Rex Ingram — Directors I Have Met (1923) 🇬🇧
That was eleven or twelve years ago, and in so short a time he has made an enviable record. But, of course, it did not come overnight. He worked in the freight-yard of one of the big railroads, and when he had money enough, enrolled as a student in the School of Fine Arts at Vale University. He studied sculpture, as well as other branches of art, and his cleverness is illustrated in portraits of his work.
by Elizabeth Lonergan
It is easy to recognise Eric Von Stroheim [Erich von Stroheim] in the caricature reproduced above. That art experience has been most helpful in putting on pictures. The average director is a matter-of-fact person to whom the practical rather than the artistic appeals. Mr. Ingram combines the two qualities to a marked degree, and Ids pictures clearly demonstrate this.
You will be interested in some of his novel ideas about picture-making and picture acting. I asked if he considered stage experience necessary for screen acting.
“Stage experience often tends to produce the best players,” he said, “though there are times when an actor has become very stilted and mechanical; then, of course, he is of little use in screen work, unless he is particularly adaptable. But where one is clever, his work is a great delight to any director, because it is not necessary to instruct him, and the time saved can be used to good advantage by the busy producer. I consider that a man like Lewis Stone, well known on the English and American stage before he went into pictures, is an example of this sort.”
Just as the English director finds inspiration in pictures of another country, so does Mr. Ingram enjoy European pictures, seeking in them something different from the usual sort of offerings.
His dream, to produce in Europe, is to be realised. At the completion of his next picture, he plans to sail immediately for England, and will go location-hunting. A little later his company will follow, and a number of pictures will be made in England or on the Continent. This will be in May or June, depending entirely upon the completion of “Scaramouche,” which will be started as soon as he returns to the coast.
An electric megaphone for crowd scenes
Ingram in action.
Collection: Picturegoer Magazine, April 1923
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see also other entries of the Directors I Have Met series:
- 1923-02: Frank Lloyd
- 1923-03: Allan Dwan
- 1923-04: Rex Ingram
- 1923-05: Frederic Sullivan-Londoner
- 1923-06: James Cruze
- 1923-07: John Robertson
- 1923-08: J. Gordon Edwards
- 1923-09: Elmer Clifton
- 1923-11: Herbert Brenon
- 1924-01: Harold Shaw
- 1924-06: Al Christie
- 1924-11: Millard Webb
- 1925-11: John Francis Dillon