Marguerite Snow — Sans Grease Paint and Wig (1914) 🇺🇸

When the patrons of Fifth avenue and Broadway shops have donned their fall hats, and when the gold has begun to show in the falling leaves in Central Park, that is the time of times to talk about Marguerite Snow.

by Mabel Condon

For the autumn, early autumn or late autumn, is her particular season of the year. It is nature-decreed. And “Peggy” is the beneficiary. She loves the colorful browns, gold-tinted, and the soft reds, tone-mellowed, and they, in turn, show their fondness for Peggy by becoming her well.

“Besides, September 9 is my birthday, so I love the fall of the year,” rejoiced Peggy, with a satisfied expression in her brown eyes as she reached a brown leather cushion and dropped it over the slipperless foot which protruded from her curled-up corner of the brown divan. For officially it was a not-at-home hour for Peggy, but unofficially she was home and privileged to rest in a négligée, and a corner of the divan, if she wished. And because one of her slippers of dull blue, a match to her négligée of the same shade, had lost itself under the divan, she expressly wished.

“Because,” she referred to her liking for autumn time, “the tones and the tints of this season of the year are the ones I like best. So, naturally, I like the season too.” Naturally. “Besides,” she went on, “the fall has always meant the beginning of new activities to me; the opening in a new part, a new city, maybe, a new show — and always the getting of new gowns and styles, that have ever been such a change from summer ones. The fall — well, it means new life to everything, except to the things that it puts to sleep for the winter. And they’re all the better for the autumn and the sleep,” she philosophised, thereby holding out a promise of all things well for the fall and its adoptions.

“In pictures, of course,” she went on, caressing the pillow that covered the foot, “the fall doesn’t typify all these things. For one season of the year is as busy as another on the picture stage. That’s what makes my work so different. When I came into pictures it was just as though I hadn’t worked on the stage at all, for I had to learn everything from the start. And so many people think that going into pictures from the stage is — well, is like going on a vacation.

“I felt that way myself once; but that was before I had started to work out my contract. It was only then I began to see that working before a camera was a serious occupation, and before long I realized is demanded the same amount of earnest preparation that a stage appearance does. Not in the memorizing of lines, of course, but in an instant and thorough grasp of what is expected of one.

“And the demand it makes upon one for clothes!” The eyes and hands of Peggy lifted themselves toward the buff ceiling and the sleeves of the dull blue négligée took the opportunity to slip back from the white, slender wrists of the Thanhouser days. “It’s not that the wear on them amounts to anything, but, my dear, it’s the variety.”

“Yes, but look at the result,” I murmured in defense of the public that rises up, men and women, and blesses the screen artist who does not wear the same suit, even the same two suits, throughout a picture.

“Exactly” returned she who is “Marguerite” Snow when her stateliness of manner asserts itself, as it does when she is on a favorite topic. “I prefer to see people dress the part, whatever that may be, and I know that appearance means a very great deal on the screen. Appearance is a study, and clothes are as much a part of this study as grease-paint and —”

“Wig?” I ventured, and Miss Snow returned the laugh that best suits her frolicsome name “Peggy.”

“Yes, — wig! Seriously, though, I believe in the doctrine of clothes.”

“Nobody could doubt it,” I answered, thinking of the films in which Miss Snow has proved the worth of this doctrine. And then, too, there was the night of the Thanhouser dance, on the coldest night of last winter, when Peggy Snow appeared in a stunningly severe gown of trailing black which set off, beautifully, her richness of hair and skin and eyes. And there was unmistakeable pride in the way which James Cruze introduced her as “my wife,” that night.

As the Countess Olga in “The Million Dollar Mystery” series, Marguerite Snow has all the scope in the world for her clothes creed. That though, is secondary, in consideration to what the Snow role really calls for; that is dramatic ability. And Miss Snow has it.

“It was my ambition for years before I started,” she said from out of her corner of the divan, on that day that the elusive slipper supplied a lone qualification for Miss Snow’s right to the title Cinderella.

“My father was a theatrical man and I began work with him when I was a little girl. We played a repertoire of all the plays a person thinks of, now, as having been the foundation of things theatrical. We traveled and worked together for years. When he died, I worked on by myself and made the coast-to-coast trip many times. Then I took a fancy to Washington, D. C. and played stock there at the Belasco theater for a time. After that I went under Henry W. Savage’s management and made a brunette College Widow.

“It was at the close of a season in this role, that I was one of a visiting party to the Thanhouser studio. It was my first intimate knowledge of the world of pictures and I was overwhelmed with the wonder of it. The whole party was invited into a scene and to my amazement. I was asked to work permanently in the company, after that little trial.

“And I’ve never lost my interest in the work for each new role brings with it a new problem of part and — yes, clothes,” she laughed at the recurrence of her favorite doctrine and then added seriously. “When you figure that the clothes I got for the Million Dollar Mystery series alone, cost me thousands of dollars, can’t you see how big a doctrine it is?”

There was no disbelief offered as a counter and Miss Snow returned to a further mention of those early days at the Thanhouser studio.

“The first pictures I worked in were ‘A Marble Heart,’ ‘A Woman’s Loyalty’ ‘She’ — that’s the one that introduced Jimmie” — (meaning “Jimmie” Cruze) — “into the company. Then there was ‘East Lynne,’ and ‘Undine,’ and ‘The Woman in White,’ and ‘Carmen,’ and ‘Dora Thorne.’ These are some of the early ones. It’s been three years since I came here and adopted the ‘Forty-five’ minute town for my own.

“We worked down in Florida one year; that was the time Jimmie and I got married. And since then we’ve played here in the east and have lots of joy which our friends share with us, here in this little apartment. Being right next to the studio, we’re always ready — sometimes,” she added with a laugh, thinking, I guessed, of the times she hasn’t been ready at the director’s call.

“But one can’t always be ready,” she apologized. I agreed and glanced in the general direction of the run-away slipper.

And standing on one foot, Peggy Snow-Cruze smiled a good-bye at the company whom she made at home during her official not-at-home hour.

Press “Finds” Child Actress

“Finds” in theatricals are numerous. Especially this is so when the press agent’s brain becomes weary and lax. Many a press man has “found” someone. Many of the “finds” have made good, and a great majority of them have fallen by the wayside.

The proof of the celluloid, however, is in the selling, this is the reason this “find” has not been discovered until this late date. “The Littlest Rebel” was produced three months ago. Mimi Yvonne, the child actress, played the role of Captain Carey’s seven year old daughter. That she was a child actress was not discovered until the unreeling of the six part Civil War drama a few days ago. The story of her discovery is interesting. She and her mother were crossing the Atlantic on their way from Liverpool, their home, to New York.

Frank A. Tichenor, general manager of the Photo Play Productions Company, became acquainted with little Mimi, and for five days watched her closely. On his arrival in New York he called on her mother at the Hotel Belmont, and there pleaded with her to let him use Mimi in the production of The Littlest Rebel. Mimi’s mother emphatically refused. Several visits followed, with the result that Mimi was finally permitted to “try out.”

The opening of The Littlest Rebel in Chicago at the Studebaker theater, has opened the eyes of Mr. Tichenor, for he had “discovered” that the press comments on little Mimi are indeed flattering, that the press and public have taken it upon themselves to star her in this dramatic attraction. Mimi will be seen shortly in another production the title of which will be announced later.

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Blackwell Working on First Subject

Carlyle Blackwell, late of the Famous Players and formerly leading man and director for Kalem, is now installed in his own studios in Los Angeles at the head of the Favorite Players Film Company.

The first subject which will be turned out by this popular star is to be an adaption from Charles Neville Buck’s novel, “The Key to Yesterday,” and will be four reels in length. Work on the production is now going forward with great rapidity and it will be ready for release within a short time.

Mr. Blackwell plans to produce one picture a month at the present time but will shortly add more players and increase the output. He is now negotiating with some of the most popular stars appearing before the camera to take the leading roles in adaptions from plays and novels which have met with unqualified success.

He is an actor whose appearance on the screen assures a finished performance and is also a director of exceptional ability.

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Owns Rights in Five States

A. M. Gollos, of the Photoplay Production Releasing Company, states that his advertisement in the last issue of Motography should have carried the announcement that he now owns the state rights on “The Littlest Rebel” for the states of Illinois, Wisconsin, Indiana, Minnesota and Michigan.

This film showed to approximately 52,000 people in four weeks at the Studebaker theater. The Vista theater, a new house opening at Forty-seventh and Cottage Grove Avenue, ran The Littlest Rebel on the first night to 3,500 people.

Mr. Gollos states that Jones, Linick and Schaefer have booked the film for the Orpheum, Keystone, Century, Plaza, Crystal, Garfield and Lyceum theaters with repeat options.

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Actress Awards Contest Prizes

Some time ago Princess Mona Darkfeather conducted a competition for children offering prizes for those who drew the best pictures of an Indian maiden. Over three thousand drawings were received and the prizes have been awarded. There were five classes, arranged according to age. Two of the first prizes went to America, one to Scotland and two to England.

Altogether the English children took far more pains with their drawings and took more prizes than their American cousins. Mona has sent special prizes to forty-six kiddies and has given away over three thousand photographs, for she sent one to each child who contributed to the competition.

Collection: Motography Magazine, September 1914