***************************************************************************** * T A Y L O R O L O G Y * * A Continuing Exploration of the Life and Death of William Desmond Taylor * * * * Issue 55 -- July 1997 Editor: Bruce Long bruce@asu.edu * * TAYLOROLOGY may be freely distributed * ***************************************************************************** CONTENTS OF THIS ISSUE: Interviews with Mary Pickford Taylor Case Errors in "Forbidden Lovers" ***************************************************************************** What is TAYLOROLOGY? TAYLOROLOGY is a newsletter focusing on the life and death of William Desmond Taylor, a top Paramount film director in early Hollywood who was shot to death on February 1, 1922. His unsolved murder was one of Hollywood's major scandals. This newsletter will deal with: (a) The facts of Taylor's life; (b) The facts and rumors of Taylor's murder; (c) The impact of the Taylor murder on Hollywood and the nation; (d) Taylor's associates and the Hollywood silent film industry in which Taylor worked. Primary emphasis will be given toward reprinting, referencing and analyzing source material, and sifting it for accuracy. ***************************************************************************** Some TAYLOROLOGY graphic image files are available for viewing in Acrobat format (.pdf) at http://www.public.asu.edu/~bruce . The files presently include photos of Taylor acting and directing, a map of Alvarado court, Taylor's birth and death certificates, a sketch of the murder scene, photos of Taylor and Minter autographed to each other, letters written from Minter to Taylor, etc. ***************************************************************************** ***************************************************************************** Interviews with Mary Pickford Mary Pickford ("America's Sweetheart") was the biggest star directed by William Desmond Taylor. The three films in which he directed her--"Johanna Enlists," "Captain Kidd, Jr.," "How Could You, Jean"--were the last three she made for Famous Players-Lasky before beginning independent production. Below are 11 interviews with Mary Pickford, from 1913-1922. Also included is her 1923 testimony which revealed that Adolph Zukor had once offered her $250,000 if she would retire from the screen. As a star and as a producer, Mary Pickford was the most important woman of the silent film era, and the interviews below give glimpses of her personality, intelligence, and sense of values. Hopefully someday someone will make a serious effort to find the hundreds of interviews given by Mary Pickford during the silent film era, and make them freely available on the Internet. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * January 19, 1913 SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE Mary Pickford, Recent Recruit to the Footlights, Was Known to Millions in the "Movies" When a pretty young woman first sees herself on the screen, after she has been "filmed," she seeks a secluded spot and weeps. "Do I really look as bad as that?" she sobs. The sight of herself is almost too much. "I suspect," said Miss Pickford, when discussing her experience recently, "that a man will gravitate toward strong drink. I remember well the first time Lionel Barrymore saw himself as others see him. "'I've got a grouch on with myself for being so fat,' he observed. 'Anyhow, I wonder what right I've got to be going around and posing as a leading man. Back to the stage for mine!'" Very seldom, though, is it "back to the stage." Much more often it is from the stage to the "movies." That is why it has been such a source of comment that a woman like Miss Pickford should give up one line of work, in which she has a reputation that is second to none, for another that is, in many respects, more strenuous and exacting. Not since she was a very little girl with a company playing "The Warrens of Virginia" has Miss Pickford essayed a speaking part, until recently she blossomed out as a real Juliet in "The Good Little Devil," the play with which Mme. Rostand and her son proved that the author of "Cyrano" and "Chantecler" was not the only one of the family who could turn out dramatic novelties. And for the very reason that Miss Pickford has been away so short a time from the clicking cameras and shouting stage managers of the "movies," her views on the styles of acting which go best in, the photoplays and the real thing are of particular interest, because her own work has forced her to bring the contrasts into vivid relief. "As a matter of fact," she declared, "one does not have to resort to more pantomime before the camera than behind the footlights. Some actors have spoiled themselves for returning to the stage by doing so; but it really isn't necessary. "Would you believe it? One has to be very much more real for a film play than for an audience. You can't fool the camera. It catches every little thing--many things that, ordinarily, the eyes never see. "I soon discovered, when studying myself on the screen, that I couldn't pretend to cry in front of the lens. If a scene demanded sobs, I had to weep, or turn my head away from the camera. "Now, on the stage it is perfectly easy to counterfeit sobs. There the voice helps in the deception. The same holds true in many ways--all emotions may be simulated by the voice; but when one is deprived of its aid, one must make up for it by keener attention to facial expression. "Often, when acting for the 'movies,' I have been greatly disconcerted when the man playing opposite to me would speak a line that should have been impassioned in an ordinary tone of voice. Imagine some one declaring, 'I love you,' as if he were asking you to 'Please pass the butter.' Sometimes I feared that I might lose control of myself altogether, and I knew that after such a thing happened, I could never finish my part as well as I had begun it." There is, indeed, a special technique required for the photoplays--a technique that has been evolved in a few years. It has been but a matter of half a decade, or thereabouts, that Miss Pickford became a Juliet of the gelatine films. She had finished her engagement with "The Warrens of Virginia," and realized that it was time for her to be thinking of giving up juvenile parts. An opportunity to act before the camera presented itself, and she took advantage of it. Since then she has played all sorts of parts--has seen herself on the screen as wild western heroines, as women from the classics, as poor little innocent girls and as very well-dressed rich ones--in fact, has gone pretty well through the dramatic scale. "When I went into moving-picture plays," said Miss Pickford, "they were paying $5 a day at the highest. I believe I was the first woman to get $10. Now they are paying hundreds a week. "Naturally, it was strange work at first, and I found that I had to acquire a special facility for it. In the first place, do you realize that all the indoor scenes occupy a space not larger than a good-sized rug? That will be crowded up with furniture of various kinds. To get around naturally, without bumping against tables or knocking down chairs, is no easy matter. It takes months to learn to dart about without betraying the fact that one is steering a serpentine course around sideboards and things. The slightest awkward move, you know, will show on the screen, to the exclusion of everything else. "One the other hand, when I went back to the stage, I felt that I could never get across it. The distances were vast--terrible to me. At times I felt as if I were crossing a desert. "Still another thing that one must get accustomed to on the picture stage is the shouts of the stage managers. There is always a terrible hubbub when a play is being produced. When one or more are put on in a week there is no time for such careful rehearsal as theatrical companies receive. "Consequently, the stage managers are always on the alert. 'A little more life there! Don't make a funeral out of this scene,' a man will yell at you, and if you have not properly schooled yourself, you will took toward the person who is yelling. Be sure that glance will show on the screen and will spoil a scene." In a sense, it was this "slap-dash" rehearsing that cause Miss Pickford to desert the "movies," which have given her the most familiarly known face in the nation. She wanted to get back to David Belasco--he is her idol-- because she felt that his coaching is a liberal education in stagecraft. "He rehearses so wonderfully," she said. "He always knows just the effects he wants, and how to get them; is never at a loss, and never out of patience. I can't imagine how some people can go through a rehearsal under him in a matter-of-fact humor. I drink in everything he says, remember it and study it out." "And now that you no longer have the screen to study, do you practice before the mirror?" she was asked. She laughed merrily. "Booth did it; Mansfield did it; most of the great actors have done it," she replied; "but somehow I can't imagine myself doing it. I should feel so foolish if I tried it. Besides, I should be so constrained and self- conscious that I wouldn't know how to control my face. "When I'm playing Juliet, the blind girl, I know just what muscles to 'wiggle'"--and she laughed again--"because I've studied my expressions so long on the screens that I can call on any one I want." Literally, she has acquired a complete repertory of her own expressions by seeing herself in so many photoplays. Whether she wants to portray joy or grief, anger or amusement--in fact, almost any emotion one can name--she can mold her facial muscles to it with as much certainty as one would pull the strings of a marionette. "I can't imagine anything that is of as much benefit to an actress," she said, "as studying herself on the screen. It's so different from practicing before a mirror. When one is acting, one should feel the emotions that are being imitated. That is not possible--at least, would not be for me--if one is in front of a mirror. But after one has acted in a photoplay, the results can be seen in cold blood long after the impressions of the moment have vanished. "It is possible then to judge the effect of every expression as it is flashed on the screen. The part the eyebrows play, whether one has frowned too much or not enough, how one appears when sobbing--all these and many other things can be seen, just as if one were criticizing another person. "In time it is but natural that one should be able to call upon an expression with practical certainty. I feel the advantage of this, particularly when I am playing the blind girl. My eyes are open, but I am not supposed to see. Were I to appear at all conscious of the manner in which I am expressing various emotions, the illusion would be lost. The audience would not feel that I was blind, but would be keenly alive to the fact that I was merely playing blind." It may be noted that, for the reasons Miss Pickford stated, there are few persons who can take "blind" roles. Generally there is nothing sightless but the "lines" of the part. Similarly, the schooling of the photoplays, in being seemingly unconscious of all sights and sounds except those which should influence the acting, has stood Miss Pickford in good stead. A blind girl is never expected to see anything that goes on about her--and Miss Pickford never does, so far as the eye can judge. "On the whole," she said, "I feel that my experience before the camera has been of great benefit; but I can easily see how it might have done great harm. I always had in mind the fact that I might want to become a real actress, and so never allowed myself to indulge in more gestures than if I had a speaking part. I don't believe it is necessary, and a great many actors ruin themselves for stagework by assuming exaggerated manners and expressions. "If one were acting in a French or Italian company, it would be different. Those people are more given to gestures than we are. Why, the French companies laugh at our 'movies.' They say they can see no acting in them. Just the same, we often laugh back at theirs, because they go through so many antics. In either case, the actors are right. An American who worked his face and thrashed the air like a Frenchman would appear just as ridiculous as a Frenchman who talked only with his mouth." From all this it can be realized that Miss Pickford has been no dilatory student of her art. People who have admired her, week after week, for a matter of five years or so, may be sure that they have liked her acting because she has studied every little detail of her work until she is able to gauge the effect of every movement she makes. And, as her appearance is universally known not only in America, but in Europe as well, the natural question is: "What is she like off the stage?" That's asked of every actress. A New York girl wanted to know one time, and followed Miss Pickford and her mother for a number of blocks when they were walking home from a moving- picture studio. Finally, the younger woman began to suspect they were being shadowed, and turned to see who was behind them. "Did you want to see me?" she asked the hesitating girl. "Oh, Miss Pickford!" the latter exclaimed, "I'm so glad you have a pretty voice, because if you hadn't I wouldn't enjoy you so much in the moving pictures next week, and I hoped you had because I see you every week, and I made up my mind that I just had to know what you are like." Aside from a pretty voice, Miss Pickford has golden hair, the eyes that best go with it, and a pleasant manner, altogether free from constraint of affectation. What she has so far done has never gone to her head. It is what she wants to do in the future that she is bothering most about. As to size, she is slightly below medium; and as to age, she is still in her early twenties. From Canada she has come, and she retains her love for the open and the genial sympathy with mankind that goes with it. Perhaps as good an index to her character as any is to be found in a remark she made of her acting: "I always like to think of 'the poor little man in the gallery,' and make my voice carry to him. He has paid over his good money, just as well as those in the expensive front seats, and he is just as much entitled to the worth of it as they are." * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * August 1913 Estelle Kegler PHOTOPLAY The Charm of Wistfulness A captious critic once offered a reward of a thousand dollars for any one of his ilk who had written about the art of Mary Pickford without using the word "wistful." Up to now no one has come to claim the reward. The critic knew he was safe. The morning New York awoke to place the laurel wreath of a new fame on the childish brow of its "good little devil," you might have read of Mary's wistful eyes, her wistful smile, her wistful voice. That solemn group of folks who sit in aisle seats and sharpen their pencils over the trembling forms of terrified authors, behaved quite as if they had discovered Mary. As a matter of fact, Mary had been "discovered" long before these reviewers of plays, who never speak of the "movies" without a shudder, ever suspected anything artistic could come from pictures. Out in Manhattan, Kansas, or Moose Jaw, they knew all about little Mary long before Mr. Belasco, dealer in highbrow drama, ever considered offering her a prominent place in a Broadway production. And she burst upon the "Big Way" with the acclaim of more than a million picture fans trailing her right up to the stage door. The acclaim has now turned to clamor--clamor for the return of Mary to the world of photoplays. "When I think of that great big generous world out there really wanting me to come out on the screen and play with its fancy, it makes me so homesick I could weep," is the confession of Miss Pickford. It was in Shanleys, after one of the best performances the lady, late of the silent drama, had ever given in "The Good Little Devil." Around in front of the Republic theatre playgoers lingering for their carriages, were still discussing the appeal of the blind "Juliet." The newest star in Mr. Belasco's constellation looked as weary as the bouquet of violets drooping in her nervous fingers. "Of course I love the spoken drama, too," she hastened to add, brightening at the contemplation of her established success. "When I left the motion picture field it was not necessarily a final farewell. I believe people in my profession should know how to do a great many things and do them well. "When the pictures are peopled with actors and actresses who have the solid foundation of experience beneath them they will be infinitely better than they have been under the regime of amateurs whose only claim to being cast is that they photograph well. There must be something more than mere photography. There must be technique, ease, versatility, and seriousness of intent." It seemed so incongruous to have this child creature sit there and deliver judgments on subject so serious as the future of a national amusement. One must constantly revert to the kingdom of careers where it is written that Mary began wielding the grease paint and hare's foot when she was a mere baby, and that she has been building up fame and a bank account ever since. "It is a long way from the glamour of face to face applause to the heaps of admiration and approval that come to the picture favorite through the mails," said Mary. "For the one there are invitations to sip tea, to dine, to sup, to go here and there and everywhere, to meet this celebrity and that man and the other woman. "For the other there is the peace, the security, the privacy of the woman whose circle of admirers is limited to her family and her friends. The actress finds it difficult to draw a definite line between her professional and her home lives. The picture actress slips off her screen identity with her screen wardrobe, and the minute she leaves the studio she is just like any other private citizeness. It is all a matter of preference. Oh yes, and of dollars." Mary didn't tell me, but I happen to know she is a bit of a home-body herself. In a cozy little, rosy little apartment not very far from the Hudson river, she is the daintiest chatelaine that ever presided over the destiny of a happy home and an adoring, awfully good looking husband. Yes, Lovey Mary has fallen victim to the wiles of Danny, the boy with the bow and arrow. If you should call at the apartment and inquire for Mrs. Owen Moore, who do you think, would be the answer? Why none other than the girl with the sunny curls, the blue violet eyes, the pouting lips of the "good little devil." Perhaps curls would be twisted up into a grown-up knot as becomes one who deals with the servant problem and other items of house-wifely lore, but the wistful smile would be there to greet you. Will little Mary return to delight the hearts of her nickel-a-half-a- dime public? Perhaps so. You know she promised "maybe." * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * August 23, 1913 Mabel Condon MOTOGRAPHY Mary Pickford's dark eyebrows and hazel eyes were quite as I had imagined them, but the blonde curls that bobbed from under her straw hat were a distinct shock, as I had always believed Mary to be a brunette. Not that anybody had ever told me she was; I just imagined it from my acquaintance with her one the screen and the screen, you know, has the faculty of converting blondes into brunettes with neither excuse nor warning to the blonde so converted nor the picture patrons so deceived. So Mary is a blonde. "Have a chair," invited Mr. Schulberg, he of the publicity department and the scenario editorship of the Famous Players' Company; also the Mr. Schulberg of the honeymoon flat over in Jersey, and who is so new a groom that he still brings unexpected company home to dinner. "When Mary is through with this scene she'll take you to her dressing room," continued Mr. Schulberg, and with that promise I accepted the chair and sat back to watch Mary's debut at boarding school and to forgive picture screens in general their deception as to Mary's curls. The scene being rehearsed was one from the story, "Caprice." Six times did Mary bob and smile her little "love-me" smile in introduction to the stylish young ladies who were to be her schoolmates and who had lots of fun at the expense of Mary's pathetic jacket, her rustic hat that tied under her chin and the beruffled skirts that dipped five or more inches at the back; six times did Mary lovingly brush her father's carpet bag with the front gore of her skirt and six times did he throw her arms about his neck and caress the sleeve of his coat in a brave farewell. Then, but not until then, did the brow of Director J. Searle Dawley rid itself of four or more superfluous lines and he bellowed the signal, "Go!" Three clangs of a bell brought carpenters and everybody else in the studio, but not in the scene, to a full stop. Mr. Dawley poised himself on the outside edge of the stage setting in readiness to hurl forth instructions and the camera man loomed up as "the man of the hour." It was all over in one and one-third minutes and eighty feet of film, and Mary walked from under the blue-green lights to where a plump, dark- haired lady was sitting. As we approached, I heard Mary say, "Hello, Mother dear." The dark-haired lady answered, "Hello, Mary darling," and then I experienced the full wonder of a Mary smile as Mr. Schulberg introduced us. "If you don't mind, we can talk while I dress for the next scene," suggested Mary. I didn't mind, and in a few minutes Mary was seated in front of her dressing table brushing her thick curls over her left forefinger and telling me that she had been working hard--just as I had seen her--since nine o'clock that morning, but that she didn't get tired--not very tired, anyway-- because she likes picture work so well. "While I was playing in his 'Good Little Devil,' Mr. Belasco used to read interviews in which I'd say I liked pictures better than the stage," laughed Mary. "But I do like them better--though I'm going back with Mr. Belasco's company in the fall; meanwhile, I'm doing the work I like best." "And what do you do when you're not working?" I asked from the depths of the most comfortable chair I've ever seen in a dressing room. "Live in a bathing suit," replied Mary, putting down her white-backed brush and beginning to pin up her curls. "We have a house at Beechhurst, Long Island, and I stay in my bathing suit all day; that is, the one day of the week that I'm there," she amended, as she applied a second amber pin by way of a reprimand to the little curl over her left ear. The little curl promptly slid back into its original position, and Mary continued: "It's glorious out there in the evening, too--only for the mosquitoes! I don't believe they eat a bite until I arrive and then they all pick on me--" "Why, Mary, what's that?" came the alarmed voice of Mary's mother, as she appeared in the doorway. "Mosquitoes," answered Mary demurely, and Mary's mother breathed a relieved "Oh" as she took possession of the rocker under the electric fan. "And it's so dreadfully quiet there nights that it's spookey. Last night--" Mary paused to insert a final pin where she thought it would do the most good, then turned around and continued--"I was sure somebody had broken into the house--" "For what?" Mary's mother wanted to know in a calm voice. "Oh, for--I don't know what for," Mary went on, "but, anyway I was sure somebody had broken in; I could even hear him walking around downstairs and I wanted a drink so badly, but I was afraid to get up and get it, so I just waited until it was daylight and then I got two." "And the man who 'broke in?' I suggested expectantly. "Well, he wasn't there this morning," Mary's muffled voice informed from the wardrobe bag into which her head was poked in the effort to choose a costume for the next scene. "No, not last night either," said Mary's mother, and that settled it. Mary emerged from the bag with a pearl-gray suit and a sheer white waist with a quantity of ruffles on the collar and down the front. "Hope this won't make me look fat," she remarked, as she studied the effect of the ruffles in the glass and arranged the waist line of the gray skirt with its white silk drop. "I wouldn't be 'little Mary' any more if I got fat," she smiled. "I try not to look any littler than I can help--though I like that title the people gave me, 'little Mary,' because I feel they call me it through liking, and I love to please the people. There--" donning her coat and turning around for her mother's inspection, "am I all right, mother?" "Yes, you look very nice," her mother answered. "What hat are you going to wear?" "Mercy! I didn't bring a hat with me," wailed Mary. "Try mine," Mary's mother advised, removing her small white hat. Mary sat it jauntily upon her curls. It looked as though it belonged there, and Mary said: "Now, I'm ready. Will you come out and watch this scene and come back with me again?" "Delighted," I answered, and Mary hurried away to the blue-green lights of the stage setting and Mary's mother and I found chairs where we could see everything, and I asked Mary's mother how and when Mary started her stage work. "In the Valentine Stock Company when she was five years old," said Mary's mother, who really looks every much like Mary, or Mary looks like her, rather. Mary's mouth is distinctively her own, however; it's the only one of its kind in the world, I'm sure. "The man who owned the company saw Mary and asked to have her for a part he had in mind. He said, 'I think you could do it, Mary,' and Mary said, 'I'm sure I could.' So she did and has played every stock child part since then." "Do you want to tell me how old Mary is?" I asked, and she replied: "Yes; Mary doesn't mind. She is nineteen and was born in Toronto, Canada." A roomful of girls burst into the set and rehearsals were one. It was the closing of the school year and everybody was saying good-bye to everybody else, and parents and guardians were calling for their girls. And Mary offered a big contrast to the Mary of the preceding scene. Only two rehearsals were necessary this time and when the camera man had taken two "stills" and some of the girls were wondering if that would be all for the day, Mr. Dawley announced in a voice that could be heard on Broadway (almost): "Get ready for the dormitory scene. Get your nightgowns on--and remember, girls, no street clothes underneath!" There was a dismayed "Oh-h-h-h-h!" from a group of "extras," but Mr. Dawley paid no attention to it, and Mary, her mother and I returned to Mary's dressing room, where Mary had to take her hair down and make ready to carry a girl through the hall and down the stairs of the dormitory, which was to be set on fire. "I hope you don't get your hair burned, Mary," worried her mother. "If I were you, I'd pin it up." "No, that wouldn't look like really and truly night time," said Mary, and then: "Gracious! I've lost my stockings--my white ones! I simply must have stockings--" as she hurriedly went through a suit case and traveling bag and her mother investigated the hooks on the north wall. "And I have only a few minutes--" There was a violent rap at the door and a man's voice called: "Mary, I want to borrow your nightgown." "All right," answered Mary, and handed it out through a crack in the door. "That's the property man. I have to have another exactly like it for the next scene and he bought that one yesterday, so he knows where to get the other. But if I don't find my stockings--" "Here they are," and Mary's mother advanced triumphantly from the vicinity of the north wall hooks. "Oh, thank you, mother. Yes, I remember now that I hung them just there." During the wait for the property man to return her gown Mary asked if I thought she resembled Mary Fuller. She had been told repeatedly that she did. There is a resemblance, but it is more striking in the pictures of the two Marys, as then their hair looks to be the same color. "I admire Mary Fuller very much. I've never met her, though I tried to on Edison night at the Exposition, but she had gone home. Sometimes--" The knuckles of the property man sounded on the door and when the gown had been admitted and donned, Mary resumed her position on the sofa, and continued: "Sometimes I stop and think of all the motion picture people who are working at that very minute, and I wonder just what Alice Joyce is doing and what parts are being played by the people of the Western companies. I think it's wonderful, the bigness of it all." I admitted it was wonderful and was sorry Marry happened to glance at the clock just then, as it reminded her that it was about time for the next scene. "Maybe I'll see you in Chicago this winter," she said, slipping a long coat over her dishabille. "I'm going to play there for a month, you know." "Everybody ready?" called Mr. Dawley. I wasn't going to stay for the dormitory scene, so said good-bye to Mary outside her dressing room door. With a handshake and a smile, Mary joined the groups of white-robed figures that came from the various dressing rooms and I returned to my hotel feeling much the richer by virtue of having met "little Mary," received two of her very latest photographs and known the fascination of Mary's "love-me" smile which makes everybody do just that. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * August 29, 1914 Mabel Condon MOTOGRAPHY An informal visit with Mary Pickford one afternoon last week, furnishes me with a timely topic and you, if you read far enough, with the information first hand--or second, if you wish--for Mary told me and I'm telling you-- that Mary is not particularly overjoyed with the sudden burst of publicity which has come her way with the reissuing of old time "Mary" films. I'll tell it to you just as Mary told it to me. It was the day in the Famous Players studio that Jim Kirkwood hesitated over the history of his life and then sat for that picture that didn't justify his raw-boned manliness a bit. And it was while he was hesitating that Mary Pickford emerged from an "extra" dressing-room, in a pink silk negligee and pink rose-budded boudoir cap. And her arms were about a round little white-robed body, which nestled into the silky softness of the negligee, and looked out at us from round, blue eyes that bespoke the satisfied contentment of the four-months old owner. But it was the shade of the four-months old's head that caught and held the attention of Mr. Kirkwood. At one time in Mr. Kirkwood's life, the covering of his own head had been just so, and of the same color, so of course Mr. Kirkwood was interested and broke forth in rosy predictions of what the future held for one so proud as was the four-months old. "To think," regretted Mary, "that that sweet little face will some-time grow a horrid beard." "And to think," enlightened Mr. Kirkwood, "that those sweet little legs will, on Saturday nights presumably, bring their owner home this way." Let your imagination draw a zig-zag across this page and you will have the demonstration supplied by Mr. Kirkwood. "Jimmie!" expostulated Mary, turning her armful of man-baby away from the maker of such a suggestion, "just look at his round little feet--he's all round--and so good! His mother says I may mind him for a while, so, when Jimmie's through talking, come over to my dressing-room--will you?" So when I thought "Jimmie" was through, I went. But Jimmie was by no means through, as, with his "Grease Paint" chat over, he became much more talkative and bobbed in and out of Mary's dressing- room every few minutes. "He's an awful tease," said Mary as, after discovering by an investigation of the infant's bib that he shared the initial "J" with him, Mr. Kirkwood set out to find the mother to learn if the baby's name wasn't Jim. "But everybody likes him," added Mary, "and it's really fun and not like work at all, making pictures with him. The cast of 'The Eagle's Mate' was so congenial that we had the nicest time imaginable making the exterior scenes. I went to the Strand to see the film on its second night there." She paused and patted the round little body of the four-months old. The caress must have been a soothing one, for the round one's round eyes promptly closed and Mary smiled down at him and whispered "asleep," whereupon the round one's round eyes opened and surveyed Mary and her blue-grey ones. And Mary smiled back and continued:-- "I really ought not to go to see any of my own pictures." Her upper lip expressed her sorrow at something and I asked why. "Because it's such an ordeal for me," she answered, "I sit tight on the edge of the seat and keep thinking 'Will they like it?' and I criticize every move I make and, really, I don't have a bit of a good time! If others were as critical as I, I'm afraid people wouldn't like my work at all." "But they do like you," I insisted and suggested, "I wonder if you have any idea of just how much you are liked?" Mary looked thoughtful and said hesitatingly, "I can't realize they like me that well, but look," she smiled eagerly and with her right hand swept aside a newspaper on the table beside her. The act disclosed countless letters as yet unopened and there was a package loosely done up in tissue-paper. "I got this one this morning from a girl in a hospital in Baltimore," she passed me the tissue-paper package. It contained a sewing apron of daintiest lawn and was embroidered in artistic blue and white butterflies. A note attached explained that the donor had made it while lying ill for weeks and assured Mary that it betokened much love and admiration. Could the ill little girl have witnessed Mary's joy over its possession, I'm sure she would be repaid for her work of love. It was then that the subject of the re-issuing of the Mary films was reached and Mary declared indignantly that she did not like it very well. "For many of those early films were made when I was not as happy as I am now--and condition always affects one's work," rocking the round one, now really asleep, gently in the low rocker Mary occupied out of regard for the infant's comfort. "But of course," Mary began philosophically--but I never knew what it was that she had intended to say, for Mr. Kirkwood entered with the disgusted information that the little chap's name was "Joe" instead of "Jim." "Joseph Porter Riley," practically announced Joe's little mother, appearing from behind Mr. Kirkwood's shoulder. "I named him for Director Porter," she finished, still more proudly. "Really," explained Mary delightedly, giving Joe an extra joy pat. Then, as she passed the little round one to its mother, she whispered softly, "I'd rather own him than--than fifty thousand dollars!" And little Joe's mother smiled contentedly as she bore the little man away for a waiting scene and Mary, when he had gone, took off her boudoir cap and arranged her curls in preparation for going before the camera in the production of "Behind the Scenes" which Mr. Kirkwood was to direct. As I said at the beginning it was just an informal visit so I've told it to you just as it occurred. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * September 1914 Katherine Synon PHOTOPLAY The Unspoiled Mary Pickford A flash of sunlight across a dark room, a white moth glimmering in the dusk, a lily swaying at the edge of a pool--these were the first phrases that flashed across one's mind as Mary Pickford crossed the big stock room of the Famous Players' studio in West Twenty-sixth street, New York. The day was one of those period of gray fog that the ocean flings upon New York in the summer. Outer Twenty-sixth street sagged under the burden of its gloom. The studio, denied of activity by the darkness of the skies, sank into apathy. Around the stock room actors and actresses, in groups of twos and threes and fours, talked listlessly, mostly of the intruding weather that forced upon them the undesired idleness. Then the door opened to reveal a girl standing on the threshold, a girl whose rioting golden curls seemed to have caught all the sunlight that should have been gladdening Manhattan, and whose eyes held the deep blues of the hidden skies. An ultra-fashionable little straw hat topped the curls, and a costume that matched the smartness of the headgear emphasized the slender beauty of one of the best known and best loved of all the motion picture actresses. For the girl of the golden curls was Mary Pickford, and there is only one Mary Pickford in the universe. Reams have already been written about Mary Pickford, whose sensational success in motion pictures has made her more conspicuous on Broadway than any of the newer actresses of the legitimate drama. Cornell University graduates voted her the most popular actress of the year. She is getting a salary of $26,000 a year, and Daniel Frohman, who has the authority, says that her new contract will give her $50,000 next year. She has been called repeatedly the most beautiful woman in the world. When she appears at a public place, crowds throng for a glimpse of her. Her pictures on the films draw the same enthusiastic crowds that used to go to Maude Adams' performances of "The Little Minister" and "Peter Pan." And--Mary Pickford is only twenty years old. Think of it! "What is she really like?" was the question that followed my first impressions. Adulation such as she has received at her age must have its effect upon her manner and her character. It would seem impossible that any girl of twenty could go through the triumphs, social, financial and artistic, that this girl of the golden curls had won without acquiring all sorts of affectations or that haughtiness that excludes the rest of the world. The test of an artist's innate greatness is his attitude toward his fellow workers. The greatness of Sir Henry Irving is remembered today quite as much for his kindness toward the subordinate players in his companies as for his presentation of Shylock. Mary Pickford stood the test. For, as she entered the room, listless men and women looked up to give her the greeting of a smile or a wave or a word that she returned without any self-conscious "star" superiority, but with the gracious gracefulness of a charming girl. Her naturalness, unforced good humor, and her youth lighted the studio as effectively as if the lost sun had come out over the roofs of New York. Trailed by a studio satellite, one of those "boarding-school crushes" which are the inevitable result of such popularity, Mary Pickford went here and there among the groups. As she came nearer, one might see that her eyes held deep shadows strangely at variance with the brightness of her smile. When she spoke, her voice seconded her eyes. A voice to go with such golden hair as hers should be liltingly joyous. Mary Pickford's voice fell into cadences that suggested, fleetingly, the minor notes of a violin. What she said, however, was so far from sad that it was almost impossible, after having talked with her, to go back to that first impression of sadness. She talked about New York, about books, about plays, about clothes, about styles, about everything that a girl of twenty usually talks about. After a while, a much longer while than it usually takes to drop from general social conversation into a personal interview, she was led into talk about herself and her work. The talk about herself she made brief. From others one has to learn that Mary Pickford has been on the stage since she was five years old, that she made an instantaneous success when she went into film posing five years ago, and that she is about to receive a salary equal to that which our United States of America gives to its President. From her one may gather--but only by implication--that she is a thoughtful, ambitious studious artist, who does her best in every task and who is never satisfied with that best. "Have you seen 'Tess of the Storm Country?'" she asked with the artist's instinctive desire to make her work speak for her. In the miniature theater of the studio the operator ran off the films at her request, showing her in the role of Tess, which her most enthusiastic admirers declare is her greatest triumph and which she herself likes best of all her work. "The more ragged and dirty I look, the better I can play," she declared. Ragged and dirty she certainly looked in the pictures, but in all of them glowed that special and peculiar loveliness that makes her beauty so wonderful. Hers is a beauty of pathos, and plays like "Tess of the Storm Country" reveal it in its most appealing phases. The wistfulness of the pictures found a mirror in her eyes that grew shadowy again as she watched the flashing scenes until there came the one where the woman in the village doused Tess's golden-topped head in a tub of water to give it a thorough washing. With the scene Mary Pickford was all girl again. "I was awfully glad that was in the story," she said. "Now everybody who sees that knows that my hair is my own." "Was that why you went through it?" "Oh, no," she denied. "The story called for that, but I was tired of getting letters asking me if I wore a wig, or if part of my hair was mine, or if it was naturally curly, or if I had to curl it on an iron." "Well, it looks too wonderful to be true, Mary," chimed in the satellite, after the manner of satellites. "If you had to do it every morning, you'd know it's too true," Mary Pickford assured her in that patience with satellites that only the youthful stars have. Just then there shone on the screen the scene in which Tess fondles the dead rabbit. Mary Pickford covered her eyes with her hands. "Ugh!" she shuddered. "That was the hardest thing I ever had to do," she confessed. "Once I had to run a car at fifty-four miles an hour. I'd rather try one at a hundred than touch a dead rabbit again." "Would you like to do 'Tess' on the regular stage?" some one asked her when the reel was ended. (She had experience on the stage with "A Good Little Devil.") She considered the idea thoughtfully. "No," she decided. "Acting on the regular stage is too often a question of voice, rather than of the combination of elements that make motion picture work." She pushed back her curls from her ears as if to get them out of the way while she talked about the problem of the difference of the two kinds of acting. "On the regular stage," she said, "an actress has to have, for emotional scenes, a certain quality of voice. A good stage director knows just exactly the tone that will produce the effect he wishes. Sometimes he will, if he thinks it necessary, make an actress hysterical just to achieve that tone of voice. Once she gets it, she can hold it for a certain number of performances. Now, in the movies, an actress has practically no use for her voice--although I speak the lines all through the part--but instead of putting the work into acquiring a tone, she uses her brain to express the emotions in pantomime." "Which is the harder work?" "I think," she said, "that the movie work is harder because it requires so much more consideration. In the regular drama an actress who makes a success in her part stays in that sometimes season after season. After she has once grasped her role, it may become mechanical with her. She seldom feels the necessity of thinking out variations for it. It is a piece of sculpture that she presents night after night, seldom varying from her original performance. But in the movies, the success of a role never keeps the actress at it. Once done, it is done for all time and she goes on to something else. For instance," she elucidated, "'In the Bishop's Carriage' and 'Tess of the Storm Country' and all the other plays I've had, are scattered all over, some of them are almost forgotten, while Mr. Kirkwood is rehearsing me in my new play, 'Behind the Scenes.'" "Behind the Scenes" is Margaret Mayo's comedy that the Famous Players Company brought James Kirkwood on from California to produce. James Kirkwood is a young director who has done wonderful work in film productions. By one of the strange coincidences that seem to happen oftener in theatrical business than outside of it, he is a childhood friend of Mary Pickford, having come from Toronto, Canada, where she also was born. "I've known Jimmie since I can remember anybody," she said. "It's queer," she went on, "that all of us who used to play together away off in Ontario are here together in the studio now. There's my brother Jack. Haven't you seen him?" Her sensitive face glowed with sisterly pride. "Jack's just come to the work," she said. "They say that he looks just like me, and I think that it would be awfully good fun if we could play in some film as twins. Do you know any story about twins?" She made inquiry for Jack, but the younger Pickford had been assigned to outdoor work somewhere on the Jersey side. "Oh, I'm so sorry you won't see him," said his famous sister, "but you'll look for his pictures on the films, won't you? Jack's really wonderful. "Jack's the third of the family to come into the studio," she continued. "My sister Lottie is here, too, but she's on a vacation this week. She's doing lovely work." Mary Pickford declared with enthusiasm that had never once revealed itself about her own finished work. "But nothing like yours," amended the satellite. Mary Pickford flashed her blue-gray eyes upon her with something like anger. "Well, she hasn't been at it nearly as long," she said with the conviction that if Lottie had her sister's experience, she would far outshine her sister. "I suppose," she explained, "that there's no work where experience counts more than in the movies. I imagine from what I know of it that it's very much like newspaper writing in the speed and certainty with which the work has to be done. It's all set down 'on the jump.' If you make a mistake, it's there. You haven't time to amend it. And so you have to get in mind the entire character, thinking it all out before you register it, but working with a speed that more than matches the writing of a story that has to make a certain edition. Is that right?" It was so closely right that it revealed a remarkable discernment in the girl of twenty. There aren't very many trained workers either on newspapers or in motion pictures who have so clear a psychological grasp of the needs of their work than has this wistful-eyed girl. The Frohmans say that she has a genius for expressing great emotion through the medium of pictures. There is a general impression that this genius is facile rather than deeply considered. But to see Mary Pickford work in Margaret Mayo's play is to come to realize sharply that she plans her effects with the same mental precision that Mrs. Fiske gives to her dramatic effects. She has a different medium of expression, a more restricted and restrictive method, etching rather than color painting, but the idea is the same, the ideal similar. Through two hours she worked in scenes that required only the gray light that the dark day afforded. She went over and over certain parts with a patience no novice ever shows. She never lost her good temper. To the crossfire of directions and counter-directions she was apparently indifferent, coming to visible emotion only in her work. Before long her quiet good nature was as oil on the troubled waters of studio work. Every one in her vicinity was influenced by it. When the work for the morning was over Mary Pickford donned again the tip-tilted little straw hat and went out from the studio into Twenty-sixth street. At the entrance were grouped a half-dozen children, ragged, dirty as no heroine of the movies ever could have been. One of them leaned forward to touch Mary Pickford's dress. Instantly the girl was down on her knees on the pavement, talking with the youngsters with that camaraderie that only the young of heart can show to childhood. Instantly they were her friends. Wonder-eyed, they clustered around her till she looked like a good fairy descended among the children of the streets of New York. One might have expected her to fly off in a glittering chariot drawn by winged horses. Instead she arose with the children clinging to the skirt of the costume that was so patently "Fifth avenue." "I know a place," she said--and the beginning sounded Shakespearean, but the rest came with the force of an O. Henry tale, "around on Seventh avenue where they have the best ice cream soda in New York. Who wants to come with me?" Who didn't? And she took them, ragged, dirty, and radiant, around the corner with her. And with them she took the glinting sunshine that had shone for a little while on the high-buildinged, gloomy street. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * January 8, 1915 CHICAGO DAILY NEWS Mary Pickford Tells of Work in "Movies" About six years ago a mite of a girl in short dresses approached Gilbert M. Anderson ("Broncho Billy") in this city shortly after he had made his profitable alliance with George K. Spoor in the formation of the Essanay Film Company and applied for work as an "extra" in pictures. This child was filling an unimportant part in "The Warrens of Virginia," which then was playing in Chicago, and saw an opportunity to earn some extra money without interfering with her regular engagement. But her application was rejected and Essanay lost an opportunity to develop a brilliant star. Such was the early experience of Mary Pickford with the "movies." Shortly after this episode, or during the summer of the same year, following the disbanding of the theatrical company, this screen favorite, who stands foremost in popular favor with the film "fans" today, applied at the Biograph company for a position and immediately was engaged by D. W. Griffith, then producing director at that studio. That was the beginning of the meteoric career of the diminutive star. Under the careful tutelage and guidance of her director Miss Pickford showed remarkable comprehension of pantomime art and her artistry manifested itself quickly on the screen. Other producers soon competed for her services, offering her what then appeared substantial increases in her salary, and she was induced to leave the Biograph company. She returned to it shortly afterward, when she realized her mistake. "Necessity practically forced me into motion pictures," said Miss Pickford to a reporter for The Daily News Wednesday, during her short stop in this city. "Otherwise I might have been some obscure stage actress--possibly a star. Who knows? And to necessity I attribute whatever success I may have achieved on the screen. My mother is my sole inspiration and concern and has been since childhood. To chase the wolf from our door prompted me to enter the 'movies,' and to keep it away and give her comfort and every convenience possible encourages me to work more diligently daily. "We're inseparable--my mother and I--traveling everywhere together. You cannot imagine how I miss her on this trip. But rest assured that her inability to accompany me was due to exceptional circumstances." Miss Pickford was en route for the Los Angeles studio of the Famous Players Film company, where she will be engaged in producing several plays under her new contract. Adolph Zukor, president of the concern employing her, was one of her party. The first production which will be "filmed" on the Pacific coast with "Little Mary" in the leading role will be entitled "Rags." "Strange," commented Miss Pickford, "I am usually cast in productions where I interpret such a role as is suggested by the title of the play. The producer insists that character is best suited to my talent. And, to be perfectly candid with you, I feel more at ease in rags when engaged in enacting a scene than in fashionable and attractive apparel." "And to be equally candid," broke in the reporter, "you appear more delightful and captivating as a poor little waif than when you are dressed up as a fine lady." Miss Pickford smiled. "That is the trouble with specializing in anything, particularly for the stage or screen performer," she said. "The public grows accustomed to see the artist in a certain kind of role, and when he or she steps out of the familiar part to assume another it does not appear to impress the public, however perfect the interpretation may be. I suppose when I grow too old for hoyden parts I will be relegated to the discard. "I love motion pictures. When I am not working in them I am attending performances of photo plays. Frequently I hear comments of every description on my performance from the spectators surrounding me, who are unconscious of my presence. I welcome my criticisms as I do the praiseworthy comments and profit by many of the critical remarks I chance to overhear. Occasionally I am recognized. "The love of the thousands of mothers and children, expressed to me in person and through the numerous letters I receive, makes me the happiest girl in the world and encourages me to do all I can to please them." * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * September 1917 Frederick James Smith MOTION PICTURE CLASSIC Mary Had A Little Tear "Little Mary's" blue eyes looked tired. "You want a really truly serious interview," she said. "You shall have it." And she sighed. "To begin with, I'm wondering just where the photoplay is drifting. Surely it isn't moving forward. It lacks leaders fearless, progressive, courageous enough to blaze the way. I'm wondering." And "Little Mary" sighed again. "Perhaps I am pessimistic. But the screen has given me more than money and a name. It has been my world. I have watched the photoplay from the first days. Its sweep upward was tremendous, unlike anything in history. But today I feel that it isn't so popular as it was a year ago." "This is going to be a serious interview," I said with conviction--to myself. "Little Mary" is the one screen star I know who has seriously studied the screen. Miss Pickford can and really does think. Popularity has not turned her head. Three years ago I interviewed her when she was just dashing into national popularity. She hasn't changed in personality in the interim. No cynical note mars her gentle charm. But three years ago she was a little, be-curled Mary, quite dazzled by the crowds that gathered about her automobile. Today she has developed into an alert thinker. "The whole thing has become a mad race--in a circle," continued Miss Pickford. "Starring is a struggle indeed in these days. Perhaps, if things do not change, I shall slip out of the race in a year and a half, when my contracts expire. I can always go on the stage. Of course, the salaries would be different. But I haven't been extravagant. I have saved a good part of what I have earned for just such a possibility. I have developed no expensive tastes." "But you surely can't seriously consider such a thing?" I remonstrated. "Imagine the wave of horror that will stir the army of film fans?" Miss Pickford smiled a tired little smile. "Still, it is a possibility. I feel that the photoplay is at a standstill. It can advance no further without leadership. I know it is trite to say that the scenario is the weak spot of the movie. The whole screen drama is in a complete rut of conventionality. "This is due to three things: men of brains aren't writing the scenarios, producers fear originality and twist scripts into the hackneyed, and most stories are made to fit a standard measure, five reels, or padded to be special features. There are three standards plots in movieland and they revolve around the vampire, the foundling and the slavey. Bedecked, twisted, gilded, all the plots move around this trio. "The producer lacks aggressiveness. He will not venture. Just one man in the motion picture world will take a chance--David Griffith. He is the one man who dares to risk everything to prove an idea. We owe the photoplay of today to Griffith. "Producers have been lax, extravagant and impractical. They have been spending $50,000 for a production where half would suffice. They have been spending thousands to build mimic cities, to reproduce a battlefield and burn a steam yacht. They have wasted thousands in the studio, in advertising and in the distribution of the photoplay. But they are standing still artistically. "This dramatic rut keeps me eternally playing the curly-headed girl. And I hate curls, I loathe them--loathe them!" The Pickford eyes snapped fire. "Imagine a producer giving me the role of a married woman with children! True, I once was permitted a baby in 'Madam Butterfly.' But they tell me that it was never very popular, judging from the financial returns. "Now, I don't want to stand still. I would much rather fit the part than have the part fit me. Of course, I can understand the problem of the manufacturer. The quest of the good scenario is discouraging and disheartening. It is practically impossible to get it. I can never understand why authors do not seriously adopt scenario writing. Not because of poor remuneration. That no longer holds good. An available script brings a good price these days. But original ideas are so far apart that the producer must adapt the novel or the play." "Do you believe this to be advisable?" I interrupted. "At the present time, yes. There is no other way to get a carefully developed and consistently thought out plot. The fiction writer puts time and care into his work. Hence the bit of fiction adapted to the screen has, on the average, consistency and care, lacking in the script hastily turned out for the films." Miss Pickford discussed what she termed the ideal scenario. "It should have a plot strong enough to take an observer's mind away from the star," she said. "It should have, no matter how serious the theme, the element of laughter. I am sure that people go to the theater to be entertained. They have enough in every-day life to depress and weigh them down. The story must be told sincerely. The little, human things must be injected. "I believe that overplaying, too much facial pantomime, too much screen ranting, ruin most of our present day productions. One little gesture can tell a story in itself." "Do you feel that the star system is losing in popular favor?" I ventured. "I am positive that audiences do not go to see the picture as a picture. I base that opinion on my visits to the motion picture houses. And I do not alone go to the big theaters. Film fans have been fooled too many times to go without a reason. "Four years ago the film fan said, 'Let's go to the movies?' Today he says, 'What's playing tonight? Who's the star?' That is the reason the star will continue in favor and high salaries. Possibly things may change when the screen has developed its great writers and its screen technique. But as things stand, the exhibitor will continue to demand the star and the star's salary will continue to climb. "I want to see more stars. I say that with sincerity, for I feel that the more stars reach popularity, the more popular will grow the screen. The more Charlie Chaplins, Douglas Fairbanks, Marguerite Clarks, Mae Marshs and Anita Stewarts, the better it will be for all of us." We talked of Mae Marsh. Only a week before Miss Marsh had told me that "Little Mary" was her best beloved star. Some of the tiredness disappeared from Miss Pickford's eyes. "That was sweet. I think the world of Miss Marsh's ability. I saw 'Intolerance,' but I do not vividly remember the trappings of Belshazzar's court or the magnificent sweep of it all. I just remember Mae Marsh in that scene of the modern story where she sits in the courtroom and forces a pitiful, trembly smile to the boy." Miss Pickford gave a realistic little imitation of the scene. "It made me weep," she confessed. "I wish I could do anything as good." I reminded Miss Pickford of a remark by Manager S. L. Rothapfel, of the New York Rialto. Mr. Rothapfel told me that he believed Miss Pickford to be our greatest actress--on or off the screen. "Her possibilities are as yet untouched," was his comment. "I have come to think I am not an emotional actress, although"--and "Little Mary" laughed--"I am emotional enough in real life. But I have a real dread of making faces." Miss Pickford was serious again. "I'd give my string of pearls for a good story--for another 'Tess of the Storm Country' or 'Hearts Adrift.' I mean that, too. One story like that would be well worth a strong of pearls. In these days one good vehicle means that a star can rest upon her laurels for a little while. That one good vehicle will win back all one's wavering followers. "Sometimes I think that I may be at fault. Do I spoil directors? I have had some of the very best. But I either make them self-conscious or afraid to displease film fans, or something. They simply won't let me break the way to new things. "Of course, I never wanted to play a role that would ever offend the little girls who love me. Mothers bring their little children to see me, and that means a lot. But, even if I wanted to, I couldn't play a vampire. In the first place, the vampire is just a creature of the films, utterly foreign to real life; just a mushy, maudlin appeal to the worst impulses." "Little Mary" was departing for California the following day. Her trunks were the conspicuous scenery in the room. "Do you know, I hate to go away from New York. I love winter and the snow. And California is far from the real heart of the movies. I shall be returning as soon as I can, you may be sure. "One thing will make my trip pleasant: I am going to visit the little orphan girls of a Catholic convent near Los Angeles. They all know me; indeed, one night I took my production, 'Cinderella,' to the convent and showed it to the kiddies. It did touch my heart to hear their glee at seeing the fairy story. "Only a little while ago mother was very ill. The good sisters out there heard of it and told the children to remember mother in their prayers. The next morning during services a little childish treble spoke up: 'Don't forget Mary Pickey's muvver!' Wasn't that dear?" I am sure that film fans will never forget "Mary Pickey" as easy as she seems to think. "Little Mary" is too deeply endeared to the hearts of Americans--she is too much a part of ourselves. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * July 1918 Martha McKelvie MOTION PICTURE CLASSIC ..."Isn't it a wonderful thing to be called 'America's Sweetheart'?" I asked. "It has always been difficult for me to realize my success," Mary answered, modestly. "Sometimes, when it is brought to my attention by the many kind things done for me, it quite overwhelms me. "I do realize that my life, although short, has been mighty full. I often think, 'If I should die today, my cup is quite full.' Surely, there is little more kindness and love that could come my way. I've had a big share, and I am so very grateful. Of course, I see so much that I can do in my work. I live for it; but I mean, I have been so blessed and my life has been so full." Miss Pickford seems to be amazed that her public has let her stay so long. As every one knows, many of the stars who shone brightly on the movie horizon at the beginning have vanished. Some of them are remembered, some of them are not; but Mary has LASTED. It seems to me, as I told Miss Pickford, that her popularity cannot wane. Surely, a public that has loved so sincerely cannot discard so easily. The stars who have died in popular favor were bound to go. It's a clear case of the "survival of the fit." Bernhardt has always been and always will be "The Divine Sarah." Mary is and shall always be "America's Sweetheart." "And now for a complete confession about this 'Stella Maris' make-up," I ventured. "All right," laughed Mary, "I'll fess. When I read the script of 'Stella Maris,' my heart went out to that little character, Unity Blake. To me she seemed just a little mutt dog--one of the kind, you know, that cringes and wags its tail at the same time, the kind that is just starved for affection. I'm interested in an orphanage, and it has been evident to me that where there are about fifteen women in charge and maybe two hundred or more children, it is quite impossible to give them more than mere physical needs. "If the institution children are fed, clothed and, in a way, educated, the women in charge have plenty to do. It's easy to see that they would have little time to curl the kiddie's hair and fix them up in attractive way. So, when I studied the character of Unity Blake, I braided my hair in two pigtails, just as institution children must do." "It wasn't so much what you did to your hair," I cut in; "it's what you did to your face." "Oh, that," smiled Mary. "Well, to get the mutt expression, I had to do a lot of work. First, I pasted my hair down tight with a lot of grease. This also made it look darker. Then, starting with the eyes, I rubbed in white paint all around them, even on the lashes, This to make them look smaller. Then I used rouge on my cheeks, to make hollows; black paint in my nostrils; black on each side of my nose, to narrow the bridge; and darkened my teeth. "Next I combed my eyebrows down in a scraggly way, and, by a little practice, learned to draw my mouth into crooked, hard line. "You've noticed, perhaps, the little children in the poorest sections of a city. They are seldom straight. The older girls of many working mothers are forced to carry their little brothers or sisters around and care for them while mother works, and you'll often see them with one side sort of drooping from carrying children too heavy for them. So I gave Unity Blake a drooped shoulder, and I tried to give her the loveless look of a little mutt dog." Do you see, you folks out front, how carefully Mary thinks out the characters she gives you! "Oh, Martha McKelvie," she said, sadly, "you don't know how my heart goes out to the ugly little ones in an orphanage! We all instinctively love the beautiful. And if there's a stray bit of attention going around, it's pretty apt to light on the sweet, attractive kiddies. The ugly ducklings are apt to have a loveless lot." Our Mary's face looked wistful as her thoughts went out into the slums, orphanages and homes in loving sympathy. "Do you like playing kiddie parts?" I asked. "Oh, yes!" she replied. "Especially the ones like Unity Blake. It's rather easy to play the nice, pretty ones. I feel that I've really accomplished something if I can get the sympathy and love of my public for an ugly one. I always study a part very carefully and try to get into the spirit of the child I am to portray. The costume, dressing the character, means a lot. You know, when I'm dressed as a child, I never walk. Always skip or run. Funny how one feels a character when they are made up and dressed for the part. You just naturally lose your own identity." Just here Marshall Neilan called Mary's attention to the fact that the pet hen they had been using in a scene for "M'liss" was to be taken out and its tail-feathers plucked for her hat. You who see this play and watch the proud M'liss after the feathers are jauntily perched on her head, because, as she explained to weeping Theodore Roberts, who owns and loves the hen, "Fashions is fashions," must not think that Mary did the dirty work. A common, hard-hearted man did it and the picture lays it all to Mary. She had to be assured and reassured that it wouldn't hurt before she consented to let the play go on... No star of today could be more modest, more lovable than Mary Pickford. She's nice to every one. She likes criticism, if it is constructive criticism; but it breaks her heart to give weeks of thought to a character and then have a critic break down all that she has done by a sweep of the pen and a few carelessly spoken words. She mentioned a criticism given her "Little Princess." "The critic said, 'Miss Pickford's Little Princess was too healthily sophisticated'!" said Mary. "That really DID hurt me, for I gave ten weeks to making that character, and I read and reread the story to make sure that I fully understood. Surely no one can think that we make such characters over to fit ourselves. I always try to make myself fit the character. I DID make the Little Princess sophisticated, for the simple reason that the author of the play made her that. I do so wish people wouldn't criticize carelessly." "Which of your plays do you like best?" "Well, I loved Tess, in 'Tess of the Storm Country.' I think my friends liked that. But it is too bad to think that I did my best work in "Tess.' I think I have done better pictures since. I am so sure of this and so sure that we can give the public an even better 'Tess' that I am going to do it over. In the five years since 'Tess' was produced pictures have taken great strides. Photography, direction, everything is so much better. "It will be interesting to revive 'Tess' and prove to the public the great improvement in the art. "Now, 'Hulda from Holland' I didn't like at all. I just begged the company to suppress it. I went to see it twice to make sure and I liked it less the second time than I did the first. "I hope folks will like 'Stella Maris.' I do think that's one of the best things I've done." To you, who think that a star's life is all play and little work, let me say that "Little Mary" had been sitting around almost all day, wearily waiting for Marshall Neilan to put her scenes on. A studio is rather a bleak affair, especially on a rainy day, and Mary confided to me that brother Jack had visited her dressing-room while she had gone to answer the phone and eaten all her luncheon. "Not only that," wailed Mary; "he scolded me when I cam back for not having MORE for him to eat!" As Jack approached at this moment, I mentioned the fact that few men on the globe today would have so much nerve. Jack grinned, and Mary said, "Oh, well, brothers walk in where angels fear to tread." To smooth things over and keep the Queen of Movieland from becoming too impatient at the long delay, Marshall Neilan offered a bribe of "one stick of gum," and it was gratefully accepted, although unused, by Mary. Miss Pickford calls the cameramen who do the stills, "snooper-snappers." "Because," she explained, "they're always snooping round, snapping me." Miss Pickford has plans completed for several pictures. After "M'liss" comes "How Could You, Jean?" and then the revival of "Tess of the Storm Country." In the Pickford Company at present we find such artists as Theodore Roberts, Tully Marshall and Tom Meighan. Mary is a great believer in a well- balanced company, and sees no reason why any star should be surrounded by a poor cast in order that they, themselves, may shine more brightly. During my visit Miss Pickford received a mammoth cake from the "Green Room Magazine" of Australia. Although the "Green Room" sends a cake to some great star each month, this is the first time it has been sent out of Australia. As I left she was unpacking it and registering all the enthusiasm of a child with a Christmas-box. But she took the time to waive me a cheery "Good- by." * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * December 8, 1918 Grace Kingsley LOS ANGELES TIMES Mary Pickford, Producer "Here I am--all alone in the world, without an alibi!" That's what Mary Pickford, now a producer for the First National Exhibitors' Circuit, said, the other day, with her humorous little smile. She meant there's nobody to lay the blame on if her pictures go wrong. "I used to be able to say, when I was with Artcraft, and anything went wrong, 'Well, now, if Mr. Zukor had let me do so and so--.' And now I haven't a single person to blame if 'Daddy Long-Legs' and 'Pollyanna' don't turn out to be the successes I of course hope they will be." Mary looked very tiny, as she stood out in front of all those people who were applying for jobs in "Daddy Long-Legs," at the Griffith studio. For, you see, Mary is doing all the casting her very own self, and neither Wellington Wales, her manager, nor Marshall Neilan, her director, can do anything about it when Mary sets her tiny foot down. But she's wonderfully sweet and kind with all those applicants. Even after a weary session of four hours, she still told those she couldn't use why she couldn't. In the kindest way imaginable, at the same time taking down their names and addresses, and assuring them that if ever she could use them in a picture she would do so. She had such a wonderful little way, too, of putting those actors at their ease. Which made it easier for her, too, as having lost their nervousness, she could better judge their suitability and qualifications for the various roles. When I remarked that, she said: "Well, I remember when I used to go into managers' offices to apply for jobs. I always was afraid I'd be either too short or too tall for the role I was applying for. So I used to scrooch down as little as I could, so that if they said I was too small I could suddenly grow up right there before their eyes." Oh, yes, and she helped Agnes Johnston write the screen version of "Daddy Long-Legs," and she's going to make the little heroine commence at 12 years old, which will be delightful, I think, don't you? There is going to be a little dramatic stuff, too. Talking about dramatic stuff made Mary smile reminiscently. "You know, in 'Stella Maris' they said in New York it wasn't I playing the poor little miserable heroine at all! They said Artcraft had engaged a real actress to play that part, and that she had skinned me to death." That Miss Pickford is working at the old Griffith studio, along with the Gish sisters, naturally leads one to reminiscences of other days, the old Biograph days, when the three worked together as youngsters, and even further back to their childhood days, when they all lived together. "Mother used to say to me," said Mary, "that Lillian Gish was just too good to live. She was the sweetest child and never made any trouble as Dorothy and I did. And do you know, after I heard mother say that two or three times, I never would stay alone in the room with Lillian any more-- I was afraid she was so good that she'd die right there." Just then happened on the scene David Wark Griffith, who, you remember used to direct Mary. "What do you think of our young lady now?" said Mr. Griffith, glancing at Mary with his whimsical smile, which carried a lot of pride and affection in it, too, for he thinks Mary is a wonderful little artist. "Such a rich girl! Do you know, I remember the awful time I had keeping Mary, in the old Biograph days, because she wanted $30 a week! 'Thirty dollars!' exclaimed the business head of that concern. 'Mary wants thirty dollars a week! Why, I never heard of such a thing! There ain't no picture actor in the world worth thirty dollars a week!'" After all, the producing game isn't so new to Mary Pickford as it might seem to be. "Mr. Zukor used always to let me help with the writing, the casting and directing," said Mary. "But at the same time, it's an awful responsibility, and, as I said before, here I am all alone in the world without an alibi. "You see, I always try to play up to the hardest part of my audiences-- the practical business men, to do such good work that when their wives say to them, 'Oh, let's go down and see Mary Pickford,' they won't answer: 'Mary Pickford! Oh, she always wears curls and acts foolish. I'd rather stay at home and read my paper.'" * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * September 18, 1921 Louella Parsons NEW YORK TELEGRAPH New York is killing Mary Pickford with kindness. Everywhere she goes crowds surround her and try to show their love of her by clasping her hands or speaking her name. Now, Mary has a heart that success and fame have never touched. She is as sweet and unaffected as she was in the long ago when she was on the stage and earning a pitiful little weekly salary--barely enough to keep the Smith family in food. Because she is Mary, and because she never wants to seem unappreciative, she lets this mob come close to her, and she tries to make that Mary smile carry itself into the hearts of all her adorers. Wednesday night I went over to the Ritz to see her. Douglas Fairbanks was standing guard at the door. "She is so worn out--I have to make her rest," he said. Can you imagine the energetic Douglas, with a following of his own that resembles the adulation given the President of the United States, acting as a guard? Well, that was exactly what he was doing. Watching her door to see she had a nap. "You may go in," he said. He opened the door, and this was what I saw--our Mary in one bed, and Lillian Gish in the other. Lillian had worked every hour since Mary came to town and this was the first moment she had had to see her childhood chum and girlhood friend. The two girls had chattered and chattered like veritable magpies. "Come on in," called Mary. "We have talked and talked and talked." They were just like any other two girls, these two world-famous stars. They were discussing clothes, plays and Mary's trip abroad. The subject came to mothers, as it always does with these two girls, who are the two most devoted daughters I know. "Did you see 'Over the Hill'?" Mary asked. "That is the finest mother propaganda I ever saw. It should be compulsory for every girl to see that picture. There is a lesson that no one should miss. The psychology of the poorhouse is so real. Back in the mind of every human being is the fear that some day when old age comes he will be forced into dire poverty." Lillian Gish added her tribute by saying she thought every screen player should see the performance of Mary Carr, which stands out as one of the most finished portrayals of mother love ever shown on stage or screen. "You know," said Mary, "it makes me sick when I hear some young girls talk to their mothers. High school girls who speak as if their mothers should get off the earth. I have heard them say: "'What do you know about it?' "That is the reason I think 'Over the Hill' will do good. It will open the eyes of some of our young people." Any one who knows anything about Mary Pickford and Lillian Gish will realize this is not said for effect. They are daughters--both of them any mother might rejoice to have--tender, thoughtful, and devoted. Douglas, who had contented himself with remaining on guard, now came in and joined in the conversation. It was the night before "Little Lord Fauntleroy" opened, and he was giving the preparation for Mary's picture the same loving care she gave "The Three Musketeers." Any one who could peep behind the curtain and see Mary and Lillian and Doug would feel the simple kindness of the three has never half been told. As Mary is to the outside world, that way she is in the bosom of her family. I say this after knowing her for seven years. She is one of the few real people in the world--our Mary. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * February 7, 1922 LOS ANGELES EXAMINER Mary Pickford Pays Tribute to Slain Picture Director A gracious tribute to the memory of William D. Taylor, murdered director, was paid yesterday, in an interview by Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks. "The most patient man I ever knew," Mrs. Fairbanks said, and her husband added. "We all knew him as a gentleman of whom the film industry might well be proud." "We were horribly shocked," Mrs. Fairbanks said, "to learn of his death and we simply refuse to believe the innuendos against his character. Neither of us were intimate friends of his, but he had directed me and we naturally were well acquainted. "Both as a gentleman and as an artist I respected him. "He was ever courteous, considerate, and above all, patient. It's pretty hard directing all sorts of people in big pictures, members of the casts often being temperamental and even stubborn. He never had a harsh word to say to anyone and would spend all sorts of time and energy to get just the artistic results he wanted. "To me and to everyone who ever mentioned him to me, he was always the quiet, reserved, artistic gentleman. The films could not have lost a more valuable or more beloved member and I cannot deplore too much the fact of the tragedy or the attendant notoriety. "We are hardly ever out and have our own small circle of friends, and so about his private life we know nothing. But it seems a shame that these girls should have to be linked up with such a ghastly crime. Although I know none of them well, I have always heard of them as nice, well thought of citizens." To this statement Douglas Fairbanks added only that he had met Taylor a few times and though not an intimate of his, knew of him as a man of the highest caliber and a man who was ever trying to make of the films something finer and better. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * November 11, 1923 LOS ANGELES EXAMINER Mary, Doug on Stand in Federal Hearing Los Angeles hearing of the Federal Trade Commission investigation into the alleged motion picture trust came to a close yesterday afternoon with the testimony of Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks... Mary Pickford was the first witness called by W. H. Fuller and H. A. Cox, attorneys for the Commission... Under questioning by Attorney Fuller, Miss Pickford related her motion picture career and recounted the signing of a starring contract with Famous Players-Lasky Corporation in 1914. This concern is named as principal respondent in the Government's complaint against the alleged film combine. "When I went with them," she stated, "it was with the guarantee that my pictures would be sold solely upon their merits and not marketed to exhibitors with a lot of other films they didn't want." "For two years I constantly received complaints that exhibitors could not purchase my films alone. I complained to Mr. Zukor and he promised to remedy the matter but nothing was done," she continued. "I again went to him and told him that I would walk out unless he lived up to the stipulation in my contract. "We compromised and I was given my own company with the Artcraft Pictures. But the same thing happened all over again. I wanted to make less pictures and spend more money on them to produce bigger and better films that would have to be sold on their own merits. "Finally conditions grew worse instead of better and I was compelled to resign from the company. I simply could not get them to sell my pictures as we had agreed. "When Mr. Zukor found out that I was actually leaving him," Miss Pickford declared, "he said to me 'Why don't you retire? I will give you $250,000 if you will quit the screen!'" "Did he give you any reason why he made the offer?" asked Attorney Fuller. "He did not," Mary answered. "He gave me no reason."... When Mary left the stand, all the members of the hearing arose and bowed as she passed from the room and returned to a nearby set where a corps of actors awaited her appearance... ***************************************************************************** ***************************************************************************** Taylor Case Errors in "FORBIDDEN LOVERS" Despite the fact that a few fairly accurate recaps of the Taylor case have been published (e.g., Time-Life's UNSOLVED CRIMES), most new recaps continue to perpetuate old errors and myths, or create new ones. FORBIDDEN LOVERS by Axel Madsen is a recent "non-fiction" book which devotes a few error-and-myth-filled pages to the Taylor case: 1. "When the Arbuckle scandal broke...[Taylor] was elected president of the new Motion Picture Directors Association." NEW?? The Motion Picture Director's Association was founded in 1915, six years prior to the Arbuckle scandal. Taylor was then serving his third term as president of the organization. 2. It is stated that Taylor was often photographed in his British Army major's uniform. Taylor was a captain, not a major, and it is a captain's uniform he is wearing in those photographs. 3. It is stated that Mabel Normand's adult film career owed much to Taylor. Not really. Aside from recommending her cameraman, Homer Scott, it does not appear that Taylor made any real contribution to Mabel's film career. He never directed her and they never even worked at the same studio. 4. It is stated that at the time of the Taylor murder, Mabel Normand was working for Sam Goldwyn. No, she had left Goldwyn a year earlier, and since that time was again under contract to Mack Sennett. She was working for Sennett at the time of the Taylor murder. 5. It is stated that at the time of the Taylor murder "Neilan was the lover of newly divorced Paramount star Gloria Swanson." Actually it was Neilan who was newly divorced from Gertrude Bambrick; Swanson was still married to Herbert Somborn at that time. 6. The book mentions Mary Miles Minter as one of a group who would "sail to Catalina Island on Sundays or go for spins to Lake Arrowhead or Palm Springs in their fabulous roadsters"--in reality Mary's mother would never have allowed her to make such trips alone or on a date. Mary's life was very guarded and restricted until she finally moved out in late 1922. 7. It is stated "Mary sued her mother in 1926 for $1,345,000, but curiously settled out of court for $25,000." The lawsuit was filed in 1925, and the out-of-court settlement gave Mary $150,000 in bonds plus ownership of Casa Margarita, which had considerable value. 8. "After a year at the Hollywood Health Club, the tony residence for moneyed bachelors, Bill Taylor had moved to an apartment court at Alvarado Street." Hollywood Health Club? Not hardly. Before entering the British Army in 1918, Taylor had lived for several years at the Baltic Apartments, 1127 Orange St. (now Wilshire Blvd.); after he returned in 1919 he promptly moved into the Alvarado apartment court. 9. It is stated that Edna Purivance occupied the other half of the building that Taylor lived in. No, this is a common error--she lived in the building immediately to the west of Taylor; she did not live in the same building as Taylor. 10. It is stated that on the morning of the murder, Paramount executives were burning papers in Taylor's fireplace. No, Taylor's apartment had no fireplace. 11. Madsen evidently likes the rumors about ladies' underwear found in Taylor's apartment, but he reports contradictory rumors as fact: that Taylor wore some of it to "unmentionable drag parties," and; that it had been "planted by the studio to cover Taylor's deep dark secret--his homosexuality." Rumor, rumor, unconfirmed rumor. And the presence of any underwear belonging to Minter was never confirmed, and strongly denied by her. The same can be said of the rumored initialed nightgown--a nightgown did exist, but seems not to have had initials. There were, however, some handkerchiefs of Minter's which were found among Taylor's effects, and those handkerchiefs were initialed. 12. It is reported as fact that Mary Miles Minter and Charlotte Shelby had visited Taylor the night of the murder. But this is only dubious rumor, and certainly not established as fact. 13. It is said that newspapers insinuated Taylor had been the cause of the suicide of Zelda Crosby. Contemporary newspapers made no such insinuation; Crosby killed herself in New York and Taylor worked in Los Angeles. 14. It is stated that Charlotte Shelby killed Taylor and "paid off successive Los Angeles district attorneys." Shelby may have killed Taylor, though the case against her is far from proven and is rather doubtful. But if Shelby "paid off" Asa Keyes, then why did she flee the country for three years, and not return until Keyes was out of office and safely behind bars? 15. Taylor's life history, as presented in FORBIDDEN LOVERS, is very scrambled. It is stated that Taylor "after the Great War, had gone to New York, tried stage directing, married, fathered a child, and skipped out on mother and daughter to try gold prospecting in the Yukon and Alaska." But Taylor's marriage, desertion of family, and trips to the Yukon happened BEFORE the Great War, not after. And Taylor had earlier been a stage actor, but had never been a stage director prior to deserting his family. 16. It is stated that Allan Dwan gave Taylor his first break as a movie actor. How? Taylor first acted for Ince, then for Vitagraph, and finally for Balboa--thereafter he devoted all his time to directing. Dwan never worked for Ince, Vitagraph or Balboa, so how could he have given Taylor his first movie acting break? 17. It is stated that Edward Sands was actually Taylor's brother. No, Sands was not Taylor's brother--there was a drastic difference in age, their physical appearance was not similar, their handwriting and fingerprints were different. Sands was actually Edward F. Snyder and was not Denis Deane Tanner. 18. It is stated that at Taylor's funeral, Mary Miles Minter approached the open casket and kissed Taylor on the lips. Mary Miles Minter did visit Taylor's body in the mortuary, but she did not attend Taylor's funeral; at the time the funeral was in progress she was making an official statement to William Doran, in the office of the district attorney. 19. It is stated that "the presence of a black teenage boy at Taylor's Alvarado Street home was never mentioned [in the press]." Huh? What is Madsen talking about? Is this supposed to be a reference to his servant Henry Peavey? Peavey was very much mentioned and interviewed in press accounts of the murder, but he was certainly not a teenager--contemporary press accounts state he was 40 years old at the time of the Taylor murder. If the "black teenage boy" is supposed to be someone else, the statement should be clarified, as this is something we have seen nowhere else. Hopefully, someday newly-written recaps of the Taylor case will contain mostly facts, and rumors will be identified as rumors. But as long as new writers continue to rely on HOLLYWOOD BABYLON and A CAST OF KILLERS, that day may never come. ***************************************************************************** ***************************************************************************** Back issues of Taylorology are available on the Web at any of the following: http://www.angelfire.com/az/Taylorology/ http://www.etext.org/Zines/ASCII/Taylorology/ http://www.silent-movies.com/Taylorology/ Full text searches of back issues can be done at http://www.etext.org/Zines/ or at http://www.silent-movies.com/search.html. For more information about Taylor, see WILLIAM DESMOND TAYLOR: A DOSSIER (Scarecrow Press, 1991) *****************************************************************************