nothing last-
ing to the photoplay and, eventually, they were
eliminated.

Today, although the screen is less than fifty years
old, it has practically completed the process of purging
itself of those insincere persons who saw in it only a
quick way to easily gained money. Today the people
who are succeeding in the studios are the young actors
who see in the screen a chance to carry the acting art
to millions, who fifty years ago never saw a Maude
Adams or a Henry Irving.

Today writers of great novels and great stage plavs
are finding a new thrill in producing original photo-
plays, written directly to fit the requirements of the
new art. Today young scientific students read avidly
of the remarkable scientific advances — chemical, elec-

[77]

Talking Pictures

trical, photographic, and acoustical — which have been
made in the film industry, and which will continue to
be made by it for years to come.

Today the person really sincere in his ambition to be
a part of the screen's future knows that exceptional
financial rewards go to only a few, for special and
unique reasons; that for the majority there is only a
compensation reasonable to the profession involved.
Those who are entering the pictures are concerned
more with the satisfaction of achievement in a great
new field than with its financial compensation. In other
words an unhealthy mental approach to the screen has
been replaced by one which is healthy and normal.

The screen's great future is unquestioned. That it
could in fifty years have risen from custard-pie comedy
to The Good Earth, Lives of a Bengal Lancer, Romeo
and Juliet, Story of Louis Pasteur, Anthony Adverse,
or David Copperfield makes the possibilities of its prog-
ress within the next century almost illimitable.

Those who wish to embrace the screen as a career
must do it wholeheartedly, not in the spirit of one
young college graduate who had a fine reputation as
an amateur actor. He wanted work in motion pictures.
He was a good type and, even though young, an excel-
lent technician. But in his conversations he remained
aloof, even sullen.

Finally the reason was discovered. He admitted that
he despised the screen. He was seeking work as a screen
actor only in order to make enough funds to take him
to New York, where he proposed to seek work on
the stage.

[78]

The Scenario Writer

Similar tales can be told of authors who wonder why
the motion picture producers never buy their stories.
After making such a complaint, one confessed that he
had seen only one motion picture in ten years.

The screen of the future will offer many rewards,
but these will only be for those whose devotion is stead-
fast. And the scenario writer will share strongly in any
future advance of the medium, for, more than any other
technician, he is definitely of the screen and unique to it.

From the criticisms of associate producer, star, and
director the scenario goes to the stenographic depart-
ment. x\bout fifty copies are made. These are sent to
the heads and subheads of twenty-six different depart-
ments: research, art direction, interior decoration,
camera, laboratory, sound recording, music, carpenter
construction, location, make-up, "trick" effects, dance
direction, hairdressing, transportation, casting, prop-
erties, and many others. Each department translates
the scenario into its own terms.

Picture making is divided into three distinct periods:
preparation, production, and completion. During the
time of preparation, the average for which is three sixths
or one half of the total time, the story is purchased and
adapted, and we have seen these processes. We shall
now examine the building of sets, the making of cos-
tumes, the hiring of players. Careful preparation can
save a great deal of money during the expensive period
of photography.

The period of actual photography requires only one
sixth of the total. The period of assembling, editing the
individual photographed strips of films into a cohesive,

[79]

Talking Pictures

smooth film story, and the manufacturing of hundreds
of duplicate release prints for exhibition in the theatres,
requires one third, or two sixths, of the total time.

In other words, if the total time of a picture in
process were six months, three months would be de-
voted to preparation, one to production, and two to
completion. Pictures vary in the total time they take,
from six months to three years, depending on research
and physical factors.

The first work to begin is that of research, for upon
it rests the success of a film. On a picture requiring a
great deal of necessary authenticity, such as David Cop-
perfield or Parnell, research may start two or three years
before the filming begins. Research must be completed
or at least outlined before a set, or a costume, or a
property is made. The eyes of the picture-going public
are well-trained. Anachronisms are immediately noted,
and they bring letters to the producer of the offending
picture. Before the physical preparation for the picture
begins, such wrinkles are carefully ironed out.

[go]

MOTION PICTURE RESEARCH

When one recreates past or present life on the
screen, it is necessary that he have reasonably logical
backgrounds against which characters may play.
Anthony Adverse required a partial reproduction of
life in Italy during the romantic days when Bonny-
feather was a great trading house. The Garden of
Allah needed the Sahara oasis of Sidi-Zerzour, with a
house of proper period and Arabian architecture.

For The Good Earth whole villages were photo-
graphed in China. Then, for use in close-ups in Holly-
wood, houses were taken apart, their pieces numbered,
and sent to America. There they were set up before
the cameras. Portions of the 1893 World's Fair were
recreated for The Great Ziegfeld. More than six thou-
sand illustrations covering manners and customs of the
Dickensian period were assembled before a single setting
was built for David Copperfield.

The following questions are a few which reflect the
extent and character of research:

1. Who invented the Chinese ricksha?

2. In what year did ice cream make its first ap-
pearance ?

3. Were mustaches usual for British gentlemen at
the time of the French Revolution?

[8. ]

Talking Pictures

4. What was a "Jimmy Skinner"?

5. In what year was gold discovered in Cali-
fornia?

6. Were cats used during the World War to
warn soldiers and sailors of poison gas?

7. In the days of Mary, Queen of Scots, did
mounted Scottish clansmen wear kilts?

8. Did the first French colonial governor of
New Orleans wear a mustache?

9. When did sailors of the British navy first use
the hand salute?

10. Did women or men first wear gloves?

11. What was a "yellow dog"?

12. What sauce did Giovanni Galeazzo Visconti
serve with chicken in 1378?

The above questions might very easily be part of
the familiar "Questions and Answers" parlor game.
But they were not amusing to the research technicians
who answered them. To these men and women such
questions represent a routine. If answered correctly,
the public blandly accepts the word of the research
expert without credit or praise. Let such questions be
answered incorrectly, however, and whatever serious
dramatic intent the picture may have had is lost sight
of in public clamor over obvious, careless, and unneces-
sary inaccuracies.

The public demands that its pictures portray authentic
customs and manners, but when a picture is correct in
this regard, it seldom bothers to inquire how this result
was achieved. But it is quick enough to blame if the

[82]

Motion Picture Research

hapless motion picture producer is caught in an obvious
error of detail.

It has been established that the background of a photo-
play must support and advance the action of the fore-
ground, but that it must never be obtrusive.

Any error in detail easily recognized by a theatre-
goer would destroy the seemingly effortless building
toward a climax, which is particularly essential in a
photoplay. To prevent breaks in the concentration of
audience members, more than a quarter million ques-
tions on customs and manners are answered each year
by studio research departments. A screen writer must be
sure for example that if he uses the slang expression
"chappie," this term was really in use at the time of
his story.

The art director goes to the research department
with questions concerning period architecture, furni-
ture, and properties. The property man asks for books
that will tell him how to run an ancient Chinese ox-
power gristmill. From every technician in the studio
come questions that concern his especial art or vocation.

The uninitiated are aDt to consider a studio research
department as a sort of specialized library. It is true
that such a department mav have ten thousand or more
books of its own, including encyclopedias, almanacs,
trade directories, naval and military regulations of vari-
ous countries, and all other traditional tools of the
research worker.

But these books are far less important than the con-
tents of huge files. One portion of these files contains
data from which all kinds of information can be ob-

[83]

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tained. One file may tell what man or organization
has the finest existing library on Tibet. In another, one
finds the name and address of a man who is an expert
on the habits of the llama, a South American beast of
burden.

Another section contains thousands upon thousands
of clipped pictures, carefully indexed and cross-indexed
by subject. If a director wishes to see a fire engine of
the 1905 period, he will find under that classification a
half dozen illustrations of such equipment. Since the
film is a pictorial art, these picture files are vitally im-
portant. Every research head guards them and looks
forward to some unexpected discovery which will
enrich the collection.

During a London rainstorm one research director had
stopped for shelter near a secondhand store. She noted
copies of Punch hidden under stacks of old newspapers.
She moved the pile slightly and found complete sets of
the magazine for years, beginning with 1841. For re-
search connected with such pictures as The Barretts of
Wimpole Street and David Coppe? 'field the value of the
find could not be estimated in money.

So thorough is modern motion picture research that
the percentage of errors which reach a finished picture
is infinitesimal. It should be emphasized that the perfec-
tion to which motion picture research has been carried
must be considered in any discussion concerning the
appreciation of a good motion picture. Few other arts
have brought research to a point so fine, for no other
art has had focused upon its works the eyes of so many
millions of people.

[84]

Alabama Hills, California, used for mountain passes and other rugged vistas
Seacoast used for French. Scotch, and New England marine locales

Plaster expert completes a column for the set of a talking picture
Silversmith at work in a motion picture studio

Motion Picture Research

One might conceivably get by with an error in the
novel Gone with the Wind, reaching one million five
hundred thousand readers — but who would dare to
present the smallest inaccuracy before the audience of
one hundred million the picture will have in its first
weeks in film form.

When theatregoers gleefully rush into print with a
cinematic error, they are more often wrong than right!
No less than a dozen persons wrote the studio about
a "letter box" on the gate of the cottage at Blunderstone
in David Copperfield. They pointed out that letter
boxes did not exist at the time. But they only thought
the object was a letter box. It was really an old-
fashioned candle lantern, quite true to the period.

Letters were received from Britishers saying that they
had never seen a telephone like that used in What Every
Woman Knows. The telephone had been bought in
England and imported from there.

The research department keeps itself informed of the
foreign and historical material in the studio's own film
library which will be discussed at length later. In one
large studio it includes sixty million feet of film and
covers almost every important world event since 1906.

Important, too, is the ability of a research director to
find quickly men and women who are experts in some
special phase of human experience.

A Chinese general is available for Oriental lore.

A quiet-mannered Austrian nobleman is called in for
conference for pictures concerned with Middle Europe
during the past thirty years. When he was a boy, he
was a page in the court of Emperor Francis Joseph.

[85]

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A doctor listed in medical journals as one of America's
six best mental specialists is at hand when scenes involv-
ing mental instability are filmed.

Navy and army officers of twenty different countries
can be reached by telephone and brought to any studio
within an hour.

A woman who has made herself an expert on the
table service etiquette of a dozen nations is a joint
employee of a research and an interior decoration
department.

If a dramatic crime is committed in a specified city,
fictitious street names are obviously used to avoid com-
plaints. But if a section of a city is used in a highly com-
plimentary sense, the studio will receive complaints if
the real names of the streets are not used ! This actually
happened in a large southern city. Its aristocratic resi-
dential district with its fine old homes was photographed
in some detail. The common protective custom of using
fictitious street names was employed, and complaints
poured in by the score.

Copies of telephone books from every great city in
the world are an integral part of a well-regulated re-
search department. Trouble arises if real telephone
numbers are employed in a crime scene, so false num-
bers are used.

One amusing exception to this concerned a New
York telephone number used by a young gallant in
calling a very pretty girl. Over a hundred curious New
Yorkers dialed this number and were answered by a
sweet voice which said, "This is Loew's Ziegfeld Thea-
tre, and this week we are playing Ronald Colman in

[86]

Motion Picture Research

Clive of India'" The theatre belonged to the film
company concerned and the number could be used.

In one recent picture the Lambda Chi fraternity was
mentioned. Since this is the name of a fraternity, Kappa
Chi was devised.

In the same college film, the locale was obviously a
college in California. The names of the professors and
the students at all California colleges were checked so
that each name used in the picture would be fictitious.
A iMiss Fiske, for example, became a Miss Luke. Miss
Luke is a studio secretary who signed a waiver giving
the film concern the full right to use her name. Pre-
cautions of this sort are obviously necessary.

Research for great costume pictures often becomes
a matter of careful selection from a great bulk of
material. Before costumes and sets were prepared for
David Copperfield, photostatic copies were made of six
thousand different illustrations of the period. Prelim-
inary to the making of Romeo and Juliet, a research
expert brought back from Europe nearly ten thousand
photographs of paintings, frescoes, and building details.
For one story of slave-trade days, more than three hun-
dred reference books were read.

These facts are so plain that it is not necessarv to
emphasize further how important it is to understand
the science of film research. Understanding its function
is a prelude to the correct appreciation of a fine modern
photoplay. It provides employment to manv people.
Scholarship is not, as some would believe, limited to
professions with established traditions. The details
which the research department supply are the results of

[87]

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patient inquiry and sustained investigation. Co-operation
from this department and a knowledge of its possibilities
are connected with all other divisions within the studio.
The questions which appear early in this chapter are
but few of many which arise. To appease any curiosity
which may have arisen, the following answers are
submitted.

i. Who invented the Chinese ricksha? Ans. A white
missionary designed it for the use of his invalid wife.

2. In what year did ice cream make its first appear-
ance? Ans. Ice cream was invented in 1851 by a dairy-
man in Baltimore, IVId., who wanted some method of
using his surplus cream.

3 . Were mustaches usual for British gentlemen at the
time of the French Revolution? Ans. Ronald Colman,
who played Sydney Carton in A Tale of Two Cities,
normally wears a mustache. As theatregoers are ac-
customed to the Colman mustache the question was
important. It is a fairly consistent rule that when wigs
became popular, mustaches went out, and vice versa.
But the time of Sydney Carton was a transition period.
By careful tracing, Nathalie Bucknall found that while
mustaches came back shortly afterwards, definitely
Sydney Carton would have been clean shaven. Mr.
Colman accepted the dictates of the research depart-
ment and went to the barber.

4. What was a <cJimmy Skinner"? Ans. Slang is by
no means a new thing. It seems to have been more
generally used in the days of Dickens than now. In
the time of David Copperfield a "Jmrnv Skinner" was

[88]

Motion Picture Research

a dinner. Among other slang phrases of the time were
"A wink of the balmy," (sleep) and "Kool the name-
sclop." (Look out for the policeman!)

5. In what year was gold discovered in California?
Ans. The accepted belief that gold was first discovered
near Sacramento in 1849 is incorrect. In 1840 first
evidences were found in a canyon not far north of
Los Angeles.

6. Were cats used during the World War to warn
soldiers and sailors of poison gas? Ans. This question
was asked as part of research for Seventh Heaven. Near
the close of the war cats wTere used for this purpose,
particularly in submarines, but canaries wTere considered
better "barometers" to measure the presence of gas in
dangerous amounts.

7. In the days of Maty, Queen of Scots, did mounted
Scottish clansmen wear kilts? Ans. No. They wore
long tightly fitting trousers known as "trews." These
were probably the forerunner of our jodhpurs. (Asked
during research for Mary of Scotland.)

8. Did the first French colonial governor of New
Orleans wear a mustache? Ans. No. (Required for
Naughty Marietta.)

9. When did sailors of the British navy first use the
hand salute? Ans. The question of the British naval
salute developed during research for Mutiny on the
Bounty. British army soldiers saluted their officers one
hundred and fifty years ago, but until Queen Victoria
issued an order in 1890, British naval sailors did not
salute. They merely lifted their hats in the presence of
their officers.

[89]

Talking Pictures

io. Did women or men first wear gloves. Ans. Men,
2400 years ago; women not until 1300 a.d.

11. What was a "yellow dog"? Ans. A slang term
used for a gold coin about 1870.

1 2 . What sauce did Giovanni Galeazzo Visconti serve
with chicken in 1378? Ans. This fourteenth-century
gourmet had his chicken served with a sauce made of
violets. The account of the Gargantuan banquet offered
by Visconti to his friends provided authentic details,
even recipes, which guided reproduction of the banquet
of the Capulets in Romeo and Juliet.

The answers to these questions reflect a great deal
of hard, concentrated mental work. Without a capable
and specially trained research department, no sound
attempt at the authentic reproduction of manners, cus-
toms, and actual environment of other periods could
be achieved by any film studio. It is impossible to over-
estimate the importance to modern motion picture mak-
ing of correct and accurate research. It is one of the
most vital activities in a studio.

Scholarly and exact research into manners and cus-
toms of all periods, races, and geographical locations
is an integral part of modern motion picture making.
The "dear old days" of the film, say of 1908, when
nobody bothered much because a girl of the Civil War
period wore a blouse, era of 1900, are gone forever.
With the growth of the picture audience millions of
critical eyes were focused on every detail.

For this reason every modern studio has its own large
research department, headed by a well-paid, highly com-

[90]

Motion Picture Research

petent technician, specially trained for the service.
Questions with respect to various details constantly
arise and they must be correctlv answered. These
questions, of which the above are but few, were an-
swered by departments especially established for the
purpose.

[91]

9

THE SETS ARE MADE

It is customary in preparing for picture production,
to start first those operations which require the most
time for completion. Settings lead this list, and ward-
robe follows. Decisions as to sets are made at a con-
ference of operative technicians. This conference carries
forward the intent of an earlier conference of associate
producers in which it was decided to buy a particular
story.

The new conference includes the associate producer,
the studio production manager, the director of the
story, the assistant director, the research director, the
art director (or chief studio architect), the cameraman,
the transportation director (automobile and railroad
arrangements), the location man (who finds and chooses
authentic outdoor "locations"), the casting director
(acting talent), the costume designer, the construction
superintendent, the electrical superintendent, the chief
painter, the "trick shot" expert, the cost accountant,
and the chief recording engineer. Thirty years ago a
staff this large was unheard of. Thirty years from now
it may be double its present size.

If additional technical advice is needed, a special
technical director is added as indicated under Research.
The Ghost Ship is an example. A sea captain, trained

[92]

The Sets Are Made

upon a sailing ship, was an important figure in the initial
production conference.

The detailed work of each of the men mentioned
will be discussed later. Since all of them have individual
interest and problems dealing with the settings to be
built, they all attend the initial conferences. Each must
know what the other is doing, and all must maintain
the spirit of working together. In an enterprise so
mosaic in character as the making of motion pictures,
the failure of anv one activity to correlate, interrelate,
and co-operate might easily mean failure on the part of
the whole picture to achieve its dramatic goal.

Specific problems must be solved. Among them are
the number of lights the electrical superintendent will
have to supply on a given day; the number of people
to be fed and the number of meals to be served on loca-
tion; the number of cameras; the kinds of lenses the
cinematographer will need for a certain effect on a
certain day; the number of gallons of paint the chief
painter will require. When such questions have been
solved, the cost accountant sharpens his pencils, and the
art director-in-chief appoints a company or a "unit"
art director as assistant.

The cost accountant puts everything down in cold
figures. Through long experience he has developed
many short cuts. By averaging the costs of many sets
he can estimate any one set at a certain figure per square
foot and come very close to the actual cost. In the same
manner, for crowd scenes it is known how many
players are needed to give a crowded appearance to a
specified area of square feet.

[93]

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The cost accountant brings these figures to a second
conference. There, if the budget is too high, each de-
partment head computes methods of economy. The
final budget is established on a basis of a certain number
of working days. To complete the picture within a
prescribed time becomes the objective of all concerned.
Film cost accounting has reached such a point that
despite the many chances of disturbance in a business
so dependent on human health and weather factors, a
good 80 per cent of all pictures reach completion
within the time set, and within the original budget cost.

The mention of the cost accountant brings into focus
a general department of the studio which spreads its
activities so widely over every phase of production that
it may be overlooked as a factor in production. But
the accounting department pays all the bills and com-
putes all the costs. Picture making is not like the manu-
facture of gloves, or of overcoats, or of shoes; it is not
based on a few raw materials and specific labor activities.
Picture making is a business in which the rules change
every day. To prevent loss or waste, accounting and
auditing practices must be much more precise, exact,
and detailed than those which prevail in most other
industries.

The financing of day-by-day production in itself is
quite distinctive. Modern studios are not concerned
directly with the sale of the pictures they make. They
turn out a finished photodramatic product and that ends
their immediate responsibility. No studio attempts to
dictate selling policies. It furnishes its photoplays to a
subsidiary corporation of sales experts. The studio's

[94]

The Sets Are Made

problem is to furnish a specified number of pictures a
year. During the depression, studio officials were often
asked, "How many people did you lay off?" During
the depression studio employees suffered less perhaps
than those of any other manufacturing plants, for they
had to provide the same number of finished films as
they had done formerly. The only difference was that
they had less money returning from the distribution
department with which to make these pictures.

In normal studio accounting practice, studios draw
on their sales subsidiary the first of each week for the
money required for that week's operations. The busi-
ness side of a motion picture studio is a study in itself,
and it is developing rules and opportunities of its own.

After the settlement of budget issues, the unit art
director begins his work. A unit art director is a com-
bination of artist, architect, and interior decorator. In-
variably he is a specialist. He usually knows one branch
of architecture and decoration better than any other
available person. Pictures such as Cafe Metropole and
Grand Hotel, both continental in tone, had as unit art
directors technicians of foreign birth. Such men would
scarcely be assigned to A Star Is Born. A "marine
architect" is necessary for the filming of such pictures
as The Captain Hates the Sea and Captains Courageous.

The work of the research department has been de-
scribed. If the picture is one entailing extensive archi-
tectural research, such as A Midsummer Night's Dream,
the unit art director will be appointed months earlier
than he would be for a modern story.

After proper and thorough research the unit art

[95]

Talking Pictures

director customarily makes rough sketches of all sets
considered. For a picture with twenty sets he might
make rough sketches of them four or five different ways.
If the picture is particularly colorful and important, like
Lloyds of Loudon, he will supplement these pencil
drawings by having an artist prepare his better con-
cepts in water colors.

To settle basic technical problems, these preliminary
designs are then studied with the director, cameraman,
and sound engineer. Doors and windows and stairs must
be in the right places for the dramatic action required.
Adequate recording of sound must be possible. Once
again emphasis is placed upon the co-operative relation
of the various departments.

When approved, a regular architect's blueprint is
made from the sketches. But these plans are not yet
final. They are put in the hands of a man who, with
light veneer wood, makes miniature sets to exact scale
size. This part of the picture making process would
be a joy to children, for the miniature sets would be
ideal for "playing house." No toys ever produced by
the best craftsmen of Germany are better made than
those prepared for this professional purpose.

But these devices are not playthings nor are they
juvenile. Directors, cameramen, sound men, electricians,
property men, assistant directors, and casting directors
pore over them. They regard these "toys" with intense
seriousness, for they are the means of saving thousands
of dollars each year. With small models like these the
average director, sometimes using wooden figurines
made to scale, works out the detail of his action and

[96]

The Sets Are Made

decides on his entrances and his exits. The cameraman
plans where to plant his cameras and which lenses to
use. The electrician computes finally the number and
kinds of lights he will need for correct illumination.

In working with this tiny model, hidden story mis-
takes, mistakes of movement, and other overlooked
technical errors are discovered and corrected before
they can cause costly delays. The assistant director,
responsible for "background action" in big crowd
scenes, can figure the movements of groups of people
so that the human background behind the principals
will always be plausible and logical.

When each model has passed this sort of "third
degree," the head draughtsman of the art department
assigns men to draw completed plans for each set and
for the detail sketches. These architect's plans are much
the same as those prepared for a house, except that they
are more detailed. They bring in a new element. They
are all figured with an eye to the single lens of the
camera.

Attached to the plan will be from five to twelve
detailed sheets of drawings. These will include details
of cornices, special hardwood, doorknobs, call bells,
office furniture, ship's fittings, or whatever may be
necessary. The plans are prepared by excellent archi-
tects, for the increasingly vigilant observation of the
theatregoer demands exact detail. Nothing short of
perfection ever passes without a challenge from some
among the 11,425,000 persons who attend picture
performances each day in the United States.1

1 Figures supplied by the Association of Motion Picture Producers.

[97]

Talking Pictures

Scores of blueprints are made and furnished to all the
departments which assist with the building, decorating,
or photographing of the set. At the same time the art
director makes stage space reservations for this and all
the other sets being made for a specific picture. In any
major studio it is necessary to reserve space for settings
on stages weeks and weeks in advance, just as it is
necessary to reserve seats early for a popular stage
attraction.

In a single large room at one studio there is an im-
mense chart, holding large floor-size plans of the various
stages. Art directors cut out proportionate forms in
paper of the sets they are to build and place them on
the master chart of the stage on which they plan to
work, fitting them in to utilize every possible inch of
space. It is customary also to group the sets for a given
production as closely as possible on adjoining stages.

By this time plans have been delivered to plumbers
and painters and carpenters, most of whom never see
any one of the stars for whom they prepare hundreds
of sets. The "industrial section" of a great studio works
twenty-four hours a day. The actual physical building
of a set as large as Fotheringhay Castle in Mary of
Scotland may take weeks.

It is in set construction that the greatest number of
the 276 professions and vocations, concerned in the
making of a picture, find their outlet.

Diesel engineers will place a huge engine in the set
representing the engine room of a great steamship.
Genuine Gloucester fishermen will install bait-cutting
tables, the counterpart of those actually used on the

[98]

The Sets Are Made

fishing schooners which operate dangerously on the
Grand Banks, in the path of onrushing passenger liners.

Chinese cooks will install their native stoves. Ice-
making engineers will place equipment to freeze the
surface of immense skating rinks.

The activities of a unit art director, and of the in-
dividual artisans who aid him, are limited only by the
imaginations of the authors who wrote the stories which
are being translated into picture form.

For the earthquake in San Francisco the sets had first
to be designed. Then engineers — experts in stresses and
strains — were asked for their contributions. It was care-
fully figured whether a pushing, pulling, or lifting strain
had to be applied to make the wall or floor of a building
buckle or break in an authentic "earthquake" manner.
When these places of break were determined, material
resembling mortar, but not cohesive, was placed between
the bricks, so that when strain wTas applied the wall
would give way. Hydraulic lifts or ropes attached to
powerful pulleys or other forms of leverage wrere placed,
out of view of the camera, to provide that strain.

This presented unusual problems, but even the smallest
set requires the close, expert attention of many different
trained hands. The making of sets is a complicated,
fascinating enterprise.

Every day of the year the "set board" in the con-
struction department of a big studio offers a challenge
to the imagination.

A typical recent list of such settings included: "In-
terior of Captain Disko's cabin, schooner We're Here"
"Exterior of slave trader's compound," "Outer office of

[99]

Talking Pictures

Excelsior Oil Company," "Central Horse Barn at Brook-
dale Breeding Farms," "Operating room of General
Hospital," and many others.

Sets are of no value if they are so conspicuous that
they attract more attention than dialogue or action.
But without correct sets, the action of the play loses
dramatic force.

[ ioo ]

,

Upholsterers preparing furniture for a talking picture
Studio plaster artist at work

Property man checking inventory of his supply box

10

PROPERTIES

Of the many trade terms used within the motion
picture industry, the majority are original. Three,
however, "spotlights," "grip," and "properties," are an
inheritance from the stage.

Properties are any physically movable articles used to
provide atmospheric background for stage or screen
plays, or which are handled by players during the
physical action of such a play. The term was first used
in a theatrical meaning in the fifteenth century. That
meaning, for the stage play, has not changed since that
time, and the word has been incorporated into the newer
language of screen production.

The stage has been responsible for many words which
have enriched and expanded our language. Then along
comes a new art, the motion picture, distantly related
to the stage, but still differing from it in many ways.
It was inevitable that it, too, should begin to evolve a
language of its own, a language which includes such
specialized terms as "close-ups," "fade-out," and "cut
back." It was inevitable that the motion picture should
take many words from its relative, the stage. One of
the most important of these is "properties."

Present-day descendants of fine old theatrical families
like the Barrymores (the Blythes) , the Tearles, and the

[101]

Talking Pictures

Dennys, going back several generations, all say that
"properties" had been in use long before the birth of
their earliest acting ancestor.

Large and important as property departments have
grown in the legitimate theatre, these are dwarfed by
the property warehouses maintained by the larger
studios. One ordinarily good-sized studio property
department has an inventory of 350,000 articles, rang-
ing from pins to Louis Quinze furniture, and from the
mortgage on the old family homestead to a washtub of
the 1880 era.

It has been indicated that technicians, interior decora-
tors, and others deal with a wide variety of objects.
To give any particular setting an authentic atmosphere,
they must have a large central storehouse from which
they may draw.

A description of one of these storehouses will aid
those seriously striving to learn standards by which to
evaluate accurately a good motion picture. Mistakes in
atmospheric properties do more to destroy or to impair
an illusion than perhaps any other single error which
might be committed.

It is obvious that it would be fatal to put a mailbox
on a street corner built for a period twenty years before
box collection was introduced. And matches can
scarcely be used in a setting dated for a time previous
to the invention of this important necessity of modern
life. To avoid mistakes correct properties must first
be found; then used properly.

The property department focuses upon itself the care-
ful attention of several other departments. The property

[102]

Properties

man himself is mainly occupied with the physical care
of properties. He must know how to use them cor-
rectly. He must know where to find quickly in the
enormous mass of his materials objects as small as a
postage stamp of Jugoslavia. He must know the use
of any required object, but he is not expected to know
its authenticity. He gets his instructions relative to the
historical accuracy of any object from the research
department.

The property man is not asked to assume the re-
sponsibility of matching the right period furniture, the
right draperies, or the right china. This is the work
of a trained interior decorator who is a member of the
varied technical staff of a modern studio property de-
partment. If flowers are to be used, the property man
is not expected to superintend their arrangement or to
know their symbolism, for an expert florist is available
to give his advice.

Draperies are a most important subdivision of a screen
property department. The interior decorator and the
property man have available the services of a dozen or
more men and women, experts in fabricating draperies
and in the arrangement and hanging of tapestries. Should
the interior decorator decide to re-cover a piece oi
furniture to make it more suitable for a certain pictorial
ensemble, a complete upholstery shop is at hand.

Any property man working during the production
of several different photoplays has thousands of different
articles in his keeping in the course of a year. We have
said that he need not know the exact historical "why"
of each of these articles, although expert property men

[io3]

Talking Pictures

invariably are, by virtue of their nearness to art subjects,
highly competent in art research, but he is required to
be deft in their handling. When a set of Lowestoft
china like that used by George Washington is brought
to a dining-room scene, an awkward "prop" man,
through breakage, could cause delay and financial loss.

A prop man must have the instincts of an amateur
detective. On a few hours' notice he must ferret out
supplies of most incredible things. No one knows for
what a director may ask in his desire to make a setting
strikingly authentic.

One afternoon a director decided that the character
of a long-deserted house would be best established if a
flock of moths could stream from a clothes closet when
it was opened. The next morning, fourteen hours later,
moths by the hundred fluttered out of the closet! Even
today the property man will not tell where he found
them.

"That's my private secret," he said, when asked. "I
may need moths in a hurry again!"

Well-known is the tale of the cockroaches required
for The Big House. The scenario contained a scene in
which the convicts staged races between their favorite
cockroaches. The director decided to add this episode
the day before the scene was to be shot.

The property man started out in high glee, for he
expected no trouble. He had eaten in at least ten "greasy
spoon" places in which he had seen cockroaches, but
his spirits weakened as he went vainly from one
restaurant to another. Restaurant owners, while roaches
crawled on the walls back of them, would deny that

[ 104 ]

Properties

there had ever been one in their cafes. They were afraid
it might be learned that the "movies" had staged a
successful cockroach hunt in their establishments. But,
finally, the weary searcher found a proprietor whose
greed for money outweighed other considerations. In
this restaurant one hundred fat roaches were trium-
phantly captured and carried before the cameras.

A record example of an effort to increase pictorial
authenticity through completely correct "props" is
found in an instance arising during the filming of The
Good Earth. Part of this picture was made in China.
The close-ups were photographed on farms reproduced
in a valley of rolling hills at Chatsworth, California.

To make these reproduced farms duplicates of those
in Hopei Province, John Miller, veteran property man,
spent nearly a year in China. He went with a truck far
into the Chinese countryside. He offered farmers flat
sums for every movable object on their farms. Very
often they refused, despite the lure of ready cash, for
the Chinese reverence for old things is deeply rooted.
But more than a sufficient number of farmers were
found who would sell enough to fill three hundred
cases writh thousands of objects.

These cases included complete hand- and oxen-driven
waterwheels which, when installed in California, lifted
water three hundred feet up a terraced hillside, plows,
grain grinders of stone, knives of various kinds, pots,
dishes, condiment jars, beds, mattresses, and other price-
less authentic properties. These objects were not new
but worn. Many had been in actual service for a cen-
tury or more. They added great value to the picture.

[io5]

Talking Pictures

Three weeks after he had completed his work for
The Good Earth, Miller was far at sea in a Gloucester
fishing schooner, showing young Freddie Bartholomew
the correct way to clean a Grand Banks codfish.

An interesting instance of the wide experience of a
property man arose during the filming of a picture
which required a certain shawl exactly like that worn
by a figure in a large portrait which appeared promi-
nently in an important scene. The property man was
frantic as the time to exhibit the picture approached and
he had not found the duplicate of the shawl. An order
had been given to try to weave a shawl of the same
pattern when an elderly lady entered the studio as a
visitor. She was seen by the worried property man, who
could hardly contain his excitement as he begged the
owner for the loan of her shawl.

The property man has one of the most interesting
and most constantly changing jobs in all the working
world. He learns something of nearly every art and
custom to be found in any country.

One man returned from fourteen months in darkest
Africa where he became intimately familiar with Negro
tribal gods, with native weapons and foods. The first
job given him, when he had again settled into the studio
routine, was the preparation of afternoon tea for a cozy
foursome in a set representing a charming English home.

The property man belongs to an old profession, but
the coming of the screen has added immeasurably to its
interest and its responsibilities. But his work, under
film conditions, must be supplemented by that of still
other specialists.

[ 106]

Properties

The interior decorator in a studio property depart-
ment is one technician who requires no special training
to succeed in a motion picture studio. In a film plant
he performs the same function he would if he were
called to approve the furnishings and decorations of a
home. He has made himself an expert in furniture of
all periods and all nations.

He is never mentioned in publicitv or advertising of
a film, but if his touch were absent, the picture would
suffer. Interior decorators in studios are not chosen
until they have had vears of experience in private prac-
tice. Many of them were heads of interior-decoration
departments in large furniture stores. One well-known
interior decorator, after he retired from screen work,
reopened a business he had once owned in Paris, France,
and prospered in it until his death.

Perhaps the most interesting function of the interior
decorator is his connection with antique furniture.
Really authentic period furniture is invaluable. A par-
ticular piece may not be needed for vears, but when the
decorator needs it, his need is intense. If it is not the
property of the studio, he mav find it difficult to buy
or to borrow.

One studio has eighteen hundred genuine antiques.
If all the antiques in all the studios were to be assembled
in one place, the collection would probably be the
largest in the world. And to studios, with their expert
buyers, such antique collections become profitable in-
vestments. The collection mentioned could be sold to
collectors for five times its cost.

Very valuable are "consecutive collections." One

[io7]

Talking Pictures

studio rejoices that it owns one example of every type
of telephone or typewriter made since these modern
necessities were invented. A collection of perfume bot-
tles covering every period for four centuries is greatly
prized. One property warehouse has available a com-
plete collection of housewives' brooms, going back to
the crude collection of willow twigs fastened together
by the pioneer women. And quite important when
needed are individual units of a collection which in-
cludes every known style of coffeepot.

Traditional in drama during its development have
been "the papers." When the cruel "Desperate Des-
mond" is about to foreclose on the old family home-
stead, mortgage papers are needed.

One section of each property department is devoted
to "paper props." The list of this section includes
foreign and American restaurant menus, police warrants
of a dozen countries, mortgages, marriage licenses, traffic
summons from every state in the Union and every im-
portant foreign country, diplomas, tables, theatre tickets,
surgical examination papers, army discharge certificates,
commitments to prison, wills, real-estate deeds, and tele-
graph and cable forms.

"Hand props" is a term used to designate a subdivision
of the property department which contains properties
easily held or carried in the hands. Among these are ink
wells, candelabra, pie plates, communion cups, knives,
forks, spoons, matches, pins, pencils, brushes, combs,
scissors, surgeons' scalpels, and feather dusters. These
hand props are physically so small that, when a picture
starts, a competent prop man usually assembles all he

[ 108]

Properties

will need and thtn carefully locks them up for safe-
keeping in his portable prop box, or his permanent locker.

Every studio has its efficient police department to
protect against theft, but small articles can be stowed
away in pockets, or unintentionally mislaid. The loss
would have been only a few dollars if the pen on Glad-
stone's desk in Parnell had been stolen, but it would
have occasioned thousands of dollars in damage, through
loss of time, had that pen disappeared during the mak-
ing of the picture. It sometimes takes weeks to locate a
single important historical property of this sort.

Since' animals in motion pictures come under the
technical classification of properties, one producer
brought down a storm of criticism on the head of his
property department for permitting the use of a collie
dog in a certain photoplay. His research had been in-
adequate. Collies were not bred until many years after
the time of the story being filmed. Animals are re-
sponsibilities of the property department.

Any kind of animal, with the possible exception of a
giant Panda, of which there is only one in captivity, can
be secured within a few hours' notice. Trained dogs are
available in abundance. One trainer has sixty-seven dogs
"on call"; and all are trained to obey hand signals, for
vocal signals are not possible in filming a talking picture.
Of these sixty-seven, only three are thoroughbreds, for
the trainers contend that of the two, mixed breeds are
more intelligent. Trained cats are rare, but there are
several in the colony trained to enter a room, turn, go
to a certain chair, and move in certain directions.

Laughter lurks behind contacts with trained animals.

[ 109 ]

Talking Pictures

A wealthy Eastern manufacturer thought it would be
a good practical joke to put a goose in the Pullman
drawing room of a departing friend. The bird escaped
from the car. Subsequently, the manufacturer was sued
for a large sum, and the owner of the goose collected.
He proved that his goose was trained valuable property
by exhibiting films showing the goose "acting."

During one of the Tarzan pictures, the director learned
that it is easy enough to get a hippopotamus into water
but sometimes hard to get him out. One morning a
director scheduled a scene in a lake in which these big
animals took part. In the afternoon he had planned to
photograph them on land. It was three days before the
last one could be induced to leave the lake.

Sometimes animals cause trouble by growing. In
Sequoia one sees a beautiful little fawn. To get con-
secutive scenes of a fawn a half-dozen different fawns
had to be used, for fawns grow rapidly and as they grow
they lose their distinctive spotted coat. It was impossible
to make the picture as fast as a certain fawn would
grow.

In common studio practice, the property department
is subsidiary to the chief studio art director, for minds
particularly trained to artistic details are needed to give
correct instructions to those persons who secure and
handle so many different objects.

Upholsterers, silver platers, florists, interior decorators,
drapery experts are all picked from persons who have
had years of previous experience in regular commercial
establishments employing such technicians. They adapt
their work, of course, to the special requirements of the

[no]

Properties

studio they enter, but to enter a studio originally their
greatest recommendation is their previous experience in
their specialized line.

The unit property man assigned to secure, watch, and
handle the properties for each separate production com-
pany is the one technician in a property department who
is unique to a studio. Any studio property man could
step on the stage of a theatre and handle the job of a
theatre prop man, but the theatre prop man would find
it difficult to enter a studio and take over the duties of
his cinema brother.

The cleverness of a property man depends so much
on experience that he develops chiefly by the apprentice
method. Boys enter studio propertv departments about
the age of sixteen or slightly older. For some years they
move, dust, wipe, and polish heavy furniture. When
their familiarity with the hundreds of thousands of ob-
jects with which they are surrounded is sufficient, they
go on a production set as assistant property man.

The next step upwards for a clever, intelligent prop-
erty man is the position of assistant director. This is a
logical advance, for no one else in a production com-
pany, except the property man, is so thoroughly trained
for effective organization of time and effort. Some of
the most capable modern-day assistant directors received
their advancement by way of the property department.
It is a long trail to film success, but it is sure.

The work of the property man indicates how
thoroughly Hollywood is related to the countless in-
dustries of the world.

[m]

11

COSTUMING THE PICTURE

Many students of the drama feel that the important
place of costumes in dramatic presentations has been
proven by the various attempts to present the plays of
Shakespeare with actors dressed in modern clothes. The
experiment undoubtedly has its value as laboratory study
in actual college classes intent upon detailed study of
Shakespeare. Students in such classes are endeavoring
to trace the development of Shakespeare's literary style,
and their concentration is of a scholarly nature.

But before audiences who came to such performances
for the major purpose of being entertained, Shakespeare
in modern dress has not been successful. The greatest
lines of dialogue ever written lose their effect if the
setting before which they are said is not in keeping with
the historical period or the specific incident concerned.
And even if the setting be accurate, there is still a loss
of dramatic force unless costumes are correct for period
and incident.

That is why the wardrobe department of a modern
studio is almost the largest unit within any film plant.
And that is also why inspired designers who can increase
dramatic values with their costumes, have become among
the most indispensable and highly paid technicians of
the cinema.

[112]

Costuming the Picture

With one large studio using more than eight hundred
thousand yards of cloth per year, an approximate figure
of seven million yards for all film-making plants would
be conservative. This great array of materials would
permit the making of a new dress, or a new suit of
clothes, for 90 per cent of all the men, women, and
children in the city of Chicago. Or it would make a
triple width carpet between the cities of Los Angeles
and San Francisco.

The experts handling such an expensively immense
amount of cloth fall in two groups. They may be
modern designers, Adrian, Newman, Banton, Wakeling,
Omar Kiam, or Orry Kellv, or such a wizard in the pro-
duction of "character" clothes as the late "Mother"
Coulter.

"Mother" Coulter, who died happily at a ripe old age,
wrapped up in her personality and her achievements all
the challenge to the imagination there is in the work to
which she gave her life. Her concern was not with
what people will wear next summer, or fall, or winter.
Her province was the past, and the unusual in costumes.

Nearly fifty years ago, Lucy Coulter, a young actress,
used to while away stage waits by needlework. In New
Orleans one night the wardrobe mistress of the companv
was taken ill, and "Mother" Coulter was pressed into
service. Later she made costumes for Weber and Fields
and for scores of other theatrical producers. She made
Marie Dressler's first costume some forty years ago, and
continued making all of her character costumes until
Miss Dressler's death.

"Mother" Coulter used to relate humorously that the

[ml

Talking Pictures

largest costume she ever made was a pair of pants for an
elephant, and the smallest a sweater for a white mouse.
During her lifetime she made trailing draperies for a
Cleopatra and hoopskirts for a Barbara Frietchie. As a
costume "ager" Mrs. Coulter was esteemed as the
greatest. She had on her cluttered desk a veritable
witch's collection of secret brews and concoctions
through and by which she could give new cloth the
effect of wear and age.

The charm and delight there is in imaginative, creative
work of this sort is perhaps proven by the fact that no
one could make "Mother" Coulter retire. She literally
"died in harness," beloved by the elder employees,
adored by the younger to whom she was a wise and
mellowed mother confessor.

Colorful as is the work of the character wardrobe
mistress, the focal person in any modern film studio
costume department is the head designer. He or she
must be a person who dreams of beautiful and attractive
clothes, and who can make those dreams a reality of
fabricated cloths.

The designer may create clothes for an absolutely
modern story of the present day, or conceive some
fascinating series of costumes for a dance number, or
dig deep into research for elaborate period presentations.
That famous painting, The Procession of the Magi, was
only one of hundreds photographed in Italian and
French art galleries before work was started on the five
thousand costumes for Romeo and Juliet.

To get a special effect a designer expends both his
genius and his materials in a prodigal manner. Forty

[in!

Costuming the Picture

costumes in The Great Ziegfeld required over fifty
yards of light material each. The designer and the
producer of the picture felt that the expenditure was
more than justified when the first appearance of the
costumes brought exclamations of delight from the
audience at the first preview of the film.

When a modern story is to be made, the gown de-
signer will prepare water-color sketches of his ideas.
He mav do fifty or sixtv of these, offering three or four
conceptions each of fifteen or more gowns that the
feminine star will use during the picture. Then the
procedure is as follows:

He goes over these sketches with the star, the direc-
tor, and the associate producer.

Selections are made.

The crowns are then cut and assembled on forms.
These forms are an exhibit in themselves, for they are
the exact size of the player.

When an actress joins a studio, a form is modeled to
her exact measurements. Thereafter, all but final fittings
are made on this form. All forms are kept up-to-date
each month, by padding or removing padding in order
to keep pace with changes in the star's figure.

The system saves time. Because of it, fittings are un-
necessary and in an hour a star can try on a dozen com-
pleted crowns with the certaintv that onlv very minor

1 C? J.J

changes, if anv, will be necessarv. While gowns for a
new picture are being made, a star may continue work
on a current production.

In emergencies, a well-equipped studio wardrobe can
do seemingly miraculous things. A few years ago, a

[ 115]

Talking Pictures

New York stage actress, Madge Evans, was signed to
appear opposite Ramon Novarro, a reigning male star.
She could not leave the East until the end of the run of
her play, which continued longer than she had expected.

Finally it was necessary to start the picture, and all
scenes were completed which did not require her
presence. Eventually she left for California. The day
she arrived the last scene which could be made without
her had been photographed. If she could not work
immediately, the entire company would have to be idle,
with resulting heavy financial loss.

Arriving at 5:45 p. m., she was taken to the studio.
She put on make-up and donned her first gown. In one
half hour she was working before the cameras, for her
gown fitted her perfectly. It had been made with no
other guide than a yardstick placed in a still picture with
her. The photograph had been taken in New York.
Solely through use of this comparison the wardrobe
created a costume which required only one slight change
at the neck.

If the settings and gowns are really fine, the audience
should be entirely unconscious of them. They are part
of the background before which our story moves. If
any portion of this background becomes obtrusive, some-
thing is wrong.

The question of costume wardrobe is involved, and
research is an important factor in answering it. A cos-
tume designer must maintain the known dress rules and
the exceptions to them of the period with which he
deals. Suppose careful research discovered that in the
fifteenth century women wore four different kinds of

[n6]

f%

Wardrobe executive with costume designs
Repairing costumes for a talking nicture version nf Knmon <—A 7,,/;^

More than fifty thousand pieces are filed in this library of hair

Costuming the Picture

dresses at formal functions. If three of these were un-
becoming to the star of the picture to be made, it is
obvious which gown would be chosen.

Tailors, able to produce overnight a smooth-fitting
uniform of the days of Napoleon, are standard figures
among the eight hundred employees required in a typical
wardrobe at the height of activity. Dye experts may try
a dozen different tints for a certain costume before tests
reveal which tint gives the best photographic effect.
Dry cleaners work busily quite oblivious of the fact that
drama is being photographed in the stages not far from
their quarters.

Enough dry cleaning is done in a big studio to care
for the needs of all the citizens in Sioux Falls, South
Dakota, or Shamokin, Pennsylvania. Superfine needle-
work is in demand. For nine weeks one costume for
Greta Garbo required the undivided attention of eight
needlewomen from the great center of this craft, Guada-
lajara, Mexico.

The storeroom for raw materials in a big studio ward-
robe is challenging to the imagination. When a Chinese
picture was being made, hundreds of bolts of heavy,
hand-woven cloth came in on every freighter from the
Orient. They had been purchased in Chinese markets
by special buyers sent westward for that purpose. There
are bolts of heavy old-fashioned sateens; bolts of chiffon;
of gingham and percale; spools of thread by the thou-
sands, and needles by the millions.

Proper accessories are as important as the costume
itself. Every wardrobe keeps hundreds of shoes of all
styles and sizes, thousands of belt buckles and handbags,

[117]

Talking Pictures

and thousands of pieces of costume jewelry. A shoe-
maker is a regular member of personnel. Usually he has
trained himself to make costume boots- for period mili-
tary productions. Thousands of women's hats are made
yearly by expert milliners.

Studios furnish women with all their clothes, ancient
or modern. Men buy their own modern costumes, but
when a past time is to be portrayed, the clothes and
accouterments required are made or bought for them.
The men's wardrobe section is therefore comparatively
small, but it has a great deal of color and character. It
will offer uniforms for police in a dozen cities over a
period of sixty or more years. It will have the uniforms
of every army that ever marched to war, including those
of the Pharaohs and the Caesars.

[»8]

1

STRANGE JOBS

Ix addition to the trained workers already described,
motion picture making requires many others. Among
these is the "a^er" who can take newiv made furniture
or walls and by use of planes, draw^knives, sandpaper,
putty, and paint give the illusion of wear the scene re-
quires. Genuine antiques are not always available, par-
ticularly those of a remote period, or those which
enjoyed brief popularity in their day. The work of
aging furniture requires great care, and it cannot be
done skilfully by those unfamiliar with the process.

There are also agers in the wardrobe department. A
woman can take a new dress and by rubbing it on the
floor give it the effect of years of wear in a few min-
utes. By dipping portions of the dress in coffee, she can
give it a stain of age.

Each studio has two sets of garage mechanics, one for
new cars, the other for automobiles over twentv vears
old. The second group are kept busy repairing ancient
machines, for each studio has from two to a dozen old
cars of several makes. These are frequently needed as
atmosphere to set the time of a scene. And as old cars
are often hard to secure when thev are needed, studios
find it wise to keep a number of such automobiles.

Every studio has a brass and iron foundry. It can

[»9]

Talking Pictures

make bars for a Peruvian jail, wrought iron doors for
the palace of a king, or, with more modern ornamenta-
tion, contribute to the growth of wrought iron usage
in home decoration.

Every studio has its "horse wrangler." Usually he is
not at the studio, but on a ranch where he trains horses
for special stunts in a picture, and to which he brings
horses from other sources when there is to be a scene
requiring mounted men.

Thousands upon thousands of pounds of plaster are
used each year in the "plaster" or "staff" shop. Mold-
ings are made for every kind of architecture. Coats of
arms are reproduced. Any competent plaster shop fore-
man will keep in readiness for a sudden call the plaster
coats of arms of the Hohenzollerns of Germany, the
late Romanoffs of Russia, the Windsors of England, and
the Hapsburgs of Austria. Reproductions of famed
statues are made as they are needed.

One brightly lighted building is used by men whose
tools are capable of cutting a human hair in thirty parts.
This would be one ten thousandth of an inch, the pre-
cision required for the repair of cameras and sound
recording machines.

These men, too, are among the many individuals in
a studio whose work goes entirely unsung, although
decidedly honored within the family. There are no
machines used in any form of manufacture which are
more delicate than cameras or sound recorders. Often
long and costly delays are obviated by the ability of
these high-grade mechanics to diagnose a delicate mal-
adjustment and repair it.

[ 120]

Strange Jobs

A studio armory may have up to five thousand
weapons, ranging from the most modern weapons of
several different present-day armies, through flintlocks
down to and including very ancient catapults. Several
catapults were built and operated by experts in weapons
for the picture Cleopatra, the scene of which was laid
in the time of the Caesars.

The professional studio sailor has been briefly men-
tioned. His duties may vary from the command of
windjammers in pictures like Captains Courageous, The
Slave Ship, and Captain Blood to the instruction of a
child actor in tying different knots.

The wind-machine operator is unique to pictures. In
the old days he gloried in noise. For silent pictures it
did not matter if the gas engines driving his wind-
making propellers made a tremendous clatter. But today
he tends noiseless electric motors which drive the
propellers with no more noise than a slight whir. The
wind stirred up, however, is just as great!

Every studio has its "wild animal" man. His duties
may be many or few, depending on the pictures being
made with wild beasts. But there are always some ani-
mals in the studio zoo, and several studios maintain a
large collection which they rent to other plants. A zoo
of this sort would have lions — African and mountain —
tigers, elephants, deer, antelope, buffalo, giraffes, and
zebras as its nucleus.

In studios where films are prepared for foreign sale,
keys with special foreign accents have to be placed on
typewriters. And because most studio authors arose
from newspaper work, and write with the pounding

[I2l]

Talking Pictures

two-fingered "hunt and peck" system, "mills," as profes-
sional writers call typing machines, get their worst maul-
ing in a studio. A typewriter repair man with special
training is required to keep the machines in order.

Perhaps it would not seem that keymakers would
have many special duties in a studio, but a studio key-
maker averages three thousand keys for offices and for
vaults. Great manuscripts, fine furniture, all of these
things are precious, and need to be safeguarded.

One of the things guarded most carefully are new
gowns made by famous studio designers. Outside gown
manufacturers have become so aware of the great sales
values accruing to a new gown worn by a popular
feminine star, that it has been suspected that they keep
agents in the various plants to tell them of a new design.
To guard such designs until the gown appears in a
picture, locks are changed frequently.

As this is a business of pictures naturally its most ef-
fective advertising is by and with pictures. For a studio
to make and deliver to theatres, newspapers, and maga-
zines all over the world, a million "prints" of individual
still photographs of stars and scenes is not uncommon.
These photographs pour in an increasing stream from
the publicity and advertising departments.

The publicity department requires as a prerequisite
of employment for its key positions four or five years
of service as a reporter for an important newspaper.
This is needed because this department supplies stories
of studio activities, with illustrations, to thousands of
newspapers and magazines on all parts of the globe. So
much attention is focused on film players by their

[122]

Strange Jobs

appearances on the screens of the world theatres that
their comings and goings have become "news." What
they do and where they go is of interest to millions.

Studio publicity men translate what happens within
their studio into accustomed journalistic vernacular. To
give an idea of the extent of newspaper and magazine
demand for data about film personalities and film mak-
ing, over three hundred different newspapers, magazines,
and telegraphic news syndicates maintain paid reporters
in Hollywood to gather such material. Much of the
effort of a studio publicity department is expended to
discover items for this important group, responsible for
at least 60 per cent of the film news seemin the periodical
columns of the world.

A studio advertising department may create a com-
plete advertising campaign, or merely outline ideas in
sketch form which will be completed in New York.
A studio advertising department recruits some of its
employees from commercial advertising agencies, but
most of its people come to it after four years or more
of experience in writing advertisements for theatres in
various parts of the country. Besides copy writers, a
studio advertising department employs sketch artists to
prepare layouts and drawings.

Finally, the average studio advertising office usually
prepares "trailers" for use by theatres. "Trailers" are
a form of advertising which has reached its highest de-
velopment in the film field. To make trailers, a com-
petent film editor is joined with a good advertising copy
writer. The film editor picks out certain key scenes of
a coming picture. The copy writer supplies intriguing

[123]

Talking Pictures

explanatory lines, calculated to make those in the audi-
ence wish to see the picture thus graphically advertised.
The trailer is usually shown for a week before the main
picture is to be exhibited.

Office boys would not, it would seem, be anything
but office boys, whether working in a studio or the outer
office of a chewing gum factory. But office boys in
motion picture plants are chosen with great care. Inas-
much as most of the work in a studio requires specialized
training, there are few places for ambitious young men
without such special training, except as office boys.
Therefore one finds that a large percentage of young-
sters in a film making establishment are either college
graduates, or honor students from a high school.

It is known that these minor jobs furnish the best
way to get into a studio, in which one can be in contact
with all the various technical activities. For this reason
studios have long waiting lists and pick and choose care-
fully. As studios are immense places, running errands
is a tiresome chore and an office boy will easily cover
twenty miles on a busy day. But he sees everything,
meets everybody, and after two or three years may be
taken into one of the departments to begin his education
in film making.

It should be evident by now that no man or woman
in any profession, no tinsmith, no manicurist, no marine
engineer, to mention only a few, can stand back and
say, "The movies. I haven't anything in common with
them." There is hardly a world activity that regularly
or periodically does not make its contribution to a
motion picture. Even the science of bacteriology offered

[124]

Strange Jobs

special advice in the filming of The Story of Louis
Pasteur.

Passenger automobiles and big busses transport players
from studios to locations. Such conveyances may carry
a star in stylish dress on one trip. On the next, a sudden
frantic call from an assistant director might cause the
driver to load a box of frozen codfish or half a dozen
dynamite caps. Under the transportation department
are nearly two hundred other wheeled vehicles, portable
electric generation outfits for use on location, portable
loud-speaker wagons for the long-distance transmis-
sion of a director's orders, and portable wind-making
machines.

An emergency hospital is available for the actor with
a frog in his throat. In a large studio, two nurses are
always busy binding the smashed finger of a carpenter,
or removing a foreign substance from the eye of a
cameraman.

The physical vastness of a film studio is hard to ex-
press in words but if you owned a motion picture studio
you could:

Pay the electric light bills for 100,000 five-room
houses each month. The average small home uses
six kilowatt hours of electricity each month; an
average big studio requires 600,000.

Insulate a ten-storv building so that veils and
screams would not disturb the neighbors in any or
all of its 500 rooms.

Build with the gravel and cement annuallv re-
quired an artificial lake having a dam fifteen feet

[125]

Talking Pictures

thick, fifty feet high, and one hundred feet long.

Stock, from the grocery and hardware supplies,
a general store large enough to supply a city of
20,000 people.

Shave more than 1,200 men daily, from New
Year's Day to Christmas, with the razor blades
used in the film editing department.

Whitewash the political scandals of a large city
with 5,800 gallons of flat paint.

And these comparisons are on the basis of but one
studio. For the industry as a whole they can be multi-
plied at least ten times.

[126]

13

THE CASTING DIRECTOR

Perhaps the greatest achievement of the film pro-
ducer is the manner in which he has developed a flawless
co-operative svstem wherein each separate artist con-
tributes his finished tile to the film mosaic. He merges
his work imperceptiblv into that of the man or woman
who preceded him, and leaves his own contribution so
that, in its turn, it fits smoothlv into the tiles to be laid
by the artisans that follow. To use a term from the
athletic field, "team work" has been developed to a fine
point in the modern studio. Without such co-operation
the advances achieved bv the industry in such a short
period would have been impossible.

When the conductor of a svmphonv lifts his hands
and begins the direction of his musicians, their co-
ordination determines the qualitv of the musical result,
for each musician is trained to follow the conductor.
This fits the finelv integrated work of a film studio.

It should be clear that a great motion picture is entitled
to more praise for perfect execution than almost am*
example from the other arts. In a film there are many
background elements that could, bv being suddenlv
obtrusive, impair the flow and power of the whole.
Likewise if this happens in musical orchestration the
result would be discord.

[127]

Talking Pictures

Among other things, the human background must
accurately reflect time, place, and customs, and it must
merge quietly into the whole general scheme of the
mosaic. There have been many comments in the press,
praising the realism of the "human atmosphere" in vari-
ous pictures. Among the most outstanding of these were
the comments upon the northern natives in Eskimo; the
surgeon in Men in White; the Russian peasants of Anna
Karenina; the newspaper reporters of Five Star Filial;
the Indian-fighting army men of The Plainsman.

But with the bouquets come brickbats. Letters are
received which say, "Where did you ever get the idea
that a big bum like So-and-So looks like a banker?" or
"You cast Miss Such-and-Such as a society girl when
she looks more like a fat laundress."

An expert studio casting director, because his art is
not an exact science, relies upon an intuitive judgment,
a trained memory, and years of association with plays
and players.

Every casting department has cross-indexed files to
which the casting director may refer. These carry the
names and abilities of hundreds of actors and actresses
of all ages. The Central Casting Corporation, with larger
files containing more names, is kept with equal exactness.

A casting director will sometimes use his indexed files
for routine casting of small roles. But generally touches
of special charm arise from the large gallery of portraits
hung in the halls of the casting director's mind. A gruff
ticket agent whose few lines bring a laugh, or a pathetic
mother whose child is killed by a truck — roles adding
great emotional value to a picture — demand inspired

[128]

The Casting Director

casting. A good casting director needs to file in his mind
at least five thousand faces, and know the acting ability
of each of these players.

Picture a scene in which the leading lady stops to ex-
amine the work of some dear old woman, perhaps a
seamstress. From the flow of the story the casting direc-
tor knows whether a moment of pathos or one of
comedy is needed. Filed under "Pathetic Women," if
that is the touch required, there may be forty names.
But in all probability the casting director decides out
of his memory which one of the forty fits this part, and
he only reaches for his indexed book to find her tele-
phone number.

Roughly, in every picture there are approximately
twelve "principals," the characters about whom the
mechanics of the story revolve. The leading two or
three of these are called "stars," the others "supporting
players." They represent the aristocracy of acting. In
a large studio about 80 per cent of these "top flight"
players will be recruited from the plant's own "stock
company." They will be under contract to that studio
from one to seven years, appearing in various pictures
as assigned.

The remaining 20 per cent will be "free-lance"
players who are in one studio today, another tomorrow.
Below the principals in rank are the secondary or back-
ground players. Their importance is apparent. They
are essential to the human atmospheric accuracy of the
finished picture. At one time, more than seventeen
thousand individuals had their names registered in the
industry for atmosphere work.

[129]

Talking Pictures

The term "extra" which seems so firmly set in the
minds of the public as a name for background players,
is never used in the studios. It implies unimportance,
and the competent minor player is anything but unim-
portant. He is a trained artisan. He may lack the ability
or the face or the body to enact the role of Charles
Laughton; but, possessed of the "finest cauliflower ear
and broken nose in America," he is very important for
certain deft character touches. He knows by experience
how to conduct himself before the camera. He knows
how to move naturally in a crowd.

He resents the diminution of his importance implied
in the term "extra," and hence it has practically dis-
appeared from the modern film vocabulary. The ex-
perienced minor player is a valuable and respected mem-
ber of any film-making community. In fact, the great
concentration of minor players in Hollywood has been
one reason why this community has retained its film
production leadership.

Eighty per cent of the types needed for dramatic
motion pictures fall into about forty-one groups. For
men the groups include: dress men, juveniles, bell hops,
bald men, comics, police, collegians, butlers, beards
(sometimes listed by the slang term "beavers"), riders,
freaks, tall men, short men, dwarfs, stunt men, dope
fiends (in appearance), military, character men (a gen-
eral characterization in which may be found, perhaps,
judges, lawyers, doctors, bill collectors), tough men,
Negroes, Orientals, Hawaiians, Latin types, German
types, Slavic types.

For women the groups include: dress women (mean-

[130]

The Casting Director

ing intelligent "society" types who can wear beautiful
clothes charmingly), pretty girls (what a list this is!),
homely girls, stenographers, tall women, short women,
stunt women, maids, character women, women riders,
dowagers, healthy children (children are sometimes in
a separate file, sometimes in the women's file), peaked
children, Negroes, Hawaiians, Orientals, Latin types,
German types, and Slavic types.

Should there come a request for an unusual type not
frequently needed, an efficient casting director has his
sources of supply which he may tap by making a few
telephone calls. A certain young medical interne in a
Los Angeles hospital augments his income, and brings
needed financial aid to many unfortunates, by keeping
a casting index of freak medical cases. He can supply
on demand men and women with both or either legs,
arms, or eyes missing. In an hour he can send over a
man with the "shakes," or a woman with a harelip. He
once provided a studio with a woman who had a case
of angina pectoris — the sound of whose uncertain heart
beat was vital in establishing a certain point in The
Bishop Murder Case.

The card indexes used are established in the best tradi-
tion. Typed information is on the front, and a small
picture of the player on the back. The front of the card
gives these data: name, address, telephone, weekly salary,
daily salary, age, weight, height, general appearance,
color of eyes, carriage, wardrobe (the average minor
player has an advantage in employment if he has sport
clothes, evening wear, and street clothes of varied
pattern), class, subclass, coloring, parts played.

[nil

Talking Pictures

The class might be "pretty girl," the subclass "Latin
type"; or "tough men," the subtype "Oriental." It will
be interesting to analyze more carefully several of the
thirty-nine subdivisions into which the casting director
allocates the humans of the world.

"Beards" is a class which sounds interesting, if not
romantic. (And there is less romance in the slang ex-
pression, "Beavers"!) The importance of this subdivi-
sion is seen when a costume picture is made — a Parnell
or a Maytime or a House of Rothschild. Into this class
are grouped all men who either have prominent beards,
or can grow them quickly.

One man, Professor Schmalz (all names used are
fictitious), who has a fine European "spade beard," has
played thousands of counts, diplomats, and types of
this sort.

"L. Nardon" is listed as "concert singer in appearance,
wears a Vandyke."

"H. Frank," one finds, "has a long, full gray beard,
excellent for Westerns."

There is written of another: "Beard grows very fast,
can develop a swell, tough stubble overnight." This
man keeps busy in underworld pictures, in charac-
terizations presupposing either lack of or indifference
to razors.

"Dress men" is a broad class, which includes fairly
good-looking men who are at home in well-cut busi-
ness or dress clothes. You would not find under "Dress
men" one who writes on his application: "Tough
mechanic with two teeth missing."

There are two classes which are decidedly not set in

[132]

/

:*•

I

i

>-« ■ „

Architects in a studio

J

Supporting players in a last-minute rush to complete make-ups

The Casting Director

one mold. These are "character men" and "character
women." Out of these are secured those individualistic
persons, who, when carefully chosen, greatly increase
the authenticity of a specific picture. One recalls the
little old woman coming out of the elevator in Grand
Hotel, the Swedish masseuse in Love Is News, the
provincial storekeeper in Rose-Marie. It is in the selec-
tion of these that the casting director reveals his best
abilities.

As a guide to the casting director, "remarks" are
carefully worded in his two files. The following are
illustrative:

"iMary Ames" is thirty-six years old, five feet eight
inches tall, weighs 138 pounds, prim, stern, society
grande dames, or hard-hearted old aunts."

"Margaret Graham, 45," is briefly listed as "very
Scotch."

"iMartha Hines," we find, is "five feet seven, excellent
for mothers and kindly landladies."

"Helen Bane" is a "sweet character type, good as a
mother or grandmother." There is evidently a casting
difference in grandmothers, for "Florence Lane" is listed
under "refined grandmothers."

"Edward Brooks," who is listed as "a magnificent
drunk," has been on the "water wagon" for nine years.

"Emmett Hope" is listed as "like Judge Ben Lindsey."

"Jimmy Parker" has been a devout church member
for years, but he makes his living as a successful cine-
matic "crook."

"John Wade, 57, five feet one and one-half inches
tall, weighing 160 pounds," is listed as a "Sea Dog."

[133]

Talking Pictures

After Tom Kane's name appears "Character, Comic,
Crook, Bumps." These words mean that Mr. Kane is
a good journeyman laugh-getter, that in appearance he
is a crook, and that for a consideration he is not averse
to being "bumped" from windows by police, or handled
roughly. This gentleman used to be a professional acro-
bat and knows how to handle his body to avoid injury.
Clark Gable tossed him down a ladder in China Seas.

The Casting Corporation also aids the studios in
getting specialized types not frequently used. It has
lists of practical seamen and both infantry and cavalry
groups of ex-soldiers. Players who closely resemble
famed historical characters are carefully listed in cast-
ing offices. When needed for a picture, it is vital for
a casting director to know where they can be found.

If a General Pershing is wanted, the telephone quickly
brings Joseph W. Gerard to the studio. Thomas Pogue
greatly resembles Benjamin Franklin. A very little
make-up, mostly mustache, transforms Sidney Blackmer
into Theodore Roosevelt. Frank McGlynn has played
Abraham Lincoln for a score of years.

A list of "atmosphere" players needed for the next
day is filed at 3:00 p. m. on the preceding day. The
players are notified by telephone when to report and
what wardrobe and properties they are to bring from
those departments. After the player arrives in the morn-
ing, he is sent to a dressing room with orders to report
in make-up to a certain assistant director at a certain
hour. This may be 9:00 a. m. if the set is in the studio,
or 6:00 a. m. if the company is working at a distant
"location."

[134]

The Casting Director

The studio casting director actually selects only three
out of four levels of players: first, the stars; second, the
secondary principals; third, the "bits," (atmosphere
players, such as shoe clerks or newsboys, who have one
or more lines to speak).

The fourth and last level is largely composed of
"crowd people." In the old days, studio casting direc-
tors also picked "crowd people." But it was found that
both confusion and downright hardship and discomfort
to the lesser paid players was an inevitable result.
Players in this lower level were forced to telephone,
individually, some fifteen studio casting offices daily.
In addition, they rushed frantically from one studio to
another to sustain their connections. Studio telephone
connections were swamped, and the personnel found
itself with insufficient time to take care of anyone
properly.

To avoid these difficulties which arose, on December
4, 1925, the Central Casting Corporation was organized.
It is a unique service organization formed and owned
by the Association of Motion Picture Producers. Those
companies which are members pay the expenses for the
service of this organization.

The advantages of this bureau are several. It makes
it necessary for a minor player to telephone only once
a day to ascertain work possibilities. It permits the cast-
ing directors of many studios to file separately bulk
orders such as "forty-five police officers," "five hun-
dred members of an Irish mob," "twelve bookkeepers,"
"twenty-seven automobile mechanics," "two-thousand
Chinese."

[135]

Talking Pictures

The operation of the bureau is simple. A specially
constructed switchboard at the headquarters of the Cen-
tral Casting Corporation enables instant handling of
telephone calls. At peak times — late in the afternoon —
these reach one thousand an hour.

A registration with the Central Casting Corporation
in no way binds the minor player. It merely registers
him for crowd work if he needs it. It does not keep
him from accepting a better job in the "bit" or even
the "featured players" level, if one should be offered.
On the other hand, the Corporation promises no certain
number of working days each week. It offers merely
a connection between day-work actors and the em-
ployers, eliminating the duplication of effort and energy
required before this plan was made effective.

The Casting Corporation places about six hundred
players a day. It saves these players a quarter of a
million dollars annually in fees which agents formerly
charged to get them jobs. But it also has twelve thou-
sand registrants, and no new names were added between
1935 and 1937.

Recent statistics show that only fifty-eight out of the
fifty-five hundred registered male players average three
days or more each week. Only twenty women out of
the sixty-five hundred registered average three working
days a week. Out of the fifteen hundred children the
average for each child is about four days a year.1

The Casting Corporation has consistently held that
for anyone to support himself or herself with work in
this "bulk" category of minor players is next to an im-

1 Figures supplied by Association of Motion Picture Producers.

[136]

The Casting Director

6

possibility. The Corporation steadilv discourages any-
one's going to Hollywood for the purpose of securing
employment through it. Its ranks are refilled mostly
from within the industry by one-time players of higher
grade who for various reasons no longer seek steady em-
ployment but thus keep their connection with a profes-
sion they love.

The Corporation points out to the ambitious that its
lists are not a good start toward stardom. While an
occasional person has risen to eminence out of the minor
ranks, there are only about twelve such instances in the
ten-year history of Central Casting Corporation.

It cannot be emphasized too greatly that the essentially
human background of any motion picture constitutes
one of its greatest assets. The psychological appeal of
the picture is stirred by it. The drama of commonplace
living is accentuated. The audience becomes uncon-
sciously trained in its ability to sort dramatic falsities
from dramatic truths. To trained observers a badly cast
minor part, played insincerely and incompetently, is as
disconcerting as discordant music to a musician.

[137]

14

STARS

The term "star" as it is applied today to individuals
is misused and misunderstood. Because there is so much
glamour and appeal to youth and exceptional physical
beauty, some have come to think of this expression
only as it applies to a few young men and women of
the screen.

But these striking looking youngsters, vivid, exotic,
different, represent but a few of the world's stars.
The word in its broader meaning concerns any man,
woman, child, or animal who becomes a definite and
outstanding leader in whatever he, she, or it may be
doing. Lindbergh, Louis Pasteur, Caxton, the first Eng-
lish printer, and the dog Rin-Tin-Tin were stars.
Shirley Temple, little more than a baby, has captured
the hearts of millions. A tired elderly woman, Marie
Dressier, became greater than most of the young players
of today's films may ever hope to be.

In fact, even in motion pictures, foresighted people
look forward to the day when acting will not be the only
road to stardom. When the educational film reaches its
full stature it is possible to conceive that some partic-
ularly dynamic lecturer in educational work will enjoy
a popularity equal to that achieved by the Ronald
Colmans and the Loretta Youngs of today.

[138]

Stars

This matter of screen personality has interesting
angles. Two people who are equally charming when
seen face to face are photographed. The photograph
adds strength to the personality of one, the other "fades
out" and becomes less powerful. This is the reason
why some people become film stars and why, when they
achieve this eminence, they are paid large salaries.

No phase of picture making has so much rumor and
untruth connected with it as that of star compensation.
To hear some of the misinformed comment, it would
seem that stars get all the money required to make a
modern picture. As a matter of fact the pennies of each
picture production dollar are spent approximately as fol-
lows: stories, 15.95; directors and cameramen, 13.20;
sets, 9.90; costumes, 2.75; locations, 2.75; raw ma-
terials, 7.70; administration, 23.10; and for all players
from stars to the last member of a crowd scene, 2 4.6 5. l

Perhaps the position of a star may be explained by
saying that he is like an inventor who has developed a
new invention. Wishing to protect his cleverness the
government grants him a patent. That patent guarantees
the profits on the invention exclusively to him for a term
of years. In the same manner, in a personality which
can attract the attention of the public, the star has an
asset that is exclusive to him or to her.

Suppose that it were possible to have two men so alike
that both could travel under the name of Charles Chap-
lin. Let us have both of these Chaplins make the same
story with the same cast.

Put the finished pictures in two theatres side by side.

1 Figures supplied by Association of Motion Picture Producers.

[139]

Talking Pictures

The first night both theatres would be packed, but on
the second night only the theatre having the film with
the real Chaplin would attract a crowd. Its neighbor,
showing the film of a man looking like Chaplin but with-
out his genius and creative ability, would be empty.
Starring, therefore, is merely an expression to indicate
supreme attraction values.

A star in films can be young and beautiful, or old and
wrinkled. A star can be a young child, or an animal. A
star, once developed, once proven by the crowds attend-
ing pictures in which he or she appears, becomes a very
valuable asset. Companies have indicated their opinion
of such asset values by insuring individual stars for one
million dollars or more.

Stars in the entertainment field are not an original
development of pictures. In the Roman arena there
were star gladiators. During the Middle Ages, there
were star minstrels, traveling from castle to castle. There
are star bullfighters and star ball players. And the stage
has had such stars for hundreds of years.

No producer, then, needs coaching in the value of
stars. There was a time when producers attempted to
"star" directors and writers. But great as are the con-
tributions of these technicians to each film, their appeal
to the public is not a fraction of that possessed by
players.

The business of finding stars and developing them has
become a semiscience. Once ambitious youngsters and
older actois flocked to Hollywood. Now they stay at
home, knowing that a nation-wide "scout" system makes
certain that any success they achieve in an amateur stage

[ HO ]

Stars

performance will be seen. When discovered, if they
possess exceptional talent, they will be sent to a studio
with a contract for three months.

There a "test" will be made. Once, in silent picture
days, tests were quite casual. The player walked to-
ward the camera, turned, smiled. But today, there is
dialogue, and a test usually consists of several scenes
from an actual picture. Sets are built and other actors
hired to support the candidates. The cost of making
the cheapest test is several hundred dollars.

If the test is satisfactory the candidate enters a prac-
tice "school." This school is exclusive to its studio
and is headed by two or more trained directors of act-
ing and voice. These give daily individual instructions
to the newcomers in acting, correct placing of the voice,
and how to sit, stand, and walk.

Several studios cast their young players in actual stage
plays, which are presented only for one night to an audi-
ence composed entirely of producers, directors, writers,
and other players. In this manner the fundamentals of
acting are drilled into a candidate, and minor faults and
mannerisms are ironed out before the young player is
permitted to appear in front of the cameras. If the
player reaches this stage, his or her option will have
been extended to six months.

Then for a long period the player appears in minor
parts, many different ones, to show every facet of his
personality. In about a year and a half may come the
first real opportunity for self-expression — a subordinate
part. By this time the player is fairly well-established,
but there is still a question whether he will be a star, or

[hi]

Talking Pictures

just another one of hundreds of competent but com-
paratively unpublicized "feature players."

Good feature players are vital to good pictures.
The public would soon notice their absence. But the
public usually places feature players into some care-
less generality like "Joan Crawford had a good cast."
Therefore, the compensation of the feature player
remains very much under that of the star. A good
feature player earns a comfortable living, but little
more.

But the personality that suddenly starts to draw
theatregoers into a playhouse by the hundreds of thou-
sands receives rewards for possession of an exclusive
and most valuable commodity.

In the days of silent pictures, physical personality
alone counted. One actor who could not speak above
a whisper made a fortune. A woman star became the
top "drawing card" of American films before she could
speak a correct sentence in English.

But today a prerequisite of acting in talking pictures
is a high school diploma. Studio coaches have found
that young people who have less education usually
have faults in diction which are too deeply rooted to
correct. Candidates are seldom signed for a studio
unless they have shown a previous predilection for
acting by appearances in college or high school plays,
or in little theatre productions.

Sometimes there is a long wait before a star is dis-
covered. Marie Dressier had been brought to Holly-
wood to star in silent pictures. She made one great
film. Then she started steadily downgrade. She was not

[142]

Stars

in demand and producers avoided her. She was finan-
cially insolvent when talking pictures came in. In fact,
completely discouraged, she had gone to New York
with the intention of making her future home in Paris.
She was called back for one part, "Marthy" in Anna
Christie. Then, when more than sixty years of age, she
became overnight the greatest single "drawing card" the
screen has known.

In Marie Dressler's case the accident of the arrival of
talking pictures was the major cause for her startling
comeback. She had been a very great stage comedienne.
Her training in the comic speaking and timing of lines
had included that greatest of all training grounds, the
immortal company of Weber and Fields.

In silent pictures, her personality had not "caught
on." But in Anna Christie fat, sloppv, disreputable
"Marthy" wanders into a dingv waterfront cafe. She
opens her mouth, and from the moment of her first line
we take her to our hearts. The sudden rise of this
woman — tired, worn, and more than sixty years old —
is one of the most interesting stories of Hollywood. In
a year a woman who had sought in vain for tinv "bit"
parts at every studio was the greatest monev-maker the
screen has ever known. She did not possess glamour,
that much overworked word, but she did have a far
more important asset, heart interest. She could enter
our hearts with a quick lift of her massive, homelv
face, with a quiver of her big lips, and there she re-
mained enthroned.

Then there are stars who "fade out" after a short
success under one management, but who rise into the

[143]

Talking Pictures

skies brighter than ever when given different stories
and different direction. Ability to sense where a star
has been handled incorrectly is, of course, one of the
special and valuable talents of a successful producer
or director.

While stars are being considered, it is wise to eliminate
the common misunderstanding of the word "double."
The man or woman in the street hears of "stand-ins,"
the persons who replace the stars in front of the photo-
graphic lights while long camera or sound recorder
adjustments are made, and confuses them with
"doubles."

"Stand-ins" are not doubles. Unlike doubles they
need not resemble the star at all. There has been much
publicity given to the fact that stars do not do dangerous
scenes; that doubles, persons who look exactly like
them, are used, but this is untrue. Except in very rare
instances, in which the star could not possibly master
in a short time the physical dexterity needed to avoid
injury in a dangerous scene, he or she does the action
personally.

As a matter of fact stars are very sensitive on the
subject of doubles, and habitually refuse to have them,
unless forced to do so by their producers.

Wallace Beery, a very competent aviator, refuses to
let anyone else do his airplane scenes. William Powell
exploded in rage once when he heard some person in a
theatre audience explain how a "double" had done the
scenes in Libeled Lady, in which he is carried for hun-
dreds of yards down the current of a swift, rocky
mountain stream.

[ H4]

Stars

"Doubles" arc too often confused with "stunt men."
When at all possible, stars will do their own stunts.
But when the action requires a stunt to be performed
by a minor player, a stunt man or woman, one willing
to take great physical risks, is employed.

Dick Grace, a daring flyer, cannot remember how
many planes he has crashed.

One of the most spectacular stunts on record was
in Manslaughter. A player, dressed as a motorcycle
officer and going fifty miles an hour, crashed into a
standing automobile and was thrown over the motor
onto pads. In the picture story he dies; but the stunt
was figured so closely for safety precautions that he
came out with only a wrenched shoulder. He went on
to do hundreds of other similar stunts.

The life of a star on the screen is not as long as it
would be on the stage. Too much familiarity dims the
value of the star's face. The average life of a picture star
is about seven years. In two decades on the stage it is
estimated that the great Maude Adams did not appear
before more than ten million people. Were Maude
Adams a film star todav, twice that number would see
her in a single evening.

This comparatively short life of a screen star once
brought the heartfelt remark from a studio technician,
"I'm glad I'm not a star."

He meant by this that in his own obscure place in
the studio he did not earn any more than he would in
the same profession outside, but he could without in-
terruption earn his salarv — a good living wage, until he
was sixty or seventy. He would be able to pursue a

[145]

Talking Pictures

profession or an art he loved as long as he lived and
while so doing he would have privacy.

No one realizes the deep values of a private life until
he sees the smothering adulation which the public
lavishes upon film stars. When a star leaves a studio
after eight to twelve hours of hard mental concentration,
or physical action — for acting is exhausting labor — he is
met at the gates by autograph hunters. He must smile
and be pleasant. He stops at a filling station to get
gasoline, and again the curious rush upon him. If he
goes to Paris he cannot examine in quiet the art treas-
ures of the Louvre, or the tomb of Napoleon. Nor can
he travel comfortably in public places without a police
escort.

From the financial side his position is far from being
as attractive as it seems. He earns his big salary for his
exclusive commodity, his personality, for perhaps seven
years, but he is required to pay taxes exactly as if he
were to make that salary all his life. He has exceptional
expenses for clothes and for a staff to handle his enor-
mous mail. And from his salary he must save enough
to maintain himself and his family, if he has one, the
remainder of his life. For when the public tire of a
star, they do so very thoroughly. Quite callously they
forget in a year a star they once idolized. In two years
they may not remember his name.

Recently a star very greatly admired fifteen years ago
walked into a studio employing twenty-two hundred
people. Although he was among picture people, there
were not twenty who recognized him. The star of
today is always faced with the fact that, while still

[i46]

Stars

young, with his greatest acting development often still
to come, his public will eventually drop away from
him. There will be no work for him except in minor,
obscure pans, so he may be forced to enter an entirely
new profession, usually either screen writing or screen
direction.

And comparatively few become either writers or
directors. It is an axiom in the theatrical business, "Once
an actor, always an actor." One star of the past lives
today on a beautiful ranch outside of Los Angeles. He
was shrewd in his investments and has ample means.
But an actor to his fingertips, he is an unhappy man.
Gladly he would part with his fortune if he could be
assured that once more his name would appear above
the name of a picture, in the "star billing."

The star has his moment of shining glorv, but he also
has definite worries. If he does not go into some other
profession, such as directing, it is doubtful whether in
the end, he attains as much ultimate satisfaction as an
obscure technician in his own studio. The strange but
definite manner in which screen popularity disappears,
overnight, gives the actor a powerful psychological
body blow.

[147]

1

MAKING FOLKS OVER

The patience of Job is required in order to undergo
the hours and hours of sitting needed to create a com-
plicated make-up for a talking picture. Charles Laughton
was not needed on one set until 9:00 a. m., but for
weeks he breakfasted at 5:00 o'clock. The make-up
artist took two hours to create the luxuriant beard
needed for the playing of Mr. Barrett in The Barretts of
Wimpole Street. He needed two and one-half hours to
create scores of lines and wrinkles for the role of eighty-
year-old Madelon Claudet, played by Helen Hayes.

Preparing the deep, ugly scar on Lewis Stone's face
in Grand Hotel required great skill and much time.
Modern make-up technique has eliminated former dis-
comforts. Mr. Stone has described the itching, the
excessive heat caused by the surface of his Grand
Hotel scar, as "the tortures of the damned." The thick
skin of a rare fish, fine cotton, and collodion were the
principal ingredients of this make-up. It was with fish-
skin and collodion that Stone's right ear was molded
close to his head to give one side of his face an earless
appearance.

Collodion, likewise, was the basis of the scar worn
by Johnny Weissmuller in Tarzan and His Mate. The
skin of Weissmuller's right temple was pinched together

[148]

Jack Dawn, make-up expert, with Reginald Dcnnv

Luise Rainer becomes Chinese for The Good Earth
Hair by hair, the wig expert builds up a hairpiece

Making Folks Over

and held by drying collodion. Clever painting with
water colors by a make-up artist completed the scarred
appearance. Today, neither Stone nor Weissmuller
would have the discomfort they endured when they
wore those early make-ups. The Westmores (Wallace,
Ernest, and Percy) , Jack Dawn, and every other studio
make-up expert is constantlv developing new methods.
Their discoveries are carefully guarded.

Perhaps one of the most recent and important dis-
coveries was used for the first time during the produc-
tion of The Good Earth. In this picture, it was necessary
to transform Luise Rainer, Paul Muni, and other white
players into Chinese.

The old method of securing slanted eyes by pulling
their corners and fastening them with invisible fishskin
is painful and not particularly effective. The new
method, as invented by Jack Dawn, puts molded sections
of thin, light, skinlike material over the actor's own
skin. First of all, a clay model is made of the face
desired. Then dimensions are compared between this
face and that of the actor to play the part. Where the
actor's face needs to be built up, it is done by molded
layers of the new chemical formula.

Because the new face is built and the player's own
face is not malformed or twisted in any artificial manner,
he can act his role with no physical discomfort. By this
method an exact duplication of another's face may be
obtained. Recently, with the actual death mask of
Napoleon as a guide, Charles Boyer, an actor, was able
to make over his features into an exact likeness of the
Corsican adventurer.

[ 149 ]

Talking Pictures

Those who consider the great Lon Chaney the
"greatest artist of make-up who ever lived" wonder
what heights Chaney might have attained had he pos-
sessed the advantage of these new discoveries. Chaney
was ahead of his time in make-up and had many personal
secrets which died with him. But, clever as he was,
had he known the newer methods now available he
could have avoided much of the discomfort he felt
when he rehearsed and acted the role of Quasimodo in
The Hunchback of Notre Dame.

Ability to add or subtract age is the mark of the
relative genius of a make-up artist. Age first attacks the
neck. Shadows are painted in with reds or browns, and
cords are intensified and made stringy by the same color-
ation. Scores of grayish-blue or black lines, no larger
than a thin thread, are placed at the eyes and the mouth.
The inside of the eyelids are reddened, and shadows,
referred to as "balloon tires," are outlined under the
eyes. The illusion of fat, or the lack of it, is easily
established by clever use of red. Age is removed by
a reversal of the means described to add it.

Male players with strong lines of character in their
faces frequently avoid make-up except where it is re-
quired for radical changes of appearance. Wallace Beery
and Ronald Colman, as examples, find that the distinc-
tive facial configurations nature gave them not only fit
without make-up into many characterizations, but have
become personal trade-marks of great monetary value.

Young leading men and women, whose youth is a
major asset, usually wear a clay-yellow make-up, which
gives them a clear, white complexion on the screen.

[150]

Making Folks Over

Young people with red cheeks are practically forced
into this make-up, because too much red in the face
often photographs as a black, or grayish blotch.

A seemingly perfect make-up may prove unsuitable
when tested by actual photography. Only long experi-
ence with cameras and film brings to make-up artists
a sixth sense of how a make-up will photograph and
even then the best of them sometimes guess wrong.

"Most of our unpleasant surprises," Jack Dawn has
said, "come from reflected light. We know what to
expect from the spectrum of the direct lights which we
use in our make-up rooms. But when that light hits
something red, say a red dress, it reflects with an in-
creased amount of that color. Red, of course, photo-
graphs, but it photographs dark.

"Reflections from a red dress on the cheeks of a
narrow face makes these cheeks appear sallow on the
screen. High lights become middle tones, and the
delicacy of true beauty can be distorted into ugliness
by the wrong use of color.

"The darkness with which red photographs is just as
conspicuous on the screen as the color red is vividly
arresting when it is seen. Red must be applied very
carefully or the design of a beautiful girl's face will be
spoiled.

"An example is the face of Jeanette AlacDonald. She
has a fine, oval face. Very little rouge is used in her
make-up, and that is brushed along her cheekbones
horizontally. This avoids producing a lengthening effect
which would result if the rouge shadow added a vertical
line in the curve of her cheek."

[151]

Talking Pictures

Dawn added that a costume with a white yoke often
reflects so much light under an actress' chin that the
camera does not record the actual shadow, and a dou-
ble chin may appear which is not there at all.

Properties or parts of settings sometimes create reflec-
tions which do strange tricks inside the camera, and
impair the planned effect of a make-up. Work stops
until cures are found. A dress may need to be remade,
or reflections from furniture or mirrors ended by rub-
bing putty over the offending object.

The most popular feminine screen stars use less than
half the make-up for street wear that the average girl
or woman does. Norma Shearer contents herself with
a dab of lipstick. Joan Crawford uses a bit of powder
and very little rouge. The star soon learns the danger
of too much make-up, except in deliberate application
for a specific character effect.

Hair is a most important commodity in any studio
make-up department. Two costume pictures, May time
and Parnelly in which many hirsute characters took part,
required the use of much hair. Some wag has said that
the make-up department of the studio had "hair enough
to put a beard on the man in the moon; hair enough to
make a mattress for an elephant."

Wigs and beards require artistry in handling. The
artist must study the way the hair lies on the skin of his
subject, and then carefully set in his strands to follow
these specific curves and dips. A good artificial beard
cannot be distinguished from the natural, even in the
most severe close-up, but a beard badly applied will
betray itself if a few strands run in false directions.

[152]

Making Folks Over

o

Wigs are fragile and for screen plays in which many
are used, a wig repair man is at hand. Wigmaking is a

separate craft. Most make-up men can make a good
wig in an emergency, but normally the best wigs are
created by men and women who do nothing else. As
in the placing of a beard on the face, the expression of
art in a wig is the placing of the strands of hair into
the meshes of the wig cloth so that they lie exactly
as would real hair.

To make-up experts the items on their daily order
sheets are simple routine. The following is no unusual
excerpt from such orders: "Make-up for tomorrow:
two Chinese fan-tan dealers ; six policemen with handle-
bar mustaches, yintage of 1902; a Filipino murderer;
an old woman with one eye. . . ." Make-up is an
essential tile amongr the hundreds combined into our
motion picture mosaic.

With no intention to seem derogatory in any sense
to the operators of a beauty shop, we remind our
readers that there should be no confusion between the
workers in a commercial beauty shop and a skilled film
studio make-up artist. The beauty shop operator need
only enhance beauty already present, or distract atten-
tion from facial faults. The make-up artist must know
sculpture. In fact one of the leaders of this new pro-
fession was a sculptor of reputation for years.

The make-up man must haye the equivalent of a col-
lege postgraduate's knowledge of chemistry, for with
special formulas he literally molds a new face over that
of an actor. He must know as much about lighting
and photography as a cameraman, for if he mistakes the

[153]

Talking Pictures

photographic effect of any one make-up, hours of labor
will be lost.

Motion picture make-up is so tied in with studio re-
quirements that a make-up artist serves an apprentice-
ship for several years before he is allowed to work on
important assignments. Studio make-up departments are
recruited from the most imaginative employees of
beauty shops, and from research workers in factories
manufacturing cosmetics. The studio make-up leaders
of today, however, are either actors who became in-
terested in the art from personal experiments, or former
painters or sculptors.

The art of the screen has advanced greatly in the
past decade, but it has been able to advance no faster
than the art of make-up. In arts such as that of the
screen play, or the stage play, there are few contribut-
ing artists whose contributions rank in importance to
that of the studio make-up expert. The Good Earth,
with its changing of American faces into Chinese, is
only one of a number of pictures which could not have
been made ten years ago when make-up men were less
expert.

[154]

16

THE DIRECTOR

No men doing the same work vary so greatly in
temperament and methods as motion picture directors.
They all seek the same goal, a story translated to the
screen in a manner which is realistic, appealing, and
human, but the roads they take toward this goal are
widely different. Each one is distinctly individual in
his methods. One will make a great success using
methods exactly opposite to those of a fellow director
on a neighboring stage, who will also turn out success-
ful photoplays. Some direct with speed and, after one
rehearsal, impatiently call, "Camera!" the traditional
signal to begin photography. Some are slow and
methodical, rehearsing many times. Some are mural
painters, making their photographed effects with broad
sweeping strokes. Others paint miniatures, spending
hours to get the exact expression they want on a
player's face.

Many are specialists who do one kind of thing well,
and never vary from that field. Others set no limits
to their directorial ambition, except that the story thev
handle be strong and worth wThile. Some directors do
their best work with men; others get more emotional
response from women.

However different they may be individuallv, all

[155]

Talking Pictures

directors meet on one common ground. They all are
specially and acutely sensitive* to the drama of life, for
they all have the same central hobby, an enthusiastic,
abiding interest in people. A good director cannot be
a grouch or a recluse. He must have an insatiable love
for, and interest in, his own kind. And every director,
whether he will admit it or not, is a practicing psy-
chologist.

The principal tools with which a director works are
men and women. A director is judged by the logic
and accuracy with which he fits actors and actresses
into the parts and the plot of a fictitious story. It is
here that individuality of the director becomes most evi-
dent. Each director will have different methods of get-
ting* the ultimate in emotional reaction from the cast
of his picture.

One director will be very brusque and businesslike.
Another will patiently explain each scene quietly and
in great detail. W. S. Van Dyke is an example of the
first school, Sidney Franklin of the second. Sidney
Franklin, unconsciously, is an extremist in his method.
He speaks in such an abnormally low, quiet voice that
his players find themselves giving unusual concentra-
tion to every word he says.

The director must know his story so thoroughly that
he senses the exact moment when actors should be sub-
dued or their actions. intensified. Actors depend on di-
rectors to give them the necessary connection between
scenes. If a player worried about tempo, the distraction
would interfere with his creation of a perfect individual
scene. It is the director's responsibility to be certain

[156]

The Director

that each scene joins smoothly with the previous scene.

Directors come from many vocations. Clarence
Brown was an automobile engineer; Sam Wood, a real
estate salesman; George Cukor, a stage director; Frank
Capra, an engineer; Gregory La Cava, a cartoonist;
Mitchell Leisen, an architect; William K. Howard, a
salesman. The overwhelming majority, however, were
actors. D. W. Griffith, Cecil B. DeAlille, Robert Z.
Leonard, Jack Conway, Harry Beaumont, Charles
Brabin, the late Richard Boleslawski, and W. S. Van
Dyke were all actors originally.

Just below actors in point of numbers are ex-
cameramen and ex-assistant directors. Ex-cameramen
include Mervyn LeRoy, Victor Fleming, and Sidney
Franklin. Humberstone and Taggart are named among
those who rose from the post of assistant director.

Directors are master salesmen. They convince the
players by various psychological methods that their in-
terpretation of the emotion required for a particular
scene is correct. Some stars respond better when han-
dled by certain directors than by others. For this
reason a star will often have the same director for
four or five consecutive pictures.

New players of apparent potentialities but compara-
tively little actual creative experience place the heaviest
strain on a director's ability.

Cecil B. DeAlille once cast a beautiful unknown girl
to play the lead in an important picture. The girl had
no professional experience except brief employment in
a small stock company. She had a beautiful face, an
even, sunny disposition, and a lovely smile.

[157]

Talking Pictures

But for the first week of the picture the last two
assets seemed destined to turn into liabilities. Life had
been so pleasant, success had come so easily, that the
young actress could do little else but smile.

But the picture called upon her to be the center of a
very tragic situation. DeMille talked and explained,
but the actress only smiled, and her tragic scenes were
wooden and unconvincing. It seemed impossible to
break the psychological barrier which kept back the
deeper emotions of the girl. It was obvious from her
vitality and her abounding health that those emotions
were present in her soul. How could they be brought
to the surface?

DeMille, as a last resort, determined to use harsh
methods. He called the girl and her brother to his
office. The invitation to the brother was deliberate.
People are much more sensitive to a psychological slap
in the face if a member of the family is present.

Brusquely, he told the girl she was discharged, that
he was putting another actress in her place. In an in-
stant the psychological barrier melted. She fell on her
knees by DeMille's chair. She wept. She told him that
his action would ruin her professional career.

DeMille picked up a hand mirror which he had
placed conveniently on his desk. Handing it to her, he
said, "Now look at yourself. See how relaxed you are.
See the muscles in your face. At last you have released
your deeper emotions. Look at yourself again; then
look at these pictures."

He handed her photographs of herself in scenes
from the photoplay.

[158]

The Director

The actress stood up. "I see what you mean," she
said. "I can do it now."

Realizing then the emotional reactions required of
her, she was magnificent in her final attempt at the
scenes in which she had formerly failed. Those scenes
raised her to stardom, and during her career on the
screen she was an acknowledged leader in flawless emo-
tional acting. In such methods of lifting a player to
higher, greater interpretative levels, one finds one of
the many valuable contributions of the director.

The unit manager is responsible for the business
details of a production, but he is seldom on the set. He
keeps ahead of the director by inspecting sets in proc-
ess, spacing them so that thev are ready when needed.
This prevents waste in stage space. He arranges trans-
portation of food, supplies, and personnel. He makes
certain that actors working in other productions will
be ready for a call to his picture on specific days. He
works closely with the assistant director and usually
he has been one.

On the other hand, the assistant director seldom
leaves the set. He is by the side of the director every
minute of a working day. He is always the first to
appear in the studio, the last to leave. When large
crowds must be sent "on location," he may arrive at the
studio at 4:00 a. M. and finish his work at midnight.

Weeks before a picture starts he, in collaboration
with the unit manager, "breaks down" a scenario into
its special requirements for wardrobe, actors, both prin-
cipals and minor players, settings, properties, make-up,
lighting, cameras, sound equipment, and locations.

[159]

Talking Pictures

Every activity is scheduled by days. Production time
may vary in length from twenty days to several months.
In a large studio the unit managers and unit assistant
directors report daily to the studio production manager.
He balances all the requirements of all working com-
panies against the available studio space and facilities,
and allots these accordingly.

The assistant director prepares the "3:00 o'clock
call." This will specify the types, if minor players, and
the costumes. If the call is for an outdoor setting, and
the weather is cloudy, a second and "alternate" call
will be posted specifying work on an inside set. His
"chart" indicates to the director, and to all the cast and
technicians, which players will appear on specific sets
on specific days. It also gives a cue for wardrobe and
make-up. The 3 o'clock call is filed with the casting
office at 3:00 p. m. of the day before it becomes
effective.

The assistant director directs the "background ac-
tion" of big scenes. Suppose the leading lady and lead-
ing man are having an argument on the curbstone of a
busy street intersection. If the street were empty, the
scene would be absurdly ineffective. It would lack
atmosphere.

But if other people are to be on the street, they must
act in an acceptable manner without interfering with
the work of the principals. Assistant directors of such
a scene give silent cues to previously rehearsed players,
taxi drivers, messenger boys, and truck drivers so that
they may come casually and naturally into the scene
from different directions.

[ 160]

The Director

Assistant directors and unit managers train them-
selves to be calm. Thev are so accustomed to strange,
immediate demands that thev accept them as routine.
If a director suddenly would sav, "I must have Siamese
twins on the set at 9:00 a. m. tomorrow," without a
flicker of an eyelash a trained assistant would go to a
telephone. At the appointed time the twins would be
on hand.

And these men are trained to prepare against any
possible contingency. If a girl is required to run down
a flight of stairs it is customary to order two or three
duplicate gowns for her. Actresses have fallen under
such circumstances and ripped their clothes. Delays
caused by accidents of this kind would cost many times
the price of a second gown.

Newspapers once ridiculed a certain unit manager
who had been seen loading several huge boxes of corn-
flakes to be used as "snow" in the Arctic. But the unit
manager had studied Arctic weather charts, and he
knew that freak weather occasionally keeps snow out of
the skies and of! the ground for weeks, even at the
Arctic Circle. Had the company been delayed by lack
of snow, a loss of thousands of dollars would have
resulted.

On location, unit manager and assistant director be-
come hotel managers. Complaints about food and hous-
ing come to them. Tact and diplomacy are prerequisite
qualities of these men. Xo one who has the desire to
work only eight hours a day should aspire to their
positions. They are the hardest jobs in the film cata-
logue. But they are the most satisfying to an ambitious

[161]

Talking Pictures

man. They both provide perfect training for positions
either as director or associate producer.

So valuable is an assistant director to a director that
the two usually work in "double harness/' A director
will often have the same assistant for years. They grow
so attuned to each other that sometimes incidents arise
which suggest mental telepathy.

This dialogue actually occurred between a director
and an assistant director :

Director: "I decided last night we would use a Chip-
pendale dining set instead of the one I looked at yes-
terday."

Assistant: "It's here."

Director: "I also decided that it would be better to
have a Japanese houseboy than that colored maid."

Assistant: "He's on the set and made up."

These three men, the director, the unit manager, and
the assistant director, are the channel through which
most of the money flows into the making of a picture.
It has been stated earlier that preparation of a picture
requires one half of the total time; photography one
sixth; and completion one third.

But in the direction and photographic third occurs
the major portion of the expense. Here costly settings,
gowns, properties and well-paid actors and technicians
are concentrated. False judgment can cause heavy
financial loss at this point. To avoid this, and to get
the finest dramatic and emotional effects for the least
expenditure, is the joint problem of the director and
his two immediate associates.

[ 162 ]

The Director

No one shares the burden, however, for artistic-
quality. That belongs to the director alone. It cannot be
emphasized too strongly that while all the arts needed to
make a photoplay do not come under the control of
the director, he is responsible for the smooth laving of
more tiles in our finished film mosaic than any other
film artisan. His importance in the film making struc-
ture cannot be overestimated.

[t63]

17

THE STAGE IS SET

The preliminary preparations have been made. The
first sets have been erected on a stage and are ready for
actual production. The cameraman, the property man,
the electrician, the sound engineer, and others have
been preparing for the period of production in the same
manner as the scenario writer, the director, the stars,
the casting director, the art director, and the make-up
expert.

There is a great difference between the stages of
today's talking picture era and those of the silent period
of the cinema prior to 1927. Basically, stages are barn-
like structures varying from one hundred to three hun-
dred feet in length, and from fifty to a hundred feet in
width. In exterior height they vary between forty and
one hundred and ten feet.

Externally, today they are made of stucco and ce-
ment which keep out sound. They are solid and sub-
stantial in appearance. In the days of silent pictures they
were light wood or steel frame structures, the latter
having either canvas or glass side walls. In the silent pic-
ture era it made no difference whether doors were open
or shut. In summer, side walls were raised and the
actors worked in the full view of those employed on
the studio property.

[164]

The China Seas — in Hollywood

Jeanette MacDonald in screen adaptation of The Firefly
Director Robert Z. Leonard at center.

Illuminating engineer inspects electric switchboard of studio
using 600,000 kw. hours a month

The Stage Is Set

Today the walls are solid. The structure has the ap-
pearance of a bleak, windowless jail. Its interior is pro-
tected against external sound by two heavy "ice-box"
doors, with a small waiting space within. This is pro-
vided so that a person entering the outer door after the
warning red light of a "live" stage flashes, can remain
in the provided space until the stage is again "dead."
He never enters the second door to the actual interior
while a scene is being photographed.

"Shooting" on the stage has stopped us in the waiting
space. But shooting is now over. Door number two
opens and we are beckoned to the stage. We blink our
eyes in semidarkness. Far above us are shadowy plat-
forms along which electricians may move, adjusting
overhead lighting. Overhead are the tracks of light-
weight cranes used to carry heavy equipment.

The scene may be of a telephone booth in a far cor-
ner of this big structure, or a reproduction of the British
House of Commons, crowding every inch to the door-
way.

The walls are padded with a chemical wool which
absorbs sound, but does not reflect it. It takes a great
deal of voice volume to call across a stage. In your
homes and offices you are accustomed to the aid given
you by the bounce of your voice against hard walls and
windows. There cannot be a bounce of this kind on a
sound stage. In your home you have two ears to sep-
arate the direct sound from the bounce. But in sound
recording, at present, the recording system has but one
"ear" and cannot do this.

We see a long metal pole which looks, despite its

[165]

Talking Pictures

gadgets, exactly like an old-fashioned well sweep. At the
end of the pole there is a round object about the size of
a cannon ball used in i860. The "well sweep" is a "mi-
crophone boom." The cannon ball is the microphone.
The sweep permits the microphone to follow a player
as he stands up or sits down, walks to the right, left,
straight ahead, backs up, or climbs a stairway.

The microphone is centered with a disk slightly larger
than a silver dollar. This is the entrance to the interior
of the microphone. Just inside is a diaphragm, not
unlike that in the mouthpiece of a telephone. The voice
sets up a vibration in this diaphragm, exactly as with
the telephone, which in turn sets up a varying oscilla-
tion of electrical current impulses. If the scene is made
on location, these impulses are carried over a wire to a
portable recording machine. Usually, they are carried
to a permanent apparatus in a building which may be
adjacent to the stage, or some distance from it.

Formerly, the microphone was long and slim, like a
vacuum bottle, with a separate protuberance at the bot-
tom for the diaphragm. Later it was made round be-
cause the slim form and separate diaphragm caused
malformations of the sound waves as they went over its
uneven surface. These malformed waves were part of
annoying "ground noises" in early sound reproduction.

The stage is padded to prevent malformations of
sound in larger and more vicious forms. Its special
acoustics bring the voice to the microphone, but very
little farther. Sound recording must not be complicated
by sounds reflecting at different angles from furniture
or five or six different wall surfaces.

[166]

The Stage Is Set

The present round microphone form allows the sound
waves to pass smoothly around the microphone as air
passes smoothly around a modern airplane wing, and
distorting air bubbles are thus reduced. Perfect sound
waves are spherical, just as the circles which spread out
when a stone is tossed into a pool are circular. Two men
control the microphone. One, the "boom man," op-
erates the boom, moves it to follow the players as they
move through a scene.

The company recording engineer may be high above
the set in a sound-proof booth with double glass win-
dows put in a side of the upper part of the stage, or in
a portable, equally sound-proof booth placed just off
the set itself. Or he may wear head telephone receivers.

In all instances his equipment is the same. His fingers
are on several dials, not unlike those of a radio, which
regulate the volume of sound delivered to the record-
ing machines. His eyes watch a dial on which a needle
flickers quickly, showing how much recording cur-
rent the voices of the actors are generating. With his
loud-speaker or headset he listens to what is being said
to the microphone on the set in front of him. iVs the
sound is delivered to his ears, his fingers on the dials
raise or lower the volume at his trained discretion.

In front of us is a strange appearing device called
the "rotumbulator." This is a camera platform so con-
structed that in a second it can run noiselesslv to the top
of a heavy eight-foot post. On its moving circular base
it can move up and down and sideways. The whole
structure is on rubber wheels and one man can move it
noiselessly backward or forward on special aluminum

[ i67]

Talking Pictures

rails, a score or hundreds of feet if needed. When
moved in this manner, the effect achieved is called a
"trucking shot." When the camera moves in a quarter
or half circle sideways on its own stationary axis, its
action is referred to as "panning."

Another form of camera platform is the "boom."
The boom is of duralumin, or very light steel, and,
when horizontal, extends forward some twenty odd feet
from a rear weighted base. For "shots" following per-
sons up a stairway or climbing a tree, it can shoot its full
length almost directly upward and swing in a complete
circle. There is also a smaller boom which duplicates
the work of the rotumbulator.

The head cinematographer, or director of photog-
raphy, never physically touches the camera, except to
satisfy himself anent pictorial composition adjustments.
He stands near it, usually in discussion with the "gaffer"
or head electrician. The "gaffer" may have under him
six or a hundred electricians, depending on the lighting
required.

At the request of the cameraman the gaffer gives
orders, "Kill that spot," meaning turn off the spotlight;
"Give me that rifle right over here," meaning turn the
beam of that special focused light on this or that player;
or "Silk that broad," meaning put a wood frame
covered with light gray silk over that "broad," or type
of floor lamp, in order to cut down its illumination. By
these and other instructions, couched in equally vivid
and exclusive slang, the illumination of the scene pro-
ceeds until it completely satisfies the trained eye of the
head cinematographer.

[ 168]

The Stage Is Set

The head cinematographer has at least two assistants.
The operative cameraman sits on a tiny folding seat
which is fastened to the post of the rotumbulator. He
seldom leaves this seat while the scene is being lighted
or photographed. He checks the focus and makes lens
adjustments at the order of the head cinematographer.

The lesser assistant in importance keeps the camera
clean, carefullv polishes the lenses, of which there are
from five to nine in an outfit. He also sees that the
"filters" used to intensify one special spectrum color
value, and the "optical disks" and "gauzes" (to dim the
outlines of a scene for a specific dramatic purpose) are
in order.

When a scene is completed he walks before the
camera with a blackboard called a "slate." This bears the
name of the picture, the cameraman, and the number
of the scene as listed in the scenario, and the number
of the "take." It serves as a guide wThen the film is de-
veloped in the laboratory and in the first processes of
"cutting" or editing.

The advance in photography has been very great in
the last decade. Lenses and films are 50 per cent faster
and scenes can be photographed with 50 per cent less
artificial illumination.

Several men in more or less clean overalls may be
seen rushing around moving portions of sets and furni-
ture; moving the rotumbulator when needed; perform-
ing a great deal of valuable semiskilled labor. These
men are the "grips."

A good grip is much esteemed by a director. He
knows the physical side of work on a set so well

[ 169]

Talking Pictures

that he performs a prodigious amount of constructive
labor in a day with great efficiency. Normally a grip
is very graceful in his physical movements. He has to
be. A grip needs physical size, it is true, but an awk-
ward, large man could be a veritable bull in a china
shop, overturning rare vases, scratching priceless an-
tiques, and in general being more troublesome than
valuable.

Just out of sight of the set, a man is busy scrambling
eggs on a gas plate. He is a property man giving a final
touch to food which will be immediately required on
the scene. Another property man is placing a vase of
roses on a table. The roses are too long, so he goes to
his "prop box," a portable case about six feet high which
moves on rollers. He takes out a pair of scissors and
clips the stems of the roses.

But scissors are only one item in this "Pandora's
Box." In it are the immediate "hand props" which may
be needed in the current scene: the mortgage on the
old family place, a Bible, a fountain pen, calling cards
(printed in advance with the character's cast name),
and a host of other articles. It also has a large standard
inventory. This inventory is planned to reduce delays
which might be caused by unexpected emergencies.
How this box can be a protection against emergencies
is obvious when one reads the list of the contents.

It includes pens, pencils, paper, aspirin, pins, bandages,
cigars, cigarettes, hammers, nails, tacks, mucilage, paste,
eyewash, mouth wash, chemical "blood," fuller's earth
(for the dramatic soiling of clothes), picture hangers,
absorbent cotton, stamps, furniture polish, silver polish,

[ 17° ]

The Stage Is Set

nail polish, nail files, razors, razor blades (more often
used for cutting film tests than the star's beard ! ) , thread
(ten kinds, colors, sizes), needles, darning cotton, head-
ache powders, collodion, coffee, tea, rouge, cold cream,
lipstick, copper wire, picture wire, drinking glasses,
cups, and almost anything else which may be requested.

The property man is the company representatiye from
a huge four-story building with an inventory of three
hundred and fifty thousand articles. He goes to head-
quarters night and morning for special properties.

A trained interior decorator carefully adjusts window
curtains. Under the orders of the art director she has
selected and arranged the furniture, either antique or
modern, and completed the set with curtains, pictures,
hangings, vases, china, and silver.

The woman in a white uniform is the studio nurse.
She is on call in the studio hospital for actual profes-
sional services, and she gives technical advice about any
scene concerned with hospitals, nursing, or medicine.

The assistant director controls the physical assem-
bling of all this detail. Close by the chair of the di-
rector is a young man with an open copy of the scenario
and a poised pencil. He is the set secretary. As in-
terior and exterior scenes are sometimes photographed
weeks apart, it is his job to see that an actor wearing
a black hat and carrying gloves does not step to a
closed doorway and later enter the room with a gray
hat and no gloves. Under this secretary system such
errors are today almost impossible. The secretary keeps
careful notes on each scene, even to the size and num-
ber of the dots in the leading man's tie.

[171]

Talking Pictures

A middle-aged woman whose needle-pricked hands
betray her profession, stands in readiness. She is from
the wardrobe. She will save a great deal of time during
the day by adjusting flounces and pressing wrinkled
materials, or making quick repairs if a dress should be
torn.

When the stars arrive, make-up experts and hair-
dressers accompany them. In a scene full of action,
make-up suffers. The deft, quick touches of a waiting
expert again save time.

Everything is prepared for the presence of the actors.
The boom man stops adjusting the microphone. He
steps before it, calls, "One, two, three, four, five, six,
seven, eleven, sixty-six!" The emphasis on the letter s
is to test the ability of the sound recording system to
record satisfactorily consonants with hissing sounds or
sibilants.

Through a loud-speaker a hollow voice calls, sound-
ing very odd and different in the echoless room, "O.K.
for sound." The company sound engineer, or "monitor,"
or "mixer," has declared the delicate apparatus he con-
trols ready for the day. The operative cameraman
makes his final physical adjustments.

We stated that the "camera" is fastened to a platform
of the rotumbulator. Over the camera is attached its
"blimp" or "bungalow." The cast-aluminum blimp or
camera cover fastens over the camera when it is in action
and makes it sound tight. This is necessary, for as yet
no fully effective method of silencing a motion picture
camera has been discovered.

The "clicking" noise one hears is integral to motion

[172]

The Stage Is Set

photography. This is because, as Edison learned, mo-
tion pictures really do not move steadily. They "stop
and go." Were the film to travel back of the camera
lens in a continuous ribbon, it would record nothing
but a blur. What really happens is that a ratchet effect
pulls one section of film, or "frame," back of the lens.
It halts there for a fraction of a second to release the
film, and then pulls another and repeats the process until
it is stopped. A completed photoplay is a succession
of thousands of individual small photographs, which
through an optical illusion, explained by the Law of
Persistence of Vision, gives the effect of movement.

It must be nearly time for the stars and the director
to come on the set. The property man is cutting cig-
arettes into different lengths. This chore will save him
time later, for, if his leading man smokes during a scene,
progressively shorter cigarettes are needed to show the
time lapse. A scene which is shown with all its close-ups,
long-shots, and medium-shots in five or ten minutes on
the screen may have taken three days to make.

The big inner ice-box door is opening. The players
and the director enter. In a moment rehearsals will start.
In half an hour the first scene will be taken. Technical
workers are busily engaged in from twenty to thirty
different activities, and their separate contributions
rapidly begin to come to a focus. To the assistant direc-
tor the head cameraman has reported "Ready!" To the
cameraman has come word from his head electrician
that every light is in its proper place, and competently
manned. The assistant director sees that the stars and
featured players are all in their portable dressing rooms,

[173]

Talking Pictures

and in the hands of hairdressers and make-up experts.
Gowns and other costumes have been brought on the
set from the wardrobe. It is in these last few minutes of
preparation that one senses still further the remarkable
technique of co-operation between different technical
elements which is the basis of modern efficient motion
picture production.

[174]

18

"LIGHTS! CAMERA!"

The set is ready. All technicians are at their posts.

For a final adjustment of wardrobe and make-up, the
stars scatter to their portable dressing rooms which are
approximately eight feet square and have in them make-
up tables, proper lights, and couches for rest between
scenes.

The director confers with his assistant, who checks
the details of the day with his chief. The assistant
has already placed the cameras in the position indi-
cated by the director the night before. "Stand-ins,"
minor players who in size and coloration resemble the
stars, have been before the hot lights for at least half
an hour. The cinematographer has completed the illu-
mination for the first scene. If the scene is a hotel lobby
and requires a crowd of forty bellboys, maids, guests,
and clerks, the assistant has already rehearsed his "back-
ground action/' the natural movements customary
in such a setting.

The director, satisfied that everything is in readiness,
glances over his notes. Most directors make notes on
cards, envelopes, or sheets of paper. Some keep all their
plans in their minds. But if notes are made, they indi-
cate clearly the director's personality.

One man, highly methodical, makes a neat chart that

[175]

Talking Pictures

looks like a graph of a football game. Others dictate to
a stenographer immediately before coming on the set,
and they refer frequently to their carefully typed notes.
Others depend on a few scribbled remarks made while
riding to the studio. The methods to be used are the
director's own problem. Although he has much work
to do in a day, no one else can do it but himself, for
he alone is responsible for results.

There are no rules for a director's personal prepara-
tions. But somehow he usually has available the results
of hours of study made the night before. Sitting down
alone with his script, he plotted out his day's actions,
entrances, exits, and "business." This last comprises
gestures, movements, and significant handling of prop-
erties like papers, guns, or bottles, which may advance
the dramatic action.

The stand-ins step out and thankfully relax into chairs.
The players are called before the camera and rehearsal
begins. Rehearsals may last only a few minutes or they
may extend for days. Their length depends entirely
upon the emotional importance and physical size of the
scene. It took days to rehearse fifty men in the scene in
which Parnell was dismissed as head of the Irish party.
A scene of a man putting a nickel in a dial telephone
could be filmed within twenty minutes.

Length of rehearsal varies with directors. Some get
their best results with multiple rehearsals. Others "run
through the lines" once. Then, if the memories of the
players are not at fault, photography is ordered. Tech-
nical interruptions during a rehearsal are frequent.

The mixer, stationed in his booth, is listening to the

[i76]

"Lights! Camera!"

voices as they come to him through the microphone.
He may say, "Miss Colbert will have to be just a little
louder on that last sentence, Mr. Lloyd. She moves
away from the microphone faster than we can follow,
and her voice dies."

During these proceedings, the cameraman is scurry-
ing here and there. He has completed his lighting
preparation with stand-ins so that no more heavy moving
of lights is necessary. But now, with the stars on the
set, he perfects the job. Bv voiceless pantomime, in
order not to interrupt the rehearsal, he signals elec-
tricians "up high" to give more "backlight" on the red
hair of Jeanette MacDonald or to outline the broad
shoulders of Nelson Eddv with a spotlight's beam.

The director is satisfied. He calls, "We'll take it!"

All required lights are switched on. Because lights
create heat, rehearsal is usuallv done with about one
quarter illumination.

The propertv man takes a last look at a still picture
which was taken on the same set at the conclusion of
work the night before. He assures himself that all the
furniture and "hand props" are in their proper places;
that Mother has her sewing basket and Father his cigar,
which has been burned to the right length for the time
element involved.

The assistant director glances about to see that all the
actors required are properlv made up, in their places,
and ready for action.

The operative cameraman adjusts his lenses finally
and swings shut the soundproof covers of his "blimp."
His chief, the head cinematographer, takes one last look

[177]

Talking Pictures

at his lighting through a "blue glass," which resolves all
colors into their eventual black and white photographic
values. Using it, a trained cameraman can know ap-
proximately the appearance of the scene when the film
is developed, printed, and projected.

The boom man stands ready to swing the microphone
down, up, to the right, to the left, or straight ahead,
following the action of the scene as the players have
already rehearsed it.

The director calls, "Ready! Everybody quiet!" The
sound engineer presses one button. Some distance away,
in the central recording building, ten cams, or small
metal wheels, turn over in a small box. These wheels
have breaks in their surface so that as they turn in con-
secutive order they will make electrical contacts which
will set various different pieces of machinery into ac-
tion. Automatically the electrical contact broken by
cam number one cuts off the stage telephone and in-
sures absence of unexpected, extraneous sounds from
that source.

Cam number two starts a combination system of a
red light and an intermittent buzzer on the outside of
the stage. Under pain of instant discharge, no studio
employee may open the doors of a stage while this
warning signal is in operation. Cam number three closes
still another electrical circuit and starts the motors of
the recording machines. Cam number four does a sim-
ilar function for the motors of the camera. A fifth cam
operates a tiny light within the camera. This flickers
for a fraction of a second, and sensitizes the film with a
foggy mark which, when developed, indicates the si-

[178]

"Lights! Camera /"

multaneous start of sight and sound. Another cam does
the same fogging action inside the recorder. It takes a
few seconds for the speed of the recorder and the camera
to be absolutely together.

Such synchronization is the essential principle of
talking picture production. When this occurs a final
cam turns, and a bell rings as the signal for the actual
start of photography and recording.

The development of this automatic starting system
is an example of the refinements which clever minds
are steadily adding to the whole film production proc-
ess. In the early days of talking pictures, various indi-
viduals on the set, the assistant cameraman, the assistant
director and others gave the orders and made the motions
which are now accomplished by electrical contacts set
up by a few revolving metal wheels. Because of the
necessity of co-ordinating several human voices and per-
sonalities, it sometimes took three or four minutes to
accomplish what is now done in a few seconds. The
new method insures absolute svnchronization, and is
much easier on the nervous systems of players and tech-
nicians.

The signal bell has sounded. The boom man calls,
"Up to speed!" The director calls, "Camera !"

The scene is on. In all, only ten to twelve seconds
have elapsed. Not a sound is heard except the voices
of the players. The camera clicks busily in its blimp, but
not a click emerges from the metal cover. The phone
is disconnected. The stage doors cannot be opened. The
director cannot say a word. His directions must be
completed before the scene starts. In silent pictures he

[179]

Talking Pictures

directed as the scene proceeded, but in talking pictures,
once the signal is given, the actor is entirely "on his
own." Usually, unless it is a long shot establishing the
action, a scene takes less than a minute. An ordinary
talking picture contains about three hundred scenes. It
is exceptional for a scene to last eight minutes.

The scene ends. The director calls, "Cut!"

"We'll take it again," he says. "You were just a trifle
too slow at the start, Mr. Montgomery. This will af-
fect the sincerity."

The cameraman swings the blimp open and takes a
quick look at his camera to ascertain if he needs to
reload his film magazine. The director turns toward
the monitor's booth. That gentleman is holding his right
thumb upward. "It's O.K. for sound," the players are
told. If his thumb is down the scene is N.G. or no good,
for some sound recording reason.

They scatter for quick "dabs" at their make-up. The
blimp cover crashes down.

"All ready!" cries the assistant. The players take
their places.

"Camera!" cries the director, and the scene is re-
peated.

Ordinarily a director tries for three perfect negatives,
one with which to make prints in the United States,
one for foreign use, and one for reserve. But to get
these he may photograph the scene eight times or more.
When a scene starts, there is no interruption except
when a player "blows," or forgets his lines. Nothing
annoys players more, for invariably they are proud of
their ability to remember.

[ 180]

Sound engineer adjusts microphone at end of "Boom"
"Boom man" changes position of microphone during photographing

H

\

Electrician focusing a spotlight from above a set
A special arrangement of "babv" spotlights to give an artistic lighting effect

"Lights! Ca?nera!"

On a small scene there may be only one camera. On
a big scene a dozen or more may be used to catch the
action from different angles. Such multiple use of
cameras is common for crowd effects like those shown
in Ben-Hur and The Big Parade.

When the so-called "establishing" long-shot of the
entire set, with all the players and action, is taken, the
players are far from the end of this sequence. They are
certain to be saying the same lines over and over, in
close-ups and medium shots, for one, two, or perhaps
several days.

These close-ups and "mediums" are "cut into" the
long-shot when the picture is finally assembled. The
close-up is probably one of the motion picture's five
great assets. Its increased size of faces "points up"
drama. The close-up is the factor that most definitely
sets the technique of the photoplay apart from that of
the stage play or the novel.

When on the set, life is hectic for the major players.
After an hour or more of intense concentration, a star
may have a few minutes away from the camera while
close-ups are taken of his leading lady. But he may not
rest. A tailor arrives to try a costume on him which
will be used five days later. The scenario writer brings
a revision of scenes which must be memorized before
the next day. The publicity department asks for a
photograph with a Siamese nobleman. An expert
arrives to give the star ten minutes' instruction in han-
dling an Australian bull-whip, which he must use in
the picture.

The minor players have an easier time than the stars.

[181 ]

Talking Pictures

The less ambitious among them read, play bridge, or
sew. Those who think of the future sit by the side of
the director, intently studying every move made by the
players, storing this information in their memories. Close
attention to the difficult technique of screen acting has
led unknowns to stardom.

The technicians engaged in making a motion picture
are not always completely absorbed by the concen-
trated, serious business of their work. Many incidents
have comic aspects. One tragicomic moment came on
the first day of "shooting" David Copperfield.

Tests had been made of hundreds of young boys in
every part of the United States, Canada, and Great
Britain. One of all these, and one only, would be chosen
to act the role of David Copperfield. Freddie Barthole-
mew came to Hollywood from England and his tests
proved admirable. During the first day under actual
camera conditions, the lad played his part as if he had
acted for years. Director George Cukor could hardly
contain his satisfaction.

Time was taken out for lunch. After lunch Freddie
came to the director. "Look, Mr. Cukor!" he cried, and
with great juvenile pride he showed a gap in the mid-
dle of his upper row of teeth. He had lost a tooth in a
hard French roll!

The confusion can be imagined. Players were sent
home. Cameramen were dismissed. Dentists were called
who worked all of the following night to prepare a
tiny tooth. Before nine the next morning, they arrived
with it. But the company had lost a half day's work
because a little boy had lost a tooth.

[182]

"Lights! Camera!"

In this chapter we have sketched the general technical
background of any and every scene taken within a
studio. In all studios this technique is much the same,
differing only in details. The physical settings and the
players, however, differ from day to day. One day a
stage may savor of Alaska, the next of Versailles; the
next of the Kremlin in Moscow. This constant change
to those within the industry constitutes a large part of
its irresistible charm and appeal.

But not all settings of a talking picture are indoors,
for, unlike the stage play, the photoplay may wander
as it wishes. Ever)' photoplay has some exteriors. Many
of these can be photographed on the studio property,
but others must be made outside. One picture may de-
mand that a company go outside for only a day. The
requirements of another may cause the company to
leave the studio for weeks, even months.

Interior work in the studio, and exteriors "on loca-
tion," are integral parts of the same picture making
process. They differ, however, quite widely in their
methods, in the mechanisms used. Because the work
within the studio is so much more complicated, requir-
ing so many more different elements, it has been dis-
cussed first.

[183]

19

"GOING ON LOCATION"

Location refers to any motion picture setting, built
or merely scenic, which requires a director to move his
stars, cameras, sound equipment, and properties outside
the gates of the studios. It does not include all outdoor
settings. Many of the greatest outdoor scenes ever
photographed have been made within the actual studio
enclosure. Space for outdoor settings varies within
studios from thirty to several hundred acres.

Great exterior settings built entirely within studio
fences include the Casino at Monte Carlo and its flank-
ing buildings (Blind Husbands); the Cathedral of Notre
Dame and its plaza (Hunchback of Notre Dame) ; the
Garden of Gethsemane (Sign of the Cross) ; the plaza of
Verona (Romeo and Juliet); the Bastille (A Tale of
Tuoo Cities); colonial New Orleans (Naughty Mari-
etta); and the exact-to-scale-size courtyard of San
Quentin Prison (The Big House).

When exterior settings, with all due regard for the
illusion desired, can effectively be built within the
studio, a great deal of time and work is saved. But
when a profusion of trees and vegetation, or natural
landscapes, or specialized backgrounds not easily dupli-
cated, are an essential to authenticity, it is necessary to
leave the studio and go to proper spots providing the

[184]

"Going on Location"

pictorial effect desired. In studio vernacular, this is
called "going on location."

Locations vary in distance from the studios. From
one studio it is a ride of only four blocks to a great pro-
ducing oil field. But thousands upon thousands of miles
were traveled to Africa and the Arctic by those players
and technicians who went "on location" to make, re-
spectively, Trader Horn and Eskimo.

The selection of locations is in the hands of an ex-
pert, the "location director." In his office one finds
several steel files. In these files are about five thousand
cards containing data on possible locations, 80 per cent
of which are w7ithin two hundred miles of the studios.

The variety of exteriors which are easily reached in
Southern California makes it a particularly advantageous
place in which to base motion picture studios. It offers
within forty miles the Pacific Ocean and the towering
Sierra Madre Mountains. Immediately to the east of
those mountains one finds the up-torn desolation of
Death Valley, the desert sand dunes in the region of
Yuma, Arizona, and the fertility of Imperial Valley.

From snowy peaks to a swim in front of a South Sea
shack erected at the ocean's edge is a matter of less than
three hours' driving time. In between, and just beyond,
one finds rolling hills and flat country which may du-
plicate any geographical section in all the world. Onlv
two or three hundred miles to the north and within a
small radius there are extraordinary scenic wonders such
as glacier-carved Yosemite National Park and the big
trees of the Sequoia National Park. A few hundred
miles due east is the Grand Canyon.

[ 185 ]

Talking Pictures

The location director keeps his five thousand cards
very carefully cross-indexed. Attached to each card are
pictures giving several views of the location. A survey
of the cards used at the various studios reveals the fol-
lowing information required for the adequate handling
of a location department:

The owner's name; the amount of the rental; the
distance from main highways, from piped water sys-
tems, and from electric lighting or power lines ; the con-
dition of roads leading to the location; its proximity to
good hotels; the potentialities of the terrain for the es-
tablishing of a camp; the number and location of tele-
phones, or distance from the nearest telephone line ; the
distance from the nearest grocery store, drugstore, doc-
tor, and hospital; the time the sun rises and sets and in
what direction it passes overhead in relation to the pos-
sible location of a contemplated setting ; the time of high
and low tides (if a seashore location) ; the location and
number of sanitary conveniences.

These cards are altered regularly to fit changing con-
ditions. Once a very lovely rocky beach seventy miles
from the studios was popular for attractive sea scenes.
There bold pirates landed with their loot. There, with
the spray of rock-churned waves as a background, lead-
ing men made photographed love to hundreds of screen
beauties. Since talkies were invented this beach has been
abandoned, for, while its beauty is untouched, a broad
motor highway, recently completed, parallels the ocean
within one block. Noise from passing automobiles makes
its use as a setting virtually impossible.

Perhaps the most frequently used single place in the

[ 186]

uGoi?ig on Location''''

world, cinematicallv speaking, is an old Spanish ranch
fifty miles north of Hollywood. Covering thousands of
acres, it provides an incredible number of different vistas.
A tangled acreage of hundred-year old oak trees is ap-
propriated named ''Sherwood Forest" after the famous
English forest it resembles. The Three Musketeers,
with Douglas Fairbanks, was one of the first of the hun-
dreds of pictures to take advantage of its special values.

Not far away is a lake, flanked on one side by other
forest land. It resembles lakes in the heart of Africa
and, because of this, lions have roamed its shores; hip-
popotami and elephants have swum in its waters. Still
another section of the ranch offers a lovely little stream
meandering through gentle, rolling hills. Like southern
England in everv respect, it has been the setting for
many British fox hunts.

Hills are hills the world over and therefore one hilly
ranch with a few trees mav serve for several radically
different locations. With a dozen straggling buildings

www C

erected in its valley, one ranch was an exact reproduc-
tion of the cattle town of Lincoln, New Mexico, scene
of the battle between two factions which was a high-
light in the tumultuous cinematic career of the bad man,
"Billy, the Kid."

Then for two vears the same ranch became actually
a segment of the Hopei province in China. Chinese
farmers by the score, provided with primitive water
wheels brought from China and working onlv with

w w .

Chinese tools, cultivated eight hundred acres to a ter-
raced height of three hundred feet.

It was mentioned that a certain beach can no longer

[187]

Talking Pictures

be used for locations because of a motor road. Like-
wise, the old Spanish Providencia Ranch, two miles
from the nearest studio and only twelve from the
farthest, provided scenes in The Covered Wagon, Blood
and Sand, and many other old pictures. It is seldom used
today for transcontinental airplanes pass over it.

Sandy dunes like those of the Sahara Desert may be
found in several places, near Oxnard and Barstow, Cali-
fornia, near Yuma, Arizona, and two hundred miles
north, at Guadalupe, California. In Guadalupe, where
the sand piles in great hills over an area ten miles long
and six miles wide, was placed fifteen years ago what
still remains the "record" location of all times. For
two weeks, at an average cost of forty thousand dol-
lars a day, twenty-five hundred men and women and
three thousand animals were encamped, working before
a towering reproduction of Rameses, an ancient Egyp-
tian city, for scenes in The Ten Commandments.

Catalina Island, twenty-eight miles off the coast, has
doubled for the South Seas innumerable times. One
of its blue coves has played the part of the Sea of
Galilee. Beautiful willow trees around a city reservoir,
high in the hills, make it ideal for eastern park scenes.

One town, near San Francisco, does a good business
doubling for New England. Producers willingly travel
four hundred miles to reach it, because it is one of the
few spots in all California which does not have palm,
orange, lemon, banana, or eucalyptus trees. Originally
built by a group of non-conforming Massachusetts
farmers, anything savoring of California's native Spanish
heritage has been kept from it.

[ 188]

"Going on Location'"

The popularity of California as a place for the wealthy
to retire makes it easy to find lovely homes of every
conceivable kind of architecture. Spanish, Italian, Nor-
man, French, British, and American schools are all
represented.

This versatility in architectural style has been respon-
sible for a unique charity. Years ago, certain women
whose houses had been frequently in demand bv motion
picture companies conceived the idea of gathering all
owners of pictorially attractive houses and gardens ad-
jacent to Los Angeles, Pasadena, and Santa Barbara into
what is now called the "Assistance League." The pic-
ture companies pay the usual rental for the use of these
homes, but the owners give the monev to the League
for the support of worthy Los Angeles charities.

Camps are not established for locations which can be
reached within a two hours, ride. On these, however,
adequate comfort and make-up facilities are built and a
hot noon meal supplied by a "chuck wagon" service.
These chuck wagons, a de luxe version of the kind used
for many years to feed cowboys on cattle round-ups,
care for as many as one hundred people in hotel style.
For large crowds, box lunches, prepared by organiza-
tions which do nothing else, are provided.

"Day locations" of this sort are not so popular with
players and technicians as the more distant ones because
of the very long hours they require. Sunshine is precious
to cameramen. Players need to arise at five to catch
the eight o'clock sun at a location fifty miles distant.
They do not leave work until sundown, which in sum-
mertime brings them home at 8:00 p. m. or later.

[ 189]

Talking Pictures

Life on camp locations is also keyed to the hours of
the sun, but, unless too long drawn out, is welcomed as
a change from routine. Knowing that good food and
relative comfort are prime requisites if camping workers
are to remain happy and efficient, one organization has
made a specialty of "movie camps." It can, on a twelve-
hour notice, fill orders to establish a camp for a thousand
men and women a hundred miles out on the desert, or a
similar rendezvous on the top of a ten-thousand foot
mountain peak.

Here they are provided with filet mignons, iced tea,
and inner-spring mattresses. Motion picture people
were not surprised when this competent company was
awarded the immense catering and housing contract for
Boulder Dam.

Requirements for a location on the Sahara-like sand
dunes near Yuma, Arizona, 280 miles from Hollywood,
illustrate the general location problems. The picture was
The Garden of Allah.

The location being relatively small, some fifty tent
cabins were built to house two hundred persons. Tents
were equipped with hot and cold water, electricity,
modern plumbing, and plain furnishings. A recreation
hall, which contained a store supplying such personal
items as razor blades and tooth paste, and needles and
thread, provided a place for social diversion and like-
wise acted as a theatre where the director and staff
could view the scenes photographed the previous day.
A warehouse was also required for such construction
items as one hundred and twenty-five thousand feet of
lumber, thirty-five hundred adobe bricks, two hundred

[ 19° ]

"Going on Location"

and fifty sacks of plaster, sixty kegs of nails, and fifteen
hundred yards of burlap.

Outdoor work develops its own specialists. One
cameraman seldom shoots a scene on a studio stage, for
his best work consists of filming sunsets, sunrises, and
beautiful cloud effects. Another cameraman has be-
come an Akeley expert. The Akeley camera looks
like a cheese set on end and can move in any direction
with twice the facility of its stage brother. An Akelev
expert can follow, in close-up, by means of a long tele-
scopic lens, an airplane in motion or a horse coming
down the stretch in the Derby. This expert, too, is
almost entirely used for work beyond the studio limits.

In similar manner, picture companies have traveled to
every nook and corner of the United States and Canada.
For westerns, companies have shot in Arizona, New
Mexico, Montana, Oregon, Washington, Colorado,
Idaho, and Wyoming. A company went twice to photo-
graph the Dionne quintuplets at Callander, Ontario.
The Mardi Gras at New Orleans has been the back-
ground for several pictures. One or more picture com-
panies usually arrange to have players at the Kentucky
Derby, working that spectacle into some photoplay.

The Army, Navy, and Marine Corps have been co-
operative at various times, allowing photographing of
their equipment, boats, and buildings when they were
for specific stories. Permission to photograph any gov-
ernmental equipment is only given by special arrange-
ment which can be withdrawn at any time. The Gov-
ernment departments have the right to approve the
manner in which the material is to be used in a picture.

[191]

Talking Pictures

The companies are also given to understand that each
permission is individual and does not constitute a
precedent.

In cases in which photographing close-ups on gov-
ernmental property would entail a delay of actual opera-
tions, establishing "long shots" alone are taken, and then
a portion of the boat or building concerned is built at
the studio under the supervision of service experts. In
this manner a portion of the landing deck of the air-
craft carrier Saratoga was constructed at the studio for
scenes in Hell Divers. For a submarine picture, Hell
Below, permission was granted to film exteriors at Pearl
Harbor, Hawaii. Interiors were built to exact scale at
the studio.

Many times night work is required to take scenes in
locations used for regular business during daylight
hours. Department stores are cases in point. One large
store has been used many times from 8:00 p. m. to
4:00 a. m. The agreement of the studio at such times is
that all cameras and lights will be rubber shod to prevent
injury to floors or showcases, and that any piece of
store furniture or goods, used during the action will be
replaced in perfect condition by the time the store opens
in the morning. In like manner theatres are quite often
used as locations from the close of the last show at
midnight until noon the next day.

Very rarely is permission given to photograph in a
prison or jail, but when a prison is to be photographed,
prison heads act as technical advisors and sets are built
to scale at the studios. An exact and imposing reproduc-
tion of the "Yard" at San Quentin Prison is still stand-

''Going on Location"

ing. It was built for The Big House and later used dur-
ing the filming of Criminal Code.

From this discussion of locations within America it
should not be thought that picture making is confined
to our continental borders.

For scenes in dramatic photoplays, companies have
gone from studios in London, Paris, Hollywood, Ber-
lin, and Nice, to everv corner of the globe. It is doubt-
ful if anyone exceeds the travel record of W. S. Van
Dyke. This director has covered over half a million
miles during his career. First he made many Westerns
in remote pans of the United States. Then he headed
two extended foreign "locations." He was in Africa
fourteen months with the thirty-five Hollywood tech-
nicians and players needed to make Trader Horn, and
for a similar length of time he was above the Arctic
Circle for Eskimo, with a staff of equal size.

For foreign locations there are endless complications
of passports, interpreters, vaccinations, income tax clear-
ances, local labor laws, transportation of food, the pro-
tecting of delicate films against excessive temperatures,
dryness, or humidity, and various other difficulties. But
Van Dyke contends that a location in darkest Africa,
with all its complications, is preferable to one any-
where within Southern California, for there are few
"movie fans" in darkest Africa! There he is able to
work without interruption from a curious and investi-
gating public.

Police protection is very essential to any picture mak-
ing outside the walls of the studio. The news, "The
movies are here," spreads rapidly over a countryside.

[193]

Talking Pictures

Once when Mary Pickford was taking scenes at a
small railroad station near a main automobile highway,
it took twenty motorcycle officers to handle traffic.

Careful attention to sanitary conditions is necessary
in order to maintain the health of a company on loca-
tion. The slightest carelessness may have serious con-
sequences. At times work of actors and technicians has
been seriously affected on location because someone
failed to supply sufficient bottled water. It is a well-
known medical fact that people when traveling are
more disturbed by a change from their accustomed
drinking water than from any other single cause.

Director W. S. Van Dyke gives much of the credit
for the success of his Arctic picture, Eskimo, to the
chef of a big Hollywood hotel. He says, "I took him
along because I knew that after fourteen months in
bitter cold and desolation only a fellow who could
make corned beef taste like lobster a la Newburg was
capable of keeping thirty-five men from individual and
collective murder!"

"Going on location' ' has social values which shrewd
producers have been quick to recognize. Work within a
studio is necessarily very businesslike. It is on locations
that players, director, and staff become better able to
appreciate one another as human beings. Leading men
find their "close-ups" are improved when they come to
know the cameraman, not just as an adjunct to the
camera, but as a person who also has flesh and blood
and sensibilities.

Stars discover that the director who works with stern
discipline on a studio stage is not a martinet, but a

[ 194]

"Goi?ig on Location"

charming conversationalist, an enjoyable friend. Friend-
ships have developed on location which have caused
directors and stars to insist on the same technical aides
year after year. This element of personal friendship is
a factor not to be overlooked when searching for the
reasons behind particularly s^ood work in anv specific
film.

[ 195

0

SOUND RECORDING

Sound recording in studios has standardized upon
the "light ray" method. In this method the motor of
the camera and the motor of the recording machine are
synchronized so that they run at exactly the same speed.

We have seen that when Edison, in 1886, began to
experiment with the motion picture, he did it not for
love of the cinema as such, but because he hoped
to create a talking picture and thereby to sell more
phonographs. This latter invention was the one which
intrigued him.

But he failed to develop a really practical principle of
synchronization, and the phonograph was an inade-
quate medium with which to reproduce sound in a large
theatre. While Edison contributed priceless inventions
to advance the process of silent film production and
projection, his interest declined as the talking picture he
sought defied his genius.

It was not until 1927 that the world had its first prac-
tical talking picture. It would serve no purpose here to
list the several score of inventors who have worked on
this problem since the time of Edison. Nor would it be
anything but confusing to enumerate the excursions into
one fruitless scientific bypath after another, before the
light ray method was discovered. Suffice it to say that

F i9<5]

H

K

)und engineer looks through soundproof windows to a talking picture set an

m

■$&*

IBM*"*'

Variable density light ray recording machine, studio type. The
light valve is at left of rectangular black box (center).

Sound Recording

for nearly four decades a talking picture formed the
goal of a long line of eager scientists. That it eluded
solution for forty years indicates the many scientific
problems involved.

In fact, the first talking picture was not made with
the light ray method. It was done by making an im-
pression on a wax record, the method used for so many
years in the phonograph industry. Difficulties in syn-
chronizing and final editing made this method less pop-
ular than the highly practical light rav svstem. Wax-
record recording is still used in film studios, but usually
only in one particular and specialized manner.

The principle of the microphone has been described.
It is understood that words spoken before the micro-
phone on the stage have been translated into varying
electrical currents. These now come over a wire from
the stage to the recording machines.

The current comes to an "amplifying panel. " This
panel is similar to those used in radio broadcasting studios
and long distance telephone exchanges. The purpose of
such a panel is to amplify the original weak signal from
point of origin by approximated a million times until
it is strong enough to be projected by telephone for
thousands of miles, or to be broadcast over the radio,
or in our case to activate the li^ht modulator of the
talking picture sound recording machine.

There are two main svstems of recording sound by
light rays. One is called the variable density method;
the other, the variable area method.

In the variable density method a beam of light passes
through a slit about one thousandth of an inch wide into

[197]

Talking Pictures

a "light valve." This is a metal box with a front and
sides, but with no back. It is about the size of three
small match boxes laid together sideways. Inside the
box, forming the tiny slit between them, are two
flattened duralumin wires which look like tiny ribbons
placed edge to edge.

The current generated by the actors' voices reaching
the stage microphone causes these wires to come closer
together and to go wider apart. The movement of the
wires varies the slit and permits the beam of light to
pass through into a tightly closed rectangular box,
through which a reel of film is moved very smoothly
and uniformly and not with the interrupted "stop and
go" motion of camera and projector. On an eighth-inch
path of this film the beam, acting as a pencil of light,
reduces all sounds to horizontal marks. On the finally
developed film these marks have various gradations of
black, white, and gray, but they are of constant width.

In the variable area method, the width of the sound
track varies but its darkness is uniform. The current
amplified from the microphone comes to a recording
device which is almost identical with an ordinary gal-
vanometer, a common device for measuring electrical
current.

The galvanometer has two wires to which are at-
tached a tiny mirror. When the current flows through
the two wires in a magnetic field, the wires move some-
what as we have seen them in a "variable density" light
valve. The movement, however, causes the mirror to
rotate slightly and to reflect light against a narrow slit,
the image of which is focused on the film. This pro-

[198]

Sound Recording

duces a constant exposure, but the moving mirror gives
an image of a wavy line of light varying in width.

We are speaking here of a separate camera and a
separate recording machine. There is a camera used
by newsreel operators which has both photographic
equipment and sound recording device in the same box,
doing both jobs at one time and on the same film. But
in studio practice it is more convenient to keep the
processes separate.

We now have a "sound track" which has photo-
graphically recorded voice values delivered to a micro-
phone. How is that "sound track," in a theatre,
transformed back again to sound?

In the release prints used in the theatre, sound and
sight are on the same piece of film. In the projection
machine one light shines through the picture, carrying
its image to the screen. iVnother light shines through
the sound track onto a photoelectric cell. This cell
sets up electrical current changes, duplicating those
which were caused originally within the microphone
on the studio sta^e. In turn these current variations
are amplified and activate the diaphragm in the repro-
ducing horns. The horns are giant variations of those
used in radio receivers. Because of this, one hears in
the theatre, properlv amplified to meet the needs of its
size, exactly the same "words and music" which were
spoken to the original microphone months before.

As we have seen there is also a process for making
wax records similar to those used for a phonograph and
synchronizing them to the speed of the camera. It has
been said that the process presents some problems when

[ 199 1

Talking Pictures

the picture is edited. A variation of it, however, is used
extensively as a supplementary process in the making of
musical films.

In the wax process, the sound record is engraved
with a jeweled stylus into a flat round cake of chemical
soap about two inches thick. This stylus either vibrates
up and down, cutting a so-called "hill and dale" type
record, or sideways, cutting the wiggly trough seen in
ordinary phonograph records. This movement is in
accord with the varying electrical current set up by
the voices impinging on the stage microphone. The
one disadvantage of the light ray recording is that we
cannot hear what has been said for several hours after
the film has been developed.

It is possible to "play back" the record on the
chemical soap, usually but incorrectly called "wax,"
but one such play back might ruin the record.
Normally the record is merely the original mold for a
later one made of hard vulcanized rubber, like that of
a phonograph.

Although this is not necessary for speaking scenes,
for musical pictures it is important that the artists hear
immediately the number they have just sung or played.
To take care of this need, a record was developed with
a metal base on which a compound similar to celluloid
had been placed in a thin layer. This layer is stout
enough, having been cut by the stylus, to reproduce the
sounds several times, enabling the artists to check the
quality of their musical productions.

Sound recording on location proved an early problem
of the talking picture. In the studio, sound recording

[ 200 ]

Sound Recording

may now be done in one central building or in portable
stage units. But less than a decade ago there were sound
effects wanted for Trader Horn which could not be
made then because certain African roads and bridges
were unable to support the weight of the truck carry-
ing the heavy sound recording equipment. The truck
weighed fourteen tons and it could penetrate Africa
only so far as that weight could go with safety.

Out of this experience, however, clever sound record-
ing research engineers gained much. They saw that
their art would be circumscribed and retarded if their
devices could not go hither and yon as freely as the
more portable motion picture camera. They designed
vacuum tubes, condensers, and other portions of the
sound recording equipment on a miniature scale. They
made lighter devices, which would not work. They
made and discarded scores of would-be portable record-
ing equipments.

But, by the time Van Dyke, the same director who
made Trader Horn, went to film Eskimo in the Arctic
a few years later, a sound recording equipment had been
devised weighing only 350 pounds. This weight is
divided between five boxes. These boxes can be carried
anywhere — by canoe or boat, in the back seat of a light
car, on horse or muleback, or by hand. Today, with
such portable equipment, there are no places to which
the talking picture cannot go and return with both
authentic pictures and authentic sound.

What is called the re-recording process is an interest-
ing and valuable development in sound recording tech-
nique. Sometimes the sounds originally recorded at the

[201]

Talking Pictures

time a scene is photographed may be incomplete or in-
adequate for the dramatic effect desired, and the re-
recording process is used to add other sounds. On each
of these machines there is a sound track. One track
may have spoken dialogue; one music; one the general
noise of a large crowd, and one the noise of a thunder-
storm.

In a projection room near the re-recording apparatus,
a technician sits before a bakelite board that has more
than a dozen knobs which are operated up and down
in separate slots. Each one of these knobs controls the
volume of one sound track.

The technician watches the picture. If the scene is a
long-shot of a crowd, the crowd noise is the most im-
portant element, and he moves the knobs accordingly.
In a close-up in which it is necessary to hear the voices
of the principal players, the noise of the crowd, a
thunderstorm, or any underlying music are all reduced
in force, and the dialogue is raised. A competent techni-
cian will do this so cleverly that no one in the audience
will consciously realize that the dialogue has, for an
instant, taken precedence.

The sound from each sound track, controlled in
volume by the technician, combines with the sounds
from the other tracks and is recorded in one recording
machine which produces the final releasable track. It is
from this secondary recording operation that the process
derives its name.

No elaborate explanation is needed to show the value
of this development. Consider the last time you were
in a crowd. Perhaps you had a quarrel with someone.

[202]

Sound Recording

The two of you wrangled furiously, and yet the noise
around you was so great that no one heard a word.

But if that quarrel were important in the development
of a talking picture plot, theatre audiences would need
to hear every word. The audience in a theatre uncon-
sciouslv take a part in a motion picture far more than
they do in a stage play, in which, more often than not,
they merely observe other people act. In pictures, how-
ever, because the technique is so much more intimate,
the audience tend to think the thoughts of the actors
themselves, and often experience the same emotional
reactions.

This method of adding dramatic values by appropriate
music played quietly under dialogue helps to intensify
the attention of an audience. This would be impossible
without the special sound recording technique just
described.

Recall the scene in May time in which John Barry-
more speaks through a closed door to Jeanette Mac-
Donald, telling her that Paul Allison (Nelson Eddy) is
to sing opposite her in her first x\merican opera. Just
before Barrymore speaks Allison's name, there begins,
very softly under the dialogue, the "Sweetheart" song.
Eddy had sung this to Miss MacDonald in their love
interlude of a day seven years before. The song sets the
emotional values of the scene instantly and builds its
dramatic power, and yet the technician has manipulated
the knobs so deftly that the music never for a moment
disturbs the dialogue. Every' word is distinct. The music
is just a murmur but quite clear enough to accomplish
its emotional mission.

[ 203 ]

Talking Pictures

When practical picture sound recording started in
1927, sound engineers had little more than a method of
synchronizing sound and sight. The system was so
inelastic that, if a player were seated, he could not stand
up and walk away in the same scene. The camera would
have to cut away from him while the movement was
accomplished. The microphone was almost immovable,
and the camera was placed, with the cameraman, in a
half ton ice-box arrangement, making it impossible to
follow a player in even such a simple maneuver as walk-
ing upstairs. Photography was impaired because the
camera "shot" through a plate-glass window. To go
outside the studio for the exterior locations which made
silent films so pictorial was at first impossible because
of the bulky equipment.

But the film industry rose to its opportunities in a
manner which has been highly commended. It put
clever scientists at work solving the problems stated.
Then, when a research worker in one studio discovered
a simpler and more effective means, that discovery was
not held back, but given at once to all the studios. Cut-
throat competitive methods, by which progress has been
held back in some industries, were sedulously avoided
by the picture producer. By co-operative and inventive
effort they carried the new art of the talking picture
forward certainly twice as fast as would have been pos-
sible had there been competitive fighting between plants
for various important scientific discoveries.

The original sound heard in theatres had deficiencies
which irked ambitious picture producers. It repro-
duced rather well over a middle range of tones, but low

[ 204 ]

Sound Recording

notes were deficient or had a bad extra resonance, a
strident sound. The letter s had to be avoided when
possible, because of an exaggerated hissing effect, and
high soprano voices sometimes recorded or reproduced
with a false and inaccurate shrillness.

To overcome these defects at least five hundred va-
rieties of the basic recording and reproducing methods
have been made by one studio alone. For the entire
industry such variations would run into the thousands.
Today, as a result, we have recording and reproducing
systems which reproduce the low basso and the high
soprano with nearly equal fidelity, which accentuate
no letter of the alphabet at the expense of others.

It has been said several times that the motion picture
as a whole deserves unstinted credit because, in a short
life of fifty years, it has made more definite artistic ad-
vances each year than any other form of art. Praise
belongs in even greater measure to the sound recording
process. Practical sound recording for motion pictures
is now just starting its second decade. Today, its refine-
ments and its great range make the crude "sound" of
1927 seem almost ridiculous. Sound recording has in-
creased so progressively, and so evenly, that the average
theatregoer is frequently unaware of individual de-
velopments which have brought spontaneous applause
from the scientific world.

It is possible that many of the important advances in
sound recording might have been delayed in their in-
ception had it not been for Lawrence Tibbett.

Tibbett brought to the immature art of sound record-
ing a voice which put too many demands on the equip-

[205]

Talking Pictures

ment of the time. In order to record him adequately
and to make possible a satisfactory reproduction of a
marvelous voice, research experts worked twenty-four
hours a day to correct the faults found in the basic
process.

Questions are frequently asked about so-called process
or "trick'' photography. Studios keep these methods
secret. There is no phase of picture making more mis-
understood than special effect photography. "That's a
trick shot," people are heard to say, a disparaging note
in their voices.

And actors have roared with rage when, following a
realistic fight or struggle on which they put days of
hard work, somebody near them in a theatre says, "Ah,
it's all done with mirrors."

Studios feel keenly that to give emphasis to trick shots,
despite the fact that they add immeasurably to an illusory
effect and therefore to the entertainment value of the
film, is to breed the unfortunate sort of misstatement
quoted above.

Trick shots are frequently used to give extra magni-
tude to a setting when such added size could not be
accomplished in any other manner. For example, by
what is called the "glass" process a ceiling was put on
the great ballroom in the Palace of the Czars shown
in Rasputin and the Empress.

Now this room was three hundred feet long and very
expensive to construct. A ceiling could have been
physically built. But, if it had, photography would
have been impaired, for the cameras could not have
secured the effects they did. So a ceiling was painted

[206]

Sound Recording

on glass. The camera "shot" through this glass onto
the setting. The painted ceiling fitted photographically
on top of forty immense constructed pillars, each thirty
feet tall. In other words the actual palace at Petrograd,
because of its ceiling, could not have been photographed
with the perfection of beauty which the use of this so-
called "trick" process made possible.

Effect shots of this sort are never used when better
results can be secured through actual methods. Studios
seek to simulate life and by experiment and invention
they have carried that ability to remarkable lengths.

Not a "trick" so much as a photographic effect
process is that achievement known as "montage."
David Copperfield and Maytime present two fine ex-
amples. In David Copperfield, by a series of short scenes
rapidly succeeding each other, great dramatic pace is
given to the flight of little David from his cruel step-
father. We see him in crowds, in rain, hiding in a
farmer's haystack, running, walking, stumbling, until he
finally finds haven in the arms of his aunt at her seaside
cottage.

In Maytime it was necessary to show the rise in
operatic prominence of Jeanette MacDonald over a
period of seven years. Programs of great opera houses
in Paris, Milan, and Madrid were shown, then through
them came the figure of the star dressed in the role of
the opera, singing the major aria. Rapidly, and here a
magnificent musical medlev arrangement by the music
department took its definite artistic part, the montage
spanned the whole operatic horizon of the picture at
its zenith.

[207]

Talking Pictures

Montage effects are secured in various ways. Most
popular is the "wipe" wherein photographically one
image is literally wiped from the screen, as if by a
magic cloth, and its place taken by a new image. Also
there are methods of having three or four different
images share the same film frame in the manner of the
montage photographs now so popular in magazines
and newspaper rotogravure sections. Montage is one of
the newest arts of the motion picture and its importance
has mounted so rapidly that all the film industry was
pleased when the University of Southern California
honored Slavko Vorkapich for the May time montage
we have mentioned.

Young scientists may well look to the motion picture
industry for inspiration. Photography has gone a long,
long way since the crude coated metal plates of Louis
Jacques Mande Daguerre. Many great advances have
come in the last twenty years in the path of the motion
picture. We exclaim today over the marvels of the
"candid" camera and wonder that still photographs can
be made in a room lighted by only one candle. But we
forget to wonder whether this achievement would have
been possible had the motion picture not grown from
infancy to maturity in two decades.

It has gone quite unsung, but the records of science
have few prouder pages than those in which more than
a thousand improvements in talking picture recording
have been entered. Edison today would smile with deep
satisfaction if he could note the marvels achieved by
modern young men in the solution of a problem which
eluded him.

[2081

1

MUSIC IX PICTURES

There are two main methods by which music is
used in sound studios. In one, in so-called "musical
pictures," the music as sung or played by the character
or characters is worked into the framework on a par
with, or greater in appeal importance than, the story.
Tvpes of such musical films are The Girl of the
Golden West, The Gold Diggers, Firefly, and Naughty
Marietta.

But the place of music in the cinema by no means
stops with productions like these, for it is used to en-
hance dramatic effects in every photoplay. It is em-
ployed to greater extent now than ever before in film
history. If individual music libraries of all the studios
could be assembled in one place such a collection would
be the largest music library in the world. In fact the
music library of one single studio is rated as the third
largest in the United States, for it has more than eighty
thousand numbers.

Direct criticism of a musical picture like May time or
Rose-Marie is a simple task for anvone knowing music.
But criticism of music that is applied to dramatic, non-
musical productions must arise from an intelligent under-
standing of special factors not found in the musical pic-
ture taken by itself. If one is able to understand why a

[ 209 ]

Talking Pictures

certain composition, played under an important dramatic
scene, increases its emotional values, and why no other
composition would bring as definite a reaction, then one
has learned to evaluate music in photoplay production.

The process of playing music under a dramatic scene
is called "underscoring." It is not a new device, but
with the coming of sound it has developed new methods
and new importance. In the days of silent pictures when
there was no spoken dialogue, music was played under
every scene in a big picture. Important productions
such as Ben-Hur, The Covered Wagon, and The Big
Parade had complete, unbroken scores written for them.
Radio announcers often wonder why Dvorak's The
New World Symphony is so frequently called for by
those telephoning "request numbers." This composi-
tion set the emotional tempo in the scene from The
Ten Commandments in which Moses led twenty-five
hundred Israelites in flight from Egypt. Here the com-
bination of pictorial and dramatic beauty with a fine
musical number gave a definite impetus to interest in
The New World Symphony.

Photoplays of the talking era seldom have uninter-
rupted musical scores. There are too many scenes in
which music conflicts with crowd dialogue or action.

The musical director deserves greater credit for
underscoring a talking picture with fine orchestration
than for the same work applied to a silent film. It is
one thing to bolster voiceless pantomime. It is another
to insert music under dialogue so that it increases the
emotional reaction started by the words, without inter-
fering with the aural reception of these words.

[210]

Music in Pictures

Because silent picture scoring was comparatively easy,
some orchestra leaders grew careless. They used the
same musical numbers over and over to get the same
effects. One piece, "Hearts and Flowers," was so over-
worked in the early days that it brought a laugh each
time it was played under a scene of pathos. Today it
would be exceptional for a musical director to use
it under a pathetic scene. Its intent is too obvious.

Two types of scoring remain unchanged from the
days of the silent picture. The first concerns the scoring
under introductory and credit titles before the picture
starts; the second, scoring for those moments between
the time the words "The End" flash on the screen and
the next film attraction begins.

The first is important because it sets the emotional
tempo of the coming picture during an actionless, but
unavoidable, moment between the first words of the
main title and the first frames of the first pictured
scene. Obviously a number to be chosen for use under
the main titles of a Marx Brothers comedy could not be
used for Camille. Tragedy, comedy, romance all have
their musical counterparts. The genius of a studio
musical director lies in his ability to select just the right
number for a specific scene. Orchestra leaders, librarians,
arrangers, orchestraters, and copyists are among the
musical technicians needed for the preparations of the
musical score of a picture. Dramatic underscoring is
done with a full orchestra and with vocal choruses as
required. The scoring occurs on a darkened stage.
When the music is ready for recording, the music and
the sound departments join forces.

[in]

Talking Pictures

For some musical scoring, the microphone is the same
as that used for dialogue. Three or four special micro-
phones, somewhat different in appearance are also in
operation. Each of these does one special task partic-
ularly well. One such microphone does best with a
singing voice, another with a large orchestra.

To the right of the orchestra there is a motion picture
screen. When the photoplay is flashed on this screen,
the leader, his score in front of him, directs his musicians.

Before he raises his baton, however, there have been
hours of hard work. He has read the scenario of the
picture, perhaps many times. There have been con-
ferences with the head of the music library, and with
original composers. He has consulted the research
heads to gain the benefit of their deep study into customs
and manners of the given time. He has talked at length
to special research experts in his own field.

He knows he cannot use a piece of music in a motion
picture score which musicians will recognize as having
been composed after the period of the story. He could
scarcely use a contemporary song in a picture of eight-
eenth-century locale. Above all things, his training in a
motion picture studio must have been long enough to
develop as second nature his ability to fit dramatic scenes
into the musical number which, psychologically, best
supplements action and words in its efforts to create
a special emotional response from an audience.

It requires hard rehearsals and careful adaptation to
fit a number into the exact time required. Directors of
underscoring are often successful composers in their
own right. Because difficulties frequently arise which

[212]

?

Stenographer types dialogue from the film
Cutter (film editor) assembles talking picture scenes

Film editor with movieola
Film editor assembles the picture

Music in Pictures

cannot be exactly corrected with any existing composi-
tion, genius in composing is necessary.

An example of a required original composition is the
score which the eminent composer, Herbert Stothart,
wrote for Night Flight, a dramatic story of an aviator's
efforts to fly through a storm. Something was needed
to offset the monotonous whirr of an airplane motor,
something to make that motor more important as a
dramatic medium. Stothart composed a score which
supplemented the sound of the motors. So cleverly did
he accomplish his task that few who hear the score can
recognize at what point the motors leave off and the
music begins. Critics were wise in their high praise of
this achievement.

For modern and original musical photoplays like
Gold Diggers, Wake Up and Live, Broadway Melody,
Waikiki Wedding, and Born to Dance, composers of
original popular songs are required. At one time popu-
lar songs came almost entirely from the musical comedy
or vaudeville stages. Today, a good half of the songs
that everyone whistles spring from musical photoplays.
It is interesting to note that popular songs have only
about one-half the life and a fraction of the sheet music
sales they enjoyed when they came exclusively from
the stage. The radio and the motion picture combined
have given songs an audience so large that "catchy
tunes" become popular in days rather than in months.

Every school boy or girl can name a score of dance-
able, singable songs or orchestral numbers which orig-
inated in "some movie." Among the many are numbers
like "Singin' in the Rain," "Off to Buffalo," "IVe Got

[213]

Talking Pictures

You under My Skin," "You Were Meant for Me," and
"The Wedding of the Painted Doll."

The question of musical copyrights is involved. No
artists are quite so thoroughly protected as present-day
composers. Not only do musical copyrights exist in
every civilized country, but musicians have strong pro-
fessional organizations to see that these copyrights are
observed, not only in their own land, but abroad. No
portions, for example of the corps song of the Marines
or any of the Gilbert and Sullivan operettas may be
used without the payment of royalties.

No music may be used without such payments except
when it is said to be in the public domain, a phrase
used with the same meaning for authors. It means that
copyright restrictions on a piece of music have expired,
and that it may be freely used without restriction and
without pay. Roughly, most numbers, the composers
of which have been dead fifty years or more, are in the
public domain. Included are all the selections of such
masters as Beethoven and Mozart, Tannhauser, and all
the other operas of Richard Wagner. "The Blue
Danube" waltz and every other composition of Johann
Strauss, belong in the public domain.

Protection by copyright for writers and composers
is akin to the patent granted an inventor. It reserves
to him exclusively for a period of years all financial
rewards accruing to each and everyone of his composi-
tions which has this valuable legal protection.

In offering a new composition, composers must be
certain that they have not accidentally simulated ma-
terial already copyrighted. To protect against a con-

[214]

Music in Pictures

tingency like this, every studio has a "walking musical
memory." In one studio a man boasted that he knew
ten thousand musical numbers. He had a stand-
ing wager that no one could play a tune which he could
not name. Until the time of his death a few years ago
he never had to pay a bet. His remarkable memory
saved his studio from a number of legal complications
which might have arisen from unconscious musical
similarities.

[215]

EDITING THE FILM

Very few persons who attend motion pictures have
any conception of what happens to a film production
following the completion of photography; or, in studio
parlance, "after the cameras stop grinding."

Almost every fairly regular theatregoer, who also
reads the photoplay pages of his or her daily paper,
can more or less correctly define the work of a camera-
man, a director, or a star. But to all except a very few
such cinematic terms as "laboratory," "cutting," "hypo,"
and "soup" have no more meaning than a sermon in
the Greek language delivered to a tribe of Kaffirs in
darkest Africa. For those who really want to under-
stand and enjoy motion pictures this is not a healthy
condition.

The period required to produce "finished prints" —
those used for actual theatrical exhibitions — is one third
of the whole time needed to carry a story from words
on a few hundred sheets of paper, to the pictured images
which parade nightly across the metalized screens of
thousands of motion picture theatres.

The period of photography is only one sixth of the
total. And yet because it is more glamorous and more
spectacular, easily ten times as much is known about
its processes than about those concerned with selection

[216]

Editing the Film

of stories, the preparation of sets, costumes, and re-
search, or with the final step of laboratory and editing
technique.

It is necessary for the student of photoplay evalua-
tion to understand the problems of the "cutter" or
"film editor," and the film laboratory technician. Very
few people are sufficiently trained to know when these
professionals, who work without the emphasis of pub-
licity have done successful work. But bad film editing,
as we shall see, can easily nullify fine direction and
fine acting. It goes hand in hand with good laboratory
technique, but this latter phase will be studied separately.

The minimum "after photography" period is two
months. However, when intricate special effects were
required, pictures have taken as many as two years
between the end of photography and the final shipping
of "release prints" to the theatres. For color photog-
raphy the time needed for completion is much longer
than for the black and white medium.

Before the picture starts, a "cutter" is assigned.
"Cutter" is his studio name, but he has a more formal
title, that of film editor, which more clearly defines his
function. The editor in a newspaper uses periods,
commas, and semicolons to increase the written power
of a newspaper article. A film editor arranges and re-
arranges close-ups, medium shots, angle shots, reverse
shots, and long-shots to give the picture story he as-
sembles, scene by scene, maximum dramatic emphasis.

The film editor receives and places in flat metal boxes,
two exposed and developed films for every scene taken.
These boxes are filed on shelves in his cutting room. The

[217]

Talking Pictures

first roll is the pictured scene, the second the sound track.

If the picture is one which has required a great deal
of research, the cutter will have much to do in advance
of production. For Lives of a Bengal Lancer, as one
example, scores of tests were made of individuals con-
sidered for character parts in this story of natives of
India and of British soldiers. Endless tests were made
to determine exact shades of make-up, and costumes
were also tested by the camera to determine their photo-
graphic qualities. In the period of preparation the cutter
shows this preparatory material over and over again at
the call of the producer and director until all decisions
as to cast, sets, make-up, and process photography have
been made.

This part of the editor's work furnishes no clue of
his creative capacities, for in this period of advance
photographic tests, he is only a capable librarian who
receives and files in film form various different pieces
of photographed data. His main duty here is to keep
such data properly filed and segregated so that he can
produce immediately the right piece of film, out of many
of the same general division.

Once the picture starts, however, the stature of his
importance expands as rapidly as a paper sack placed at
the mouth of a ten-year-old boy.

With the beginning of actual photography on the
sets, the laboratory superintendent receives each day the
various "takes" of all the scenes filmed the previous
day. These are also called "rushes" or "dailies." If the
company is on a distant location, the film is rushed to
the laboratory and back by speeding cars, planes, or

[218]

Editing the Film

racing motorboats. Such messengers may leave a loca-
tion three hundred miles away at 7:00 p. m., and rush to
the studio laboratory where the night workers process
the exposed film so that it may start back to the location
by noon next day for inspection by director and cast.

Film editing is one of the many professions in motion
picture making which has been successfully invaded by
women. The Good Earth was edited by a man and the
majority of film editors are men. But some of the
greatest are women. A woman, for example, edited
Romeo and Juliet, and a woman film editor, Dorothy
Arzner, has become the only woman film director.

Perhaps it is the sense of intuition with which women
are credited to a greater degree than men which makes
women so successful in editing. There are not as many
women film editors as men, but when they attain their
full powers, almost without exception they do work
of high quality.

Each day the film editor shows to the director scenes
made the day before. The director may or may not
have invited his stars and featured players to be present.

Of several "takes" made of each scene the director
indicates one as the best. His choice covers two parallel
standards of excellence: the first is that of acting; the
second of photography.

The rolls chosen are placed in metal boxes as previ-
ously described. These are marked with the scene
numbers. The editor gets this number from that on
the "slate" held before the camera at the conclusion of
each scene. The process of photographing this identify-
ing slate with its symbols has been described.

[319]

Talking Pictures

Film editors have different methods. Some do not
assemble the picture until it is nearly complete, but the
majority make what is called a day-by-day "rough
cut." For this process an editor fastens his separate
rolls of film together as each dramatic sequence is com-
pleted before the cameras. This gives him a rough idea
of the progress of the story and gives the producer and
the director a quick clue to its weaknesses. These weak-
nesses can be corrected by revising the scene and re-
taking it. In his rough cut, the editor can also practice
balancing the dramatic values of his long-shots and
close-ups. This highly creative function will be de-
scribed later in more detail.

His mechanical aid in cutting is a remarkable device.
It has a feeding slot for the sound track on one side
which, with its own photoelectric cell, reproduces the
sound just as audiences will later hear it in the theatre.

On the other side the film passes behind a glass lens
about two and one-half inches in diameter which mag-
nifies the 35 mm. frame of each separate picture to a
size large enough for practical editorial purposes. A
light shining upward from behind the film provides
sufficient illumination to give a picture, compact for
practical editing, yet large and well-lighted enough to
be viewed adequately without eyestrain.

The editor watches the enlarged image and hears the
sound coming through a miniature reproducing horn.
His first concern when he runs a piece of film is
to be certain that sound and sight are absolutely syn-
chronized, that the "start" marks on both picture and
sound track are in exactly the right place.

[220]

Editing the Film

Later his editing machine enables him to decrease
the length of a scene, to take out one word and sub-
stitute another, to do many side functions of his craft.
Without this compact editing machine, it would take
him four times as long to do his work. It could be done
in a regular projection room but another man would be
required, a projection machine operator, and there
would be a loss both in time and operating space. Film
cutting could be done by the unaided eye, but 3 5 mm.
is so small that no producer would submit a valuable
employee to so great a strain.

The editor's hardest work begins the instant photog-
raphy of the picture has been completed. He works
rapidly to produce what is called the "first rough cut."

This, for the average eight to ten reel finished picture,
will run from nine to sixteen reels. It will contain all
scenes in full length, and also all added new "business,"
or action not written in the scenario, which was photo-
graphed by the director under the inspiration of actual
set conditions. Rough cuts of talking pictures rarely
exceed sixteen or seventeen reels. In silent pictures,
when pantomime took the place of dialogue, directors
sought for effects in many different ways. A "rough
cut" picture in twenty-five reels was not exceptional,
and the rough cut of one Gargantuan film ran to more
than one hundred reels.

The associate producer, or the director, then has this
rough cut projected. With a stenographer at his side,
who makes her notes under a light bulb carefully shaded
so that the illumination cannot interfere with the
brilliance of the projected picture, the producer dictates

[221]

Talking Pictures

certain suggestions. Perhaps he feels that a different
"take" of a certain close-up would give a better effect.
Or he will indicate the value of a possible rearrange-
ment of a whole sequence, and some scenes or portions
of scenes may be omitted entirely.

The original "balancing" of various elements, close-
ups, long-shots, has been done by the film editor. This
is his particular artistry, one for which he has trained
himself by working from four to seven years as an as-
sistant or apprentice cutter. A good film editor develops
so strong an instinct for dramatic values that his judg-
ment is usually accepted by producers and directors.

In the rough cut, however, he has deliberately left
scenes long so that the judgment of others may join
with his in a discussion of what should be cut and what
scenes could be improved or shortened by retaking or
rephotographing.

The picture is projected over and over by the pro-
ducer, the director, and the editor. Changes and shifts
are made until this small group of men, sitting for hours
in a dark projection room, decide that they have made
alterations as far as they can without an "audience re-
action."

Film makers are the first to see the danger in editing
a picture only in an isolated room within the studio in
which the production was made. They realize the false
values which can creep in when men go over the same
ground for weeks. Such repetition is bound to dull the
effect of each scene on the emotions of the beholders.
Therefore, final decisions as to changes are always made
by the public, the ultimate consumer.

[222]

Editing the Film

What is called the "first preview cut" is purposely
overlength so that by restlessness and rattling of pro-
grams the audience in the theatre selected for the pre-
view may show the producer where they think the
picture is dull and where it drags.

The first preview, or experimental showing, is usually
called a "sneak." In order to assure a nonprofessional
audience, the picture is taken with secrecy to a theatre
usually well outside the Los Angeles area. Neither the
press nor players are invited because the picture is pur-
posely imperfect. Only the producer, his secretary, the
film editor, and the audience attend. The audience of
the theatre is in eff ect a collection of guinea pigs in a
semiscientific experiment. They aid the film makers by
showing their pleasure or displeasure through physical
actions or vocal remarks, and in their criticisms written
on postal cards provided by the studio.

Producers are strongly guided in their future editing
by what they hear and see while a picture is being
unreeled at a preview, but supplementary to this direct
eye and ear testimony come the critical postal cards.
Many of them are inconsequential, but there are always
20 per cent or more which show fine logic and a true
sense of dramatic essentials. From such cards the pro-
ducers gain important leads in the matter of further
cuts, shifts, or possible additions.

Other by-products sometimes develop from this
source. One preview attendant was so thrilled bv a
certain picture that he described its effect on his
emotions in one truly inspired sentence. He was sought
out and paid for that expression, and it became the cen-

[223]

Talking Pictures

tral theme of a million dollar advertising campaign for
the photoplay he had enjoyed.

After the first preview in a theatre the last retakes
are ordered, if they are found to be necessary. It has
been seen that retakes are ordered at three different
stages in the production. They are called for at various
times while the picture is being photographed. These
retakes are usually given to bolster up story values
which seemed strong enough in the original scenario
but showed weakness when actually photographed. Re-
takes are ordered after the picture is finished, after it
has been roughly assembled, but before it has had a
public preview. Retakes at this period are usually for
"polishing" purposes. When sequences are assembled,
certain scenes may prove too long or too short to give
perfect movement, or the tempo may be wrong, or any
one of a number of technical dramatic points may need
adjustments more salutary than those achieved by the
use of a cutter's razor blade.

The third era of cutting comes after the first audience
preview. Retakes here are for two essential purposes.
First, they are to correct wrong dramatic emphasis
which brings dreaded false laughs in serious scenes, or
leaves the audience unresponsive when a definite melo-
dramatic or romantic reaction has been sought. Next,
they enable the producers to take advantage of any
sudden interest shown by the audience in a player of
a minor role, who until then was inconspicuous and
unknown.

Personalities who attract playgoers to a theatre in
numbers are so great a financial asset that the emergence

[224]

Editing the Film

of an unknown actor at a preview causes great stir
among the film producers. There were retakes galore
to enlarge, or in film parlance to "fatten," the part of
a little girl called Deanna Durbin after a preview of
Three Smart Girls had given to her work an audience
verdict of extraordinary enthusiasm. And at a preview
of a certain college picture a few years ago, no one grew
excited about the star, a well-known Broadway stage
favorite. But dozens of preview cards came in saying,
"Who is that fascinating fresh kid?" The "fresh kid"
was Robert Montgomery, and within two years he was
in the rarified circle of screen stardom.

The retakes ordered after the first theatre preview
are perhaps the most important because, as we have seen,
comparative dramatic emphasis has had an acid test
under exact theatre conditions. By thus correcting
matters of emphasis, retakes frequently carry a picture
from mediocrity to greatness.

The Sin of Madelon Clandet offered particularly
definite proof of the importance of clever, thoughtful
retakes. This photoplay, in which Helen Hayes was
the star, told the story of a mother's sacrifice for her
son. It was first previewed at a suburban theatre, and
it did not meet with approval. People laughed at the
wrong times and pathetic scenes left them unresponsive.

Retakes were made. When these were read there
seemed to be very little difference between them and
the original scenes, but the emotional impact of the new
scenes was far more accurate and sincere. Previewed a
second time, the picture succeeded gloriously in im-
pressing its audience.

[225]

Talking Pictures

Every point that failed at the first preview "rang the
bell" decisively at the second. It moved with an un-
broken mounting crescendo to its climax, and it won
for Miss Hayes the feminine acting award of the
Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

An amusing happening illustrates the change brought
about by retakes. One motion picture magazine re-
viewed The Sin of Madelon Claudet as given at the
first preview, but not the second. Another magazine
had. a critic at both previews, and printed only a review
of the final showing. Magazine number one character-
ized the picture as the "worst" of the month. Magazine
number two acclaimed it as the "best picture of the
year." And both reviews were right!

There may be other theatre previews to settle minor
points or to introduce the picture to the press, but the
first sneak showing is the most important from the
standpoint of the film editor. It brings his work to a
head. From here on, speed is an essential, for money is
being lost every day that a picture costing a million
dollars or more is kept from the theatres.

When editing is completed, the work print, made
from the selected positive prints from the total of scenes
photographed, is sent to the negative editors. There a
negative is assembled, matching scene for scene, the
work print, which through all the vicissitudes of pre-
views, retakes, and editing, has come down to final
approval by the producers.

Now the production is ready for the laboratory
which will use the negative to reproduce separate release
prints furnished to theatres for exhibition purposes.

[226]

3

DEVELOPING THE FILM

One of the most vital technicians in all film making —
the laboratory superintendent — is the "forgotten man"
of the film industry7. The casual theatregoer may for
years attend and enjoy photoplays and still remain
ignorant of the value of this man's work. Yet he can
make or mar the appearance of the greatest scene ever
photographed. And by the improvement of his tech-
nique through the years he has made pictures vastly
more attractive to the observer and, by the same token,
dramatically more effective.

He is in charge of all activities whereby film sensitized
in the cameras is developed to bring out its latent pic-
torial image. He superintends the daily output of
"rushes," or scenes photographed on the sets the day
before; but his major responsibility concerns the making
of release prints of finished pictures, the prints com-
mercially exhibited in the theatres of the world.

To convince yourself of the part plaved bv the labora-
tory superintendent, have the theatre manager in your
community show a picture made in 1909, then one
produced within the current vear. People could see
pictures thirty years ago, but not much! The images
were either blurred and indistinct, or the photography
so bad that it lacked contrast and emphasis.

[227]

Talking Pictures

The laboratory superintendent is the czar of a realm
which is always seventy-four degrees winter or sum-
mer, and which has a humidity that makes its atmos-
phere seem always a little "sticky." Film tends to curl
in dry air, but the standard heat and humidity of the
laboratory prevent this. In one day for a single studio
the laboratory technician will run through his various
machines, over 600,000 feet of film or an average of
about 2 19,000,000 feet a year. This is 4,182 miles or the
distance from Los Angeles to New York and back to
Kansas City. These figures are for one large studio.
Lovers of statistics may toy if they wish, with figures
of the sort based on the total of 2,000,000,000 feet of
film used annually by the American picture industry as
a whole.

By inventing a superbly clever device, the modern
laboratory head has made sure that he will never again
have to worry about temperatures. In the old days, a
love scene would be clear and brilliant in a print made
one day; muddy, foggy, or dull and lifeless in prints
produced twelve hours later. One of the great con-
tributing causes was temperature, for if film developing
fluid varies two tenths of one degree plus or minus
sixty-five degrees, a definite impairment of photographic
quality can be noted.

But today a controlling thermostat makes such a
change virtually impossible. A laboratory superin-
tendent's struggle to keep stationary the temperature of
his developing chemicals can be compared with a
doctor's efforts to bring a fever patient back to normal.

The term "print" has been used. The original nega-

[228]

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Adrian, noted studio gown designer

Developing the Film

tive film as it is placed in the camera has on a celluloid
base an emulsion coating of several chemicals, the prin-
cipal of which is nitrate of silver. The famous quality
of nitrate of silver is this: when it is exposed to light, its
white crystals turn black. Put this exposed film in a
bath of a special chemical formula and it is "developed";
that is to say, the unexposed nitrate of silver is removed,
leaving light portions on the film. The black portions
on which the light had acted chemically remain un-
touched.

But this developed film is quite the opposite in light
values from the exhibition print which, when strong
light is shown through it, projects enlarged and moving
pictures, lifelike and natural, on theatre screens.

Developed negative film portions which the camera
saw black or dark, are in reality light because little
illumination came through the lens. On the contrary,
black portions mean that a great deal of light was
focused on the nitrate of silver emulsion. To bring
these light relations back to normal a different type of
film called positive is exposed to light coming through
the negative. This is called printing from a negative,
and the result is a positive print. Positive prints in cellu-
loid form are the counterpart of the paper prints made
from still-life negatives exposed in a hand camera.

It requires about two hundred and fifty prints of each
picture to supply the American theatres alone. These
two hundred and fifty prints are divided between thirty-
five or forty regional offices called exchanges. Since
motion pictures are perishable products, the value of
which diminishes with each day of their age, profits in

[229]

Talking Pictures

the film business depend on getting new photoplays
before as many people as possible while they are new.

If it is to succeed financially, some accountants set an
arbitrary figure of 80 per cent of its cost as the amount
a film must make the first year of its life. A national
"release date" is set on which each exchange begins
renting these positive prints to the theatres in its geo-
graphical area. With 250 prints, 250 exhibitions at top
of "first run" prices are assured during the first week.

Once making this great quantity of positive prints
(250 prints of a ten-reel picture would require 2,500,000
feet of film) was a laborious, dirty, wet process. Positive
film, sensitized by "printing," was wrapped, 200 feet at
a time, around wooden racks about four feet by four
feet. These were worked rapidly up and down first in
a tank of developer, and then in a tank of "fixing solu-
tion," or hypo, in order to stop the developing action
and permanently "fix" the photographic image. Then
they were given a final washing in a tank of water to
remove the hypo. In absolutely dark rooms, men in
rubber clothes slipped and slid in a world of wetness.

Today developing is done by an almost human
machine. This machine, sixty feet long, occupies a
room brilliantly lighted at one end, and semidark at the
other. In the dark end sensitized positive film which
has been through the printing machines enters a series
of tanks which descend partially through the floor.

The film as it comes from the printing process is
yellow, but one or two loops through the developing
tanks brings out the varying degrees of black, white,
and gray which are the light values of the picture.

[230]

Developing the Film

When the developing process is finished, the film loops
into another tank containing a second chemical formula
known under the trade name of hypo. This is called a
fixing bath because it stops the action of the developing
fluid and permanently fixes the image on its celluloid
base.

The loops then go into a third series of tanks where
water washes off the hypo. The looping continues
through a high glass case in which brilliant electric
lights, plus a current of warm air dries the film as it
moves up, then down, then up. Finally, dry and in
finished form, it comes out of the cabinet and is wound
on a reel. The time elapsed has been about forty-five
minutes, in which it took 2803.25 feet of unbroken
film to span the physical length of sixty feet between
the beginning and the end of the developing machine.

But before developing can be done, printing must
occur. It will be remembered that a picture is not an
uncut piece of celluloid, but a series of perhaps five
hundred separate pieces of film, scenes and subscenes,
fastened together to form an entirety. These scenes
may differ greatly in their lighting values. For each
scene a "light test" is made. On this strip are thirty
"frames," or separate pictures, each of the same image.
Each frame has been printed at a different gradation of
light. The frames are very dark at the bottom of the
test strip and very light at the top. The laboratory
superintendent selects by number the frame which gives
the best light values. Naturallv he would choose a dif-
ferent number for a moonlight scene from one he
would use for a scene taken in the glare of a Sahara sun.

[231]

Talking Pictures

Therefore, in the printing machines there must be
means for changing light values between scenes. In
"hand printers" an operator changes the light values by
hand as the scenes pass through his machine. In mechan-
ical printers these light changes are brought about by
a clever, patented automatic device.

In both types of printers the actual operation is the
same. The machines are in semidark rooms, illuminated
only by one or two amber globes. "Positive stock" is
comparatively insensitive to amber light. The developed
negative, recognized by its dark color, is on one reel.
The fresh, yellow, positive "raw stock" is on another.
The two films run, emulsion side to emulsion side,
(emulsion is the name for chemical coating on a celluloid
base which, acted on by light and chemicals, eventually
produces the final pictured image) over an aperture.
Here a light is passed through the negative on to the
positive, which is thus sensitized in exactly the same
light and shadow proportions as the original negative
was sensitized when the camera shutter opened and
permitted light to shine through to it.

In the printing room two negatives become one posi-
tive. In common studio practice the sound track and
the picture are photographed on separate films. When
the picture is photographed on the stages, a blank place
one eighth of an inch in width is left at the right side.
Since positive prints such as those used in theatres have
sound and sight on the piece of film, in order to make
a release print for exhibition purposes, the separate sound
track is merged with the picture in the printing ma-
chines to make a single unit.

[232!

Developing the Film

There are "wrinkles" in all trades. One of the latest
of these, from the laboratory standpoint, is called "tur-
bulation development." Laboratory superintendents
found themselves puzzled by occasional inexplicable
variations in development quality, for feet of perfect
film would be followed by other feet, dull and lifeless.
The solution, when found, was quite simple. Because
of capillary attraction all of the old developer could not
be removed from the tanks as fresh fluid flowed in, and
some, by the same attraction, would be held to the sur-
face of the film. Being old, this fluid developed the film
improperly. Today by use of a giant egg-beater, de-
veloper is thrown violently against the film, preventing
such unwanted adhesions.

One day, it seems, a laboratory technician wanted to
have a piece of film by which he could test the quality
of developing fluid. He picked the discarded close-up
negative of a blond girl. The girl was "Susy." Now,
nearly a quarter of a century later, every hour a positive
print is made of an eight-inch strip showing a number
of frames of Susy's face. One print is made for every
developing machine in use, and the changes in fluid
quality are determined by this method.

By all odds, more millions of feet of film showing
the face of Susy have been developed than that of any
star who has ever lived. And yet Susy never was a
star although she did act once in a tiny "bit." But years
ago she dropped out of pictures and today no one knows
wrhere she is. She may be dead, or she may be very fat,
and have eleven children. While Susy's own cine-
matic ambitions fell by the wayside, her destiny has

[233]

Talking Pictures

been to insure perfect photographic reproductions of
all the handsome men and beautiful women who have
risen to screen fame in the intervening years.

After the positive print has been printed and de-
veloped, it is inspected for both sound and photographic
quality. This testing has interesting human values. In
one studio, for example, there are eleven girl inspectors
for photographic values. This gives each girl about
twenty-four prints of each picture to project in a closet-
like room which has a small screen at its further end.

Despite the fact that each girl sees every photoplay
twenty-four times, she can scarcely wait until that film
comes to her neighborhood theatre, for she never hears
what the players are saying. Her curiosity in this regard
is piqued by the visual repetition of the pictured scenes.
Sound recording is checked separately in the sound
department.

The extreme efforts of the picture producers to give
the best quality possible is illustrated by these inspec-
tions. The percentage of error in development quality
found by the picture inspector is less than one per cent,
and yet an elaborate checking system is maintained to
eliminate this very small margin.

In some laboratories the film now goes to a film
treating machine where a chemical coating is put on
the emulsion side of the film for protection against wear.
Practically all laboratories wTax the sprocket edges of
the film. This lubricant permits a smooth passage of
the film through the projection machines.

At last the finished film comes to the shipping room
where each reel is packed in a separate round metal

[234]

Developing the Film

container. Then eight or more reels, comprising a com-
pleted picture, are packed in a wooden or fiberboard
box. These boxes go by train, plane, and ship to all parts
of the world, there to entertain or to instruct, or to
accomplish both functions at the same time.

It will be recalled that the start of the whole film-
making process was the search for and the purchase of
a vivid, striking storv, filled with interesting human
values. At last that story has become a filmed reality.
The values it originally had have been interpreted by
competent actors playing before constructed settings.
The reality of this photoplay, as it physically sits there
on the table of the shipping room, is not impressive. It
is a wooden box which looks as if it might contain
twenty cans of tomatoes. But take out the reels of film
in that box and feed them into the projection machine
of a theatre. Your story takes life, and characters which
were merely so manv printed words when the story was
bought six months before, walk, run, and dance, live,
love, and die before your eves.

In such progression lies the marvel of modern motion
picture making ; the thing that has grown from the peep
show to the modern air-cooled theatre.

It is a far cry from the cheap "chase films' ' of thirty
years ago to the finely planned theatres of today, and
photoplay productions of such quality, literary value,
and good taste as Little Women, Sequoia, David Copper-
field, Quo Vadis, Ben-Hur, Winterset, The Informer,
Romeo and Juliet, Anthony Adverse, Captains Coura-
geous, Lives of a Be?igal Lancer, A Tale of Two Cities,
Clive of India, Rembrandt, and Lloyds of London.

U35]

4

SOCIAL INFLUENCES

Once, in an address made by Cecil B. DeMille, he
labeled the motion picture the greatest medium which
the world has had placed in its hands for effective use
to banish war and to bring peace. He described the
possibility of a native of a foreign country coming from
a motion picture theatre with his wife and four chil-
dren, to find a fanatic urging war against the United
States. The foreigner listened thoughtfully for a while.
In the theatre in which he had spent the last two hours,
he had seen a fine picture showing a tender story of
American family life.

During his diatribe, the fanatic, perhaps, charges
United States soldiers with impaling little babies on
pitchforks. At that remark up steps our hero. "No,"
he says, "You're wrong. I've just seen those Americans.
They are not devils with horns, but men with families,
just like myself."

The remark illustrates the remarkable communica-
tion power of the cinema, a power all the more strong
because it is visual. We shall always be able to under-
stand our fellow men better when we see them.

In many ways motion pictures have exerted a strong
influence on national life and customs. Other factors
also enter, undoubtedly, but the one-time familiar

[236]

Social Influences

crudity of eating with the knife or "sword-swallowing"
in slang parlance, has practically disappeared during a
period of time parallel to the greatest growth of the
motion picture. Likewise the motion picture has elim-
inated the word "hick" from our vocabulary. Once
that term was used in derision to denominate someone
from the country wearing outmoded attire. Today
newsreels and feature pictures make it possible for a
sensitive country woman, living far from the railroad,
to appear in a large city without the slightest fear that
her clothes may seem out of place or peculiar.

It is related that the Duke of Windsor, when Prince
of Wales, left England on a fast steamer bound for
Canada and his ranch near Calgary, Alberta. His jour-
ney included official welcoming stopovers at Quebec,
Montreal, Toronto, Ottawa, and Winnipeg. He re-
quired a little more than four weeks to reach the remote
prairie railroad station of High River.

When he alighted from the train, his first glance fell
upon a man wearing a suit almost the exact duplicate
of one he had worn when photographed as he left
London. Six men on the platform had little feathers in
their hats, another style just started by him and
chronicled in the newsreels.

Annually some five millions of solid color shirts are
sold in this country alone. In 191 5 solid color shirts were
a drug on the markets. In the studios, however, such
shirts were making their appearance because both
camera lenses and camera film were far from their
present perfection. The film of that time was not ac-
curate in translating color values into black and white.

[237]

Talking Pictures

Solid whites never photographed as white. Instead, they
came out on the screen gray or streaked. Photography
then could make a new white dress shirt look as though
it had been a parade ground for a battalion of cats with
dirty feet.

On the other hand, light blues, light creams, light
yellows, or light pinks gave a perfect white. In those
days one could never tell when a dark shade of blue
would photograph white or black. In the center of the
shading arc there was an indeterminate place where a
white or a black result might depend on lighting or on
the whim of the particular emulsion on that particular
piece of film. Because light color tints were giving a
better photographic white, actors began to dye their
white shirts.

One day the late John Gilbert, then the greatest of
the matinee idols, had to go from a working stage di-
rectly to an afternoon social affair without having had
time to change his clothes. He wore a shirt dyed blue.
Within two years, the vogue was international. Since
then the sale of colored shirts has vastly increased and
they have become an accepted style.

Today with the new "panchromatic' ' (color sensi-
tive) film, colored shirts are no longer worn by picture
actors before cameras. The new film has perfect photo-
graphic values for pure white. But many a young lead-
ing man, without being conscious of the part played in
his choice by an actor of an earlier time, goes to his
dressing room, removes the white shirt he has worn
before the cameras, and puts on a colored shirt to wear
on the street.

[238]

Social Influences

Some years ago Greta Garbo appeared in a picture
called Love. At that time no woman would have
thought of wearing a hat which completely concealed
her hair. Garbo wore such a hat. This was the fore-
runner of the close-fitting hat vogue which still exists
in a modified form.

And then there was the puffed sleeve vogue. Before
these sleeves became popular, style experts literally
hooted at Adrian, noted designer. Two years previ-
ously, he had predicted that soon every woman in
x\merica would be wearing this tvpe of sleeve. In the
Plaza Hotel in New York he told this to the editor of
a grreat fashion magazine. This editor returned to her
office and wrote sarcastically of the "impudent preten-
sions" of studio gown designers.

A year later Adrian returned to New York. In the
meantime, Joan Crawford had appeared in Letty Lyn-
ton, wearing puffed sleeves. iVdrian took the same hotel
suite he had previously occupied, and asked the
editor who had once scoffed at his ideas to come
to see him. When she arrived he led her to a window,
and asked her to count the number of puffed sleeves she
saw below on Fifth Avenue. The editor was sporting
enough to give him a correct count of forty-nine.

The evidence is too great for anyone to doubt that
pictures have a definite effect on the feminine fashions
of the world.

Adrian says, "Personally I feel that this is an excel-
lent trend. There is a certain amount of fashion con-
sciousness born in every woman but often she is puz-
zled as to what to do about it. There are so many paths

['239]

Talking Pictures

she can take. And frequently preoccupations keep her
from studying clothes closely enough to know exactly
what is best for her.

"But she can see a picture which stars a woman of her
type. Let us assume that she is the general size and
coloration of Joan Crawford. She sees carefully made
clothes on which many hours of thought have been
expended. She sees perfect accessories to go with these
clothes. She can sit back in her chair and make an easy
decision as to how that sort of grooming might suit her.

"As a whole, I think it can be safely said that Amer-
ican women have never been better dressed than they
are today. Certainly average feminine grooming is far
above what it was five years ago. It is my opinion that
the films may take a goodly portion of the credit for
this fact."

Recently the author addressed three hundred students
at a college. Fifty-three girls of those present wore the
attractive coiffure of Norma Shearer in her character-
ization of "Juliet." Miss Shearer, in her turn, had
adopted the hairdress from one appearing in a Renais-
sance fresco by Fra Angelico.

Appearances of stars in costumes of ancient days
have brought into style many modes which might not
otherwise have been revived. Motion pictures are
undoubtedly responsible for the touches from the nine-
teenth, eighteenth, seventeenth, sixteenth, and even
fifteenth centuries one sees in the dresses of women of
today. A certain bodice line worn by Katharine
Hepburn as Mary of Scotland has appeared on many
current evening dresses. Romeo and Juliet is credited

[ 240 ]

Social Influences

with having brought about the Renaissance line, with
high waists, puffed sleeves, beaded fabrics, and coats
that swing from the shoulder to the floor.

But the visible influence of the motion picture is not
at all limited to dress. Its effect on interior decoration
and architecture has also been extensive.

Years ago a government commercial representative
told the author the following incident. It is a tale about
the ruler of a remote Himalaya mountain state who
once came to Delhi, India. There he saw his first motion
picture in which was shown a typical American home.
The x\siatic ruler understood but little of the action,
but one thing did strike his attention. He was fascinated
by a scene in which a man was shown reading a book
under a bridge lamp. He returned to his mountains. A
few months later an order from him for a bridge lamp
was brought to Delhi by a pack train, the members of
which had dared death to come through the snow-piled,
wintry mountain passes.

When it was explained that the lamp was powered
by electricity, which was not available in his province,
the ruler ordered a portable generating set. This
generator and lamp were laboriously carted back
through the snows to the castle of the ruler, located
three miles above sea level. Both of these objects were
unknown to the ruler before he had seen a motion
picture. The communicative value of the film has far-
reaching implications.

The cry sometimes heard from foreign countries that
"American movies are Americanizing our people'* is
perhaps the greatest proof of the effect of the motion

[241]

Talking Pictures

picture on tastes and customs. It is suggested that this
complaint is sometimes generated by foreign business
firms because American motion pictures are believed to
create interest in attractive American-made products.

It was suggested in the discussion of settings that the
motion picture is responsible for raising the average level
of taste used in furnishing American homes. Various
modifications of the "modernistic' ' trend in furniture
are currently in vogue. Many interior decorators credit
the start of this vogue to the film studio art director
who first dared to offer in motion pictures a back-
ground in the modernistic mood.

This director said, "I made this first modernistic set,
not with the idea of starting a fad, but because mod-
ernism is based on simplicity. Any method of interior
decoration which decreases the number of objects to
be photographed would naturally be valuable in a pic-
torial medium. People saw the advantage of fewer
pieces of furniture and less bric-a-brac. The result is
that today, while we have passed out of the extreme
phase of modernism, we have retained its virtue of
simplicity, first brought to the world's attention, on a
mass scale, through the motion picture."

One art director suggests that the motion picture has
aided and influenced the making of a more beautiful
American home because it has never obviously set out
to attain this end. It was long ago proven that for
commercial entertainment purposes propaganda must
be avoided. Therefore, motion pictures show, without
editorial comment, attractive people amid attractive ob-
jects. There are many perfectly chosen objects of art

[ 242 1

Social Influences

in properly made motion pictures. A prospective home
owner who sees a photoplay has a variety of examples,
chosen by highly paid experts, which may influence his
own selections.

In one picture, the setting consisted of a very lovely
modified English style farmhouse. Six interior rooms
were presented. The front exterior was shown and a
quarter-acre of gardens. In one corner of the garden
was a doll's house large enough for small children to
enter. The studio which made this picture received
nearly one hundred requests for the plans of the doll
house, and the plans of the main home were solicited
by the president of one of the largest automobile manu-
facturing companies in America. He reproduced this
house to scale as a lodge on his eastern countxv estate.

There may be questions of controversv about the
relative values of stories offered in motion picture form.
Previously we have suggested that the photoplay, a
commercial product, offered to a mass audience, the
individual tastes of which are not alwavs of the high-
est, has done a commendable job of ordering its own
house. Even if ways are found to advance the present
methods of storv regulation, it is doubtful if all can be
pleased. There will always be persons who will not
agree with some of the plot presentations in film
theatres.

But on the question of motion picture influence on
manners and customs, one finds few if anv dissenting
voices. Great architects, great gown designers, and great
interior decorators are highlv sensitive artists. Thev
seek even in a comparativelv trivial story to make sure

[243 1

Talking Pictures

that the work which represents them is work at the very
peak of their art. And because the motion picture
studios have been able to pay well for superior services,
many of the most successful men and women in the lines
mentioned have been attracted to film-making. This
has given the theatregoers of the world, for the ex-
penditure of a very small admission fee, the home-
planning advice, by indirection, of undisputed leaders.

[ M4]

THE SHORT SUBJECT

The short subject, a picture presentation in one or
two reels, is a branch of film production too often over-
looked by the public. Yet, in the United States about
one thousand short subjects are produced each year.
This is nearly double the number of feature pictures
made during the same period.

Moreover, short subjects, because of their wide range
of topics, are much closer to the educational function
of films than eight or ten reel feature pictures. These
are almost without exception, "story films. " They
tell a fiction story and are designed primarily for enter-
tainment. When they concern a historical character
like Disraeli, or faithfully reproduce great literary
classics like Romeo and Juliet or David Copperfield,
they attain direct educational significance. But the edu-
cational value of modern stories is largely indirect and
by example.

Since the short subject rarely depends upon plot for
its strength factors, the fictional method is seldom used
in its structure. The short subject keeps very close to the
borderline between sheer entertainment and direct edu-
cation. An example is the "narration short."

In this the subject is photographed without spoken
sound. A narrator, speaking on a studio stage to a

[245]

Talking Pictures

microphone while the silent footage unrolls before him,
makes comments or explanations. Commentators of
this sort whose names are widely known include Pete
Smith, Grantland Rice, Graham McNamee, Wilfred
Lucas, Carey Wilson, Robert Benchley, Lowell
Thomas, and Edwin C. Hill. A national magazine gave
its highest rating of four stars to all the presentations of
one of these commentators. They praised him for
evenly balancing correct and educational statements on
technical and semitechnical subjects and at the same
time for creating interest which made them successful
at the regular "pay as you enter" theatre.

A great deal of research preparation and study is re-
quired of a commentator. He must become expert in
his knowledge of each subject under discussion. He
must have a good voice, for he must be readily under-
stood. Distinct enunciation, correct volume, and proper
pitch give popularity to America's best radio speakers
and motion picture commentators. Men who cannot
speak correctly and effectively are obviously barred
from this interesting new phase of forensics.

Localisms, colloquialisms, slang, and idioms must be
carefully used and never to excess, although several
commentators have developed a technique for making
explanations clearer by couching their illustrations in
idioms of the moment. This method needs careful han-
dling to be effective.

The pictorial subjects discussed by the various com-
mentators have been catholic. They include birds, bugs,
astrology, telepathy, astronomy, horse breeding, history,
paper manufacture, reforestation, costume designing, the

[246]

The Short Subject

cutting of diamonds, directions to detect cheating at
cards, the proper method to fly an airplane, the collec-
tion of raw rubber from trees, and the growing and
roasting of coffee. The subjects are handled in authen-
tic manner and made clear by illustrations familiar to
the listener.

One short subject, with highly comic but scientifi-
cally accurate comments by Pete Smith, is credited by
many economists with having halted the economically
dangerous "dime chain letters." With pictures of hu-
man players, with graphic pictorial charts, and with his
clever, accurate remarks, Smith explained pictorially
and verbally the ridiculous nature of the whole plan.
Until this short subject came out, no amount of printed
expositions had been able to check the progress of the
evil.

The success of the "narration" short subject led to
an abrupt change in the handling of newsreels, for it
was early seen that pictured news was more acceptable
when explained verbally. Newsreels are standard in
every film theatre. No showman, even in those states
where two big features are offered at a single perform-
ance, would think of presenting a program without a
newsreel. In the larger cities there are theatres which
run nothing else. The importance of the newsreel and
its cameraman cannot be questioned, but the newsreel,
even after the coming of sound, used written explana-
tory titles. The "narration" short subject soon demon-
strated the superior value of presenting background in-
formation orally.

The newsreel goes everywhere. Manv feel that it is

[247]

Talking Pictures

important among the influences which will some day
end war, for war appears more horrible when we ac-
tually see men killed before our eyes. And nowadays
with the speed of transatlantic and transpacific travel
a king can be crowned in London on a Monday, and
the exact manner of his coronation witnessed by theatre
audiences in New York on the following Friday.

The time may come when people going to their work
in the morning may stop by a theatre in order to see the
daily news. When we consider that wire transmission
of photography brings us pictures of world events
within a few hours of their occurrence, that airplanes
transport films within a few hours after their develop-
ment, we realize that the motion picture must be con-
sidered of great importance as a means of communica-
tion.

Years ago the rulers of vast empires and the generals
of great armies depended on messengers who ran afoot
or on horse. In ancient Egypt the natives recorded their
history on clay or stone, not unlike the natives of ancient
Mexico. But through the ages, man has learned the value
of a knowledge of events as they occur. And through
the centuries he has mastered the means to acquire this
news. Just as the development of the film industry is a
biography of genius, so also is the development of
communication. Yet the most amazing of discoveries
related to communication were made in the last cen-
tury. What the coming years may bring one hesitates
to say. The possibilities of the newsreel, linked to per-
fected television, are almost staggering in their social
implications.

[248]

The Short Subject

The newsreel makes an important challenge to the
written encyclopedia. E*7erv studio maintains a "film
library" and in one of these libraries there are now sixty
million feet of film. About half of this footage comes
from newsreels. The rest was gathered during the mak-
ing of location pictures throughout the United States
and the world.

Most film libraries start with newsreels of the San
Francisco earthquake and fire in 1906, but some have
footagre ten vears or more earlier than that time. For
research on customs and manners from 1906 through
today, it is practically unnecessary for any film pro-
ducer to refer to a printed encyclopedia. His film li-
brary furnishes him adequate pictorial examples and in
more vivid form, for these are not still photographs.
People sit, stand, eat, dress, and walk in the exact man-
ner of the period.

When the king of a large Latin country abdicated,
one studio considered making a picture based on his
life. Its film library assembled sixty reels covering
twenty-five years of the monarch's career. His boy-
hood and all other public incidents, including three
dramatic attempts at assassination, were portrayed. An-
other sixty reels on Charles Lindbergh will be of price-
less value to aviation students a thousand years from
now, for these reels offer a graphic pictorial record
wThich is at once available, easily studied, and abso-
lutely correct.

Because it has put film apparatus to physical tests far
beyond those which would come in normal studio opera-
tion, the newsreel has also been of scientific value to the

[ 249 1

Talking Pictures

film industry as a whole. Many corrections were made
in cameras and in celluloid film formulas as a result of
the months spent in the incredible cold of the South
Pole by two newsreel cameramen with Admiral Byrd.
Many scientists who may never go on such an expedi-
tion can study the South Pole terrain leisurely and
check their own conclusions by important visual data,
gained through such pictures.

A Servant of the People is a short subject illustrative
of the effective film use which can be made of impor-
tant historical facts. The picture is a short cinematic
history of the writing of the Constitution of the United
States. It supplements written texts in a significant man-
ner. History students may now see the signers of the
Constitution come to life, hear them debating each clause
of the document, and hear the personal and human side
of the States' rights controversy.

It is evident that the motion picture is, in films like
this, indicating an approach to a new method of teach-
ing history, a method which will greatly vitalize the
subject. It is essential that significant basic material will
always be found in books and records, but the time is at
hand when the camera can and will supply valuable
supplementary material. A photographic record of a
president's campaign speeches, his inauguration, his
various accomplishments and failures, would aid in mak-
ing the United States history of the future more clearly
intelligible to our citizens.

More and more the cinema is opening new doors.
Geography, natural science, and geology have gained
new appeal values when discussed in the pictorial form.

[ 250]

The Short Subject

The short subject of today is produced for theatrical
use. Its aim is primarily entertainment; secondarily,
education. It points a way, however, for those who
dream of a day when every grammar school, high
school, and college will be equipped with talking pic-
ture apparatus. The simple psvchological devices
through which the commercial producer gains attention
for his short films might well be studied by those who
hope to make successful educational pictures. The
theatre operator calls such devices "showmanship."

While a direct editorial influence is not in the prov-
ince of the entertainment film as such, the short sub-
ject does take its part in factual discussions important
to an aroused public. An example is the Crime Doesn't
Pay series of short subjects which show that law viola-
tions bring certain punishment, whether they be small
traffic violations, or kidnaping, or safecracking. These
particular factual shorts were made with the aid and
co-operation of Federal, state, and city police and de-
tective departments.

The film cartoon has had an outstanding and de-
cidedly deserved success. It has largely supplanted the
older short comedy made with human actors, for the
mechanical basis of the screen cartoon permits comedy
effects not possible with human players. In a cartoon
which made a villain of a big brown bear, the bear
reaches into a hollow tree and eats a supply of honey.
The head bee, dressed like a general, is seen conferring
with his staff. An order is given. Bees by the thousands
appear from everywhere. They form into a sharp thin
"V" which shoots upward and then descends with the

[251]

Talking Pictures

sound of a thousand diving airplanes, striking a tender
portion of the bear's anatomy. This is a scene which
delights the children.

The perfected colored cartoon technique of Walt
Disney, Harman-Ising, Mintz, Schlessinger, and
Fleischer is one of the most fascinating high lights in
an industry particularly notable for its varied technical
advances. And because the mechanical march of the
cartoon permits exact timing with music, music is even
more important in a cartoon than a feature photoplay
studio. In fact, in the finished cartoon script the narra-
tion of the story is on one half of each page, while
opposite it is the accompanying musical score.

The choice of a story starts the work on a cartoon.
After this is chosen by the staff writers, artists are
called in to make colorful paintings of the backgrounds
required.

Then each sequence is first drawn by specially trained
artists, called animators. Suppose the sequence requires
one little dog to push another little dog away from a
pan of milk. This might take twenty drawings, or a
hundred, depending upon the movements. The average
cartoon comedy requires twenty thousand individual
drawings. One man working entirely by himself could
not make a cartoon in less than four hundred days.
These drawings are first made by pencil; then the ani-
mator puts the sequence together, and with his thumb,
flips rapidly through the file. This rough test discovers
faults in the action. This gives the same illusion of
movement secured by Muybridge with the consecutive
photographs of a running horse that he made for Senator

{ 252 ]

The Short Subject

Stanford in 1877, thereby opening the way for the
present form of motion picture.

The action having been proved with pencil sketches,
ink drawings are made on rectangular pieces of celluloid,
called "cells." These cells are placed over the painted
background of the scene, with a strong light shining
from beneath. One cell is drawn for each frame of the
picture. When these black ink cells are completed they
are assembled and photographed, one by one, against
the background. Then producers view this black and
white version and order any corrections which are
necessary for good workmanship.

All corrections having been made, the cells go to
the color room. There the head color artist marks
different numbers on the various cells to indicate the
shades and tints which will be used. They are then
given to scores of girls who color them according to
the indicated numbers. The next process is to hold each
finished cell before the proper background while the
camera photographs one separate cell for each frame
of the film.

The picture next goes to a sound stage, on which
musicians and singers provide music "by the numbers."
Unless someone has made a mistake in arithmetic, there
is no possibility of a cartoon dancer being out of step.
The individual numbers of the drawings correspond
exactly to the musical score. The creation of cartoons
is complicated, but it would be easier to deprive people
of their dinners than to deny them their cartoons, for
these have become a fixed part of the motion picture
program.

[253]

Talking Pictures

Travelogues are cousins of the newsreel. They, too,
are contributing their part to bring about eventual world
peace by replacing exaggerated written opinion with
actual pictures of people, places, and events. The
monthly news review film is related to the newsreel. It
permits a dramatization of events not possible to its
day-by-day cousin.

The careful observer of photoplay construction is
aware of the contribution made by the finest com-
mercial short subjects. They afford the basis upon
which strictly educational films will be constructed in
the future. They possess a realism which proves truth
stranger than fiction, and a dynamic, unique power
which excites the imagination in a manner strongly sup-
plemental to the effect of the written word. Few, if any,
single aspects of the motion picture offer a more uni-
versal appeal than ably filmed short subjects.

To repeat a statement made at the start of this chap-
ter, because it is not bound so tightly with fictional
entertainment methods as the "full length" feature pho-
toplay is, the short subject has been able to experiment
more boldly than its longer brother. In films of un-
doubted educational import, it has proven that there is
no real barrier between the field of entertainment and
that of education. By gaining great success with his-
torical and semiscientific subjects before persons who
paid their way into theatres to be amused rather than
to be educated, it has shown that entertainment and
education are not at two separate poles.

It is all a matter of the presentation of interest values.
Shakespeare is still a delight to lovers of reading and

[254]

The Short Subject

his plays are standard in every college. And yet we can-
not even remember half a dozen playwrights who in
his day were considered the equal of Shakespeare. But
Shakespeare, while writing greatly, also wrote enter-
tainingly. The lesson that educational material gains
effective force when it is presented with maximum in-
terest appeal, is one that the educational film of the fu-
ture may well take from the present-day short subject.

[«55l

IN HOME AND SCHOOL

Home motion pictures and the educational films
have had a parallel growth. This has been true because
cameras and projectors of the sixteen, nine, and eight
millimetre sizes are very much less expensive than the
standard thirty-five millimetre variety used in studios
and by the newsreels. The smaller equipment may now
be secured for a price within the reach of individuals
and schools.

The enthusiasm of many of the thousands of teachers
currently giving instruction in visual education had its
birth in personal "home movie" experiments. It is not
the intention of the author to advise possible home mo-
tion picture addicts what cameras to buy, or how to
operate them. The various companies making such
cameras all print excellent brochures on the subject.
It should be said, however, that no motion picture
camera or projector can ever be considered in the "toy"
classification.

The cost of the home movie hobby, while much re-
duced in the past few years, will always be much more
than that required of ordinary still photography. The
home movie camera is a delicate device. It is more com-
plicated and more intricately machined than a "still"
camera, and if carelessly handled it will produce medi-

[256]

hi Home and School

ocre results. To operate a camera correctly, one needs
as a prerequisite a deep, sincere interest in the difficult
but satisfying art of motion photography. From this
will arise desire to study and to become skilful.

Professional motion picture cameramen spend at
least six hours a week reading the latest scientific bul-
letins on photography in order to keep up with the
remarkable day-by-day adyance in lens and film
reproductiye quality. But an amateur need not study
so intently, although he should be familiar with the
basic books on photography. Cultural hobbies of this
sort bring pleasure only in proportion to the study,
effort, and interest which goes into them.

The amateur finds his greatest difficulty in his in-
ability to judge light yalues. This becomes intuitive in
a professional. An amateur cannot expect to get this
sixth sense for years. For him, there are mechanical
"light meters" and printed "light tables." Used intel-
ligently, these will bring good photographic results.
But photography is like any other craft; those with a
natural aptitude for it will develop more rapidly than
others.

Care of his camera is second nature to a professional.
He realizes that all machinery must be carefully pro-
tected and used carefully. iVmateurs frequently err in
this respect. On shipboard 16 mm. cameras have been
seen in deck chairs where they are exposed to the sea air
for hours, and amateurs have been known to bang ex-
pensive home movie cameras against posts and walls.

Home movie cameras often have signs of rust in the
lens mounting. This shows that the lens has not been

[*57l

Talking Pictures

removed and cleaned. No professional would think of
storing his camera at night without removing and wip-
ing each movable part. Makers of home movie equip-
ment try to make it foolproof, but finely built cameras
and projectors should be kept from persons who will
not give them reasonable care.

Fifty years from now, the home movie will be a
vital and established source of new motion picture di-
rectors and cameramen. The author predicts further
that within a quarter of a century no school or college
will consider itself well equipped without at least a
hundred 16 mm. cameras. These will be loaned to stu-

Type of
Projectors

In Elementary
and High Schools

, In
Colleges

Total

16 mm. Sound
35 mm. Sound

675
400

300
300

975
700

Total Sound
Projectors

16 mm. Silent
35 mm. Silent

1075

9000
4500

600

1000
200

1675

10000
4700

Total Silent
Projectors

13500

1200

14700

Total All Projectors

14575

1800

16375

Figures supplied early in 1937 by the Office of Education, United
States Department of the Interior.

[258]

In Home and School

dents taking specific laboratory and field courses in
motion photography. Except in one or two experimen-
tal schools in the progressive group such courses are not
available today.

Almost every modern school today has huge lathes
to teach boys to repair automobiles. Is it not equally
logical that schools should make easily accessible the
most important tool of one of America's largest indus-
tries? Some advance has been made in the use of pro-
jectors in schools. This indicates that the educators of
the country are becoming more and more aware of the
methods which motion pictures make available to them.
The approximate number of projectors in American
schools and colleges is shown in the table on page 258.

Analysis of the figures in the table on page 258 affords
the following conclusions:

1. The small number of sound projectors now
available will delay general visual education by
talking pictures for many years.

2. There are sufficient silent projectors of both
the 35 mm. and 16 mm. size to make possible
limited nation-wide visual education in that
form.

3. With ten thousand 16 mm. silent projectors and
forty-five hundred 35 mm. projectors, it is
imperative that silent educational films be
printed in both sizes.

The educational film situation is not definitelv estab-
lished at present. To put it mildly, it is in a state of flux.

[259]

Talking Pictures

There are many concerns and organizations issuing ed-
ucational films of more or less merit. An available
standard guide for teachers in visual education lists six-
teen hundred films by subject. A very extensive survey
by The American Council on Education isolated ap-
proximately seven thousand films which might remotely
be given an "educational" designation. But most of
these are described as "low in educational content and
hopelessly out of date."

A national distribution system, sufficiently sound and
large to render making of educational films a safe finan-
cial venture, does not exist. Many of the films offered
for "educational" purposes have been made and are of-
fered gratis by companies manufacturing various prod-
ucts, or by social, governmental, or religious organiza-
tions.

Circular Number 150, Sources of Educational Films
and Equipment published in July, 1936 by the Office of
Education, United States Department of the Interior,
lists as distributors of educational films forty-one com-
mercial concerns, ten museums, twenty-six universities,
eight religious organizations, and twelve government of-
fices. Other sources reveal that a tire company offers
thirty-five films to educators. One electrical equipment
company has thirty-three subjects for elementary
schools and thirty-five advanced technical films. The
catalogue of one distribution concern offers subjects
like Mechanisms of Breathing, Body Defenses against
Disease, Molecular Theory of Matter, Study of Infant
Behavior, Distribution and Assimilation of Foods, Plant
Growth, and The House Fly. These subjects, chosen

[ 260]

Cutter inspects several takes from the trial scene of Farnell. These scenes
are kept in cans and spliced into the film in proper sequence.

Canned romance. Containers of talking pictures when ready to be shipped
from studios to all parts of the world.

In Home and School

at random, indicate that educators have been giving care-
ful thought to the possibilities moving pictures offer
them.

Russia produces almost as many films as the United
States, but comparatively few of them are talking pic-
tures. Only a fraction are destined for purely entertain-
ment usage. The U.S.S.R. uses the silent film projected
from portable traveling projectors mounted on trucks
to bring quick education to its more remote provinces.

Apparently, the greatest immediate barrier of educa-
tional films is in the field of distribution. Conditions
would be better, undoubtedly, if there were fewer and
larger distribution outlets, and if all major outlets had
a standard policy. As it is now, some concerns offering
films lend them free of charge. Comparatively few rent
them in the customary manner of the commercial field.
Most of the companies making a business of educational
footage demand that the schools buy the prints out-
right. Unless they are supported by some heavily
financed foundation, free films will always be tinged
with the suspicion of editorial influence. Some choice
will eventually have to be made between sales and
rental of educational films. It is hoped that the schools
will at an early day work out satisfactory plans for
giving boys and girls the privilege of having talking
pictures.

Walter Evans, expert in the use of 16 mm. film for
classroom use, offers these valuable suggestions to those
schools that are using educational films or to those that
are eager to use them.

"Two developments in the field of educational films

[261]

Talking Pictures

deserve special comment. The first is the development
of sound on film in 1 6 mm. size pictures; and the devel-
opment of apparatus that is light, portable, and practical
for the school to use in projecting sound pictures in
their auditoriums and classrooms.

"It would be well to keep in mind one vital point.
If a motion picture is to be produced for general dis-
tribution in the schools, it should be "shot" on 35 mm.
standard equipment and reduced to 1 6 mm. in the print.
This is quite necessary because it is not yet possible to
get all the professional effects and results from original
16 mm. production, such as the addition of the sound
track to the film and other laboratory effects which are
only possible when working with a 3 5 mm. negative. Of
course, since the vast majority of equipment now in the
schools is 16 mm., it is necessary that the print be on the
16 mm. size. If, however, a film is being taken just as a
record of the school activities, and no distribution is
contemplated, a 1 6 mm. camera is recommended for the
economy of this equipment and film.

"The use of a new color process is another develop-
ment worthy of emphasis in any article dealing with
educational film production. The perspective of this
1 6 mm. color process opens up the film of documentary
recording of subjects in which color is inherent, in an
authentic and yet simple manner."

The statement has been heard, "But the theatre movie
and the educational film differ too greatly to have any-
thing in common." They are different, but as we have
said before, so are second cousins. They may not look
alike but some of the same blood flows in their veins.

[262]

In Home and School

Makers and users of educational films will do well to
pay due respect to the part played by the "theatre
movie" in making possible the store of proved technical
facts now available to educational films.

In addition to schools, many churches and clubs are
now equipped with either 35 mm. or 16 mm. projec-
tors. Accurate statistics are not available which reveal
the number of projection machines in these twro fields.
Whatever has been said about the use of the educational
film as a whole applies to these subdivisions.

A frequently overlooked phase of the problem is the
Cinema Club. In at least a dozen universities a Cinema
Club has taken its place with the standard stage dramatic
clubs. These clubs are also organized in numbers of
high schools. They make a study of motion picture
reviews and frequently devote time to actual reviewing.
They hold open forums for the members, and opinions
pro and con are exchanged. Sometimes papers are read
and books dealing with pictures are discussed. Com-
parison between stories as written and as filmed excites
much interest.

These clubs also devote themselves to the experimen-
tal production of photoplays, just as the Mask and
Wig Club of the University of Pennsylvania produces
various stage dramas.

A typical club will divide its membership among
several students so that each mav execute one of several
necessary duties. In this way the plan of a production
unit is followed. The club starts out by possessing a
16 mm. camera. Several members will serve as camera-
men; others will divide the work of the director, and

[263]

Talking Pictures

several will be property men. A number of members
will write the scenario. The rest will act. In most
cinema clubs the members supplement their informa-
tion by interchanging individual technical duties with
each production made.

A member of one college club said to the author,
"Membership in a Cinema Club offers the Master's
degree in the matter of photoplay appreciation. Until
you have actually made a picture in such a club, you
can never really know what an arduous task it is to bring
about screen perfection."

Actual study and experimentation are values which
cannot be underestimated. They lead to an experience
which theory can never approximate. On a small scale,
the work of cinema clubs approaches all of the bitter
failure and the happy success which is a part of any
artistic achievement. Mistakes are made and problems
are solved. Young actors and actresses meet with ap-
proval and disapproval and young directors display
inherent genius or plain stupidity. The Cinema Club
is an excellent cog in the new machinery of Practical
Education.

[264]

7

THE FILM ABROAD

The international figures on the photoplay arc
impressive. The world investment in studios and the-
atres is $2,650,000,000. To earn that sum at a salary of
$2 500 a year would take a man 1 ,060,000 years. It would
provide very comfortable five-room houses costing
$5,000 each to 530,000 persons. There is an estimated
weekly world attendance upon commercially made
photoplays of 220,000,000 people. If these photoplay
attendants stood six feet apart number one would have
his feet in Lake Michigan while the last looked out upon
a sunset over the Pacific Ocean. Such comparisons to
illustrate the Gargantuan size of the film industry could
be indefinitely prolonged.

There are 52,175 talking picture theatres in the world.
Of these 15,858 are in the United States.

There is one theatre in the United States for every
6,742 persons. There is one theatre in Europe for every
9,270 persons. There is one theatre in the world for
every 20,716 persons. The motion picture showings in
Europe, in number of theatres, are not far behind the
United States. In production, however, the difference
is great. America supplies 70 per cent of all the suc-
cessful commercial motion pictures shown in theatres
throughout the world.1

1 Figures supplied by Association of Motion Picture Producers.

[265]

Talking Pictures

It is apparent that the international market is impor-
tant for the American film producer. In fact the mar-
ket, when in normal condition, is so profitable that some
film makers count too greatly on it in estimating their
probable income. While American theatre income is
disturbed dangerously by economic depressions, the in-
ternational market has periodically been unsettled, not
only because of economic troubles, but from a number
of other. causes.

During the period of the silent film the foreign busi-
ness of the film companies flourished, for there were no
language barriers. Subtitles were easily translated into
a score of languages. The coming of sound pictures
upset this.

The first attempt to overcome language barriers led
to the making of pictures with as many as six different
casts, one for each language. At the beginning of this
system practically every successful picture was made in
French, German, and Spanish, but some pictures were
made which included Italian, Swedish, and Portuguese.
This did not prove successful. Audiences which had
become accustomed to Greta Garbo in silent pictures,
and liked her, were not quick to accept any other
actress playing the Greta Garbo roles, even though the
other actress would use their own language.

Two new methods to overcome these problems were
devised. The first method retains the English language
sound track, but superimposes printed titles in the native
tongue over the action of the picture. This mode is
particularly popular in South America where many of
the population know some English, but not enough to

[266]

The Film Abroad

grasp the meaning of a picture without written titles
which use the native idioms. The other method keeps
the familiar faces and actions of American stars, but
substitutes a sound track in the native tongue prepared
in the country concerned. This system is most popular
in European countries. Both of these methods are used
successfully.

The extent of the American participation in the for-
eign industry is shown by the figures of one company.
This company serves more than one hundred and
twenty-eight exchanges in fortv-eight sovereign coun-
tries. These exchanges are privately managed and
financed locally. They usuallv distribute films made
within their own nation along with those they buy from
American makers. A survey of reports from foreign
exchanges again emphasizes that the film is a truly re-
markable international medium of communication.

There seems to be no such thing as a specific appeal
for any particular geographical division. A picture
which is popular in one country will be popular the
world over; subject to rare individual conditions, the
entire civilized world reacts substantially the same to
dramatic situations. Musical films often attain greater
popularity outside the United States than within, be-
cause motion picture audiences in other lands are some-
times more keenly attuned to music.

This is also true of the art of pantomime. The great
ability of Laurel and Hardy in voiceless gesture has
made them even more popular abroad than they are in
the United States. Americans are not so appreciative of
pantomime as other nationals.

[267]

Talking Pictures

The native cultures of various countries have each de-
veloped characteristics distinctly their own. Italy is
famous for its operas and concert singers. The German
mind has turned largely to philosophical contributions.
The genius of the English is often expressed best in
their poetry. But all races and nationalities have a
common interest in such emotions as love and ambition,
and they react alike to these feelings. The international
photoplay illustrates still further that honest, sincere
art, as it reflects the life of human beings, is of the world
as a whole. Universal art wherever found is never
prisoned by national boundaries.

An example of a dramatic picture not suitable for the
foreign market is Murder on the Diamond. This was a
baseball story and too fundamentally American. On
the other hand, Ah Wilderness, though dealing with
American life, was very popular abroad because it tells
the story of parents and their problems with growing
boys and girls. A family theme has an international
human denominator, understood in any country. One
can understand why Romeo and Juliet has been played
in more places in the world and in more languages than
any play ever written, for stories of this sort have an
inner international language of their own, the language
of love.

If an actress or an actor becomes a star in America,
his appearance, personality, and acting ability will be
received with equal acclaim in the international field.
But there are some exceptions to this. They rest with
those instances in which the star's popularity is too
largely based on strictly American characteristics.

[268]

The Film Abroad

American slang, a cowboy twang, complicated Ameri-
can colloquialisms, or a specialized dialect may lead to
an unfavorable reception when they cannot be easily
understood.

The dialectal peculiarities, however, of almost every
section of importance in America have been made al-
most commonplace knowledge bv the films. The speech
of the New Englander, the New Yorker, the South-
erner, and the Westerner has been used in talking pic-
tures at one time or another. This has led to a finer
understanding between the sections of our nation. It has
made the literature of particular localities plainer than
it was before the talking picture.

One outstanding difference is noted between player
popularity here and abroad. In the international field,
when an actor once becomes a public idol, audiences
stay with him for a longer period. The more leisurely
mode of life existing outside the United States brings a
less constant demand for change. Stars, at least a dozen
could be named, who have not been heard of in Amer-
ica for ten years, are still attracting large audiences
abroad.

Theatres abroad are on the whole less advanced than
those in the United States. Many of the newer theatres
across the sea are air conditioned, have comfortable
seats, and excellent means of projection and sound re-
cording. The theatres of France, Germanv, Russia, and
Japan are frequently modernistic in architectual design.

In America the silent, or non-wired, non-sound-
reproducing theatre has almost completely disappeared,
but it remains very prevalent internationally. It has

[269]

Talking Pictures

been mentioned that there are thirty-six thousand sound
motion picture theatres outside of the United States.
The same international area has seventy thousand odd
silent theatres.

American audiences prove that the film is truly an
international art, for about one sixth of all films pro-
duced internationally reach the United States. They do
not care where a film is made, providing its story,
camera, and sound qualities are high. A case in point is
Be Mine Tonight. This was a German-made musical
presented in the English language. It featured Jan
Kiepura, a star of whom few Americans had heard.
Yet it filled more theatres than many American-made
successes of the period. It offered a striking new tech-
nique in musical pictures and, since its importation, has
been widely imitated.

American producers welcome the increasing interest
shown by foreign countries in improving their native
film production. The achievements of the American
film industry have been great, but it is certain that,
under the spur of adequate foreign competition, they
will surpass their former triumphs.

America was the first country to enter the motion
picture industry on a large scale, and other countries
now engaged in it largely follow the methods devised
here. There is no great country which does not have
actual film production. There are several gigantic con-
cerns in Japan, where films are exceedingly popular.
There are studios in China, India, Australia, Russia,
Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Austria, Spain, Italy, and
Sweden, and there are many others elsewhere.

[ 270 ]

The Film Abroad

The international social effects of the motion picture
industry have been great indeed. Few countries have
not already felt its effects. Its rapid development in-
dicates that it may become an even greater interna-
tional factor. The motion pictures of tomorrow may
directly aid the diplomatic relations between countries.
If it is wisely handled, it may go as an informative mes-
senger of peace, an apostle of beauty to every land.
Also the motion picture brings to us a greater sympathy
for those in other countries, a greater appreciation of
their arts and customs, and an increased understanding
of world events.

Foreign-made pictures in native language have not
been widely exhibited in this country, for the obvious
reason that Americans are generally distressingly poor
linguists. But in the Canadian cities along the Great
Lakes, one finds theatres which show French films to
good patronage. In Montreal, French language pictures
frequently outdraw those in English, and the theatres
for French films are large and modern. In New Orleans
likewise there has been a French film theatre.

In Los Angeles and San Diego, California, and at
various points in Texas, Arizona, and New Mexico, one
finds playhouses exclusively devoted to films in the
Spanish language. In these cases, and in those of the
French theatres, such focal points are maintained for
French and Mexican people living in the vicinity. But
they also provide a splendid opportunity for young
Americans to study the two languages. Language
teachers in the Los Angeles schools encourage their
students to attend the Spanish theatre. It is their testi-

[271]

Talking Pictures

mony that such attendance is one of the quickest ways
to build up adequate conversational facility in the lan-
guage.

Progressive schools and colleges, in districts where
exhibition of foreign language films is not common, are
seeking the same goal by sponsoring the presentation of
films in French, Italian, Spanish, and German in their
local or campus theatres. There is no question that this
procedure will grow in popularity and that eventually
it may develop a large, special educational market for
films in native tongues. Language teachers are in agree-
ment that native idioms correctly spoken with excellent
enunciation by trained native players, make a specially
valuable impression upon the student. Teaching of
languages by phonographic records has been a common
supplementary method for years. Now by talking pic-
tures the great value of sight can be added to this sys-
tem of instruction.

[272]

THE ROAD AHEAD

Perhaps the facts given in this book have brought
the thought, "Is there a place for me in this art industry?
If I should enter it, what preliminary training should I
need? What is the industry's future? Has it already
reached its zenith, or is it destined to attain a still greater
importance? What about comparatively new develop-
ments such as* color photography, third dimension pho-
tography, and television? As thev grow and develop
will their effect on the industry as a whole be favorable
or unfavorable? What opportunities will the expected
expansion of the educational film and the home motion
picture offer to workers in the industry?"

In its short life the film has caught up with its prophets
many times. Therefore, we shall not make positive state-
ments which new developments might make laughable
within a year. Our intent is merely to call attention to
possibilities and, by simple descriptions of the newer
and less understood phases, to excite the imagination of
the reader. This may bring about a more thorough
study of things and forces capable of carrying the
cinema to new mountain peaks, now veiled in the
clouds.

It has been stated that growth is to be expected in the
field of the educational film. This valuable growth has

[273]

Talking Pictures

been impeded in the past by a shortage of adequate pro-
jection equipment in the schools, and by conflicting,
non-uniform plans of production and distribution.
There is really no problem here except a lack of effec-
tive organization and financing. Some day these will be
provided and when that time comes many new posi-
tions will be available, because producing organizations
will be needed with staffs and equipment similar to
those in present studios devoted to the entertainment
film.

In its development color photography is not likely
to increase production personnel, but its future is in-
triguing.

There is little question but that some day color pho-
tography will supplant black and white, but apparently
that day is still in the distance. A present handicap of
color for feature pictures is that it is somewhat unusual
and it tends to distract attention from the story being
told. Since any kind of photography is merely a way
of portraying life, people must get used to it gradually
as they did to black and white photography when it so
largely supplanted paintings and etchings for certain
purposes.

A scene is recalled in which a British officer in a red
coat with gold epaulets was talking with a girl in a blue
dress. With such strongly colored visual distractions it
was difficult to concentrate on what the characters were
saying. The most successful recent color picture is felt
to have admitted this difficulty by its method of treat-
ment. Sets and lighting and dresses were in subdued
tones and there was but little color contrast, the tones

[ 274 1

The Road Ahead

of the faces and eyes being predominant. Another diffi-
culty in the way of the photography of nature's colors
is that everyone knows exactly what these colors are
and should be, and unconsciously makes comparisons of
this kind.

This puts color photography to a tremendously diffi-
cult test, which it meets only to a comparative degree.
It is the same kind of test to which recorded sound is
put: does it sound like a real person? Colored cartoons
have achieved their great and relatively easy success
because they do not need to portray nature's colors, but
these comparisons between nature and color cartoons
cannot be wisely made.

A remark of this kind should by no means be con-
sidered disparaging to color; some day all pictures will
be made in color. It has scored an amazing advance in
fifteen years, and particularly in the last two or three.

In 1922 and 1923 the author was associated with the
production of The Ten Commandments. A two-color
process was used in this picture and others, as The
Vikings and the Black Pirate. The blues were extremely
blue and the reds were very red. It provided the nov-
elty of color, but it was far from being true to nature.

But since that time there has been such progress as
to make it evident that color photography will continue
to approach full fidelity by improvement. By the time
this goal has been reached, picture production will have
increased its percentage of colored pictures in like pro-
portion.

The number of color films, while still small com-
pared to the total number made in black and white,

[275]

Talking Pictures

has already increased greatly. A factor which will aid
the advance in use of color is a reduction in cost. It
is still expensive to make and release a color picture.

Of the many color processes fully or partially devel-
oped, the most commercial and widely used method at
the moment is one in which three separate negatives
are used to record the three primary colors, blue, green,
and red. The first type of camera employed for this
process directed the light to the three films through a
complicated system of prisms. The present set-up is
simpler, though prisms are still needed.

Two of the films are now put in contact, face to
face, and run through the camera together. The light
passes into the camera through a single lens into a
cubical prism very like that used in a Lummer-Brodhun
photometer. This cube consists of two right angle
prisms cemented together on their hypotenuse surfaces.
Before cementing them together one cube is very thinly
coated with metallic gold, but the coat is so thin that part
of the light passes through it. As the light strikes this
gold surface, part of the light is reflected at right angles
and part passes straight on through.

The part which goes through the gold film has a
greenish color, but a green glass is placed between the
prism and the film. This prevents blue or red lights from
striking the film, to which it is also sensitive. Therefore,
this film photographs the green elements of the object.
The remainder of the light is reflected through a
magenta-colored glass, which permits the blue and red
light to pass through, but which stops the green, to the
pair of films in contact as described before.

[276]

A precision machinist repairs a camera part to i-io,oooth of an inch

-vlC

• Ml ¥

I !• »

Talking picture projection machine

The Road Ahead

The film next to the cube is exposed through its cellu-
loid back to the blue light, and therefore photographs
the blue elements of the object. There is a very thin
yellow coating on this film, however, which prevents
the blue light from passing through to the back film.
Since this yellow layer permits the red light to pass, the
back film photographs the red elements of the object.

These films are developed like ordinary camera nega-
tives, but instead of ordinary prints being made from
them, a process somewhat like lithography is used. The
prints are really much more like little transparent bill-
board posters than ordinary photographs. To make
these colored prints, an intermediate step is taken, com-
parable to preparing the lithography stones.

From each negative a "matrix" is made which will
have the desired image raised in relief like a rubber
stamp, but not nearly so high. Each of these matrices
is then coated with a dye, complementary in color to
that with which its negative was photographed. Then
it is successively pressed against a clear film so pre-
pared that it absorbs the dye as paper absorbs ink from
a rubber stamp. In this way the matrices can be used
over and over to make large numbers of prints. The
matrices are aligned carefully so that each successive
colored image is printed exactly on top of the other color
or colors beneath it on the print.

Another effective color photographic system which
is moving ahead with great rapidity, and which promises
startling advances for the future, uses a film with three
color sensitive emulsions, one on top of another. The
top emulsion is sensitive only to blue light; the mid-

[ 277 ]

Talking Pictures

die to green and blue; and the last to red and blue. A
thin yellow coating under the top blue-sensitive emul-
sion prevents blue light from going through to the other
two emulsions.

Light comes through a single lens without any in-
tervening optical system of prisms and no filters are
needed. Special cameras are not required. An excel-
lent three-colored transparency is produced, but the
disadvantages in this system, and those similar to it, lie
in the fact that duplicate prints are difficult and rather
costly to produce. But its utilization is so simple that
when it reaches the final stage of development there can
be no question as to the final worth of this method.

There are still other color processes, but space does
not permit their presentation. It should be sufficient to
say that the most successful methods prove conclusively
that color is progressing out of the experimental labora-
tory. How soon will color be finally perfected? No
one can safely answer that question. Edison certainly
did not think that it would take nearly forty years to
produce a practical talking picture, but it did. On the
other hand, color has advanced so far during the last
few years that its general commercial use may come
very soon.

It is with fear and trembling that the author ap-
proaches the controversial subject of television. There
are some enthusiasts who will tell you that television is
here now, that its practical use in millions of American
homes is to be expected "within two or three years."
There are still others who feel that its present somewhat
limited use cannot be extended until serious scientific

[278]

The Road Ahead

problems are solved. But because it has so stirred the
minds and the imaginations of thousands, television
stands by itself for popular interest in any discussions
of the future of the motion picture. It is provocative
and alluring and this book would not be complete with-
out a simplified discussion of it.

Television in 1937 is still quite experimental, though
it has been developed a great deal since the earliest pub-
lic demonstrations. The best systems are now capable
of producing an image about eight by ten inches, hav-
ing details similar to a small newspaper photograph
seen through a reading glass. The receivers used under
these conditions cost several hundred dollars.

Under good conditions this image can be transmitted
by very short wave radio for a distance of twenty to
fifty miles. This is roughly the distance we could see if
we stood where the transmitting apparatus is placed,
usually on a hill or a high building. This is true because
the very short radio waves behave very much as light
rays behave. They do not bend around corners, or
around the earth to the degree of the longer radio waves
ordinarily used for broadcasting. The reason for using
the very short radio waves rather than the longer ones
will be clear as we see the method by which the image
is transmitted.

The principle of television is neither mysterious nor
new. It is merely an elaborate form of ordinary teleg-
raphy, which, instead of being able to send only four
or five hundred telegraph dots each minute, is capable
of sending several million each second.

Imagine that we wish to transmit the contents of a

[279]

Talking Pictures

page of this book first by telegraph and then by tele-
vision. To do this by telegraph each letter is methodi-
cally spelled out and if there are twenty-five hundred
letters on each page it would require about twenty-five
minutes per page. Now if it were possible to have a
mechanical eye and brain capable of reading the entire
page in a small fraction of a second, and transforming
it into electrical impulses like rapid telegraph dots, we
could send the contents of this page perhaps thirty times
each second.

If these successive transmissions of the contents of the
page could now be received, not by the ear of the re-
ceiving person, which is sensitive only to relatively few
impulses per second, but by his eye, which is capable
of perceiving the very large number of impulses each
second of which visible light waves are composed, he
might be able to understand what was sent over the
telegraph just as well and perhaps more easily than if
he were listening to the telegraph dots. For now he
would be "seeing" the page not as a group of separate
dots, but as though it were a half-tone photograph like
those in newspapers. The eye blends the dots of which
the image is composed together, and if there are a great
many dots in the image the detail is fine and clear.

It is to secure fine detail that the television image
must be broken up into as many tiny dots as possible.
Of course this image would only last for one thirtieth
of a second and it wrould make a very poor impression
on the brain. If these images were to follow one another
each one thirtieth of a second, the eye would see an
apparently continuous picture of the page as though it

[280]

The Road Ahead I

had been photographed in motion pictures and pro-
jected like them on a screen.

Let us watch a television eve "read" our page. It
cannot read the words, as our eye reads them. It can-
not even read individual letters all at once. (By "read '
is meant to set up a series of electrical impulses which
will reproduce the image of the letter in the receiver.)
It must be done bv a method similar to looking at the
letter through a tiny hole which is being moved back
and forth across the paper on which the letter is printed.
This is done in a continuous succession of sweeps such
as one would use in removing leaves from the sidewalk.

As it moves, at one moment one sees the white paper
through the hole, and the next the black ink of the print-
ing. The light reflected from the tiny hole then can
be thrown on a photoelectric cell similar to that we
have seen used in reproductions photographed on mo-
tion picture film. As the light through the hole varies,
the electric current generated by the cell varies and the
television signal is formed.

The little moving hole can be replaced, as in sys-
tems at present most popular, by a device known as an
"iconoscope." In this device a tinv stream of invisible
electricitv sweeps or scans a picture thrown on a small
screen by an ordinary camera lens — much as you would
water the rows of flowers in your garden, one after
another, with a hose. The screen consists of manv tinv
photoelectric cells, each of which develops electrictv
proportional to the light thrown upon it. These are
connected to the transmitter, one after another, by the
sweeping stream of electricity.

[28.]

Talking Pictures

The cells which are exposed to much light, as from
the white paper of our page, will release a large cur-
rent impulse when swept by the stream, while the ones
in the dark parts of the type will release only a small
current, or none at all perhaps. Those in a part which
is neither pure white nor pure black will release amounts
of current in proportion to the light in which they lie,
as described before.

Since the images usually sent by television are not all
black and white, but of different intermediate shades,
the television impulses are not all equally strong, as
they are in a telegraph system. They are more like
those in a telephone signal, in which the current varies
in strength with the loudness of the voice sounds.

From this preceding description, we can also visualize
the method used for transmitting photographs over tele-
phone wires. It is quite similar, but, instead of sending
the entire page in one thirtieth of a second, several min-
utes are required. Further, instead of being received by
some device which makes the image immediately visible
to the eye, it is received on a piece of photographic film.
It is impracticable to send the picture faster than this
over the telephone lines, for they can carry only about
ten thousand impulses per second.

Instead of the letter being composed of merely four
or five dots as in the telegraph, a television signal of that
letter might require as many as fifty dots to define its
form accurately. If we consider the image to be broken
up into the tiny dots like a newspaper half tone, it would
require approximately two electrical impulses to trans-
mit each of the dots — one for the black dot and one for

[282]

The Road Ahead

the white beside it. It is easy to see that with twenty-
five hundred letters and thirty images per second, sev-
eral million "dots" or electrical impulses are required
each second in a television system.

If the telegraph dot consists of a momentary burst
of current, it can be seen that an ordinary alternating
electrical current consists of a continuous series of such
bursts, these being twice as many as the current has
"cycles per second." Only about ten thousand impulses
a second are required to produce speech quite well, so
telephone lines are only made to carry that many. It
costs a great deal to make the special circuits required
to carry the millions of impulses needed for television,
but a few have been constructed for experimental pur-
poses.

Because of the nature of radio equipment it is neces-
sary that the radio waves in use be composed of several —
usually at least from five to ten — times as many impulses
as the signal to be sent. Since the shortest radio broad-
cast waves themselves have only about three million
impulses each second, they could not be expected easily
to carry a television signal of about that same amount.
As a result radio waves having about one hundred mil-
lion impulses are used to carry a three million impulse
signal.

It can be seen that if a broadcast transmitter can send
for five hundred miles, and a television transmitter only
fifty miles, a great many television transmitters would
be needed for everyone in the country, as well as the
cities, to see television programs as they now hear vocal
broadcasts. In addition these transmitters and the neces-

[283]

Talking Pictures

sary receivers are more costly than the vocal sort. These
factors, plus the small image, make it seem improbable
to most observers that television will enjoy a wide use
for some time to come.

Having transmitted this television signal as though it
were a telephone or telegraph signal, it is now necessary
to change it back from electricity into light. This might
be done with a large number of tiny electric tamps lying
beside each other like cells in a comb of honey.

If it were practical to connect each of these lights by
a separate wire or radio set to the corresponding little
photoelectric cell in the sending device, the image would
then be formed in the pattern of these lights, without
any other mechanism. This would require thousands of
wires or radio sets, and hence it would be impractical.

It is necessary therefore to switch each light, one after
another, to the receiver just at the exact speed and in
the exact manner that the little photoelectric cells are
switched to the transmitter. But for television so many
thousands of lights would be required, "one being like a
single dot in a coarse newspaper illustration, that this
use of individual lights is impracticable. Instead, in most
of the modern systems, a device is used in the receiver
which makes use of another tiny electrical stream. This
is like the one in the sending apparatus, and it is caused
to move in exactly the same manner or simultaneously
with the one in the sending device.

This stream varies in strength as that of a hose when
the valve is opened and closed. The valve for the elec-
trical stream is the light thrown into the sending device
by its lens. As this stream strikes a special kind of screen,

[284]

The Road Ahead

it causes the spot of the screen on which it strikes to
gknv visibly in proportion to the strength of the cur-
rent. As the stream sweeps over the screen, it draws a
reproduction of the image on the screen of the sending
device. This image would be much like the one you
w/ould make if you were to draw a white pencil back
and forth over a black paper, pushing hard on it where
you wish the picture to be light, and very softly where
you wish it to be dark.

The image painted by the electric stream is not very
bright. It must ordinarily be observed on the screen
itself in a darkened room. As a result the picture is
small, for the largest screens of this type are at present
only about eight by ten inches. Efforts are being made
to make this image bright enough to enlarge with a lens
on a screen like that in a motion picture theatre, but at
present this is not easily accomplished and immediate
success is not expected.

Static and noise in the radio cause jumps and spots
in the received image, and it is very unusual at present to
secure an image by this cathode ray or electrical stream
method which can compare with that from a small home
motion picture projector.

But as late as the summer of 1937, two opposing tele-
vision camps were literally glaring at each other. One
talked of cheap television sets in every American home
within two years. The other was not so optimistic.

In such controversy there is plenty of fuel to start
bfezing fires in the minds of the young and the am-
bitious. It took forty years to bring the talking picture
from the days of Edison's first dream. Who knows but

[285]

Talking Pictures

that tomorrow the solution to the problems of tele-
vision may be found?

When it comes, it will bring great changes in its wake.
Not many think today that it will affect the ingrown
desire to go out of the house "to see a show." It is
clear, however, that television is likely to change ma-
terially the manner in which newspapers, the radio, and
the newsreel now distribute the news of the day. There
is no doubt but that a New York television theatre, the
first in the world, built to broadcast the World Series
baseball games of the fall of 1937, indicates in a small
way what we may expect from television in the future.

When television does come, there is a possibility of
some rearrangement of workers now in older forms of
communication activity, and naturally those who have
had the forethought to prepare themselves for this cer-
tain change will be in most advantageous positions.

For those willing to wear special glasses stereoscopic
photography has been solved. But except for novelty
use, of which the very popular short subject, Audio-
scopiks, is an example, it seems quite certain that the
method is not practical for general day-by-day enter-
tainment use. People would forget their special glasses
or, after a time, grow annoyed by the necessity of
having to use them. And it is also certain that such a
system would never be popular unless the theatre-owner
furnished the glasses. For sanitary reasons, he would
have to pass out new ones to each customer, and the
expense of this might be prohibitive.

But the little film Audioscopiks does intrigue one with
the possibilities it offers to that inventor who first dis-

[286]

The Road Ahead

covers a commercial method by which pictures with
length, breadth, and thickness can be seen practically
with the unaided eye. Experimental demonstrations of
this kind have been made before small groups, but as yet
are not practical for large theatres.

We know that in stereoscopic photography light is
admitted to the camera through two lenses set apart at
the distance between the average person's eyes. One of
the images is dyed an orange, the other a blue-green.
They are printed together on a single film, but the two
images slightly overlap each other, a condition that
results from the distance between the two lenses. With
this method it is physically impossible to watch a pro-
jection with the naked eye. The flicker is abnormal and
the two images superimposed produce an almost hope-
less blur. The unaided eyes cannot stand the strain
caused by this flicker for more than a few minutes.

Put before your eyes, however, a pair of spectacles
with one orange lens and one blue-green lens and mag-
ically the blur disappears, and on comes the third dimen-
sion thickness. Each eye now sees the image it would
have seen had it been in the place of the corresponding
lenses of the camera. The scientific "why" of this is too
complicated to be discussed here. But enough has been
told, it is believed, to interest those alive to the possibil-
ities of a future all-third-dimension cinema in reading
the extensive literature which exists on third dimension
photography. Long before the time of Edison, stereo-
scopic photography was the hobby of thousands of in-
ventors, and the great problems introduced by a moving
picture have only stimulated more intensive research.

[287]

Talking Pictures

These then — perfected color, perfected television,
and perfected third dimension — are goals which loom
invitingly before the eyes of the coming generations.
These are achievements whose greatest fruition must
await a genius who may be at this moment kicking his
toes in a nursery crib, or running to a touchdown on
some high school football field.

But all of us cannot be trail blazers. There is much to
be done along already established lines. But it should
not be inferred that ambitious persons should at once
take trains, boats, or planes to reach the nearest film
studios. The number of persons employed in all present
film plants is so small compared to those who would like
to be in this fascinating mixture of art and industry,
that generally film makers urge job hunters to stay away
unless they are sent for.

It is not in the studios of the present that the greatest
chances will come, but in the greatly to be enlarged
panorama which will encompass a larger future use of
the cinema medium.

For adventurous young men who like to travel, there
are certain to be exceptional opportunities in foreign
countries in the field of sound reproducing — opportu-
nities similar to those now enjoyed by questing young
mining engineers. Nearly every theatre in the United
States now has sound equipment, but in the world out-
side there are seventy thousand theatres which do not
yet have sound reproducing devices. Development of
the sound picture abroad is an alluring prospect.

And even in the United States there are great oppor-
tunities for the sound engineer in the educational field.

[288]

The Road Ahead

Out of 16,375 motion picture equipments we have in
the schools of this country-, there are only 1675 talking
picture projectors, or less than 10 per cent of the
whole. And there are thousands of schools which have
no film projecting equipment, either silent or vocal.

Today a course in a good technical school, plus prac-
tical telephone or radio experience, provides valuable
background for film sound engineering.

There are so few cameramen needed in the studios
that the chance for an outsider to enter this present select
circle is quite remote. New studio cinematographers
are being developed by an approach to the old guild
method, wherein a bov of sixteen would attach himself
to a "master" or helper, doing menial work, cleaning
and repairing and adjusting, until he gradually learned
his trade. But when the educational film broadens, as it
surely will, there will be many positions for trained
motion photographers. Some of these are sure to come
from men who have been amateur cameramen in high
school or college cinema clubs, or youngsters who have
carried a hobby to its furthest degree.

No rules, educational or otherwise, can be laid down
for writers. The writing flame burns where it pleases.
It may be found in the mind of an Oxford graduate or
in the soul of a tramp. And it is already apparent that
persons who can reallv write never need seek the studios.
The supply of really great stories is so small, the demand
by picture makers so great, that the successful author
quickly finds a path beaten to his door by eager film
story editors. Like the recipe for rabbit stew which
began, "First, catch your rabbit," to be asked by a

[289]

Talking Pictures

studio to join its writing department, you must first
prove that you can write.

The training needed for studio readers, architects,
research workers, interior decorators, and others has
been established in previous chapters. These subsidiary
trades and professions will also have to offer, in the
studios as now constituted, comparatively little oppor-
tunity because of the few positions open.

But in the enlarged cinema of the future, brightened
by color, deepened by third dimension, physically ex-
tended by television, and immeasurably expanded by a
new and great educational market, there will be oppor-
tunities far beyond those open today. In no other indus-
try or art is the view of the future so bright and so
alluring.

Let us turn back, for a moment, for one last moment,
to the motion picture of the present. If this book has
shown that the current cinema deserves more careful
and thoughtful consideration than it has received, it will
have accomplished its purpose.

Too few know of what they are talking when they
classify a photoplay as good, bad, or indifferent. Too
few have known enough about the background of a great
picture to evaluate it correctly. Many can judge the
literary quality of a story from which a photoplay has
been made, but this is not an accurate yardstick, for the
picture is dependent on many equations which are not
present in either the novel or the stage play.

Our motion picture mosaic is now complete. We
have watched each tile as it has been made. We know
the loving care which representatives of 276 arts, pro-

[ 290]

The Road Ahead

fessions, and vocations have lavished upon their sep-
arate contributions. We have seen specially qualified
artisans take these individual tiles and by a distinctive
technique merge workmanship of many hands into a
composite. This composite has been so deftly accom-
plished that the casual visitor to a photoplay theatre is
not aware of separate tiles, but only the final whole.

Armed with your new knowledge, your future ap-
preciation of a photoplay will no longer be either casual
or incomplete. Fine photoplays will have a thousand
new values for you.

A good picture will cease to be just "a good show."
You will see bevond it to thousands of trained hands and
into a myriad of clever minds.

"At long last" you will be able, truly and accurately,
to judge the greatness of a great film; the mediocrity
of a poor one. Photoplay "appreciation" by these cri-
teria gives new power and scope to the imagination.
It opens a great new pulse-stirring vista of a screen of
the future whose achievements will dwarf any we have
known to this da v.

And with these words the destiny of the screen is
left in your hands.

[291]

APPENDIX I

TYPES OF AMATEUR MOVIE CAMERAS

For the facts here given the author is indebted to Walter Efans,
acknowledged expert in this field.

Two types of moving picture cameras and projectors are
now being marketed by the leading manufacturers of amateur
motion picture equipment. They are defined by the film
width used, as 16 millimeter and 8 millimeter.

The 8 Millimeter for the Amateur

For the home movie enthusiast, whose efforts will be con-
fined to taking scenes of his children, or family, vacation trips,
and similar pictures, the 8 mm. would be the natural choice.
The light weight of 8 mm. cameras (i!/2 lb. average) increases
its attractiveness for hiking, fishing trips, and other trips. The
economy of the 8 mm. camera itself is an important considera-
tion. There is also the substantial saving of film cost, 8 mm.
film costing approximately one third of the price of 16 mm.
film. Logically more film would be used by an 8 mm. camera
owner, unhampered by the greater cost of operating a 16 mm.
camera. Hence, the dividends in pleasure derived from his
hobby would be greater to the owner of the 8 mm. equip-
ment, providing this type satisfies his requirements. The prin-
cipal of the limitations of the 8 mm. should be mentioned also :
i.e. the simplicity of design of the camera limits the effects
obtained, and the maximum screen size limits the audience to
whom it may be shown. Among the better known makes in
the 8 mm. classification are the following:

Eastman Cine 8 Keystone

Bell & Howell Filmo 8 Paragon

Agfa-Ansco Univex

[293]

Talking Pictures

Prices of good 8 mm. cameras vary from $25.00 to $100.00,
according to lens equipment and workmanship. Projectors
are slightly higher in cost, varying to the necessity for an
electric motor drive, cooling system, and good optical units
for the best screen image.

A. For simple 8 mm. cameras it is only necessary to:

(a) Thread film (In some types this is very simplified.)

(b) Set exposure on lens

(c) Wind the spring

(d) Press the button

B. For advanced 8 mm. cameras there are added features:

(a) Variable speed

(b) Variable focal length lenses

(c) Cine effects

The 16 Millimeter for the Advanced Amateur

Many people in all parts of the world have developed a
real talent for taking pictures and even rival the professional
cameraman in his hobby. For the amateur who aspires to
rival the theatre or screen with his film efforts, the 16 mm.
size equipment is quite essential. Only with 16 mm. cameras
can certain professional cinema tricks be accomplished.

While the simpler models of 16 mm. cameras may weigh
only 3% pounds, a camera capable of doing all the tricks de-
sired for semiprofessional work might weigh as much as 15
pounds, thus limiting its portability.

With modern 16 mm. projectors, the limitation of audience
size inherent in the use of 8 mm. projectors is adequately
overcome with the 16 mm. Pictures are now satisfactorily
projected on screens 14 x 18 feet wide to audiences of two
and three thousand persons. Various focal length lenses permit
latitude in screen size in relation to the distance to the projector.

Among the better known 16 mm. cameras and projectors are
the following:

[ 294]

Appendix

Eastman Cine AGFA Ansco

Bell & Howell Filmo Zeizz

Victor Paillard Bolex
Pockette Simplex

Prices of the simpler type of 16 mm. camera average around
$50.00. When special lenses, tripod, exposure meters, and
special effects are desired, it is easily possible to expend $500
on a really complete outfit.

The 16 mm. projectors are priced from about $75 to $400
for silent picture projection. Sound-on film 16 mm. talking
picture projectors are about double the price of silent machines.
Here, again, the interchangeable lenses and the screen used in-
fluence the ultimate cost to the amateur.

A. Simple 16 mm. cameras require:

(a) Magazine loading — no film threading

(b) Set lens exposure

(c) Wind the spring

(d) Press operating lever

B. Advanced 16 mm. cameras have added features which
include:

(a) Variable speed

(b) Turret, variable lenses

(c) Critical focusing

(d) Reflex finder

(e) External long film magazines

(f) Electric motor drive

(g) Hand crank, double exposure or lap-dissolve device
(h) Single frame attachment for animations

(i) Masks, footage counters, and other special profes-
sional effects.

[295]

APPENDIX II

This book, in common with recent publications dealing
with motion pictures, sets 276 as the number of arts, profes-
sions, and vocations required in making motion pictures
within a large film studio. As a matter of fact, if we added
isolated professions and vocations used perhaps once a year, the
list would rise to four hundred or more. Examples of such pro-
fessions or vocations more infrequently used are beekeepers,
butterfly experts, tropical fish experts, men who can cook
Hawaiian poi, men who can operate outrigger canoes, native
style, pearl divers, and many more.

A list of 276 regularly used employees follows:

Accountant, cost Battery maker

Accounting machine operator repair man

Actors

Adding machine operator
Advertising, copy writer
layout man
Ager, clothes
settings
Alto, singer

Amplification board operator,
sound recording

Architect
Arrangers, music
Artificial flower maker
Artist, mosaic

sketch or oils
Associate producers
Auditor
Auto mechanic, new cars

old cars
Aviator

Baker

Bandsaw operator, construction

Barber

Baritone

Bass violin player

Basso

Beaders, wardrobe department

Blacksmith

Boat builder

captain, sail

steam

engineer, Diesel
steam
Bookkeeper
Bricklayer
Bus boy, restaurant
Butcher
Buyer

Cabinet maker
Cameraman, assistant

color camera

head

operative

still

[296]

Appendix

Canvas handler, grip department

Developer

sewer

Dietitian

Carpenter, finish

Director

rough

Dishwasher

shaper

Doctor, medical

Cashier

osteopathic

Caster, plaster department

Draftsman, detailer

Casting director

general

Cellists

Dramatic coach

Chauffeur

Drapery maker

Charwomen

Dyer

Chef

Chemist, cosmetic

Editor, film

film laboratory

negative film

Cleaners, dry

newspaper (publicity)

Clerk, billing

positive film

file

scenario

mail

story

rentals

Electrician, home wiring

shipping

conduit construction

stock

motor winder

Comedy constructionist, (gag man)

set illumination

Company manager

Embroiderers, wardrobe

Composers, music

Engineer, air conditioning

Concrete workers

chemical

Conduit worker, electrical

construction

Construction, electrical

efficiency

foremen

electrical

miniatures

gas

Copyists, music

gas engines

Copyright expert, music

locomotive

stories

marine engines

Cornetists

mechanical

Cutters, tailor shop

pump

sanitation

Dance directors

sound recording

Dancers, modern

sound reproduction

tap

steam engines

toe

Engraver, metal

Dentist

photo

Designer, character costumes

Enlarger, photographic

decorations

Expert, continental (European)

floral arrangement

customs and manners

modern costumes

military affairs

[ 297 ]

Expert, oriental customs and man-
ners

Talking Pictures

Librarian, music

research

ucrs

table etiquette and order Linguist

of precedence at official Linotypist

affairs Locksmith

Exploitation expert Lumberyard foreman

Farmer

Fashion writer (publicity)

Filtration expert, water

Firearms, repairman

Fireman

Fitters, wardrobe

Florist

Flutist

Furniture repair

Furrier

Gardener

Generator expert, electrical

Grip

Hairdresser

Harpist

Hoist and elevator man

Hospital orderly

Ignition expert, gas engine
Inspectors, film quality

recording
Installer, sound recording and re-
producing
Interior decorator

Laboratory superintendent
Lace maker
Landscape architect

artist

gardener
Laundress
Lawyer

Leather worker
Librarian, film

Machinist, automotive
Machinist, precision
Magazine writer, publicity-
Make-up man
Manicurist
Masseur
Milliner

Model maker, metal
wood
Molder, metal

plaster
Monitor (or mixer), sound depart-
ment

Newspaper writer (publicity)

Night watchman

Nurse

Office boys
Optician
Orchestra leader

Painters, house

portrait

scenic, theatrical

sign

stencillers
Pantryman
Paperhangers
Papier mache workers
Pastry cook, commissary
Pedicurist
Pianist
Piano tuner
Pipe fitters
Plasterer, effect

house

[298]

Appendix

Playwright

Plumbers

Policeman

Polisher, film laboratory

Porters

Portrait photographer

Potwashers, commissary

Powder man, explosives

pyrotechnics
Printer, film

publication
Projection machine operators
Property man
Publicity director
Purchasing agent

Reader

Re-recording expert
Research expert
Re-toucher, photographic
Rigger, marine

Sailmakers

Sailors

Salvage men

Scenario writer

School teacher

Sculptor, special face molding,

make-up
Sculptors, statues
Seamstresses
Secretary
Set dresser

Sewing machine operators
Sharpshooter
Shoemaker
Silversmith
Singing instructor
Soda fountain operator
Sopranos

Splicer, film

Steelworker

Stenographer, English
German
Italian
Spanish

Sticker man, construction

Storekeeper

Street cleaner

Tailor

Talent scout

Taxidermist

Telegraph operator

Telephone lineman
operators
repairman

Teletype operator

Test Director

Timekeeper

Tinsmith

Toymaker

Tracer, art department

Tractor operator

Trainer, domestic animals
wild animals

Transportation expert

Typesetter

Typewriter repairman

Upholsterer

Violinist
Voice coach

Waitresses
Waxer, laboratory
Wigmaker
Woodcarver

[ 299 ]

G L O S S A R Y

Author's Note: This glossary of terms includes not only standard
expressions but succinct, semislang trade parlance which has given mo-
tion pictures a vital and distinct idiom of their own. Acknowledg-
ment is made for definitions used or adapted, which originally appeared
in the Journal of the Society of Motion Picture Engineers, Vol. 17, No.
5, November, 193 1.

Ac' e-tate film : Film the base of which is composed prin-
cipally of cellulose acetate.

Ac-tin'ic ray: A light ray of sufficient energy to make im-
portant chemical changes in substances or the skin of the
body.

A ger : Film studio technician whose business it is to give
new buildings, rooms, furniture, and costumes an artificial
appearance of age.

Ake'ley: A type of camera for taking rapidly moving ob-
jects; for example, race scenes.

Angle shot: A motion picture scene which continues or
duplicates the action from or of the preceding scene, but
which is photographed from a different angle.

An' i mat' or : Pen and ink artist who makes successive
drawings of the same characters for use in a film cartoon
comedy. When the drawings are photographed, an illusion
of action is given to the characters.

Answer print: The first release print made of a picture.

Ap'er ture: The opening in the aperture plate of the cam-
era, projector, sound recorder, or positive film printer
at which each individual picture or the sound track is
halted during exposure, printing, or projection.

[ 301 ]

Talking Pictures

Arranger: A musical technician who balances values be-
tween instruments and voices by writing for each a part
in the musical score, which was originally composed by
another.

Ash-can: A form of carbon arc light spotlight rarely used
today.

Atmosphere: Term used in studios to denominate anything,
animate or inanimate, that emphasizes the fact that the
scene is laid in a particular time or place.

Atmosphere actors: Minor players who by their appear-
ance give a specific human character or racial tinge to a
crowd scene.

Baby spot: Smallest sized spotlight; used for concentrated
light on a small surface, such as a backlight on a player's
hair, or for calling attention to some object, animate or
inanimate, which has played or is about to play, a specific
part in the unfolding of the dramatic action.

Backlight: Light from the rear focused on the hair or body
of a person to secure the effect of sharp relief. Perhaps
the most common technique used in modern artistic pho-
tography.

Balloon tires : A make-up term for circles under the eyes.

Banner: Form of theatre advertising printed on a long
strip of cloth, paper, or board; frequently hung across a
street at right angles to a theatre.

Beards: Casting office collective term for all actors with
natural beards.

Billing: Stage and screen term for placing and size of type
used in words advertising players in a specific picture.
"Star billing" for Joe Doakes would be, "Joe Doakes in
So and So"; "featured billing" for Joe Doakes would be
"Martin Zilch in This and That with Joe Doakes."

[302]

Glossary

Bi-pack: A form of film, used in color photography, which
has two color-sensitive emulsions, essentially in contacts.

Bit: Small part in either a stage play or photoplay, but
one with speaking lines; next step from non-speaking
"atmosphere" or '"crowd" appearances.

Blimp: A light metal cover, usually of cast aluminum,
which fastens tightly over a camera, keeping from the
stage and the recording microphone the familiar "clicking"
noise of the camera.

Bloop: Sound made when in the reproductive projector a
beam of light passes through a sound track which has been
badly spliced or patched; or through the synchronizing
marks on sound track and motion picture film.

Blooping patch: A black section, approximately triangular
in shape, introduced over a splice on a positive sound
track to prevent the noise (bloop) which the splice would
otherwise cause during the reproduction. The patch effects
a gradual diminution of light transmitted through the sound
track, followed by gradual restoration of the original value.
The patch may be applied with black lacquer or may be
a triangle of black paper or film cemented on the track.

Blow-up: Still photographic term for a very large print made
from a small negative.

Blows: When an actor forgets his part, one says that he
"blows his lines."

Blue glass: A round or square piece of specially made blue
optical glass; used by head cinematographers to translate
the natural colors of a setting into the black, white, and
gray values of the non-colored motion picture.

Blurb: Slang for short newspaper item in praise of a the-
atrical attraction.

Bon-bon : A type of spotlight.

[303]

Talking Pictures

Boom: May be either a camera boom or a microphone
boom. A camera boom is a device of light steel or du-
ralumin. From a weighted base on wheels, it can extend
approximately thirty feet forward or upward and swing in
a circle, carrying the camera at its extreme end. Used for
scenes emphasizing action and movement. A microphone
boom consists of a standard supporting a light telescoping
pole which can extend forward twelve feet or more, carrying
at its end the operating stage microphone. It can be
lowered or elevated or moved in an arc to follow an actor
over a considerable area of the setting. With the exception
of its extra gadgets, it looks exactly like an old-fashioned
well sweep.

Broad: A floor stand lamp which has a rectangular light
box on a thin steel standard; used for mass illumination of
an interior set; also used for smaller exteriors.

Bull man: Circus term for elephant trainer; also used in
motion pictures.

Bumps: Studio casting office term used in referring to
actors or actresses who will permit themselves to be roughly
handled (thrown downstairs, out of windows, etc.) for a
melodramatic effect; e.g., "He will do bumps."

Bungalow: Same as blimp.

Business: A "piece of business" is any bit of characteristic
action by an actor or actress in a scene of a stage play
or a photoplay. Throwing a custard pie might be comedy
"business." Tapping a desk with a pencil might be used
by an actor to enhance his characterization of a nervous
business man.

Camera: Container of metal, wood, fibreboard, bakelite, or
other light-resistant substance with all light excluded
except through a lens opened or closed by a shutter. This
lens admits light to sensitized film or glass plate. A
camera with an intermittent cam mechanism permitting
sixteen single pictures to be taken consecutively each

[ 304]

Glossary

second for silent pictures and twenty-four for talking pic-
tures is a motion picture camera. A camera set for single
pictures, each a separate unit, is a "still" camera. A type
of very small hand camera with a very fast lens is called
a "minnie" or candid camera.

"Camera": Traditional starting command of a director;
used to start the photographing of every film scene.

Candids: Unposed photographs made in action by small
cameras; widely used in publicizing motion picture person-
alities.

Cast: Characters in a stage or screen play.

Cat man: Circus term for trainer of lions; also used in
studios when animal pictures are made.

Cells: Film cartoon-making term for the 20,000 individual
pieces of celluloid upon which are drawn the progressive
movements of the characters or objects in a motion picture
cartoon.

C

liange over: In projection, the act of changing one pro-
jection machine to another, preferably without interrupting
the continuity of projection.

Channel: See recording channel.

Chew scenery: An expression of stage origin meaning over-
act, as, "He chews scenery."

Cine-(sin'e) : A prefix used in some words referring to the
motion picture art, or motion picture apparatus; e.g.
cinematic, cinematographer.

Cinema: Standard term for pictures which give the illusion
of movement when projected at sixteen pictures per
second through an accepted motion picture projector, for
silent films and twenty-four to the second for talking
pictures.

Cin' e-ma-tog' -ra-pher : A cameraman who supervises the pho-
tography of a motion picture.

[305]

Talking Pictures

Cin'e-pho'-to-mi-crog'ra-phy: Motion picture photography
through a microscope.

Cliff hanger: Studio term for serial picture of the melo-
dramatic type: arose out of fact that early serials featured
players in thrilling action on high cliffs.

Climax: Peak dramatic moment of a stage or screen play.

Close-up: Any photograph, or any single frame in a motion
picture, in which the major subject occupies a large portion
of the total space. The close-up is one of the unique and
valuable assets of motion picture technique.

Col-lo'di-on : Chemical used in make-up.

Comic: A player who gets laughs from an audience easily,
either by some freak of appearance or vocal articulation,
or by an instinct for the timing of movement. Also called
a comedian.

Con-ti-nu'-i-ty: The written form of the photoplay. See
scenario.

Copyist: Person trained in the technique of copying musical
scores.

Crepe hair: False hair used in making wigs and mustaches.

Crowd people: An assistant director's term. See atmos-
phere actors.

"Cut": Traditional command by which a director an-
nounces the completion of any photographed scene.

Cut back: A scene in a motion picture which reverts to
previous action.

Cut in: An incidental scene or subject, inserted in a motion
picture, which breaks the continuity.

Cutter: The person who selects and arranges the photo-
graphed scenes of a motion picture. Also called film
editor.

[306]

Glossary

Cutting: The selection and arrangement in the proper
sequence of the various scenes in a motion picture. Also
called film editing.

Dailies: Studio term for scenes in a picture taken one day
and processed and shown to the director or producer the
next day. From these he makes his choice of the best
"takes." Also called rushes.

Dark room: Darkened room in which unexposed motion
picture or still photographic film is loaded and unloaded
from containers.

Dead stage: Talking picture studio stage upon which no
recording of sound is being done.

Depth of focus: That portion of subject between foreground
and background which is considered sharp or in focus.

Deuce: A 2,000 watt spotlight.

Developer: A chemical solution used to bring out the latent
image on the emulsion of photographic film.

Developing: Method of chemically treating exposed photo-
graphic film or plates, to convert the latent image into a
visible image.

Diaphragm {dl'a-fram) (acoustical): The disk of a loud-
speaker which is caused to vibrate by electrical impulses,
thereby becoming a source of sound; also a disk in a micro-
phone which is caused to vibrate by impinging sound
waves.

Diaphragm (optical): A device, such as a perforated plate
or iris, which limits either the aperture of a lens, the field
covered by the lens, or both, depending on its location.

Director: Talking picture studio technician in charge of
rehearsing players and directing photography of their
dramatic or comic action. He is completely in charge of
all production activities on a studio stage.

[307]

Talking Pictures

Dissolve: The gradual transformation of one photographed
scene into another. In a lap-dissolve, the fade-in of one
scene is superimposed upon the fade-out of the other.
(See fade-in, fade-out.) This may be accomplished by-
double exposure or double printing.

Dolly : A type of movable camera platform.

Dope : Casting department term for any player of dissipated
appearance.

Double exposure: The superimposing of one image upon
another, upon the same piece of film.

Dow'a-ger : Casting department term for middle-aged actress
of "society" type.

Down in the mud: An expression used to describe the
voice of a player who speaks inaudibly. If the micro-
phone cannot pick up the player's voice adequately, it is
said, by the sound recording engineers, to be "down in
the mud."

Dress men; dress women: Casting department term for
minor part actors and actresses, of cultivated type, who are
able to wear clothes well and appear to advantage in scenes
depicting wealth or good breeding.

Dubbing: Re-recording a sound record by electrical means.
The operation may involve transference from a film record
to a wax record, wax to wax, film to film, or wax to film.
Dubbing is used for editorial purposes, altering sound
volume levels, and inserting incidental sounds, such as
musical accompaniment, background noises, etc.

Dupe: A duplicate negative made by printing from a posi-
tive film, or by printing from a negative and reversing.

Ear: A rectangular, almost square, piece of board or black
framed canvas which hangs on the knob of a light called a
broad, or on the edge of the camera itself to keep illumi-
nation from a direct focus on the camera lens.

[308]

Glossary

E-muV -sion : The light-sensitive chemical coating on film
which, after exposure to light, makes chemical changes;
these, after developing, fixing, and washing, produce the
final photographic image.

Exchange: Distribution center to which release prints of
new pictures are sent. These prints are in turn rented to
theatres for varying periods of exhibition. Each distribu-
tion company has thirty or more exchanges placed at
strategic geographic points in the United States and Canada.
An exchange may handle the product of one studio or of
several.

Exterior: A scene which appears to have been taken out
of doors. Small exteriors, the immediate outside of houses,
etc., are frequently photographed on a studio stage.

Fader: A projection device which varies the sound output
in any room or place where pictures are projected, raising
it or lowering it until the volume most acceptable to the
auditors is reached.

Fade-in: A gradual appearance of a projected picture from
total darkness to full screen brilliancy. This is another
unique feature of motion picture technique.

Fade-out: The antonym of fade-in. A gradual disappear-
ance of a projected screen image.

Fat part: A particularly fine, essential role.

Feature: A motion picture of five reels or more, designed
to form the main attraction of a film exhibition program.

Feeder: In a comedy team of two, the player who says or
"feeds" a line which, when replied to by the main comedian,
brings a laugh from the audience.

Figbar: Insincere, fulsome praise. When a character in a
story is overwhelmed with such praise, it is said that he is
"given the figbar."

Fill-in light: Light arrangements by a cameraman which
soften shadows and give modeling to settings and to faces.

[ 309 1

Talking Pictures

Film: A flexible, transparent support on which a light-
sensitive emulsion has been coated, or a processed strip of
such material containing a series of developed photographic
or dye images.

Filter: A glass or gelatin device placed before a camera
lens to make certain photographic corrections. Filters are
in various colors, red, yellow, green, blue, orange. To
photograph a girl in a white dress against a horizon contain-
ing white clouds, a filter would be used in order to give the
girl's clothes different values of white from the clouds,
keeping her from merging photographically into the clouds.

Five: A spotlight using a 5,000 watt incandescent globe.

Fixing: The chemical process of making a developed image
permanent by removing the undeveloped light-sensitive
substances.

Flag: A board, painted black, or a frame of black canvas,
fastened to an adjustable standard which can bend up,
down, or to either side to shade the rays of a light source.

Flash: A short motion picture scene, usually occupying
not more than three to five feet of film.

Flash back : A short cut back. (See cut back.)

Flat: A section of painted canvas, thin board, or the like,
used in building either stage play or photoplay settings.

Flood light: A type of lighting, or a type of light, which
produces a wide, general illumination over a fairly large
area.

Flop : A picture which fails.

Flutter: Sound department term for distorted sound effect
caused when the reproducing projector runs at uneven and
improper speeds, which leads to rapid and varying changes
of pitch.

[310]

Glossary

Focus (verb): Act of adjusting position of a lens with re-
lation to the surface on which the image is formed, in order
to obtain the sharpest image of the subject.

Focus or focal point (noun): Point at which a lens pro-
duces the smallest image of an object-point at a given
distance.

Follow shot: The shot made while the camera follows
people or objects as they move; also called a trucking shot
or a dolly shot.

Foyer : Vestibule of a theatre.

Frame {noun) : A single picture on a motion picture film.

Frame (verb): To bring a frame of a motion picture film
into register with the aperture of projection period during
the stationary period of its halt behind the lens of the
projector.

Frame-line noise: Noise caused by maladjustments of the
optical system of a reproducer, caused by the interruptions
by the frame lines to the light passing to the photoelectric
cell; also called motor boating, for its sound is similar to
that of a motor boat.

Free lance: Term for a screen player who is not under
contract to any one studio, but who works successively for
any company needing and contracting for his special
services.

Gaffer: Studio parlance for the head electrician of a single
producing unit. He works closely under the orders of the
head cinematographer in lighting the setting.

Gag: Stage and studio term for any laugh-producing situ-
ation.

Gobo: Black canvas over a three by six foot frame which
sits on the floor; another form of shade to keep strong
direct light from the lens of the camera.

[311 ]

Talking Pictures

Grain: Visible separations on a developed piece of film. A
chemical constituent of the developed emulsion of a film
is sometimes seen when pictures are enlarged to too great
a size from an improperly photographed or prepared
negative.

Grande dame {grand' dam'): Casting department term for
actress capable of playing imposing middle-aged or elderly
women of the ''society" type

Grip : Well-trained handyman carpenter particularly adept in
making all emergency changes of settings required during
the production of a picture; valuable member of a pro-
ducing unit.

Hag: General casting department term for any slatternly
female type.

Ha-la'tion: Halo surrounding the image of a bright object
in a photograph, when the object has reflected light into
the lens. To prevent halation, putty or thin gauze is used
to dim the reflecting surfaces. "Gobos," "ears," "flags,"
and other forms of shades are also used to keep strong
light out of the camera lens.

Heavy: Stage and screen term for a villain.

Hit: Theatre term for a successful stage or screen play.

"Hit 'em": Head electrician's order meaning "Turn on
the lights."

Hypo: Solution through which the film is run after the
latent image on sensitized film has been brought out by
the developing solution. The solution stops the action of
the developer and by dissolving the undeveloped parts of
the emulsion renders the film insensitive to light from this
point. The term hypo comes from one of the solution's
principal chemicals, sodium hyposulphite.

Inkies: Studio electrician's abbreviation for the incandes-
cent and noiseless lights used to illuminate talking picture
settings.

[3"]

Glossary

Interior: A scene which appears to be taken indoors. In
the first days of films, before artificial light, all interiors
were taken out of doors under straight or diffused sun-
light. Occasionally today, and usually on location, in-
teriors are taken out of doors.

Iris: An adjustable diaphragm of thin plates in front of a
camera lens. Its action resembles that of the iris of the
eye.

Iris in; iris out: Using an iris diaphragm on a camera to
give the general effect of what a man sees when he slowly
opens or closes his eyes.

Juicer: A professional illuminating electrician.

Junior: A medium-sized condenser spotlight of concentrated
beam using a 1,000 or 2,000 watt incandescent lamp for key
lighting; modeling of the face through lights and shadows.
Smaller than a bon-bon.

Key light: Main light source for the faces of the characters,
as distinguished from the general illumination of the
setting.

Leader: A piece of blank film attached to the beginning
of a reel of developed film for convenient threading or
insertion into a projection machine.

Lens: (a) A piece of glass or other transparent material
having two polished surfaces, both of which may be curved,
or one may be curved and the other plane, (b) A combi-
nation of two or more single lenses designed to operate
as a unit. In actual practice, many cameramen confine
themselves to six lenses: a 24 mm. for very wide angle
shots; a 35 mm. for long shots of a setting; a 1^ inch or
40 mm. for medium long shots; a two inch or 50 mm. for
medium close-ups; a three inch or 75 mm. for close-ups;
and a four inch or 100 mm. for extreme close-ups. For
trick effects he may use occasionally a lens of very delicate
wide angle focus, 18 mm. This produces intentional dis-

[313]

Talking Pictures

tortions. 28 mm. and 32 mm. are less used types of wide
angle lenses. There are a number of "telephoto" lenses for
long distance outdoor photography. These have exactly
the quality of and look like an old-fashioned telescope.
They range from 6 34 inches to 17 inches.

Lens hog: Term of derision for an actor or actress who
tries to remain in the center of the camera's vision beyond
the time properly required to photograph the action of his
particular contribution to the scene.

Level: Sound term meaning volume of sound.

Lines : Stage and talking picture term for an actor's written
part in a stage play or a photoplay.

Live stage: Stage on which sound is being recorded. At
its door a red light burns intermittently and a loud buzzing
sound is heard as a warning to stay out while the micro-
phone is "alive."

Location: Studio term for any place outside studio gates
where actual photographing of scenes in a photoplay takes
place.

Magazines: Film containers of a camera.

Make-up: Chemicals of different formulas applied to face,
hands, or body to improve their appearance photographi-
cally, or to give an artificial aspect of age, youth, disease,
or deformity. All cosmetics are used as make-up, but not
all make-up chemicals are used as cosmetics.

Matte: A mask constructed of sheet metal or other opaque
material and having an opening of any desired shape. This
is placed in front of the film in a motion picture mechanism
for the purpose of blocking out definite portions of the
picture. When you see a scene as through a keyhole, a
keyhole matte is used, for one example.

Mi'cro-phone: An electro-acoustical instrument designed to
convert acoustical (sound) waves into electrical waves.
Converts noises or a voice into varying electrical waves.

[314]

Glossary

Mixer: See Monitor.

Monitor : Sound recording engineer responsible for recording.

Mon-tage' : A series of quick dissolves or "wipes" of various
pertinent scenes that dramatize in a few seconds a number
of different related episodes building toward a certain
dramatic point.

Motion picture: The representation of an object or objects
by the rapid presentation of a series of pictures showing
the object at successive but definitely separate intervals.

Motioyi picture projector: A device for projecting motion
pictures, preferably to a plain, white, blank surface.

Motor boating: See frame-line noise.

Movies: Slang diminutive for motion pictures.

Mug shot: Slang studio term for "close-up."

Negative: Processed photographic material, commonly film,
in which the values of light and shade existing in the
original object are reversed.

Xitrate film: Photographic film, the base of which is com-
posed mainly of cellulose nitrate; the most common form
of motion picture film.

One sheet: Basic unit of billboard advertising, whether it
be for motion picture attractions, automobiles, or food-
stuffs. See poster for combinations in which "one sheet"
appears.

Operative camerman : Photographic technician who physically
operates a motion picture camera on a set.

Optical disk: A disk of optical glass which, placed before the
camera lens, diffuses the sharp outlines of an image.

Optical glass: Special form of fine glass, particularly suited
for the making of eyeglass or camera lenses.

[315J

Talking Pictures

O.S.: Scenario abbreviation for "off stage"; usually refers
to action out of sight of the cameras.

Pan 'from panorama) : To move the camera on its own axis
over a partial or complete arc, or upward or downward.
The general effect of a "pan shot" is to simulate what a
man sees when he moves his head. Extreme pan shots
where the action moves forward, or upward, or sideways
with great rapidity, are accomplished with a special form
of camera called the "Akeley."

Pan'chro-mat'ic: Applied to film emulsions that are sensitive
to the entire visible spectrum; i.e., which give to each color
proportionate shading from white into black or black into
white.

Pan shot: See pan.

Parallel: Folding or permanent platform of specific height
on which camera or lights are placed during photography.
Three and six feet are common sizes.

Pho 'to-e-lec 'trie cell: A form of electric mechanism which,
sensitive to light, changes electric current values propor-
tionately to the change of light; the device which makes it
possible to change a photographed sound track back into
sound again, just as it was originally recorded by a micro-
phone.

Photoplay : A story told in the form of motion pictures.

Positive: Processed photographic material in which the
values of light and shade are similar to the original object.
The print exhibited by theatres on their screens is a posi-
tive print. The positive is printed from a negative which
was originally exposed in a camera.

Positive stock: Light-sensitive film designed for use in
making motion picture positive prints for public exhibition.

Poster: A printed or lithographed advertisement made up
of combinations of a unit called the "one sheet." Posters
are commonly found in one, three, six, eight, and twenty-
four sheet sizes.

[316]

Glossary

Powder man: Studio expert in the handling of explosives.

Pre-release : A picture exhibited in one or two cities as a
test of public opinion before the official date of its simulta-
neous release to theatres in all parts of the country.

Preview: A showing of a photoplay in a public theatre in
advance of its official national public "release." Previews
give producers, directors, and players actual "audience
reactions." Corrections of dramatic faults found at such
previews are made by means of "retakes" (substitute
scenes).

Printer: A machine for making from a camera exposed
negative the positive prints for projection to the public in
all theatres.

Property: Stage and motion picture term for any movable
thing in a setting which is to be photographed, such as,
furniture, pictures, pins, and needles.

Prop man : Technician in charge of properties.

Publicity: An organized plan to interest the public in a
specific personality or production.

Raw stock: Studio term for undeveloped motion picture
film.

Recording channel: A complete system of amplifying and
control equipment, from the microphone to the film or
disk used in making a sound record. In common studio
practice, each company or unit making a picture is allotted
a recording channel.

Reel: Flanged spool on which film is wound; also the
quantity of film that can be wound on such a spool, usually
about 1000 feet.

Release: A photoplay completed and ready for public
presentation.

Release print: Positive print made for public exhibition.
See positive.

[317]

Talking Pictures

Retake: The remaking of a scene not considered satis-
factory after it is seen on the screen.

Reverse shot: The photograph of a scene from the oppo-
site direction from which it was originally taken; e.g., if
a camera has photographed a scene through a doorway,
the reverse shot is made inside the room and toward the
door.

Rifle : A type of lamp which has for its reflector a serried or
corrugated surface which diffuses the reflected light.

Ro-tum'bu-la-tor : A camera platform which moves forward
on wheels and whose base can itself move in a circle.
On this base is a heavy round metal post to which the
camera base is fastened. The camera base can be raised
and lowered on this post. The rotumbulator gives a great
deal of mobility to the camera.

Rough-cut: First assembly of the individual filmed scenes
of a finished picture.

Running the lines : Rehearsing the dialogue.

Rushes : Same as dailies.

"Save 'em": Electrician's term for "Turn off the lights."

Scenario: The written form of the photoplay; a technical
term for a story transformed into written form so sub-
divided as to be an accurate guide to directors and players
in making succeeding scenes in a photoplay.

Screen: Surface on which a motion picture is projected.

Scrim: A form of shade placed in front of a light. It is
similar in size to a "flag," but instead of being made of
canvas or board it is centered with gauze through which
the light passes and is diffused.

Script : Another studio term for scenario.

Senior: See Junior. Larger lamp of same type, using 5,000
watt globe.

[318]

Glossary

Sequence: In a motion picture, a connected series of dra-
matic or comic events in one place or tied to one place
by photographic effects. It carries a portion of the whole
action to a logical conclusion and to a proper connection
with the following sequence. It is comparable to an act
in a play.

Setting: An interior or exterior built on a studio stage or
outside a studio, which simulates real, historical, or fancied
rooms or buildings.

Sharpness: Clearness or distinctness of a photographic
image.

Shooting: Studio term for the act of photographing a
scene in a photoplay or any bit of action before a camera.

Shot: Photograph of a scene or action.

Sides : An old stage term for the pages of an actor's part.

Silk: Studio electrician's term for a rectangular frame over
which is stretched very light uncolored silk. This frame
is placed in front of a broad to reduce the illumination.
Silks may be also in round form and placed in front of
spotlights.

Sixty: Huge spotlight used for flood illumination of large
interiors or exteriors. Rises twenty- two feet on a tele-
scoping platform. Lamp generates an estimated 3,000,000
candle power. Comparable to the enormous spotlights
used by the army and navy. Also called a sun arc.

Slate: Board bearing name of picture, director, number of
scene, number of "take." Serves as an identification of
scene for the film editor. Held in front of the camera, it
is photographed either at the finish or the start of a scene.

Slow motion: Effect of retarded action produced by pho-
tographing scenes at a rate of many more frames a second
than the sixteen frames to a second which is standard
speed for silent photography. Largely used in newsreels or

[319]

Talking Pictures

in short subjects endeavoring to explain various athletic
techniques. When projected at sixteen frames to the
second, a "slow motion" effect is attained.

Smash hit: Theatre term for a photoplay which is received
with exceptional enthusiasm by the theatregoing public.

Sneak: Term given to the first preview of a picture, which
occurs at a remote theatre where the reaction will be that
of an average audience. The film is usually overlength,
and the "sneak" preview indicates the points at which it
may be cut or edited.

Soup: Slang for the film developing mixture.

Static: Lacking movement. A scene may be described as
"static" if it fails to show dramatic vitality.

Stock company: Group of players under contract to a
single motion picture studio, or "legitimate theatre."

Strike order: Order to remove a set from a stage after the
work on it has been completed and okeyed by the associate
producer.

Stunt man; stunt woman: Actor or actress able to do dan-
gerous athletic, acrobatic, or technical feats to provide a
"thrill" in a photoplay.

Stunts: Difficult or dangerous action in a photoplay.

Sun arc: See sixty.

"Sync": Studio diminutive of the word synchronization.
When sound and picture are not running together (e.g.,
when a character's mouth apparently moves out of time
with the words being spoken), the scene is said to be
"out of sync."

Take: One photographic and sound recording of a talking
picture scene.

Takem: Comedy term for a strong facial reaction; e.g., the
expression on a comedian's face after a fall. Such a reaction,
extremely exaggerated, would be called a "double takem."

[ 32o]

Glossary

Tarp: Diminutive form for huge black tarpaulins or black
canvas used to keep out weather or light from an exterior
setting.

Telescopic lens: Lens able to photograph a scene at a long
distance and bring it into seemingly close range.

Tempo: The timing and mood of a photoplay.

Test: A photographic, sound, or full talking picture (pho-
tographic and sound) trial of a person, animal, setting,
costume, or make-up; taken to determine suitability for
a specific picture or to determine possibilities of a person
as a new member of the acting profession.

Three sheet : See poster.

Throw the line away: Speaking a line without any partic-
ular emphasis. Lines are frequently thrown away in order
to give greater force to their later repetition.

Treatment: A story written scene by scene as the action
would appear in a final picture but without numbered
divisions or special technical or dramatic instructions. The
dialogue is only suggested. The intent is merely to promise
a skeleton's framework sufficient to permit the correction
of basic story errors before the story is transferred into the
final polished scenario form. It is the intermediate point
between a published or original story or stage play and the
scenario.

Tri-pack: A form of film, used in color photography, which
has three color-sensitive emulsions, one on top of the
other.

Trucking shot : Same as dolly shot.

Tubby: Sound recording term used to describe inaccu-
rately recorded low tones, which give the effect of a man
talking with his head in a tub. It is usually a result of the
low frequencies being exaggerated.

Turkey: Slang for a bad picture.

Twenty-four sheet: See poster.

[jn ]

Talking Pictures

Types: Players whose faces or figures set them into dis-
tinctive, easily recognized classifications; e.g., fat men,
dowagers, juveniles, hags.

Underscoring: Method of placing music under dialogue in a
sound picture.

Up to speed: Stage sound engineer's signal that the mo-
tors of the camera and of the sound recording machines
are moving in exact synchronization.

Wardrobe: Term of stage and screen. It may be the as-
sembly in some central place of costumes or modern
clothes for the use of professional actors, or it may be the
total of the costumes required by one actor or actress
for the performance of his professional duties.

"Wind her up": Studio slang for "Start the cameras."

Wipe: Transition of one scene into another by literally
wiping the first off the screen and revealing the new scene
behind it. Frequently used in montage work.

Work print: Assembly of talking picture scenes used by
producers, directors, and film editors during the editing,
re-editing, and preview tests of a photoplay. From the
work print, as finally accepted, a matched negative is
assembled from which the final theatre release prints are
made.

Wow wows: Slow changes in sound pitch caused by a slow
variation of the speed of the film through the sound repro-
ductive device of the projection machine.

Wrap it up: Last order on a set; means "finished for the
day."

Zizzy: Sound recording term used when sibilants have too
much prominence.

Zoom shot: Shot made as the camera quickly moves up
to an object.

[322] '

INDEX

Abraham Lincoln, 19

Academy of Motion Picture Arts

and Sciences, 54, 226
Adams, Maude, 77, 145
Adrian, 113, 239

"After-photography" period, 217
After the Thin Alan, 71
"Agents," 31
"Ager," 114, 119, 300
Ah Wilderness, 268
Akeley camera, 191
American Council on Education,

260
Amplifying panel, 197
Anna Christie, 143
Anna Karenina, 46, 128
Anthony Adverse, 20, 55, 61, 78,

81, 235
Appreciation Manuals, 76
Appreciation of Motion Pictures,

1-9
Armat, Thomas, 10, 16
Army, Navy, and Marine Corps,

191
Ars Magna Lucis et Umbra, 11
Art director, 83, 93, 98, no
Arts and professions used in mak-
ing motion pictures, 3, 7, 27,

98, 296-299
Arzner, Dorothy, 219
Assistance League, 189
Assistant director, 8, ill, 159,

160-162, 171, 173, 175, 177
Associate producer, 48, 49, 50, 53,

221
Association of Motion Picture

Producers, 97, 135, 136, 139, 265
"Atmosphere" players, 134, 135, 301
Audioscopiks, 286

Background action, 97, 160, 175

Background players, 129

Backlight, 177, 301

Baker, Dr. George Pierce, 73

"Balloon tires," 150, 301

Banton, Travis, 1 1 3

Barretts of Wimpole Street, The,

44, 64, 84, 148
Barrett, Lawrence, 66
Barrymore, John, 203
Barrymores, The, 10 1
Bartholomew, Freddie, 106, 182
Baum, Vicki, 67
Beaumont, Harry, 157
Beery, Wallace, 144, 150
Be Aline Tonight, 270
Benchley, Robert, 246
Ben-Hur, 19, 181, 210, 235
Better motion pictures, 6$
Big House, The, 40, 75, 104, 184,

Big Parade, The, 19, 181, 210

Bing, Herman, 75

Biograph, 17

Birth of a Nation, 18, 19

Bishop Murder Case, The, 131

Blackmer, Sidney, 134

Black Pirate, The, 275

Blimp, 172, 177, 302

Blind Husbands, 184

Blood and Sand, 188

"Blows," 180, 302

"Blue Danube Waltz, The," 214

"Blue glass," 178, 303

Boasberg, Al, 75

Bonnyfeather, 81

Boom, 168, 302

Boom man, 167, 178, 179

Booth, Edwin, 66

[323]

Talking Pictures

Bom to Dance, 213
Bosworth, Hobart, 74
Boulder Dam, 190
Boyer, Charles, 149
Brabin, Charles, 157
Breen, Joseph, 68
Boleslawski, Richard, 157
Bridle, Augustus, 5
Broadway Melody, 213
Broken Blossoms, 19
Brown, Arthur, 14
Brown, Clarence, 157
Brown, Joe, 75
Buck, Pearl, 61
Bucknall, Nathalie, 88
"Bungalow," 172, 303
Byrd, Richard Evelyn, 250

Cabiria, 19

Cafe Metropole, 95

Cameras, care of, 257

types for amateurs, 293-

295, 303
Camille, 211
Cams used for electrical contacts,

178, 179
"Candid" camera, 208, 303
Cantor, Eddie, 76
Capra, Frank, 157
Captain Blood, 121
Captains Courageous, 20, 43, 95,

121, 235
Captain Hates the Sea, The, 95
Carbutt, John, 16
Card indexes, 131-134, 186
Carmen, 19

Casino at Monte Carlo, 184
Casting Director, 127-137
Cathedral of Notre Dame, The, 184
Caxton, 138
"Cells," 253, 304

Central Casting Corporation, The,

128, 134-137
Chaney, Lon, 150
Chaplin, Charles, 30, 139, 140
"Chase" films, 235
China Clipper, 61
China Seas, 134
Cinematic terms, 216, 304
Cinema Club, 263, 264
Cinema of the future, 288-291
Civilization, 19
Cleopatra, 121
Clive of India, 87, 235
Clock for recording laughs, 76
"Code," The, 68
Colbert, Claudette, 1, 177
Cohen, Octavus Roy, 37
Collodion, 148, 305
Colman, Ronald, 86, 88, 138, 150
Color photography, 273-278, 288,

290
Color room, 253
Comedy constructionist, 75
Commercial short subject, 254
Commentators, 246
Company recording engineer, 167
Conference of technicians, 92
Connelly, Marc, 46
Consecutive collections, 107
Conway, Jack, 157
Copyrights, manuscript, 39

musical, 214
Corbaley, Kate, 51, 52
Cornell, Katharine, 66
Costuming the Picture, 11 2-1 18
Coulter, Lucy (Mother), 113, 114
Covered Wagon, The, 19, 188, 210
Crawford, Joan, 142, 152, 239, 240
Creative arts and professions used

in motion pictures, 3, 7, 27, 98,

296-299
Crime Doesrtt Pay, 251
Criminal Code, 193

[324]

Index

Crowd people, 135, 136, 305
Cukor, George, 157, 182
"Cutter," The, 217, 305
Cylinder recording camera, 15

Daguerre, Louis Jacques Mande,

12, 208
Daniels, William, 6
David Copperfield, 20, 39, 46, 60,

61, 62, 78, 80, 81, 84, 85, 87,

182, 207, 235, 245
Dawn, Jack, 149, 151, 152
Day locations, 189
Da Vinci, Leonardo, 6
DeMille, Cecil B., 8, 10, 17, 18, 19,

29, 157-159, 236
Dennys, The, 102
Derby, The, 191
Descriptive Zoopraxogrctpby, 15
Designer, The, 114
Developing the Film, 227-235, 306
DeVinna, Clyde, 70
Dickson, William Kennedy Laurie,

*5

Dickens, Charles, 20, 38, 46, 59, 60,
88

Director, The, 10, 42, 48, 49, 50,
155-163, I75-I77* 306

Disney, Walt, 252

Disraeli, 245

Distribution — a barrier to educa-
tional films, 261

Dog actors, 32

Dollar of motion picture produc-
tion, how spent, 139

"Don'ts" for would-be actors, 28,

137
"Doubles," 144, 145
Dramatic underscoring, 211, 321
"Dream" hunters, 36
Dreams Wanted, 35-47
Dressier, Marie, 113, 138, 142, 143

Duke of Windsor, 237
Durbin, Deanna, 27, $6, 225

"Ear" of sound recording, 165, 307

Eastman, George, 16

Edison, Thomas Alva, 10, 11, 15,

16, 17, 173, 196, 208
Edison Projecting Kinetoscope, 16
Editing the Film, 216-226
Eddy, Nelson, 177, 203
Educational films, 256-264, 273, 289
"Effect" shots, 207
Emergency hospital, 125
Emma, 75
Emulsion, 5, 232, 234, 238, 277, 278,

308
Eskimo, 54, 128, 185, 193, 194, 201
Essanay, 17
Evans, Madge, 116
Evans, Walter, 261, 293-295
"Exchanges," 49, 229, 308
"Extras," 130
Eyes of the World, 19

"Fade-out" of stars, 144, 308
Fairbanks, Douglas, 30, 187
Faraday, Michael, 12
"Featured players," 136, 142
Files of the casting department, 1 28
Film, 309

abroad, 265-272

definition of, 309

developing, 227-235

editing of, 216-226

editor, 217

flexible roll, 16

library, 249

packing of, 234, 235
"Filters," 169, 309
Firefly, The, 209
First preview cut, 223
Fitton, Dr. William Henry. 12
Five-Star Final, 128

[325I

Talking Pictures

Fixing solution, 230

"Flat" lighting, 18

Fleischer, 252

Fleming, Victor, 43, 157

Flexible roll film, 16

Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse,

The, 19, 30
Fra Angelico, 240
Franklin, Sidney, 71, 156, 157
"Free-Lance players," 129, 310
From the Manager to the Cross, 18
Freuchen, Peter, 54
Freund, Karl, 6, 70
Future of Motion Pictures, 273-291

Gable, Clark, 1, 8, 25, 45
"Gaffer," 168, 310
"Gag men," 75, 76, 310
Galvanometer, 198
Garbo, Greta, 1, 46, 117, 239, 266
Garden of Allah, The, 81, 190
Garrick, David, 66
General Film Company, 17
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, 41
Gerard, Joseph W., 134
Ghost Ship, The, 92
Gibbons, Cedric, 6
Gilbert, John, 238
Gilbert and Sullivan, 214
Girl of the Golden West, The, 209
Glass process, 206
Globe Theatre, 65
Gold Diggers, The, 209, 213
Goldwyn, Samuel, 17
Gone with the Wind, 22, 85
Good Earth, The, 20, 34, 44, $$, 61,
71, 78, 81, 105, 106, 149, 154, 219
Grace, Dick, 145
Grand Hotel, 20, 37, 53, 66, 95,

i33, 148
Gravet, Fernand, 27
Great Ziegfeld, The, 81, 115
Griffith, David W., 10, 18, 157

[326]

"Grips," 1 01, 169, 170, 311
Guardsman, The, 44

"Hale's Tours," 17

Hammett, Dashiell, 34

Hand props, 108, 170, 177

Harman-Ising, 252

Hayes, Helen, 148, 225, 226

Hays, Will H., xi

Head cinematographer, 169, 175,
177

"Hearts and Flowers," 211

Hell Below, 192

Hell Divers, 192

Henry VIII, 20

Hepburn, Katharine, 1, 240

Herbert, Hugh, 75

Herschel, Sir John, 12

Heyl, Henry, 13

Hill, Edwin C, 246

History of Motion Pictures, 10-23

Hollywood — a Single-minded Com-
munity, 24-34

Home motion pictures, 256-264

Hopkins, Robert, 41, 71, 73

Horner, William George, 12

"Horse wrangler," 120

House of Rothschild, 20, 132

Howard, William K., 157

Hughes, Rupert, 41

Humberstone, 157

Humoresque, 74

Hunchback of Notre Dame, The,
19, 30, 150, 184

"Iconoscope," 281

"Ice-box" doors, 165, 173, 204

/ Loved You Again, 37

Indexes, 1 31-134, 186

Industrial section of a studio, 98

Informer, The, 235

Interior decorator, 107

Index

International motion pictures, 265-
272
an aid to diplomatic relations. 1- 1
development of sound pictures

abroad, 288
foreign language film theatres,

271
methods for overcoming lan-
guage barriers. 266-268
statistics on investments, 265
Irving, Sir Henry, 66, 77
Isaacs, John D., 14
Ivanhoe, 42

Jazz Singer, The, 20
Jenkins, C. Francis, 16
"Jimmy Skinner," 82, 88
Jolson, Al, 20
Jones. Grover, 75
Journal of the Society of Motion
Picture Engineers, 300

Keene, James R.. 13

Kelland, Clarence Budington, 46

Kentucky Derby, The, 191

Keymakers, in studios. 122

Kiam, Omar, 113

Kiepura, Jan, 2-0

Kinematoscope. 1 3

Kinetograph, 16

Kinctoscope, 16

Kircher, Athanasius, 10, 11, 12

Knoblock, Edward, 54

Laboratory superintendent, 227,

228, 233
La Cava, Gregorv, 157
Laemmle, CarL 10, 1-, 29
Lasky, Jesse. i~. 29
Last of the Mohicans, 20
Latham. Woodville, 16
Laughs, clock for recording, 76
Laugh ton, Charles, 45, 148
Laurel and Hardy, 267

Lehar, Franz, 54

Leisen, Mitchell, 157

Leonard, Robert Z., 157

LeRoy, Mervvn, 71, 157

Les Miserables, 20

Letty Lynton, 239

Libeled Lady, 144

Lights! Camera! 175-183

Light-rav method, 196

Light test, 231

Light valve, 198

Lindbergh, Charles, 138, 249

Little Lord Fauntleroy, 20

Little Minister, 19

Little Women, 20, 235

Lives of a Bengal Lancer, 78, 218,

235
"Live" stage, 165, 313
Lloyd, Harold, 75
Lloyds of London. 20, 96, 235
Location director, 185, 186
Location, Going on, 183. 184-195,

3J3
Loos. Anita, 41, 71, -:, -3. -4
Love, 239
Love Is New, 133
Lubin, 17

Lucas, Wilfred, 246
Lidlaby, 54

Lumiere, Louis, 10, 16
Lummer-Brodhun Photometer. 276

MacDonald, Jeanette, 151, 177, 203.

207
Machine used in developing film,

230
Mazia Catoptric a, 10. 12
Making Folks Over, 148-154, 313
Manslaughter, 145
March, Fredric, 1
Marion, Frances, 40, 74
Marlowe, Julia, 66
Marsh, Oliver, 6

[327]

Talking Pictures

"Marthy," 143

Marx Brothers, 8, 34, 75, 76, 211

Mary of Scotland, 89, 98

Mask and Wig Club, 263

Mayer, Louis B., 10, 18, 48

Mayer Studios, 30, 31

May time, 20, 132, 152, 203, 207,

208, 209
McCrellish, Frederick, 13
McGlynn, Frank, 134
McNamee, Graham, 246
"Mediums," 181
Meissonier, Jean Louis, 15
Melies, 17

Men against the Sea, 63
Men in White, 128
Menzies, Cameron, 6
Merry Widow, The, 54
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios, 3 1
Metro Studios, 30
Microphone "boom," 166, 302
Midsummer Night's Dream, A, 20,

°5» 95

Miller, Alice Duer, 74

Miller, John, 105, 106

Million and One Nights, A, 10

Min and Bill, 74

Mintz, 252

"Mixer," 172, 176, 313

"Monitor," 172, 314

"Montage" shots, 59, 207, 208, 314

Montgomery, Robert, 225

Motion pictures
abroad, 265-272
appreciation of, 1-9
casting director for, 127-137
creative arts and professions used

in, 3, 7, 27, 98, 296-299
developing the film, 227-235, 306
director in, 10, 42, 48, 49, 50,

155-163, I75-J77* 306
editing the film, 216-226
future of, 273-291

Motion pictures — Continued
going on location, 184-195, 313
history of, 10-23
Hollywood — A Single-minded

Community, 24-34
in home and school, 256-264, 273,

289
make-up in, 148-154, 313
music in, 200-215
production dollar, how spent, 139
professions used in making, 98,

296-299
properties, ioi-iii, 152
70% of pictures made in Holly-
wood, 7, 265
research in, 80-91
Road Ahead, The, 273-291
scenario writer, 70-80, 181
selecting the story, 48-56
sets are made, 92-100
setting the stage, 164-174, 175
short subject in, 245-255
social influences of, 236-244
sound recording in, 196-208, 234
stars in, 138-147

statistics on production, 22, 136
strange jobs in, 1 19-126
why stories are changed, 57-69
Motion Picture Patents Company,

17
Motion picture production * dollar,

how spent, 139
Movie cameras, home, types of,

293-295
Movie camps, 189, 100
Mr. Deeds Goes to Town, 20
Muir, Jean, 27
Muni, Paul, 149
Murder on the Diamond, 269
Music in Pictures, 209-215
Musical copyrights, 214
Musical director, 210, 212
Music library, 212

[328]

Index

Mutiny on the Bounty, 45, 62, 89
Muy bridge, Eadweard, 10, 14, 15,

252

Narration short, 245, 247
National Council of Teachers of

English, 76
National Education Association,

65, 76
''Naturals" in books, 55
Naughty Marietta, 20, 53, 89, 184,

209
Newman, Bernard, 1 1 3
New World Symphony, The, 210
Niepce, Joseph Nicephore, 12
Night Flight, 213
Night Must Fall, 54, 64
Novarro, Ramon, 116

Office boys in studios, 124
Operative cameraman, 169, 172, 177,

180, 314
"Optical disks," 169, 314
Orry-Kelly, 6, 113
"Our Gang," 31

Packing the film, 234, 235

"Panning," 168, 315

Panchromatic film, 238, 315

Pantomime, 19, 267

Paper props, 108

Paramount Studio, 29

Parnell, 70, 80, 109, 132, 152, 176

Pasteur, Louis, 138

Pa the, 17

Paul, Robert WM 16

Persistence of Vision, 12, 15, 173

Phasmatrope, 13

Photographic effect process, 207

Pickford, Mary, 194

Plagiarism, 39

Plainsman, The, 128

Plaster shop, 120

Plateau, Dr. Joseph Antoine Ferdi-
nand, 12

"Play back," 200

Pogue, Thomas, 134

Polishing, 224

Positive stock, 232, 315

Powell, William, 144

Practice "school," 141

Prince and the Pauper, The, 41

Prints required for American thea-
tres, 229

"Process shots," 59

Procession of the Magi, The, 114

Professions used in making a pic-
ture, 98, 296-299

Projectors in schools and colleges,
258

Prop box, 170

Properties, ioi-iii, 152

Property man, 103, 104, 106, in,

171
Providencia Ranch, 118
Publicity department, 122

Queen Elizabeth, 19
Quo Vadis, 19, 235
Questions and answers in regard to
Research, 81, 88-90

Rainer. Luise, 149
Raines, Norman Reilly, 71
Ramsaye, Tern-, 10, 13, 16
Rasputin and the Empress, 206
Raw stock, 232, 316
Recording channel, 316
Recording engineer, 167
"Record" location, 188
Registration office, 55
Release date, 230

Release prints, 117, ::-. 232, 316
Rembrandt, 20, 41, 135
Rembrandt lighting, 19

[329]

Talking Pictures

Repair men for cameras and sound

recording machines, 120
Request numbers, 210
Re-recording process, 201-203
Research in Motion Pictures, 80-91
"Retakes," 224, 225, 317
Rice, Grantland, 246
Rin-Tin-Tin, 138
Ritz Brothers, 75
RKO plant, 29
Roach Studios, 31
Road Ahead, The, 273-291
Roberts, Theodore, 8
Rogers, Charles, 48
Roget, Peter Mark, 11, 12
Romeo and Juliet, 20, 47, 65, 66,
67, 78, 87, 90, 114, 184, 219,
235, 240, 245, 268
Rose-Marie, 133, 209
"Rotumbulator," 167, 168, 169, 317
Rough "cut," 220, 221, 317
Royal Society in London, 11
"Rushes" or "dailies," 218, 227, 306,

Ryskind, Morris, 74

San Francisco, 40, 71, 73, 99
Scenario Writer, The, 70-80
Schlessinger, 252

Science of Animal Locomotion, 15
Scott, Sir Walter, 42
"Scout" system, 140
Selig, 17

Sellers, Coleman, 13
Selznick International, 31
Sequence, 318
Sequoia, 20, no, 235
Seventh Heaven, 19, 89
Servant of the People, A, 250
Sets Are Made, The, 92-100
"Set" board, 09

Shakespeare, William, 20, 21, 34, 38,
46, 64, 6s, 66, 67, 112, 254, 255

Shearer, Norma, 1, 8, 18, 152, 240

Sherwood Forest, 187

Shooting the scene, 165, 182, 318

Short Subject, The, 245-255

Showmanship, 251

Sig?i of the Cross, 184

Silent-picture era, 19, 164

Sin of Madelon Claicdet, 54, 148,

225, 226
"Slate," 169, 219, 318
Slave Ship, The, 121
Smilin^ Through, 44
Smith, Pete, 246, 247
"Sneak" The, 223, 319
Social Influences, 236-244
Sothern, E. H., 66
Sound engineer, 172
Sound recording, 196-208, 234
Sound track, 199, 202
Sources of Educational Films and

Equipment, 260
"Spotlight," 18, 101
Staff shop, 120

Stage Is Set, The, 164-174, 175
Stage play, its advantages and dis-
advantages, 58
Stampfer, Dr. Simon Ritter von, 12
"Stand-ins," 144, 175, 176
Stanford, Leland, 13, 14, 252
Star Is Born, A, 95
Stars, 138-147
Stella Dallas, 74
Stereoscopic photography, 273, 286-

288
Stewart, Donald Ogden, 64, 74
"Still" camera, 256, 303
Stone, Lewis, 148, 149
Stories

bought in advance of needs, $6

market for, $$

"naturals" in, $$

scouts for, 36

selection of, 48-56

why changed, 57-69

[330]

Index

'Store show," 18

"Story conference," 47, 52, 53

Story "crop," 55

Story files, 38

Story films, 245

Story market, $$

Story of Louis Pasteur, The, 20,

41, 78, 125
"Story scours," 36
Stothart, Herbert, 213
Stradavari, Antonio, 4
Strange Jobs in Motion Pictures,

119-126
Strauss, Johann, 214
Strunk, Prof. William, Jr., 6$
Studio

advertising, 123

industrial section of, 98

physical vastness of, 125

publicity department of, 122, 123

reader for, 42-45

technical background of a, 175-
183

wardrobe department, 1 1 2-1 18,
172, 321
Studio reader, qualifications for, 44
"Stunt" men, 145, 319
Supporting players, 34, 129
"Susy," 233
Swan Theatre, 65
"Sweetheart Song," 203
Synchronization, 179, 220, 319

Taggart, 157

"Takes," 169, 218, 219, 222, 319

Tale of Two Cities, A, 20, 62, 88,

184, 235
Tannhauser, 214
Tarzan and His Mate, 148
Taylor, Robert, 25, 27
Tearles, The, 10 1
Technical background of scenes,

175-183

Television, 248, 273, 278-286, 288.

290
Temple, Shirley, 138
Ten Commandments, The, 8, 19,

188, 210, 275
"Test" for applicants, 141
Thalberg, Irving, 10, 37, 45
Thesaurus, 11
The Thin Man, 53
Third dimension photography, 273,

286-288, 290
Thomas, Lowell, 246
Thousand and One Nights, The, 10
Three Musketeers, The, 19, 187
Three Smart Girls, $6, 225
Tibbett, Lawrence, 205
Tolstoy, 46
Tone, Franchot, 45
Top-flight players, 129
Trader Horn, 20, 53, 185, 193, 201
"Trailers" in advertising, 123
Travelogues, 254
Treamre Island, 43
Tree, Sir Herbert Beerbohm, 66
"Trick" effects, 79
"Trick" photography, 206
"Trick" shots, 92, 206
Trucking shot, 168
Tugboat Annie, 71
Turbulation development, 233
Twain, Mark, 41
Twenty Thousand Leagues under

the Sea, 57
Two-color process, 275

Uchatius, Franz von, 12
Underscoring, 210, 321
United Artists Studio, 30
Unit art director, 93, 95, 99
Unit manager, 159, 161, 162
Unit property man, 1 1 1
Universal, 30

[331]

Talking Pictures

Vajda, Ernest, 64

Van Dyke, W. S., 71, 156, 157, 193,

194, 201
Variable area method, 197, 198
Variable density method, 197, 198
Verne, Jules, 57
Vikings, The, 275
Visconti, Giovanni Galeazzo, 82,

00
Vitagraph, 16
Vorkapich, Slavko, 208

Wagner, Richard, 214

Waikiki Wedding, 213

Wakeling, 113

Wake Up and Live, 213

Walpole, Hugh, 74

Wardrobe department, 112-118, 172,

Warner Brothers Studio, 10, 29,
30

Warner, Jack, 48

Warrens of Virginia, 18

Weber and Fields, 113, 143

Weismnller, Johnny, 148, 149

Well sweep, 166

West, Claudine, 44, 64

Westmores, 149

What Every Woman Knovjs, 85

Wigmaking, 152, 153

"Wild animal" man, 121

Wilson, Carey, 246

Wilson, Woodrow, 35

Winter set, 235

"Wipe," The, 208, 321

Wood, Sam, 157

Work print, 321

"Yard" at San Quentin, 192

Young, Loretta, 138

Zanuck, Darryl, 10, 48
Zoopraxinoscope, 15
Zukor, Adolph, 10, 17

[332]

This volume was designed by Mr. Charles W. Smith of
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by The William Byrd Press, Incorporated
in Richmorid, Virginia. Manufac-
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