J. Albert Hall Back to Stage (1916) 🇺🇸

J. Albert Hall, who has done much excellent work for the screen, has returned to the spoken drama for the time being, and is now appearing in Chicago in Langdon McCormick’s big stage production, The Forest Fire, in which Mr. Hall plays the “lead,” Judd Bradwin, a romantic westerner. The Chicago critics were unanimous in their praise of his work.

Mr. Hall’s last work for the film has not yet been seen in public. It was in Aubrey Kennedy’s great sixteen episode serial, The Yellow Menace, in the part of Police Captain Kemp, the relentless pursuer, who follows Ali Singh, the “yellow menace” (Edwin Stevens), around the globe. Mr. Hall was selected by the author for this part because of his striking resemblance to the late Lieut. Becker, who was electrocuted at Sing Sing, New York, for plotting the murder of the gambler, Herman Rosenthal, by the gunmen, who also met death in the chair. His appearance in the police uniform is very imposing and most realistic.

His work in pictures is well known, as he has for several years played prominent parts for Famous Players, Kinemacolor, Pathé, Biograph and Fox, appearing in the support of Mary Pickford, Pauline Frederick, Marguerite Clark, Hazel Dawn, Edward Abeles, Wilton Lackaye and Robert Edeson. On the speaking stage he has supported Edward Harrigan, Henrietta Crosman, Laurette Taylor and Robert Edeson and has sung in some of the best opera organizations. He will be missed in Filmdom.

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Observations by Our Man About Town

On the eve of an era when the spirits of the moving picture people should be reviving, I say, “continue in your hopes.” No place in the country has suffered more in the past three months than has Greater New York. The war, the Mexican trouble, and the epidemic have worked more havoc among the true and tried men than any combination of circumstances has in the history of the business. The war (we speak of the foreign war) has had much to do with the export trade. The Mexican question has had much to do with the domestic trade, in that it has taken (from New York alone) thirty thousand men. When you take away the men, you take the sinew of sustenance; if you take away the sustenance you naturally take away the support and pleasure of the family.

Which brings to our mind the subject of children. Many of the so-called reformers have pointed out during the recent summer season the fact that forty or more per cent, of the picture houses have been obliged to close because the children were prohibited from admission. It is not a direct lie on the part of the so-called reformers. It is a subterfuge. They know (and they cannot deny) that the picture shows are not dependent upon the patronage of children. The fact is, that the adults like the pictures. The mothers like them — but they cannot go to see them and leave their children at home alone, or leave them unprotected upon the streets. The truth is, then, that the sooner the authorities get wise to themselves, the less children you will find in idle play both in back yards and upon the streets. The writer has been the father of children. He knows, or has tried to know what is best for them; but when a municipal order is given to prevent the mingling of children in order to stay the spreading of a disease, and the authorities issuing that order do not cover the ground, but sit in their office and attack alone the theatrical branch (whether it be the pictures or others) he feels called upon to say there is some shortcoming. The elevated and subways and surface lines have no more right to pack their trains with children than have any of the theaters. Every railroad station (the Pennsylvania, the Lehigh Valley, the New York Central, the New York, New Haven & Hartford, the West Shore, the Erie, and all other companies) has notices posted regarding the examination of children before they are permitted to travel with their parents and guardians. Have such notices been posted by the surface, elevated and subway railroads? No! And why not? The Public Service Commission is at fault. If they were co-operating with the Board of Health, which they are supposed to do, they should have had the notices posted, and if they are not co-operating with the Board of Health, then any provision regarding spitting upon approaches to, or on, platforms, is a bluff. Then, again, if the Public Service Commission is working with the Board of Health, why is it that some member, or official, or employee of the Commission, did not inquire as to whether or not the health certificate order to railroads applied to the surface, elevated and subway railroads?

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There has been a laxity of duty somewhere. Why should the burden be put upon the poor moving picture exhibitor? It was not put upon the legitimate (as he calls himself) exhibitor, but upon the poor man dealing to the amusement of his fellow-man, for the reason that the regular theatrical season was closed,

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Why is it? Wake up, thinking people, and ponder over the question: “The moving picture people have been made the goat in this epidemic?” It is the truth. The regular theatrical season was closed when the epidemic started. The present epidemic is no worse than that which was in existence in 1907. It can be proved that there was a discussion when the present epidemic started (and among them medical men) as to whether it was more wise to give the epidemic publicity, or let it go as it did in 1907. The medical side of the story was that it would be better to have publicity in order to promote cleanliness. The medical fraternity were tools. Their recommendation and influence resulted in the closing of about four hundred moving picture houses.

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The insidious hand of the old-time manager is ever present in every act in which the moving picture has been put upon the defensive. He is as true an enemy as the reformer lighting for censorship. He is worse, because he is fighting under cover. Any man who is interested in regular theatrical productions and at the same time is interested in the production of motion pictures is not an asset to the latter industry. He may be in it for the temporary financial gain, but his heart is, and will be, with the stage. He cannot comprehend that the photoplay represents art; he cannot conceive that it is possible to reproduce upon the screen an incident more true to nature than he can produce upon the stage.

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It is a miserable man who will try to take from a man his means of existence. It is a more despicable man who will enter upon the field, pretending to be a friend, and try to ruin the possibilities of that existence.

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The moving picture game, as many managers the writer knows of calls it, is not now in its infancy. That claim has been a fallacy for the past two years. There was a time when it was in its infancy. Its possibilities are great today. But because of a few men with some capital saw fit to embark in the business when that business had them driven to the wall does not prove that they brought it to a stand where it was able to walk of its own accord.

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Most of the people who believe that they were the true saviors of the motion picture business are so blind to the truth that they cannot see further than their own office accounts. They do not seem to realize that there was money or brains in the business until they got into it. That is why many of them are not getting dividends. They know it all. If the poor dubs who saw the possibilities of the “game” before they got into it are able to draw a check, where do the newcomers fit in to kick with the stockholders? Who made the magnet? Was it the boy who said the picture was only a novelty, or was it the man who stuck and won? What made the newcomer go into the business?

Answer:
(1) He could teach the other fellow something.
(2) “If there is any money in it, I am going to get it.”
Well, if he’s got it, God be with him ‘till we meet again.

Collection: Moving Picture World, September 1916