Marie Edith Wells (1915) 🇺🇸

The Frohman Amusement Corporation’s second release (the first was The Fairy and the Waif) will be entitled The Builder of Bridges. The play of the same name by Alfred Sutro was a great success.

Marie Wells has had considerable experience in motion picture work and recently was put up for competition amongst several astute motion picture makers who wanted the girl for her singular grace and beauty. For Marie is willowy and sylphlike as well as pleasing to see.

Jack Read of the Dyreda, W. L. Sherrill of the Gustave Frohman Amusement Corporation and Lewis J. Selznick of the World Film cast lots for the fair Marie, and Sherrill got her.

Miss Wells’ cleverness and ability as an actress will surely add prestige to Gustave Frohman’s screen offerings. George Irving, the director, thinks highly of the girl’s work, and George Irving, who hath drunk deeply of the Belasco tradition, is credited with knowing a good actress when he sees her. The Builder of Bridges is an English society drama with scenes in London and Egypt. Sutro, the author, was inspired by Pinero [Arthur Wing Pinero].

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“Hypocrites” Starts Row

Corsicana minister seeks injunction and gets a damage suit.

A week or two ago the Majestic Theater, Corsicana, Tex., booked the Hypocrites for a two days showing, one day for men only and the second day for women only. Mr. Putz, manager of the house, having heard so much about the picture, decided to have an advance showing for the ministers, newspaper men and city officials. He did so, and seven ministers, the mayor, several aldermen and most all the newspaper men in town came out to see the picture. After the performance Mr. Putz had a vote to see whether “to show, or not to show.” All were very much in favor of showing it with the exception of three ministers who voiced their sentiments in rather strong terms. “A disgrace to the State, the county and to the city,” they said. “One of the most memorable pictures ever thrown on a screen. If that picture is shown in Corsicana we will denounce it, as well as you and your show, through the pulpit and press.” Needless to say Mr. Putz did not show the picture.

A few days later the Texas Paramount Pictures Co. of Dallas, seeing there was no chance for a return engagement with the Majestic Theater, sent a representative to Corsicana to lease the Queen Theater (which had been closed for several weeks), to show the picture anyway. The deal was closed, the picture was billed like a circus, and on the advertised date the representative alighted in town with Hypocrites.

The show was opened on schedule time, 1 P. M., and by 2 o’clock the house was full of ladies. (First day was for ladies only). At 2.30 P. M. the deputy sheriff entered the house, asked for the proprietor or manager, served an injunction on him, signed by the seven ministers who had witnessed the performance at the Majestic, and closed the show. The Texas Paramount Picture Co. are now suing the seven ministers for $50,000 damages. The outlook for the ministers is pretty dark and the feeling is pretty strong on both sides.

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Edgar Lewis Gets a Horse

Moving picture actors celebrate director’s third anniversary in a new way.

Harry Spingler writes from Dahlonega, Ga., where Edgar Lewis is working with William Farnum and a big company, that an original celebration of Lewis’ third anniversary of his advent into filmdom was held there on Easter Monday. In his search for location Lewis has been riding a handsome horse, which he rented for the purpose from a mining engineer who is about to move away. It was quite a blow when the director learned Monday that the owner was going to take the horse with him, not wishing it to remain on a rental basis.

Learning that this was a memorable day to their director, the company negotiated the purchase of the horse and presented it to Lewis. One minute speeches were made by Mr. Farnum, Spingler, Claire Whitney, the leading woman, William Riley Hatch, George De Carlton, Elizabeth Ayer [Elizabeth Eyre] and W. J. Gross.

Although Lewis has been in the silent drama such a short time he has had a remarkable record for the production of big and successful features, among them being The Littlest Rebel, Capt. Swift, Northern Lights, Samson, The Gilded Fool, The Thief, with Dorothy Donnelly, The New Governor, and now The Plunderer, Roy Norton’s drama of the gold mines, which he dedicated to his friend, Rex Beach. Before entering the picture field Mr. Lewis was for many years a prominent producer for the speaking stage.

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A Canadian Frontier Picture.

A story of the Canadian frontier of the present day, entitled From Out the Big Snows, is now in course of production as a Vitagraph Broadway Star Feature, in three parts, under the direction of Theodore Marston. In that part already photographed, a thrilling scene is enacted where a pack of wolves attack James Morrison, a young adventurer, who has been tied to a tree in the heart of a forest by George Cooper, a half-breed Indian, the villain. Scenes in which the Northwest Mounted police figure conspicuously, a pistol duel between Donald Hall, as a doctor, and the half-breed, and action in a realistic frontier dance hall with Dorothy Kelly as Marie, the girl in the case, will furnish added thrills while the atmosphere of the tractless forest, clad in the white robes of winter, will give the picture an air of mystic realism. Bobby Connelly and Lillian Burns are the remaining members of the cast that enact the principal characters in From Out the Big Snows.

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Mangan Increases Popularity of Crescent.

It is quite apparent from efforts exerted by Francis A. Mangan, manager of the Crescent Theater, Boston Road and 168th Street, Bronx, New York City, that he is trying hard to make his house the most talked of in that part of the city. When Mr. Mangan took the management of the Crescent on his hands, the patronage of the house was rather meagre. He at once raised the price of admission from 5 to 10 cents and put on a better show. Then the stage decorations were altered and many other improvements made. The public quickly began to notice a change in the Crescent, which met with their approbation, and the patronage began to increase steadily.

An entertaining show can now always be found at the Crescent, and on holidays and around Yuletide and Easter special features are booked with no increase in admission price. On April 4, Easter Sunday, Selig’s eight part feature, The Spoilers, by Rex Beach, was shown, and the result was that the Crescent had one of its biggest, if not the biggest, days in its career as a picture theater. Mr. Mangan had to stop the sale of tickets, and hundreds of people were turned away at each show. Proper musical selections were rendered by a ten piece orchestra which helped materially to accentuate the feature parts of the drama. Another picture was also shown entitled, “A Storm on the Yellow Sea,” and it depicted the dangerous maneuverings of a Japanese torpedo boat on a rough sea. It was greeted with applause. For the rendition of the overture entitled Poet and Peasant, Mr. Mangan had devised a pretty and effective bit of stagecraft. Actual water tumbled with the noise of a cataract over imitation rocks and soil, and formed a lasting impression on the minds of the audience. The illusion was made more convincing by the artistic arrangement of the stage setting with its green trees, flowers and walks. Taken as a whole it was an artistic as well as a financial success.

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Victor Moore in “Snobs” at the Strand.

Jesse L. Lasky’s photodramatic production of Snobs, in which Victor Moore makes his screen stellar debut, will be the offering for the coming week at the Strand Theater. It is notable that Victor Moore in Snobs will thus have the honor of being the bill for the First Anniversary of the Strand, for the most noted of American photoplay institutions has now been just a year in existence.

Collection: Moving Picture World, April 1915