A growing source of silent era film information. This listing is from The Progressive Silent Film List by Carl Bennett. Copyright © 1999-2024 by Carl Bennett and the Silent Era Company. All Rights Reserved.

About This Listing Report Omissions or Errors in This Listing

The Burglar on the Roof
(1898) United States of America
B&W : 45 feet
Directed by J. Stuart Blackton and Albert E. Smith

Cast: J. Stuart Blackton, Mrs. Olsen, Ernest Oakes, Charles Urban, Ronald A. Reader

American Vitagraph Company production; distributed by Edison Manufacturing Company. / Cinematography by Albert E. Smith. / © 12 December 1898 by [?] Thomas A. Edison? Premiered October 1898. / [?] Kinetoscope 35mm spherical 1.33:1 format or Standard 35mm spherical 1.33:1 format? / The production was shot at Vitagraph’s rooftop studio at 140 Nassau Street in New York, New York, in September 1898. [?] Slide-BigV p. 8 states that the film was shot on the Morse Building roof (Vitagraph’s offices) on 16 May 1897 (probably an error for 1898).

Drama: Crime.

Survival status: Print exists in the George Eastman Museum film archive.

Current rights holder: Public domain [USA].

Keywords: Burglary - Rooftops - Skylights

Listing updated: 25 January 2009.

References: Leyda-Before pp. 42, 43, 57, 80, 97; Musser-Emerge pp. 272, 599; Shipman-Cinema p. 16; Slide-BigV pp. 8, 169; Slide-Early p. 15.

Home video: DVD.