Edith Ritchie (1917) 🇺🇸
Edith Ritchie, who in private life is Mrs. Stephen Morris, a well known society leader of Philadelphia, is playing the sympathetic role of Ruth Hunter in the elaborate production of Clyde Fitch’s society drama, “The Climbers,” which the Lubin company is filming in its Philadelphia studio, under the direction of Barry O’Neil, and in which Gladys Hanson will be featured.
Miss Ritchie is a descendant of the Biddles on her father’s side and of the Sommer Smiths on her mother’s side and is related to most of the prominent old families in Philadelphia. She is a member of most of the fashionable city and country clubs of Philadelphia and Newport, and is a most charming hostess. Up until last summer her winters were spent either in Philadelphia or traveling in Europe, and her summers at her picturesque cottage on Bay Side at Newport.
Before she became a Lubin [Siegmund Lubin] photoplayer Miss Ritchie had achieved quite a reputation as an amateur actress in Philadelphia, New York and Newport, and she was always a prime mover in arranging and producing society plays for various charitable institutions. Miss Ritchie was educated in Switzerland and London and spent many years traveling abroad, studying music, art and the theater for her own amusement. When she returned to America she married Stephen Morris, and her wedding was one of the big social events of the season.
Mrs. Morris joined the Lubin players and served her apprenticeship last summer, helping create “atmosphere” and playing small parts in different productions. Her natural dramatic ability, however, added to her good looks, won her recognition and she was given the role of Miss Carpenter in The Fortune Hunter, in which William Elliott was featured. Her success in this exacting part won for her the role of Mrs. Dalzell in George Ade’s The College Widow.
She played the lead in The Urchin, a Terwilliger [George Terwilliger] play directed by John Ince; did some very excellent character work in some of the Arthur Johnson comedies, and had an important part in The Evangelist, Henry Arthur Jones’ play. When Barry O’Neil wanted a woman to play the part of Aunt Ruth Hunter in The Climbers he selected Miss Ritchie.
Miss Ritchie is a tall, very good looking woman with a charm of manner that is irresistible. It took courage to make the break from a social life of comfort and luxury and get into the daily routine of the exacting type of work that the photoplay demands, but Miss Ritchie [Edith Ritchie] did it and she did it with an enthusiasm that won for her the friendship and admiration of everyone in the Lubin studio. She finds her work most interesting and says her main ambition now is to make herself a success in her new profession.
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“A Theft in the Dark”
Three-reel Edison of consistent and delightful artistry.
Reviewed by Louis Reeves Harrison.
Cast.
Lord Stranleigh… Marc MacDermott
Lady Sinclair… Miriam Nesbitt
Lady Genevieve, her sister… Viola Dana
Ralph Vernon… Edward Earle
Butler… Harry Linson
Pomby… Yale Bonner [Yale Benner]
Dainty romance in its presentation, an exquisitely tinted miniature on ivory. A Theft in the Dark has symmetry of form, swiftness of action and not a little of the tingling vitality of intense drama. Its whole atmosphere has the fascination of once-upon-a-time stories, the kind we used to read long after we should have been in bed, the kind that holds us with a charm all their own when we sit in the half-shadows of picture shows and watch the illuminated screen. A very large part of this effect is due to careful treatment by Charles Brabin — he always beautifies his subject and rarely jars us with inconsistencies.
A delicately affectionate understanding exists between wandering Lord Stranleigh and Lady Sinclair, one of purest friendship, verging on the warmer sentiment but restrained by a philosophical attitude on the part of Her Ladyship — she fears that His Lordship has been pampered by good fortune until he lacks real nobility of character, the kind that is capable of self-sacrifice. She does not exact that he shall put his love to any violent test, but that he shall demonstrate true manhood when the occasion demands. Occasions are rare, but at last one comes that is worth while.
During a costume ball on New Year’s Eve — this is an unusually fine ensemble — lights are dimmed on the stroke of the hour, and a pretty maid emerges from the overhead clock to scatter roses of the New Year, bright hopes, over the assembled guests. Lady Sinclair discovers later on that her pearl necklace is missing. Lord Stranleigh takes it up on himself to discover which one of the guests, there being no servants present at the moment of the theft, has taken the jewels. He sends for detectives and prepares for a general search, but decides to make a personal investigation meanwhile. He conceals himself in a suit of armor that stands in the hall, where he can discover any attempted escape from the house, and thus learns that Ralph Vernon is the thief and about to elope with Lady Genevieve.
Stranleigh’s attitude is one of both dignity and generosity. He prevents the elopement and hushes up a scandal, but he becomes involved in difficulty himself as a consequence. He shields Lady Genevieve when her sister finds them together under peculiar circumstances and accepts dismissal from the house rather than save himself by revelation of truth that might compromise the young girl. The latter clears Stranleigh in time to prevent a permanent rupture between him and Lady Sinclair, and all ends happily for the manly lordling and his doubting lady.
MacDermott and Miss Nesbitt are beyond criticism in their flawless interpretation, but they do not carry all the honors — Edward Earle also intensifies interest by intelligent work.
Scene from A Theft in the Dark (Edison).
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Ince takes company to Georgia.
Ralph W. Ince, one of the best-known directors of the Vitagraph Company, took a company of Vitagraph Players to Georgia, leaving Tuesday, March 9, to work on the new Vitagraph serial, The Goddess, of which Gouverneur Morris is the author. Anita Stewart, Earle Williams, Paul Scardon and Julia Swayne Gordon are the principal stock members who accompanied Mr. Ince.
They expect to be gone a month or six weeks as the topography of certain sections of Georgia is ideal as backgrounds for the enactment of special scenes that require realistic natural settings.
The Goddess, which is announced to be complete in fifteen episodes, is the most pretentious work ever undertaken by the Vitagraph Company.
Collection: Moving Picture World, March 1915