The Grove Book of Hollywood
By Christopher SilvesterGrove Press
Copyright © 2002 Christopher Silvester
All right reserved.ISBN: 9780802138781
Chapter One
Eluding the Patent Agents
Fred J. Balshofer
from Fred J. Balshofer and Arthur C. Miller, One Reel a Week (1976)
Fred J. Balshofer was a stereoscopic-slide photographer who joined the Lubin ManufacturingCompany in Philadelphia in 1905. He subsequently became a producer and found himself on thereceiving end of a lawsuit from the Edison-led trust, the Motion Picture Patents Company. In1908 he founded the Crescent Film Company and thereafter was joined by Adam Kessel, anex-bookmaker, and Charles O. Bauman, a former streetcar conductor, in the New York PictureCompany, which set up the subsidiary companies Bison and Keystone. He retired from filmproduction soon after sound came in.
After a long weary ride of four nights and five days our small company, consisting ofEvelyn Graham, Charles French and his wife, Charles Inslee, J. Barney Sherry, YoungDeer and his wife Red Wing, Bill Edwards (the prop man), Maxwell Smith, who camein Arthur Miller's place, and I, arrived in Los Angeles the day after Thanksgiving,November, 1909.
We were among the first of the moving picture companies to begin building a movingpicture center in California. Los Angeles at that time was a sprawling city of approximately250,000 residents, many of whom were Spanish-speaking. Their customs and gentleway of life immediately won my admiration and friendship.
In 1909, there was darn little paper money to be had. It was so scarce, in fact, thatwhen I went to the Security Bank on Spring Street, in the heart of the city, and depositedtwo thousand dollars in twenty, fifty, and one hundred-dollar bills to the account of theNew York Motion Picture Company, the clerks eyed me as though I had held up atrain. When I asked the teller to change a twenty-dollar bill for ones, he handed me`cartwheels.' `Bills,' I said. He shook his head but managed to find five one-dollar bills,and I was obliged to take the remainder in silver dollars.
Just about the first to come to California to make movies, I believe, was ColonelWilliam (Bill) Selig, who sent Francis Boggs, his ace director, and a few actors to LosAngeles in the fall of 1907 to establish a studio of sorts in a former Chinese laundry onOlive Street not far from the center of the city. In January, 1910, the Biograph companysent a unit headed by D. W. Griffith with Mary Pickford, Henry B. Walthall, and BillyBitzer, to name a few, out to Los Angeles. They established a studio in a vacant carbarnat Georgia and Pico streets, on the southwest side of the city. Gilbert M. Anderson(real name Aaronson), a six-foot rugged individual of about thirty-five, who made thecharacter of Bronco Billy famous, was George K. Spoor's partner in the Essanay FilmManufacturing Company and was making western pictures starring himself in Niles,California, nearly four hundred and fifty miles north of Los Angeles.
Like the Biograph, we intended to return to New York in the spring, so we set up atemporary studio in a former grocery and feed store that had a large barn and some oldshacks on a fenced-in plot of ground on Alessandro Street, which was a hilly, sparselysettled section some three miles west of Los Angeles. We converted the store and shacksinto dressing-rooms for our players and put up a small outdoor stage where we couldshoot our interiors. The rented property included a small house across the street that Iused as an office and as a place to lock up the camera equipment. There also was enoughspace for a small laboratory to develop the daily negatives, which I had to do myselfuntil I trained a former cook from the Alexandria Hotel.
I would cut the negative scene by scene, leaving about six inches extra at each end,and number them, starting with scene one, two, and so on; the main, sub-, and spokentitles I wrote and sent with the developed picture negative to be photographed in ourlaboratory in Brooklyn. In those days, the negative of a complete reel or picture wasnot joined in one roll for printing; certain scenes were selected to be toned or tinteddifferent colors, so these scenes had to be printed in separate rolls and handled onseparate drums. The girls who assembled the positive prints worked at a bench onwhich there was a row of numbered wooden pegs. The joiners, as they were called, cutthe individual scenes from each roll, and the number of a particular scene was placedon the corresponding numbered peg. On the rewinder a piece of the leader was putfirst, then the main and subtitle, followed by scene one, two, and so on, including thedescriptive and spoken titles. The finished reel or picture had a splice at the beginningand end of each scene and title. As there were no machines or even guides to makesplices, the accuracy of the splice depended upon the skill of the joiner. The aboveseems fantastic compared with modern film processing. Today the full reel of a picturehas hardly a splice.
Col. William Selig had come to Los Angeles to avoid the wintry blasts of Chicagoand had intended to return in the spring. Instead, he decided to stay. Selig was a short,heavyset man about forty who had been a traveling salesman and magician before heorganized his moving picture company in Chicago in 1897. Judging by the looks of hisnew studio in California it was obvious that he was making money hand over fist. Hisstudio in Edendale covered a city block on Alessandro Street and was half a block ormore wide, surrounded by a high, vine-clad wall. Huge wrought-iron gates of Spanishdesign formed the entrance to the studio, and just beyond the gates was a lush tropicalgarden.
It was here that such coming stars as Tom Santschi, Hobart Bosworth, WilliamFarnum, and Robert Leonard, among others, played in his pictures. Late in the summerof 1910 Francis Boggs, top director for Selig, was shot to death in the studio garden bya Japanese gardener who went berserk. When Selig attempted to take the gun awayfrom the gardener, he was shot in the arm. Selig might have been fatally wounded hadnot others arrived in time to overpower the gun-brandishing Japanese, who, for noapparent reason, was all for killing Selig too.
As far as I know, there is no actual record of who was the first to photograph amovie scene in Hollywood. Dave Horsley has the distinction of being the first personto establish a studio when he took over a former tavern on the corner of SunsetBoulevard and Gower Street in the fall of 191l. As early as January, 1910, however, wephotographed scenes around Hollywood, riding our horses from the studio in Edendaleto the picturesque hills over the winding roads. There were some adobe buildings on afair-sized ranch just west of LaBrea Avenue and Hollywood Boulevard where wephotographed many horse chases, gun battles, stagecoach holdups and other similarscenes for our Bison pictures before we discovered Griffith Park. Griffith Park was abeautiful place with tree-covered hills, ideal for western pictures. It was only a few milesfrom our studio, and many times we set up an Indian village and left it there for daysat a time in the section now known as Griffith Park golf course.
We were doing fine in California and hadn't yet seen McCoy or any of his henchmenso we decided to stay. We began to convert our temporary studio into a permanentone. Our stock company of actors and actresses had grown to include Jewell Darrell,Marguerite Favar, Marin (named for Marin County where she was born) Sais, GeorgeGebhardt, Art Acord, Jack Conway, Art Ortega, Roy Purden, Frank Montgomery,Howard Davies, Princess Mona Darkfeather, Ann (Anna) Little, Jess McGaugh, TexCooper, Charlie Avery and several others. We also had Bebe Daniels, a child actress,and her mother, Phyllis, who acted as my secretary and bookkeeper.
I had bought several horses to use in our western pictures, some of them from aMexican fellow. The day he delivered them he was mounted on the most magnificentwhite stallion I had ever seen. The minute I saw that horse all I could think of was whata valuable addition it would be to our Bison pictures. I tried every argument I couldthink of to convince the Mexican to sell us the horse, but he simply wouldn't listen.However, I was able to make a deal to rent the horse for one picture. We had juststarted the film and were shooting some scenes at the old wooden bridge that used tobe on Los Feliz Road near the entrance to Griffith Park when Jack Conway camethundering across the bridge on the white stallion. A plank loosened and the edge struckthe horse a severe blow across his forelegs causing him to fall. Conway was sent sprawlingbut fortunately was not hurt. One of the cowboys ran to put his weight on the horse'shead to prevent him from getting up, while others did what they could to quiet theanimal. It appeared as though he had broken his leg.
Jess McGaugh, who was in charge of our horses, took over and did a fine job on theforeleg which turned out to be severely lacerated but not broken. The Mexican ownerbecame quite excited over the incident. He had no idea what the injury amounted toand could well wonder about the soundness of the horse after taking such a spill, evenif the stallion hadn't suffered a broken leg. McGaugh estimated the veterinary chargesat seventy-five dollars, and if the Mexican insisted on being paid for rental of the horseduring the time it was out of action, it seemed better to buy the horse as it was. McGaughthought that the owner, under the present circumstances, might be willing to sell, so Italked it over with him. The result was that I bought the beautiful white stallion for ahundred dollars on the strength of McGaugh's opinion that he would be as good asnew in a month or so.
What a bargain this proved to be! While the horse was healing, I made plans tofeature him in one of our Bison pictures. I chose the obvious name of Snowball forhim as he was snow white without a mark on him. In his first picture, I took advantageof every opportunity to insert his name in the spoken titles. When the picture wasshipped East and my partners saw it, they wired me to `Buy that horse called Snowballeven if you have to pay a thousand dollars.' It delighted me to be able to wire back,`We own Snowball. Bought him for $100.' Snowball became well known to movieaudiences throughout the country; bags of mail were received asking for more pictureswith Snowball in them. With our famous horse and Inslee in his naked Indian heroroles, our Bison pictures were outselling most of the pictures made by members of thetrust. This was a bitter pill for them to swallow.
Not long after that, Kessel and Bauman, who had been visiting in California for afew weeks and were about ready to go back East, and I were sitting in the lobby of theAlexandria Hotel in Los Angeles enjoying an after-dinner smoke. I noticed a man sittingacross from us. What drew my attention to him was that he was holding the newspaperhe was pretending to read upside down. The top of his head, which was all that showedabove the newspaper, looked familiar. I kept watching him, and sure enough, it was theold snooper himself, Al McCoy, the Patents Company detective. I nudged Kessel,pointed and whispered, `Al McCoy.' Kessel studied him awhile and told me I wasimagining things. He insisted and said, `I'll bet you a five-dollar gold piece that's notMcCoy.' I replied, `I'll take your bet.' Kessel smiled and wanted to know how I couldprove it. I said I'd go over and talk to him. I stood up and walked over to where theman was sitting and stood looking down at him. `Hello, Slim,' I said, smiling. `What areyou doing way out here?' I honestly felt sorry for McCoy at that moment. He lookedup at me like the cat that swallowed the canary. `It's my job, Fred,' he said in anapologetic manner. Calling me Fred sounded like he wanted to be on a sort of friendlybasis, `I'd hate to see you get hurt,' I answered in a pleasant tone, `but you're out Westnow and the cowboys here are a real tough bunch. They carry six-shooters, and I don'tthink they want to be interfered with.' I really put it on and could see that it was havingan effect. I continued, `I'm giving you a friendly tip. Don't start anything here or you'regoing to run into trouble. I'll keep quiet about your being here and the rest is up toyou.' With that I left him, walked back to Addie Kessel, and collected the five-dollargold piece. I didn't think we would have any trouble with McCoy and told Kessel andBauman they could leave as planned and not to worry.
McCoy took my advice and kept himself pretty scarce, but every now and then Iwould see him standing on a rise watching us through field glasses. I never told anyonewho he was, as some of the scare talk I had handed him at the hotel wasn't withoutbasis. Whenever I spotted him, I'd send one of the cowboys riding in his direction withinstructions just to inquire who he was, but McCoy always disappeared before the riderreached him. A couple of weeks went by without my seeing him so I thought he hadbecome discouraged and departed. This proved to be a poor guess. It wasn't long beforeI learned I had made a mistake.
One Saturday night I went up to visit George Gebhardt, who lived on the hilloverlooking our studio in Edendale. During the course of the evening, his wife, Madeline,went to the back porch to get something and noticed a light in my office. She thoughtit was unusual at that hour so she told me about it. Gebhardt got out his forty-five gun,and he and I started down the hill to investigate. We arrived at the office just as thelights went out. It was mighty dark on the porch, but Gebhardt had his gun ready foranything that might happen. In spite of the dark, we could make out the figure of aman tiptoeing his way out the side door. Gebhardt jammed the gun in the man's backand barked `Hands up.' A package dropped to the porch floor with a thump as he madehaste to comply. `Don't shoot,' he cried. `It's me.' You could have knocked me overwith the proverbial feather when I discovered it was Maxwell Smith, my camera boyand the only other person I trusted with a key to the place. He blabbered out a confessionthat he had made sketches and used the office lights and our 5x7 still camera in aneffort to make photographs for McCoy of the inside movement of my Pathé moviecamera. I found the plate holders where he had dropped them on the porch floor andsmashed them. Smith nearly had succeeded in his plan but almost lost his life for a fewmeasly dollars. As a matter of fact, he did lose his life from a shotgun blast a short timelater while on a hunting trip with his uncle who accidentally shot him in the stomach.
This incident with Smith made me more cautious than ever, and I never left thecamera in the office after that. I took it home with me every evening and brought itback the next morning. Weekends and between pictures, I wrapped the Pathé in aNavajo blanket and stored it in a large safety box I had rented for the purpose in theCommercial Bank in downtown Los Angeles, where we had our bank account. AlthoughI hadn't seen hide nor hair of McCoy since I fired Smith, I often wondered what hisnext move would be.
Late in 1910 Charlie French made other connections, which meant that I had to takeover the entire directing job. It was impossible to get any kind of a cameraman in LosAngeles then, so I had to operate the camera as well as direct our pictures for the nextseveral months. Then I broke in Robert Newhard, a hard-working youth I had hiredafter the Smith fiasco.
To add to my troubles, I was subpoenaed by the Patents Company to be examinedat a deposition hearing in Los Angeles, as they were preparing an infringement suitagainst us in New York. Kessel and Bauman came out to California post-haste when Iwired them the bad news. When they arrived, they too, were subpoenaed to be examined.Our patent attorneys, Lyon and Lyon, together with our regular attorney, Frank Graham,got them out of appearing by pleading that Kessel and Bauman were nonresidents. Onthe advice of all our lawyers, they went back to New York, leaving me to face thesituation alone. The attorneys for the Patents Company knew their subject well, and itwasn't very long before they had me hanging by a thin thread with their questions asto what kind of a camera I was using.
`What make is it? Describe it. Can you make a sketch of it, and the movement?' Ishook my head. `I don't know how to draw,' I said, and then gave them a run-aroundstory by describing another French camera that I well remembered and that was not aninfringement of the Edison patents. They were well aware that I was telling them a fishstory, but they had to prove it. They brought up the fact that I had rented a safetydeposit box at the Commercial Bank, which I had to admit. How the lawyers foundthis out I don't know, but I began to sweat. Luckily, lunch recess was called momentslater. `What about that safety deposit box? Is the camera in it?', Graham asked whenhe and I were alone on our way to lunch. When I nodded `Yes,' he told me the opposingattorneys would seek a court order to examine it. I had no time for lunch; the mostimportant thing was to get the camera out of the safety deposit box immediately.
Buster Edmonds, one of our actors who also drove for me sometimes, was sittingbehind the wheel of my car where he had parked when he drove me down to thehearing. He was the only other person who knew about the camera being in the safetydeposit box. Or was he? I was in a spot, and I put the question to him. Edmonds sworehe had never told anyone, not even his wife, about it. We rushed over to the bank.Edmonds stayed in the car while I hurried in, took the camera out of the box, and madesure that the Navajo blanket covered it completely before I passed the vault clerk. Ihustled out of the bank, put the camera in the car with Edmonds, and told him to getgoing. `Take it home and keep it until I want it again, but above all keep mum,' weremy instructions.
Sure enough, the Patents Company's attorneys obtained a court order to examinethe safety deposit box, and, headed by a deputy sheriff, we all marched over to the bankwhere I was identified by the vault clerk. I then led them to the safety deposit boxwhere I produced my key. Lyon and Lyon didn't know what to expect and looked grave,as did Graham, while the opposing attorneys were quite cocky. So sure of themselveswere they, in fact, that when the box was opened and found to be empty they just stoodthere and gaped in utter disbelief. Graham grinned with satisfaction and shrugged hisshoulders, and that was that.
* * *
A Barn in a Place Called Hollywood
Jesse L. Lasky, I Blow My Own Horn (1957)
Jesse L. Lasky (1880-1958) was born in San Francisco, California, and in 1913 he formed theJesse L. Lasky Feature Play Company in New York with his brother-in-law Samuel Goldfish (laterGoldwyn) and Cecil B. DeMille. Lasky's company merged with Adolph Zukor in 1916 to createthe studio later called Paramount. He was ousted from Paramount in 1932 and became anindependent producer. His son, Jesse Jr, was a successful screenwriter.
After lunch we walked down Forty-fourth Street to The Lambs' club, and there destinytook a hand in shaping not our ends but our beginnings, as far as the motion-picturebusiness was concerned. We ran into Dustin Farnum, a matinee idol who had scored atriumph on Broadway in The Virginian and shared honors with his brother William anda child actress named Mary Miles Minter in The Littlest Rebel.
We asked Farnum if he would like to star in a long picture we wanted to make. Helooked around the room and spotted Edwin Milton Royle, author of The Squaw Man.That play, which curiously combined London drawing-room settings with Wild Westscenery, had been a tour de force for William Faversham, and I suspect Farnum may havecoveted the role and lost it to his rival. At any rate he said, `You get Royle to sell youThe Squaw Man and I might agree to join you.'
Sounding out Royle, we found him vulnerable to an offer, so I called Sam Goldfishand told him we were in business.
The Jesse L. Lasky Feature Play Company was organized with myself president, Samgeneral manager, and Cecil director-general. We each held a quarter of the stock andFarnum agreed to accept the other quarter in lieu of salary for his acting stint. We hadonly $20,000 capital and had agreed to pay $15,000 for the play.
At first we planned to make the picture across the Hudson River at Fort Lee, NewJersey, where a good many one-reel Westerns and other short subjects were beingfilmed. But I didn't think a two-mile trip would satisfy Cecil's thirst for adventure, so Irecklessly tossed in the suggestion that an Indian picture ought to be made in real Indiancountry — like Flagstaff, Arizona. I remembered seeing some Indians in Flagstaff whiletraveling with Hermann the Great.
Cecil was delighted with the proposal, as I had anticipated, but Dustin Farnum balked.He said he didn't mind being paid off with stock as long as he could live at home andwork across the river, but he insisted on having his $5,000 in spot cash before goingWest. The whole project threatened to collapse — until I talked Bessie's uncle and brotherinto buying Farnum's stock. If he had hung on to his piece of paper for eight years, hecould have sold it for nearly $2,000,000. But Farnum didn't do badly, even so, as thepicture put him in the vanguard of early screen heroes, where he maintained a worshipfulfollowing for many years.
We hired a cameraman who owned a crank-handled movie camera, and Oscar Apfel,a director with experience on one- and two-reelers, to help Cecil get started. When itwas time to leave for Flagstaff, I backed out. I had no great personal faith in the projectand I couldn't see myself wasting time in Arizona when I had business to look after inthe East. So I said good-by to the rest of them at the train and promised Cecil I'd comeout if he needed me.
In the meantime Salesman Sam had learned enough about how pictures were bookedto start selling states' rights for our initial production. A print was sold for a flat sum toservice a specified territory and could be rerun in its assigned region till it wore out. A smallstate got only one print, a large state two, and a block like New England four or five. Samsold New York state rights for several thousand dollars, New England's for much more,then Pennsylvania, Ohio, and the Pacific coast. Before long we had nearly $60,000 worthof contracts. Sam was a master merchandiser, whether he was pushing a consignment ofgloves or a motion picture not yet made by men who had never made one.
While these orders and advance payments were piling up, Cecil seemed to havedisappeared. We hadn't heard a word from him for two weeks and we were worried.Finally a telegram arrived — but it wasn't from Flagstaff. It said: `FLAGSTAFF NO GOODFOR OUR PURPOSE. HAVE PROCEEDED TO CALIFORNIA. WANT AUTHORITY TORENT BARN IN PLACE CALLED HOLLYWOOD FOR $75 A MONTH. REGARDS TOSAM. CECIL.'
Sam hit the ceiling. I insisted that Cecil must know what he was doing, although Ireally didn't feel too sure of it. When you're president of a company you assume islocated in Flagstaff, Arizona, it's very disconcerting to have it turn up in a place you'venever even heard of. Sam was all for calling the company back where we could keep aneye on it. We argued for hours. At last we agreed to let them stay and wired Cecil:`AUTHORIZE YOU TO RENT BARN BUT ON MONTH-TO-MONTH BASIS. DON'TMAKE ANY LONG COMMITMENT. REGARDS, JESSE AND SAM.'
The reason for that cautious proviso was that we didn't have any definite plansbeyond The Squaw Man. Sam may have convinced the states' rights buyers of our corporatesoundness, but he himself was still hanging on to his job with the glove company, andI still had my fingers crossed.
Cecil had passed up Flagstaff as our shooting locale because the weather was badwhen he stepped off the train in Arizona, and he suddenly realized there would be nofacilities for processing the film there. But he knew there must be film laboratories inCalifornia, because, while no one had yet made a feature picture in the West, a fewcompanies making one-reelers had moved there from the East to take advantage ofcheaper land, labor, and materials and to benefit from the milder climate and moredependable sunlight. The latter was a potent economic factor in as much as artificiallighting was still unknown to motion pictures. (Sunlight didn't go out of style even afterkliegs came in, because the early carbon-arc lamps had the intensity of an acetylenetorch, making temporary blindness an occupational hazard for actors. After a scene theplayers would poultice their burning orbs with cooling slices of raw potatoes.)
The barn he rented at Selma and Vine streets had excellent accommodations for thecast of our horse opera, save for the human actors. Stalls were turned into offices,dressing-rooms, and a projection room. One end of the barn was used as a storeroom.In a clearing made among the acres of orange and lemon trees that went with the barna small wooden platform was built as an open stage. Production started on The SquawMan on December 29, 1913. Before it was finished a few weeks later, Cecil had inveigledme into making a trip to the Coast, contending that my duty as president of the companywas to be at my desk, which he had installed in the stall next to his.
I arrived at the old Santa Fe Depot in Los Angeles, called a taxi, and told the driverI wanted to go to Hollywood. He gave me a puzzled look but said, `Get in, boss — we'llfind it.'
He drove to the Alexandria, then the city's leading hotel, and had a conference withsome other taxi drivers, who set his course out of the city over dirt roads, past endlessorchards and an occasional farmhouse. We found Hollywood by the lone landmark thatantedated even the movies, a sedate rest haven way out in the country, where citydwellers could get away from it all and relax in perfect tranquillity — the HollywoodHotel — now the bustling site of three modern buildings. The taxi driver suggested thatI make inquiries inside the hotel about where I wanted to go.
I told the clerk my name and explained that I was president of the Lasky FeaturePlay Company. `This is my first trip here and I'm not sure where our studio is located,'I added. `Would you please direct me?'
`I'm sorry,' said the clerk, `I never heard of it.'
`Perhaps I should have told you that the director-general of the company is Cecil B. DeMille,' I stated impressively.
`Never heard of him,' the clerk said crisply.
Considerably crestfallen, I was starting toward the door when he called me back. `Tellyou who might help you,' he said. `Drive down this main road till you come to VineStreet. You can't miss it — it's a dirt road with a row of pepper trees right down themiddle. Follow the pepper trees for about two blocks till you see an old barn. There'ssome movie folks working there that might know where your company is.'
When I heard `barn,' I knew I was on the right track. Sure enough, a sign identifiedthe barn as the Jesse L. Lasky Feature Play Company.
My reception committee was waiting for me at the hitching posts in front of the barn— a dozen horses and a little boy stationed there to direct me inside. He led me to mystall, where I found a fresh bouquet on the desk, and then out the barn through theorange orchard to the stage, which had a clumsy arrangement of canvas diffusers overthe top. These worked something like window shades to control the sunlight. It lookedlike a big raft with a tattered canvas canopy.
After the reluctant and conditional permission Sam and I gave for his rental of thebarn Cecil had withheld an accounting of other expenditures, undoubtedly with theadmirable motive of keeping our blood pressure down. Among other things he hadrented a two-ton Ford truck. It was standing now in front of the stage, with `Jesse L.Lasky Feature Play Company' emblazoned prominently on its side. When he saw mecoming, he ran out, grabbed my hand, summoned the company, made a speech ofwelcome, pushed me against the truck, and signaled the photographer. He knew I wouldautomatically smile for a snapshot, and I think he wanted to send Sam photographicevidence of what would appear to be my happy endorsement of his extravagance inrenting the truck.
I guess it was the first picture ever taken of a movie mogul's arrival in Hollywood.
I stayed that night at Cecil's very modest rented house in Cahuenga Canyon, but Idon't think I slept much. I had never heard coyotes howling before.
The next morning his wife Constance gave us each a lunch pail which we carried tothe studio, and at noon we had our sandwiches with coffee made on a little kerosenestove by the secretary. Her name was Ethel Wales, and she later became well known asa character actress.
Work stopped on the open stage as soon as the sun went behind a cloud. If it was abig cloud, the cast dispersed to dressing-rooms or to the lunch wagon across the street,to come rushing back the minute the sun was out again. Picture actors of those dayswere often referred to as `The Sun Worshipers.' It was a ritual for them to go to thewindow and appraise the weather as soon as they awoke in the morning. On a verycloudy day the cast didn't even show up, knowing there would be no shooting. But wetook full advantage of the sunshine when we had it — there were no unions to frownon sixteen-hour days. If it looked like rain, the set was quickly covered with hugetarpaulins to protect the props.
Cold weather brought a special plague of problems. It caused tiny flashes of staticelectricity inside the cameras which ruined the film. We never knew until a batch hadbeen developed whether it would have to be shot over. On a chilly day a group ofdrawing-room sophisticates in cutaways and low evening gowns might feature goosepimples, chattering teeth, and congealed breath. The only way we could have heatedour bower in the orange grove was with smudge pots, and that would have blocked outthe sun. The actors sometimes had to mouth their dialogue while holding back theirbreath so as not to give the impression that London drawing rooms were even colderthan they notably were.
This was in January. By the following July we were making arctic scenes for The Callof the North (using salt for snow) at a temperature of 100 degrees, Robert Edeson andthe other players cocooned in heavy clothing and parkas, with melting make-up runningin rivulets down their faces.
Location trips were very simply arranged. Today a location man goes out weeks inadvance to scout and contract for the use of sites, and the company is transported tothe selected locations on a co-ordinated schedule. But in those days, when we wantedto show a country church, say, the whole company set out in search of it. Cecil and Isometimes rode ahead on horseback, with the crew and cast following in two cars.When we found what we wanted, we stopped and shot a scene, then went on to thenext setting we needed. No one ever objected to our trespassing or charged us for theuse of his property. The scenery was always fresh and stimulating. Now it's all butimpossible to find locations near Hollywood that aren't tedious and repetitious to theregular movie-goer. In order to give a modern audience the vicarious thrill of discoveryit is necessary to take a company on location to Maine or Oregon or Ireland or Venice,and indeed today's film-makers are prospecting the whole world for novel and exoticbackgrounds to fill their widened screens.
We reveled in the outdoor life of picture-pioneering and dressed the part in boots,jeans, and lumberjack shirts, not to mention Cecil's pistol. Ten-gallon hats were not apart of the Western outfits we affected, because they would have been awkward whilesighting into a camera. Instead, directors wore caps turned backward, and adoptedleather leggings for the convenience of location scouting on horseback and as protectionagainst cactus and rattlesnakes in the desert regions. Making a picture was outdoor workon or off location, since interiors were shot on the open stage and sets had no ceilings.But the directors clung to their riding breeches and reversed caps as a badge of theirprofession long after such garb ceased to serve a useful purpose. Cecil continued todress for a steeplechase even while putting clotheshorses through their paces in themarble and gold sanctuaries of his famous bathtub scenes many years later.
Some accounts have it that Hollywood became the picture capital because bootlegfilms could be made there with illegal cameras far from the scrutiny of the highhandedEastern patent monopoly with the Mexican border handy for emergencies. I know thatspies from the patent companies were circulating in Hollywood when we arrived. Wehad an approved camera, but, even so, we were afraid of trouble because we were daringto make a six-reel picture which would run sixty minutes. The monopoly discouragedany deviations from the status quo, which called for one- and two-reelers only. Theywere making easy money with little effort on short pictures and were afraid longer filmswould ruin the whole business by driving patrons out of the theaters with eyestrain andboredom — or, worse still, the public might get to like long pictures and force thefilm-makers to worry about heavier financing and genuine creative talent.
Cecil was apprehensive enough to carry a gun at all times. He was actually shot at onone occasion while carrying the film home at night, which I am sure made him feel thatrevolutionizing motion pictures wasn't such a bad substitute for a Mexican revolution.
Continues...
Excerpted from The Grove Book of Hollywoodby Christopher Silvester Copyright © 2002 by Christopher Silvester. Excerpted by permission.
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