Taylor Fashions Funny Films (1918) 🇺🇸

His proudest achievement is his latest King-Bee Comedy, “The Slave,” which will make its debut sans subtitles.

Rex Taylor, the clever scenario writer, who has written several of the King-Bee comedies, was born in Des Moines, la., just thirty years ago. He started roaming around our glorious states when very young, and finally settled down in Jacksonville, Fla., where he has resided for the past eight years.

When very young his mother told him that she was going to make a lawyer out of him. As he had his heart set upon becoming a clog-dancer there was only one thing left for him to do — run away, and he did at the age of seventeen. He arrived in Chicago, where he had a school chum who was studying to become a mining engineer. After several attempts to get a position in a theatrical company, he decided to follow in his chum’s footsteps, and entered a prep school. Two years later he made a trip to the Far West as a mining engineer. Quite by accident he was given an opportunity to play a small part with the Selig company in Chicago about seven years ago. He soon developed into a juvenile actor and director.

Three years ago he wrote his first scenario. He sold his first two stories to the Lubin company. Mr. Taylor then wrote twenty-three comedies for the Black Diamond Company that were released on the Paramount program. Recently he has gone in for feature stories, and has disposed of three of these features to the Vitagraph company. Last winter, before joining the King-Bee staff, he wrote the stories of the Klever Pictures in which Victor Moore was starred. Mr. Taylor joined the Billy West aggregation about three months ago; he is under contract to them for one year, and will write the stories of the King-Bee releases until January, 1919. He is now at Hollywood.

The proudest event of his life is the fact that he is the author of the Billy West comedy entitled The Slave, the first comedy ever produced that does not need a subtitle. His wife, Irma Whepley Taylor, a native of California, is herself a clever writer, and collaborates with her husband on all his dramatic stories.

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Guarding the Wharton Studios.

Great precautions are being taken at the Wharton studios at Ithaca, N. Y., to guard them from injury by anybody interested in preventing or delaying the production of The Eagle’s Eye, the new serial founded on the story by William J. Flynn, Chief of the United States Secret Service, exposing Imperial Germany’s spy system in this country. Armed guards patrol the grounds day and night, and no one is permitted to enter the premises under any circumstances without a pass or without being identified by someone in authority. Manager Kent has turned the studios into very well regulated and picketed military camp, and is uncompromising in his rules.

A trade showing of several of the first episodes of The Eagle’s Eye, Secret Service Chief Flynn’s screen exposure of the Imperial German Government’s spy system in America, will be made shortly after January 1. Every exhibitor who will get in touch with the nearest Foursquare exchange will be informed of the exact date and sent an invitation.

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Simmons Summons S. R. D. Buying Committee.

C. Mell Simmons, general manager of the State Right Distributors, Inc., has telegraphed to the various members of this organization’s buying body, instructing them to meet in New York on Friday, January 4. This committee includes Sidney B. Lust, of Washington; J. T. Allen, of Toronto; Leon D. Netter, of Cleveland; D. M. Vandawalker, of Chicago; Harry Grelle, of Pittsburgh, and Nathan Hirsch, of New York. Mr. Simmons has devoted much time to the examining of productions now being offered by the independent manufacturers, and, having carefully culled out those that his body might be interested in securing, has arranged for a full day of private showings on January 4.

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“Devil’s Playground” Ready.

Fraternity Films, Inc., announces it is now prepared to launch the exploitation of its live-part production, The Devil’s Playground, featuring Vera Michelena, with a supporting cast in keeping. A trade showing will be held in its projection room in the Candler building during the coming week.

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Goldman Book in New York Library.

The Public Defender, in book form, which was written by Mayer C. Goldman, New York City attorney, and which furnished the theme for Harry Raver’s photodramatic production of the same name, has been added to the files of the New York Public Library.

Mr. Goldman’s work, which has been indorsed by upward of one thousand newspapers and magazines, is said to have reached a circulation running well over the two hundred thousand mark. Among the important daily newspapers that have praised The Public Defender are the New York Globe, New York Tribune, New York Herald, and the Evening Mail.

Many prominent and influential magazines have likewise lauded The Public Defender, both for its high literary quality and its power for good.

The screen version of The Public Defender was written by Mayer C. Goldman and Frank W. Harris, the latter being also a member of the New York bar. As a motion picture production, The Public Defender, which presents Frank Keenan, Alma Hanlon, and Robert Edeson, has received high praise from many of New York’s leading clergymen, educators, and jurists, and bids fair to become one of the most talked about photodramas of the coming year.

The Renowned Pictures Corporation controls the rights of The Public Defender for the United States and Canada.

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Export Activities.

Sidney Garrett, president of J. Frank Brockliss, Inc., and Ben Blumenthal, president of the Export and Import Film Co., Inc., since returning from Chicago last month have completed arrangements for marketing the Selig-Polyscope productions in all foreign countries, excluding Great Britain. This includes all the productions which the Selig Polyscope Company has made in the past and those which will be released in the future.

Having acquired the exclusive rights to the Selig pictures these two concerns now control a great part of the output of American productions. They control between them the foreign rights to Metro, Bernstein, King-Bee, Russian Art, Tweedledum comedies, cartoons, such productions as The Barrier, The Deemster, and have also negotiated for the purchase for different territories of The Submarine Eye and the First National Exhibitors’ Charlie Chaplins.

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Robert Priest Says:

Clune’s cinema attractions, The Eyes of the World and Ramona, which have been taken over by Shallenberger & Priest and are being sold on the state rights market, are creating great interest among shrewd buyers. The advertising and publicity campaign is about ready for launching, and when it is well under way there is no doubt but the interest manifested will be greatly increased.

Now that Peggy Hyland has departed from the Mayfair company for the Fox organization, Shallenberger & Priest are enthusiastic over the impetus thus given the production, Persuasive Peggy, which they handle, and which features the English actress. Marcus Loew has booked Persuasive Peggy to open on his circuit January 28.

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Olcott Production Scores.

The demand for the use of Sidney Olcott’s spectacle, The Belgian, at charity bazaars and patriotic entertainments is so insistent that the U. S. Exhibitors’ Booking Corporation, by which the production is being distributed throughout the world, has been compelled to devote one print exclusively to that purpose.

The most recent presentation of The Belgian was given at the Hotel Astor before the Theater Club on December 26. More than 500 women viewed the production. The production also was shown before the members of the Fine Arts Club recently, and dates have also been set for its presentation in Camp Upton, Mills, Dix, and Devens.

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Lambs see “Struggle Everlasting.”

Sunday, December 30, at their clubhouse, the Lambs were accorded a private showing of Harry Rapf’s seven-part production, The Struggle Everlasting, featuring Florence Reed in what is said to be one of her best picture endeavors. As many of this society were gamboling the night that Mr. Rapf presented his special showing at the Shubert theater they made special arrangements to view the film in a body on Sunday. Then, too, they were actuated by a desire to do honor to three of their members who played important parts in the making of the picture, Edwin Milton Royle, the author; James Kirkwood, the director, and Ben Musson, who adapted the scenario.

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Cleopatra Company Opens Offices.

A new tenant moved into Room 722 of the Longacre building on Monday, December 30 — the Cleopatra Film Company, which is offering the revised edition of the Helen Gardner version of Cleopatra, which, though made several years ago, has been added to, revised, cut, embellished and enhanced in general until it is said to be a 1918 spectacle in every degree. The new lithographic material, heralds, and advertising helps in general have all been prepared and are on exhibition in the new quarters for the gaze of all interested exhibitors and territorial buyers.

Collection: Moving Picture World, January 1918