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| Patent US589168A |
125 years ago today, Thomas Edison was granted US Patent 589168, for a camera able to capture motion. Edison's research team, led by WKL Dickson did all the work.
Wednesday, August 31, 2022
Frederick March 100 -- August 31, 2022
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| listal.com |
Great American actor Frederick March was born 125 years ago today, on 31-August-1897. He was a veteran of World War One. He won the Oscar and the Tony for Best Actor twice each. In college he belonged to a inter-fraternity organization called the Ku Klux Klan, which was not related to the domestic terrorist organization. This led to many misunderstandings. Eventually, the University of Wisconsin–Madison removed his name from its theater. He was a proponent of social justice and civil rights for his whole life.
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| listal.com |
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| listal.com |
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| listal.com |
Tuesday, August 30, 2022
Sounds for the Silent Drama -- August 30, 2022
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| Photoplay, August, 1922 |
"Celluloid drama isn't always silent." This article explains some of the devices that were used to produce sound effects. This carried on a tradition from the theater, which then went on to radio.
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| Motion Picture News, 05-August-1922 |
A showing of the Universal-Jewel production of The Storm at the Central Theater in Newark, New Jersey was enhanced by forest fire noises played over a nearby radio station. I'm not sure that would be of much use.
Monday, August 29, 2022
Supreme Pathé Serials -- August 29, 2022
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| Moving Picture World, 26-August-1922 |
Pathé boasted that in the coming year they would have four serials starring three of the biggest stars in that genre, Ruth Roland, Charles Hutchison and Pearl White. Pearl White was returning to serials after a hiatus.
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| Motion Picture News, 19-August-1922 |
Ruth Roland, who was born in San Francisco, was one of the great Serial Queens. Note in this trade ad for The Timber Queen that Ruth Roland, on a horse, is saving a man, who may have been Bruce Gordon. Fred Jackman directed.
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| Moving Picture World, 19-August-1922 |
The exhibitors seemed to like it.
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| Moving Picture World, 26-August-1922 |
Ruth Roland's next serial would be The Riddle of the Range.
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| Moving Picture World, 26-August-1922 |
Charles Hutchison wrote, directed, acted and performed stunts in many Pathé serials (Pathéserials). He was best known for motorcycle stunts, but S P E E D also had trains and airplanes.
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| Moving Picture World, 26-August-1922 |
Other studios produced serials. Elinor Field played the Jungle Goddess in Selig's serial of the same name. "Col. Wm. N. Selig's greatest 15 episode serial."
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| Motion Picture News, 19-August-1922 |
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| Motion Picture News, 12-August-1922 |
Art Acord was a cowboy star who appeared in many silent films but did not make the transition to talkies. In the Days of Buffalo Bill was "A spectacular chronicle of events and adventures in the of America's greatest scout." Duke Lee played the great scout. It was directed by Edward Laemmle, one of Uncle Carl's many nephews. It was a big Universal production.
Sunday, August 28, 2022
Max Linder in His Supreme Burlesque -- August 28, 2022
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| Moving Picture World, 26-August-1922 |
Max Linder was the biggest star in film comedy before Charlie Chaplin. Linder appeared in hundreds of early Pathé slapstick comedies in France. He became a major star before World War One. There is some confusion about what he did in the war, but he was wounded or became seriously ill and newspapers reported that he had died. This was not true, but the French film industry, the most powerful in the world before the war, had mostly shut down. Max took an offer from Essanay and came to America, signing a deal to make six short films. The first two did poorly and the third did only a little better, so that was the end of the series. Max returned to France and opened a cinema. He made a feature in France, and then headed back to the US. He made a feature, Seven Years Bad Luck, which did well at the box office. His next American film, Be My Wife, did not do well at the box office.
His next feature film, The Three Must-Get-Theres, a parody of Douglas Fairbanks' recent hit The Three Musketeers, was his last film produced in the US. Max wrote, directed and produced the movie. I always thought the title was clunky.
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| Moving Picture World, 12-August-1922 |
The film used many anachronisms, like the telephone.
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| Moving Picture World, 26-August-1922 |
Max played Dart-In-Again (groan) and Jobyna Ralston played Constance. Bull Montana played Cardinal Richie-Loo.
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| Moving Picture World, 26-August-1922 |
The movie was booked into some major theaters.
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| Moving Picture World, 19-August-1922 |
Meanwhile, Max had gone back to France and started work on what would be his last films. Abel Gance directed Au Secours! and Édouard-Émile Violet directed The King of the Circus. I saw Au Secours! at the San Francisco Film Festival.
Saturday, August 27, 2022
Barbara Bach 75 -- August 27, 2022
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| listal.com |
Actress Barbara Bach was born 75 years ago today, on 27-August-1947. I was impressed when I saw her in The Spy Who Loved Me with Roger Moore. She married Ringo Starr.
Friday, August 26, 2022
Century Comedies -- They Stand Unequalled -- August 26, 2022
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| Motion Picture News, 05-August-1922 |
Century Comedies promoted their stars: Lee Moran, Brownie the Century Wonder Dog, Johnny K Fox and Queenie the Horse. Their biggest star, Baby Peggy was moving on to feature films.
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| Moving Picture World, 26-August-1922 |
Betty May was signed to be Lee Moran's leading lady.
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| Moving Picture World, 26-August-1922 |
Arvid Gillstrom had a long career directing short comedies. Century moved him from the Brownie series to Lee Moran's.
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| Moving Picture World, 26-August-1922 |
Lee Moran's former partner Eddie Lyons was starring in comedies for Arrow.
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| Motion Picture News, 05-August-1922 |
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| Moving Picture World, 26-August-1922 |
Uncle Dan Mason, who had played the Skipper in a series of short comedies based on Fontaine Fox's comic panel The Toonerville Trolley That Meets All the Trains, moved to FBO to star in a series of Plum Center Comedies.
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| Motion Picture News, 12-August-1922 |
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| Moving Picture World, 26-August-1922 |
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| Motion Picture News, 12-August-1922
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I don't know much about Gloria Joy, whose "Joy Comedies" were to be released by FBO. Sherwood McDonald directed.
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| Moving Picture World, 19-August-1922 |
William Fox produced several comedy series, starring Lupino Lane, Clyde Cook, Al St John and the Lee Kids. The other article mentions the start of Sol Lesser's Principal Pictures Corporation. We will see more about that in later months.
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| Moving Picture World, 26-August-1922 |
Lupino Lane was a remarkable acrobatic comedian. Ida Lupino was his cousin.
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| Moving Picture World, 26-August-1922 |
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| Moving Picture World, 26-August-1922 |
Sisters Jane and Katherine Lee had been in movies for nearly ten years. "The Baby Grands."
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| Moving Picture World, 05-August-1922 |
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| Moving Picture World, 05-August-1922 |
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| Moving Picture World, 05-August-1922 |
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| Moving Picture World, 19-August-1922 |
Harry Cohn, his brother Jack and Joe Brandt provided the initials for C.B.C. Film Sales Corp. The Hallroom Boys Comedies were a long running series of short comedies, based on a comic strip by Harold MacGill.
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Educational released the Mermaid Comedies, which starred Lloyd Hamilton and others.
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| Moving Picture World, 05-August-1922 |
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| Moving Picture World, 26-August-1922 |
Paul Terry made the animated Aesop's Fables series.
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| Moving Picture World, 26-August-1922 |
Max Fleischer and his brother Dave made the animated Out of the Inkwell series.
Thursday, August 25, 2022
That Son of a Sheik -- August 25, 2022
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| Motion Picture News, 05-August-1922 |
The Christie Film Company was a major producer of short comedies from 1911 to 1933. Al Christie was the director and Charles Christie ran the business. In 1922, Neal Burns, one of Christie's comic leading men, signed a contract extension.
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| Moving Picture World, 12-August-1922 |
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| Moving Picture World, 19-August-1922 |
I thought it was interesting that this 1922 film, a parody of Rudolph Valentino's The Sheik(1921) had a title much closer to Rudolph Valentino's sequel, The Son of the Sheik(1926).
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| Moving Picture World, 26-August-1922 |
Christie had big plans for the 1922-1923 season, releasing one film a month starring Neal Burns, Bobby Vernon or Dorothy Devore.
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| Motion Picture News, 19-August-1922 |
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| Moving Picture World, 12-August-1922 |
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| Moving Picture World, 12-August-1922 |
Pioneering comedy producer Mack Sennett made many shorts starring handsome Ben Turpin, who was Sennett's biggest remaining comic.
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| Motion Picture News, 19-August-1922 |
Louise Fazenda, "world famed girl clown," returned to the Sennett fold to star with Teddy the dog in "Bow Wow."
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