Hidden Hands of Filmdom (1923) 🇺🇸

April 20, 2023

Do you know who are the forces behind the screen plays you see?

The hidden hands of 1923 number

June Mathis
Catherine Hilliker
Josephine Lovett
Mrs. Rupert Hughes
Kathlyn Williams
Theda Bara
Ethel Chafin
Sophie Wachner
The Jimmie Smiths
Jeanie MacPherson

There are two widespread habits in the movie business. One is the alibi habit — also known as passing the buck. When a picture fails — or to speak in plain English, when it is a flop — all those concerned with its production can spend the long winter months telling their friends that they weren't even on speaking terms with the unfortunate film. They can gather a few good listeners around the radiator and beg them to remember that, if the director had taken their advice, the picture would have been collecting government souvenirs at the box-office.

The other habit of the film business is stealing the glory, the thunder and the hosannas of the public. The third assistant director of any picture that is warming the fingers of the cashiers in the box-office will tell you that he is the guy who first saw the possibilities of the story and that he, himself, developed the entirely unforeseen dramatic talents of the star.

Too Many Master Minds

The studios are all cluttered up with Master Minds. In fact, they are so filled with Master Minds that it is hard to get any work done.

If you will believe all you'll hear around the front offices of the studios, the successful pictures are almost completely the work of lowly but inhumanly modest persons who never get their names on the credit cards. The insane asylums may be filled with men who think they are Napoleon but the studios are overrun with carpenters who think they are D. W. Griffith.

However, in spite of all the noise, there are a few workers in the studios who can qualify, if not as Master Minds, at least as Hidden Hands who have helped build up some big reputations and some big pictures.

Perhaps the most capable Hidden Hands belong to June Mathis, who figures on the screen as the editorial director of Goldwyn Pictures. Miss Mathis has caused more trouble in the feminine world than the woman who launched suffrage or the fellow who invented bobbed hair.

Miss Mathis' Capable Hidden Hand

Miss Mathis thrust Valentino on a waiting world. Whereupon feeling that she hadn't quite played fair with the men fans, she pulled Nita Naldi from comparative obscurity to glory in "Blood and Sand."

The story of Rodolph's rise and The Four Horsemen is an old one by this time. Lots of persons claim to have recognized in Rodolph great latent talent. But he was originally selected by Miss Mathis because he had "that look in his eye" and an undoubted charm for women. She saw him first with Clara Kimball Young in a picture called "Eyes of Youth."

Miss Mathis believes in sex appeal. That is to say, she believes sex appeal in an actor or actress is a legitimate and admirable asset. She also believes that the public wants love stories.

Several years ago, Miss Mathis was writing scenarios for Metro. Guided by her, Nazimova rose to great popularity. The collapse of the Nazimova came at almost the exact time when Miss Mathis no longer wrote Madame's scenarios. Bert Lytell's one claim to fame as an actor, "The Right of Way," was also produced under the guidance of Miss Mathis.

A Thousand a Week

Just at present, the Goldwyn Company believes that Miss Mathis's advice is worth a thousand dollars a week. She has been associated with so many lucky undertakings that directors look upon her as a sort of charm. To have her on the lot is better than nailing a horse shoe over the door.

Of course, her dramatic technique in scenario writing and her close attention to story details also make her valuable. But the real secret of her success lies in the fact that she has those mysterious flights of inspiration known as "hunches." Figuratively speaking, Miss Mathis goes in for "visions and dreams"; she has a way of handing out suggestions about pictures that make the directors believe that it is straight-from-the-shoulder stuff from Heaven.

The Inspirational Touch

This peculiar quality of giving the inspirational touch to her advice makes Miss Mathis popular with her workers. The temperamental director who might resent suggestions from an everyday business woman eagerly listens to every word from a woman who has a gift of endowing herself with the inspiration of a priestess.

Only an unusually magnetic woman would assume such a definite leadership in any studio. Moreover only an unusually gifted woman would be entrusted with the production of an important picture like Ben-Hur. Although Ben-Hur may be officially in the hands of one or several directors, it really belongs to Miss Mathis — and everyone in Hollywood knows it.

Ben-Hur has proved Miss Mathis something of a hypnotist. For she has succeeded in hypnotising the Goldwyn officials into handing the leading role to George Walsh. As an actor, Walsh rates along with Corse Payton. He was a jitney Douglas Fairbanks for William Fox arid afterward he was the moron's delight in several serials. Nevertheless, Miss Mathis believes he can act and believes he is just the person to play Ben-Hur. It is her newest "hunch."

The Case of Jeanie MacPherson

Jeanie MacPherson, the hidden hand in Cecil De Mille's pictures, figures on the screen as author of the scenarios. Jeanie is the exact opposite of June. She is not a magnetic person; she is a quiet looking Scotch girl. She has no inspired "hunches" and her conversation lacks fizz. June Mathis is all personality; Jeanie is completely minus any sort of glitter.

Jeanie can do anything she is told from murdering a Barrie play to creating a Roman orgy. As a scenario writer, she has a good workmanlike technique, a level 'head and a keen knowledge of what the public — and Mr. De Mille — wants. Jeanie knows Mr. De Mille better than anyone in the world knows him. She is the ideal worker, the ideal silent partner.

While C. B. directs the dancing girls in the studio, Jeanie sits in her office and invents the scenes that must hold the story together. She can re-write a story hundreds of times to suit her boss. And she can re-write her own work without complaining. She isn't much in evidence around the studio but she is very much present when C. B. begins to put the picture together. And when the director gets stuck, the rush call goes out for Jeanie.

Griffith and His Cutters

D. W. Griffith's stories are not so much written as assembled. Griffith shoots miles of footage, works for months, stages all sorts of fine effects and then dumps the crude product on the door-step of Mr. and Mrs. Jimmie Smith. Whereupon Jimmie and the missus rescue the orphan of D. W.'s brainstorm and beat it into submission.

The Smiths are officially known as the chief cutters of the Griffith studio. They are among the oldest members of the Griffith family. Jimmie was a school friend of the beloved Bobbie Harron and received his education at St. Joseph's Parochial School down in Greenwich Village in New York. But he went through his college training at the old Biograph studio.

Griffith has known Mr. and Mrs. Jimmie for years and he knows that he can trust them. They are his Court of Common Sense. In the projection room Mr. and Mrs. Jimmie look at many thousand feet of film and decide what is essential to the story. It breaks a director's heart to see his best stuff go in the discard but Mr. and Mrs. Jimmie work so tactfully that they can cut a picture without forcing: Griffith to leap off Brooklyn Bridge in sheer depths of gloom.

More Hidden Hands

Oddly enough, two costume designers can qualify as hidden hands. Both Sophie Wachner, of the Goldwyn studio, and Ethel Chafin, of the Lasky studio, have unusual personalities. In spite of the fact that they are close to the business of making pictures, they still have a detached and critical attitude about the work that goes on in the big lots.

Sophie Wachner represents Higher Criticism at the Goldwyn studio. The actors or actresses really fear her. She can make them or break them with the company. Her likes and dislikes are as casual, as sudden and as unreasonable as a bolt of lightning. She either likes a picture or she hates it. She seldom says why she likes it or why she dislikes it but, once she is mad at a production, she stays away from it.

In other words, Sophie is the General Public. Her opinions coincide almost exactly with the reaction of a million or more film fans. Actors and directors court her favor, exactly as they court the favor of the public.

Mrs. Ethel Chafin seldom expresses her opinions about the pictures and she doesn't play favorites in the studio. But she is a marvellous bureau of complaint. She listens to confidences, she smooths away fights, she gives good advice, she calms hasty tempers, she encourages beginners. And when she has nothing else to do, she designs clothes.

If she were an older woman with white hair, she would be called the studio mother. But she is a young, good-looking and business-like person and so her advice carries the force of practical experience.

Theda Bara and Driven

The old line from "Merton of the Movies" — the one about "the best pals and severest critics" — holds good in many movie households. As a matter of fact, the wives excel as critics and plenty of important movie affairs are settled on the bungalow porches of Hollywood. Or at little home dinner parties. Or at Sunday afternoon teas. If you want to know the truth about a picture, don't ask the director. Just go to the director's wife.

Charles Brabin, a director with no masterpieces to his credit, married Theda Bara. Now in the course of many years' studio experience, Miss Bara learned something besides how to make her eyes misbehave. So when Brabin started out with a small sum of money to make a picture called "Driven," Miss Bara, disguised as Mrs. Brabin, took a heavy interest in the undertaking. The wise guys say that Charley couldn't have done it without her.

Driven was a success and it established Brabin as a big-time director. As for Miss Bara, she took none of the glory because she knows she can go out and reap enough glory on her own account.

Since her marriage to Charles Eyton, Kathlyn Williams, former Selig star, has played second parts. As the wife of a Lasky studio manager, she could have demanded fat roles, plenty of glory and lots of close-ups. But she has carefully submerged her own interests to those of her husband.

The result is that Miss Williams has more influence in the studio than many of the more glaring lights. Her tact is immense and her good nature unbounded. In the most trying situations, she keeps a strictly neutral position and, in consequence she is credited with smoothing away many misunderstandings in the studio. Her stellar role is that of peace-maker. And if you don't believe a peace-maker is a commercially valuable proposition, consider the expense of a law suit instituted by a temperamental star!

Kathlyn Williams Diplomat

Incidentally, Miss Williams is Pola Negri's most trusted friend. The dark-eyed and fiery star finds the blonde and calm Kathlyn an ideal companion. Kathlyn's tact has probably saved the company some real money.

Another wife of still a different type is Mrs. Rupert Hughes who sometimes publishes poems under the name of Adelaide Minola Hughes. She hasn't Theda Bara's business ability neither is she a peace-maker like Miss Williams. But she is one critic to whom Rupert will listen. And Rupert doesn't like criticism. When Mrs. Hughes, who is not officially connected with the movie business, enters the studio, Rupert drops the megaphone. And before Rupert submits a scenario, he usually discusses it at length with the Missus.

Moreover, Mrs. Hughes has a way of bringing just the right persons together at her dinner parties. And that is a much more difficult art than writing free-verse poems.

The combination of a director husband and a wife who writes scenarios is hard to beat. As soon as a director, who happens to be unmarried, finds a scenario writer, who also happens to be unmarried, he generally rushes her to the altar to clinch her services for life.

Anita Loos (Mrs. John Emerson), Josephine Lovett (Mrs. John Robertson), and Ouida Bergere (Mrs. George Fitzmaurice) might resent being called hidden hands or master minds because they are willing to let their husbands have the glory. But when an important decision confronts any of these directors, the Little Woman usually has a few well-chosen words to say on the subject.

Katharine Hilliker and her husband, Captain H. H. Caldwell, are another capable business concern. The Caldwells specialize in upholstering and dry cleaning foreign-made productions for American audiences. As you know foreign directors seldom worry about the fine feelings of censors and it is the job of the Caldwells to make such pictures as "Passion" and "Mad Love" safe for our democracy. They were the hidden hands behind some of the success of the first German pictures.

But the most muscular and close-fisted hidden hands in all the glorious movie business are those that rocked the cradles of the stars. In other words, the most efficient business management is controlled by the Movie Mother. If you don't believe it, ask the star who owns one.