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The Silent Film Quarterly ——————————————————————————
Volume II, Issue 2 Winter 2016-17
Table of Contents Editor’s Message
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Lewis Walker
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Claire Inayat Williams
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Lea Stans
Departments: Coming Attractions
A Roundup of New Releases
Silents In Review
SFSFF “Day of Silents” 2016
Silent-ology
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Annette Bochenek
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19
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Louise Fazenda: The Forgotten Queen of Slapstick
Hometowns to Hollywood
Oliver Hardy: From Harlem, Georgia to Hollywood
Original Features: Henry “Pathe” Lehrman: The Volatile Jocelyn Leigh
Can’t Silence Love:
Thomas Reeder
Meredith Riggs
The Silent Films of Charles Farrell and Janet Gaynor
Classic Features: Runaway Romany:
Marion Davies
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Marion Davies
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Charlie Chaplin
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An Original Scenario
My Experiences:
While Filming “Runaway Romany”
Fooling for the Film:
A Weekly Magazine Column
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Editor’s Message Issue 6 ended up significantly longer than I expected (eight pages longer than Issue 5), and even then I had to cut out some content I had hoped to include. For example, you’ll notice that the second installment of the Baby Peggy interview has been postponed to Issue 7, along with some other great features which I assure you will be worth the wait. The last several issues have relied very heavily on original content, but in this issue there is a wealth of original material reprinted from the silent era. The first of these ties into the cover star, Marion Davies, who made her film debut a century ago this year. Her first film, Runaway Romany, was a success upon its release but is unfortunately lost. Davies not only acted in the film, but wrote the scenario herself. To celebrate the anniversary of this film, I have reproduced Davies’s original short story in its entirety, as well as a brief article by Davies on the making of the film. These two rare documents will certainly be of interest to any of the actress’s fans. The last reprinted feature is longer than Silent Film Quarterly’s usual fare, but I felt it was too important not to print. Charlie Chaplin wrote a little-know weekly magazine column in Great Britain while he was with the Essanay Company. 102 years after they first appeared in print, they are once again made available to silent film fans around the globe, and will hopefully prove interesting to fans of the Tramp. I am also thrilled to announce two new columns by two of my favorite film historians. Lea Stans’s excellent Silent-ology website has been known to me for sometime, and I’ve always been impressed by Stan’s incredible research and scholarship. I was fortunate enough to meet Lea in person last year (for a quintessential Los Angeles dinner at Roscoe’s Chicken and Waffles), and our conversation gave me countless new ideas for the magazine —foremost of which was adapting her website to the printed page. Her articles will provide an invaluable addition to the magazine. The second new column likewise adapts another exceptional website, Annette Bochenek’s Hometowns to Hollywood. Annette and I met last November in Chicago; I could tell we would become fast friends when she managed to talk our way into the original Essanay Studios building. She provides an invaluable service in examining the humble beginnings of Hollywood’s elite, and I’m excited to have her profile a silent star in each issue. As always, I appreciate any and all feedback on the magazine, and look forward to another successful year in 2017. Stay tuned, and thank you sincerely for reading! Your editor, Charles Epting
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Write for Silent Film Quarterly! Want to write for Silent Film Quarterly? The magazine is always looking for interesting original content about the silent era, including feature articles and reviews of silent films. Please contact the editor at charleseptingauthor@gmail.com if interested or for more information.
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Coming Attractions: A Roundup of New Releases by Lewis Walker Hello again silent cinephiles! 2016 was a bumper year for silent films being restored, released (whether it be theatrically or on home video), and warmly received by the great public, we had such films as Children of Divorce (1927) restored and rereleased to celebrate Flicker Alley’s 50th home video release. The film stars Clara Bow and Gary Cooper in the follow-up to Bow’s It. It not only presents us with Gary Cooper on his way to stardom, but also Bow in the midst of a career defining string of motion pictures that she will be forever remembered for. Not only has the film been painstakingly restored straight from the negative but also includes a new score by the Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra and includes an hour long documentary about Clara Bow. It is a great addition to any silent film library, and Flicker Alley need to be congratulated on the fine work they are doing. The BFI in England both ended 2016 and started 2017 in an incredibly strong way. In January they are releasing Charlie Chaplin: The Essay Comedies in Blu-ray for the first time in the UK. Unlike Flicker Alley’s earlier release it will not be released in a duel format edition but rather separately, this isn’t necessarily a NEW release, but any restored Chaplin is
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good to know about. However, one huge release from the end of 2016 was Abel Gance’s Napoleon (1927) available for the first time on Blu-ray and marking a 50 year restoration and discovery project by Kevin Brownlow who wrote such biblical silent film books as The Parade’s Gone By… The set is just a joy to behold and includes a bumper crop of special features amongst other goodies that makes this an essential part of any silent film library. In other exciting news Grapevine Video have made the move to Blu-Ray releases alongside the regular DVD editions, most notably the 1916 rags to riches story East is East starring Florence Turner, who appeared in Buster Keaton’s 1927 film College. Speaking of Buster Keaton Kino Classics in association with Lobster Film will release The General (1926) and Three Ages (1923) in a double-bill Bluray release. Keaton getting the upgrade to Blu-ray is always worthy of a purchase and both, not that any Keaton film isn’t, are brilliantly made and hilariously funny, with Three Ages being Keaton’s first feature length film, and The General being maybe one of the greatest comedies ever made, well worth the $20. Also available from Olive Films is Wagon Tracks a 1919 western starring the king of the silent western William S. Hart. The film was hailed at the time of release and will definitely be an interesting watch, one that is full of revenge and adventure. The Masters of
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My Top Five Releases of 2016 1. Napoleon (1927); BFI 2. Pioneers of African American Cinema; Kino Lorber 3. Children of Divorce (1927); Flicker Alley 4. Early Murnau—Five Films; Eureka Entertainment Ltd. 5. 3 Bad Men (1926); Kino Lorber Cinema collection from Eureka video in England released news towards the end of last year of a few exciting upcoming releases in the silent film domain. First was the 1925 German film Varieté starring Emil Jannings and directed by E. A. Dupont presented with a new restoration that I'm sure will be astounding. The story evolves around a couple of trapeze artists that builds to a exciting and dizzying finale. Then came the news of two releases that are otherwise available in the US, the first is Fritz Lang’s Destiny (aka Der M u d e To d ) f r o m 1 9 2 1 , containing the 2K digital restoration premiered at Berlinale 2016, in a duelformat edition. The hero’s over at Eureka also promised a ‘beautiful’ Buster Keaton Blu-Ray boxset of The General, Sherlock, Jr. and Steamboat Bill, Jr. If this comes anywhere close to the Early Murnau and Buster Keaton: The Complete Shorts Collection then we are in for a real treat. The last two editions have no release date as of yet, but expect them sometime within the next 12 months. On a personal note, as the world talks about the death of DVD due to streaming
services and VOD I for one feel optimistic about the future because in 2016 we saw some truly remarkable editions that not only presented restored masterpieces but forgotten treasures. Not only did this editions give us a film that we needed to add to our collection but also spectacular special features and improved soundtracks and color tinting. While the more popular films of recent years will see declines in sales I hope that the more bumper and time consuming editions will show the demand for collectable and well presented forms of more obscure and interesting films that wont be included on Netflix or Hulu. As we head into a new year, already promising to be as exciting as the last, I ask that as a collective we keep the need for these films prominent by talking about the releases, sharing photos and reviews on social media and most importantly buying them. As I'm sure most of you are aware restoring a film is very expensive process and one that is made possible by us the viewer. I whole heartedly hope that 2017 will be equal to, if not better than, 2016.
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Silents in Review: San Francisco Silent Film Festival “Day of Silents” 2016 by Claire Inayat Williams
・・・ Regular Silent Film Quarterly contributor Claire Inayat Williams has once again attended the San Francisco Silent Film Festival’s annual “Day of Silents,” held on December 5, 2016. As always, the festival provided an exceptional range of films, both beloved and rarely-seen. Williams was on-hand to report on all of the festival’s highlights exclusively for the magazine.
Chaplin at Essanay (1915) Release date: 1915 Director: Charlie Chaplin Cast: Charlie Chaplin as The Tramp, Edna Purviance, Ben Turpin, and various other players ・・・ It’s hard to convey the magic of Charlie Chaplin to those who have yet to be introduced to him, his films need to be seen to be believed. To many the influence of this man and his work is profound, his screen quality full of bravura but also genuine, sweet, and char ming. So charming in fact that it’s easy to forget the diligence and ingenuity that went into what we, the audience, are seeing. We know that behind the scenes much of his life was peppered with great losses and strife; he was plagued by critics who sought to destroy him and powers that didn’t appreciate his fight for the “little man”. But while at the Essanay Film Manufacturing Company much of this was still before him and the beauty of these shorts lies in what came after: the developing brilliance and the perfecting of his craft with each succeeding film. He was only in his early
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20s while signed with Essanay and was still very much figuring out who he was as an artist and who he wanted to be as a celebrity. What is especially remarkable about this period in Chaplin’s body of work is the evidence of the genius he was becoming. He had begun to round out and breathe life into the Tramp character, he was finding his slapstick footing and nailing his comedic timing. The female characters began to get higher and higher up the pedestal, and stayed there for the rest of his career. The year he spent at Essanay was the crowning point of their legacy and when he left they didn’t stay open much longer. Chaplin looked back on this time with some bitterness due to artistic and business differences, which led to several lawsuits. Despite his personal feelings towards it the work he did there is so special, it allows us to glimpse inside the mind of a maestro as the gears are still turning.
So This is Paris (1926) Release date: July 31, 1926 Director: Ernst Lubitsch Cast: Monte Blue as Doctor Paul Giraud, Patsy Ruth Miller as Suzanna Giraud, Lilyan Tashman as Georgette Lalle, and Andre Beranger as Maurice Lalle ・・・ Based on an 1872 French vaudeville play by Henry Meilhac and Ludovic Halevy called Le Réveillon (which also inspired Johann Strauss’ operetta Die Fledermaus), Ernst Lubitsch’s So This is Paris is a boisterous ball of fun that could easily be attributed to Oscar Wilde or comedic Shakespeare. It portrays two neighboring couples: Doctor Paul Giraud (Monte Blue) who lives happily on one side of the street with his quixotic romance novel-reading wife Suzanna (Patsy Ruth Miller), and on the other side dancing partners in wedded discord Georgette Lalle