Jessie Stevens (1915) 🇺🇸

Writing of Jessie Stevens — fat, fair, and a favorite — is like writing of theatrical history, for on the stage she’s been since she was plumped down, as a three months’ old, some forty odd years ago. No, Jessie is a rara avis among actor folks in that she is very careless about telling her age. But that’s only part of her effervescing good nature which has infected many a screen with heartiest of laughs.

Jessie — no one thinks of calling her “Mrs. Stevens” — came from a theatrical family, her father, George E. Stevens, in the early seventies, having several theaters throughout the east, run on the old stock system, where the star travelled about and was supported by the permanent stock company. One of these which she recalls with pleasure is J. H. Stoddard, who played in her father’s theaters.

She played child parts innumerable, but perhaps “Topsy” in Uncle Tom’s Cabin claimed her most. At ten years of age she was playing Marie’s mother! But Jessie was “some” ten-year-old for size and weight. From 1876 to 1882 she played in that company in various parts. Her fall in weight was accompanied by her rise to stardom, for in 1884, registering but 120 pounds — on the scale — she toured throughout the middle west as star in repertoire with her own company. And the west has never forgotten Jessie, where she acquired a great following, even to this day.

She then appeared, till 1890, in various comedies and dramas, playing everything from Martha in Faust and the Duchess of York in Richard the Third to comedy characters, at one time playing with the late John Griffith.

Then followed engagements with Frohman’s Jane company, the southern company playing Mme. La Marquise, in the Schiller Comic Opera Company at Chicago, in stock all over the country, in J. H. Wallack’s Dairy Farm, and then in Hal Davis’ vaudeville sketch, Fall of ‘63, where her work as the black mammy is easily remembered.

Motion pictures first saw her in 1909, when she appeared with the Essanay. With a breath in vaudeville, she was again back, this time with Selig for one year, disappearing again to appear in vaudeville in The Little Mother, when she joined the Edison stock company two years ago and is still there. In Edison films she has played comedy characters and dramatic roles, her motherly face and figure becoming known the country over.

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Doings at Los Angeles.

Universal City is opened for good and every one there is busy. Mr. Horsley having arrived is looking over the ground for his new animal studio and other big and interesting happenings are in the air. The crowd of visitors who came on the Universal special brought much news and are taking much news away with them. Some want to remain here and live, while others wish the snow and blazing summer. The ever changing complement of the half hundred companies keep one busy maintaining a line on who is who and who’s where. The past week has been exceptionally exciting, with many banquets and other affairs for the film people.

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The Static Club did itself proud once more when it gave a wonderful banquet at a local cafe. Nearly every cameraman was there, as were many big directors and leading players. The dinner was a grand success and the club is to be complimented. Mr. Horsley was one of the honored guests.

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James Kirkwood, who has been directing Mary Pickford at the F. P. studio [F. P. Fay Studio], left for New York on the 24th to resume eastern producing. Allan Dwan is now directing the famous little star. We nearly had an election of Screen club officers, or could have held one, for President Kirkwood, Treasurer Blaisdell [George Blaisdell?] and several other well known screeners were present.

George Melford and his Lasky players are in San Francisco getting scenes for Stolen Goods, in which Blanche Sweet is starring. Eighteen people went up on the steamer. K. McGaffey, publicity man for Lasky, also made the trip. They will be gone for a week or more. George has been doing some record shooting at the L. A. Gun Club meets at Venice, and last Sunday he nearly made a record score at the championship shoot.

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Wray Physioc, directing Indian specials for the A. B., has returned from a trip to San Fernando valley, where he did some big desert scenes for a redskin picture. While on the edge of the little Sahara one of the men killed a big rattler while a scene was being made. It had 9 rattles and a button. The players were there four days.

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Selig’s zoo received the largest shipment of wild animals ever brought across. There were in the consignment of live freight 2 elephants, 2 camels, 2 snow leopards, 2 black tigers, 4 Bengal tigers, and a number of funny birds and miscellaneous animals. The Selig plant now has 18 Bengal tigers, the largest number owned by any single firm. There were enough animals to occupy two special cars for the transcontinental tour. It took 90 days for the trip from India, the voyage being made on a German ship which had to zigzag across the waters in order to miss encounters with alien ships of war.

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Fred Kley of the Lasky firm, if asked how he likes the road to San Diego, will say, “It’s fine, but one place. That is where the old road switches for Mexico.” When on a half week vacation Mr. Kley motored to the southern city and en route he missed the right road and found himself on the way to old Mexico after several hours’ running.

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Wilfred Lucas and his Fiction Players are in Las Vegas, Nevada, getting scenes for the latest picture, “The Taming of the Red Butte Western.” There are 25 people in the company and they will be gone for a week.

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The new F. P. studio at Melrose and Bronson avenues is fast nearing completion and the company will soon be moved in from the Rolfe studio, which they are now using through the courtesy of Mr. Rolfe [B. A. Rolfe].

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Dave Kirkland, who directed for Sterling, and who more recently was with Keystone, has joined the L-KO and Pathé-Lehrman and is captain of a squad of players and is turning out comedies by the thousand feet.

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Well, the record is going up. The Clansman has run eight weeks.

And we had not a cloudy day in March.

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Rex De Rosselli kept a panic from starting at the opening of Universal City when he closed a cage door which had been opened by some green hand or by a wandering visitor. The cage contained leopards and one of the animals had made its exit when Mr. Roselli discovered the situation. The person who opened the cage had fled in terror.

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Lillian Gish has forsaken the screen and is now living in San Francisco — but it is only a vacation, and she will be back in a few weeks to resume work at the Griffith-Mutual studios.

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Jesse L. Lasky is due to arrive this week from New York. New stars will probably be brought west to appear in features during the summer. May Allison is now working at the American in Santa Barbara, having gone from the Lasky studio after finishing a picture there.

Mack Sennett and Ad Kessel have been busy the past week plucking stars from the Orpheum, and every show that comes to town is learning to fear the comedy film makers who make serious inroads on their stock of good actors.

Fay Tincher will now have a chance to work a new idea into one of her comedies, for a woman of this city has invented an electric manicuring machine which cuts, trims, polishes and perfumes the nails. It ought to be good for a laugh in a Mutual comedy.

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Bids have been called for by the city government for pictures to be made of the entire system of training in the local schools. The films will be exhibited at the expositions and throughout the States. Outdoor work and play will be shown, as will the special instruction, swimming, fire drills, night school, cafeteria system, penny soup kitchens, musical organizations, science, domestic art, manual training, building, athletics, and in fact every branch of the educational system in vogue here. Every student is to be photographed, kiddies and kindergartens, and School Marms and Normal will be pictured. About a hundred thousand persons will be filmed for this big exhibit.

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Paul Powell and his company of 20 players have gone north to Santa Barbara to get scenes for The Nun, in which Dorothy Gish is featured. They will make scenes around the convent there and will be gone four days.

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Eugene Pallette was the pleasing master of ceremonies at this week’s good fellowship dinner at which a record breaking number of players were present. Gene is from the south; those who missed the feed missed something worth while.

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The set-to between the local board of censors and J. A. Quinn, manager of Quinn’s Superba Theater, which is now showing Hypocrites, was brought before the courts today and Mr. Quinn given time in which to plead. The shoe pinch comes on the showing of a beautiful girl, nude, as “Truth.” The “Evening Herald” had a front page story on the 24th devoted to the battle for the exhibition of this big film.

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Miss Rea Martin, late of Peg o’ My Heart company, has rejoined the Biograph and is an ingénue again and is appearing in When Love is Young under the direction of Eddie Morrissey.

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Wm. Wolbert and a company of Kalem players have ceased production at the Hollywood studio and are now at leisure. Chance Ward is still making “Ham” comedies here.

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J. A. Berst, the new general manager and vice president of the Selig Company, while visiting the headquarters here said that the new Selig feature, The Millionaire Baby, is to be one of the best ever made. He also sees a great improvement in the general run of pictures and says that there will be even a greater improvement in the near future.

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The Progressive Motion Picture Company, in the Marsh-Strong building, handling Paramount Pictures, report that a new departure has been made in the exhibition of features. At Quinn’s Superba, where “Hypocrites” is having so strenuous a run, there are six shows a day, prices being 25, 35 and 50 cents. Three-quarters of the entire house is reserved. There are 700 seats, and no one can stumble in while the picture is being run and miss the beginning or have to wait to see the start. The present exhibition consists of the overture, a single reel scenic, the prologue to the feature, and then the four reels of big film. The new idea is working out well, according to Manager M. H. Lewis [Milton H. Lewis] of the Progressive Co.

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Henry B. Walthall is now with the Mutual. It was stated some weeks ago on this page that Mr. Walthall would rejoin Griffith, but at that time it was only a rumor, but very well founded. Since that time he actually signed up again and is now working at the old stand. He is being featured in Ibsen’s Ghosts, picturized by Russel E. Smith.

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Bill Cavanaugh, the fat ex-policeman who was recruited to the Ince forces, has joined the L-KO in Hollywood and is working in funnies again as the heavy copper.

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Herbert Rawlinson, screening Sanford Quest, and his assistant, Anna Little, and the rest of the Black Box players are up by Oxnard doing some desert scenes for the latest installment of this wonderful serial.

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Mildred Harris and Paul Willis are seen in a novel little play by Mary H. O’Connor at the Mutual. It is The Matchmakers and is a story of school life, a fire and rescue being brought into the picture. F. A. Kelsey is making the film.

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Recent additions to the producing staff of the Santa Barbara Motion Picture Company, Kriterion release makers, are Miss Veronica Larkin, who was with King Baggot in Imp Pictures, and also with Lubin; Joe Massey, a great character man; Dorothy Browne, formerly of the Universal; Elsie Cort, who was also with the Universal; Robert Morris, late of Lubin; Edward J. Peil, also from Lubin; and Pete Morrison, who was a cowboy leader with the American, has swung across the gap to the Big K studios and is working with Bert Bracken.

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Three big men have been added this week to the already large complement of the Ince forces. Henry Woodruff, H. B. Warner and Dustin Farnum have all been signed and will appear in multiple reel specials in the near future, with casts of well known actors supporting them.

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Nick Cogley, formerly with Selig, is now operating a company for the Mutual at Hollywood. He is directing Charles Clary in a big feature. The two were with Selig together and are now again going over old times.

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Reginald Barker, directing an Ince story this week, used 15 out of 40 babies that were submitted to him by anxious mothers to use in The Reward, which features Bessie Barriscale. Imagine Barker’s position when he had to choose with the mothers watching, each desiring her own love-darling to be selected to play in the picture.

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Jack O’Brien and his Mutual players are in San Diego getting new settings for scenes in Captain Macklin by Richard Harding Davis, and filmatized by Russel E. Smith.

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David Horsley, who arrived last week, is busy on the field at his big lot which now. contains the Bostock jungle and arena. The new studio is being constructed and it is to be a wonder, both in size and quality. One great innovation is the “pie” stage, as he calls the circular stage which contains 12 different sets. It is like a pie cut into a dozen portions. The entire list of interiors can be made in rotation without resetting the camera. The cameraman swings the machine around from set to set and shoots as fast as the director can run his people and animals through the scenes. He will release one single reel animal comedy and one three reel animal drama each week. The whole ground is 590 x 350 feet, with a studio space of 225 x 350 feet. There is room for six studio platforms in addition to the main circular stage. The Horsley diffusing system will be used.

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Frank Beal, ex-Selig and American director, is here to work for the Features Ideal Éclair branch under the management of Robert Levy.

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Before James Kirkwood left he was given a big farewell dinner by Mary Pickford and Al Kaufman, with W. E. Wing as roastmaster. It was a topsy-turvy affair and was uniquely unusual, everything being just the’ opposite as usually done. The diners filed in to a funeral dirge. Kirkwood was roasted. Guests were called on to talk, and they knocked Kirkwood, who was not allowed to eat, for his soup was hot hypo; fish, gelatinized soda, and other tasty dishes were faked for him. After each course, however, he got something to eat. At the conclusion he was presented with a fine jewel case in which rested his own gold watch, which he had been searching for for a week. Finally he was given a chance to talk and was given best wishes for his journey homeward. The affair was in the blue room of the athletic club and was one of the biggest dinners of the season, being attended by many prominent film people.

Clarke Irvine.

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Pollock Building New Theater.

Edward Pollock, of North Tarrytown, New York, has had plans drawn for a moving picture theater he is to build in that city. The plans call for a structure 40 by 120 feet, to be built of brick and concrete. The facade will be pretty in design and there will be eight exits. A stage with dimensions of 14 by 40 feet will be provided for. There will be 800 seats in the auditorium. 600 on the parquet floor and 200 in the balcony. The appointments and equipment will be on a par with those to be found in deserving and handsome picture theaters in bigger cities.

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Burr McIntosh Film Corporation.

Burr Mcintosh, expert photographer, actor and jack of all artistic trades, has organized the Burr Mcintosh Film Corporation and will play the stellar role in Colonel Carter of Cartersville, the first production of the new concern, inspired by F. Hopkinson Smith’s novel. This and subsequent pictures will be handled by the World Film Corporation. Mr. Mcintosh made his debut as a picture actor some little time ago in In Mizzoura.

Collection: Moving Picture World, April 1915