Robert G. Vignola — Photoplay Stars I Have Directed (1917) 🇺🇸
(Editor’s Note. — In this age of specialization, when even a motion picture producer concentrates his energies upon the development of photoplay specialists in the various departments of his vast organization, it is interesting to find the motion picture director who is not a specialist and has devoted his energies to the creation of many types of photoplays with many different stars. There are today a great number of photoplay directors who have concentrated their activities upon one star to the exclusion of all others and have directed these particular stars in a long succession of pictures.
by Robert G. Vignola, Famous Players-Lasky Director
The advisability of thus arranging the schedule of production so as to confine a director to a single star is distinctly questionable. The opinion of Mr. Vignola tends toward the belief that the development of the director’s ability and of the star’s ability by interchanging stars and directors wherever it is feasible to do so, is the most beneficial method of production.)
One of the most valuable assets which I shall treasure as a part of my mental equipment is the delightful association with the several stars whom it has been my privilege to direct since I joined the Famous Players-Lasky forces nearly two years ago. If a director is worthy of the name it seems to me that he should have a clear understanding of human nature in all its manifold aspects, and I know of no fuller and more effective manner of studying character than by being intimately associated with a number of stars.
I know of a great many directors who prefer to confine their activities to the direction of a single star, in the belief that they can study and develop the individuality of that player; but it has always seemed to me that what we are striving to do is to present human nature upon the screen, rather than the characteristics of any one person; that is to say, the most effective production is, to my mind, the one in which every person in the audience instinctively feels that he or she has a part in the story itself.
If the individuality of the star is permitted to express itself upon the screen, to the disadvantage of the broader human traits which should be evident, it is very clear that the picture will fail in the primary attempt to gain the complete sympathy and understanding of the audience and to impart to the audience the feeling that it is vitally concerned in the action upon the screen.
Various names have been applied to this attempt to draw the audience out of itself. It has been called “projecting personality over the screen”; but after all it is merely developing the complex human side of every story to a point where it reaches out and touches the heart of the mass of the people. It has never seemed to me that the director who was forced to make an intensive study of one star could succeed in accomplishing this as successfully as one whose broader powers of observation had been ripened by intimate contact with a number of stars.
Personally, if it were possible, I should like to direct every single star on the Famous Players-Lasky roster at least once, for I am sure that I would learn a great deal from each one of them. As it is I have had the pleasure of directing Marguerite Clark, Pauline Frederick, Louise Huff, Hazel Dawn, Jack Pickford, Frank Losee and Owen Moore, and I would not have missed any one of these experiences for anything.
The studying of the characteristics of these various stars is a revelation in the complexities of human nature. It has also been my good fortune to have assigned me a wide diversity of stories for production, the fact these photoplays range from Mary Johnston and Booth Tarkington to Israel Zangwill and Charles Dickens, and that the stories themselves have embraced morality plays, comedies, pastoral dramas and near-French farces.
To revert to the subject of stars themselves, those who know Marguerite Clark only through her screen activities, probably think of her as a delightfully clever and thoroughly charming personality whose spontaneity arises purely from youthful exuberances. This is all true, but there is another side of Miss Clark which those who have been associated with her in the studio have found to be in reality a dominating factor in her tremendous success, for she is a profound student of the motion picture from every phase. She analyzes the stories in which she plays a part, and studies every possible means of making her character as effective as possible. When she steps upon the stage she has a clear and concise idea of her own role and of the story as a whole, and of the exact relation to the production played by the particular scene in which she is about to appear. Upon this foundation of careful thought she builds a characterization which is invariably convincing because it is based upon a profound study of human nature. When Miss Clark is playing a little girl, such as she played in “The Fortunes of Fifi,” she approaches every scene from the viewpoint of the little child, using her dramatic experience in interpreting the youthful viewpoint in the most effective manner possible. It is for this reason that one never feels that Miss Clark’s action upon the screen is forced, but rather that it is a spontaneous reaction to a given situation.
Though Pauline Frederick is apparently the antithesis of Marguerite Clark, and has given the screen very different types of roles from those in which Miss Clark has starred, at the same time these two stars have at least a few points in common. Both have reduced the art of appearing artless to an absolute science; both have studied the drama and the photoplay from every conceivable point of view; and both have come from the stage to the screen after winning success before the footlights. I do not hesitate to say that I have received many valuable suggestions from Miss Clark and Miss Frederick in the staging of productions in which they have starred, and that I will always be glad to receive similar suggestions from any stars whose opinions are so valuable as are those of Miss Clark and Miss Frederick.
Miss Frederick is a remarkable example of the impetuous actress who is at the same time highly intellectual. Many times in the course of some big dramatic scene Miss Frederick has made an impulsive expression or gesture which has far succeeded in effectiveness anything that could be devised by hours of rehearsing. It is because she does this that Miss Frederick is always fresh and interesting upon the screen and never gives the impression of studied dramatic action. I believe her to be one of the best-read women in professional life, and she is certainly one of the most interesting and best-informed talkers that it has been my privilege to meet.
Louise Huff, whom I have directed in a simple little Quaker story and in adaptations of “Great Expectations” and Seventeen, is a delightful example of success won by circumstances exactly opposite from those attending Miss Clark and Miss Frederick. Practically inexperienced upon the stage, little Louise Huff first won her success through personal charm and native ability. She was by no means an experienced actress when she first became a photoplayer, but everyone who saw her on the screen was instantly captivated by her delightful personality. Not content, however, with this form of success, little Miss Huff set about a herculean task of mastering the photoplay. That she is today an accomplished actress and that she has, if anything, increased the charm of her personality is, I think, undisputed. Certainly her popularity is steadily increasing.
One of the most interesting stars with whom I have come in contact is Jack Pickford. Here is a youth who has fought his way to the top despite the handicap of being the younger brother of one of the most popular stars that has ever appeared on the screen. Appearing at first in support of his illustrious sister, Jack has steadily worked his way upward from minor roles to parts of primary importance, until he is today a star in his own right. Though proud of his sister, he has always resented being regarded as “Mary Pickford’s brother,” and has insisted that he rise or fall according to his own accomplishments. Everyone who has been associated with him in the studio has admired his attitude, and I am very sure that he is as popular among his associates as he is upon the screen. Jack has endeared himself to his directors by his willingness to do anything that is requested, regardless of the physical dangers involved or the humiliation to his pride.
Of all the players that I have met, Frank Losee, a veteran of the stage, is the most interesting. He has never permitted his many years’ experience before the footlights to becloud the fact that in becoming a photoplayer he was entering a new sphere of activity. With many successful years upon the stage behind him, he entered the Famous Players studio as a self-styled rookie, and he has played more successful character roles in support of the various stars, and in several productions in which he himself was featured, than any other player.
From each one of these stars, and from the many distinguished players who have appeared in their support in the numerous productions over which I have presided, I have received a liberal education in human nature which has proven invaluable to me in the interpretation of photoplays, and I take this means of acknowledging the intangible debt to my fellow workers.
—
Hero of Screenland Explores Cowland
Here we have photographic proof that George Walsh, the William Fox star, likes the cows and — perhaps he sees the chickens in the distance. At any rate James J. Jeffries, the big fellow to the left, who once was the champion gladiator of the world, evidently enjoyed having George as his guest on his cattle ranch in sunny California.
—
Harold Lockwood — The Silent Trend
Harold Lockwood and the Yorke-Metro Company have caught the spirit of the times admirably. They have rushed to the rescue by contributing a departure from the serious in photoplay — a rescue in which all producers must co-ordinately participate for the good of the state of the public mind. The sordid must disappear from the screen. Even the ordinary life tragedy must go unless it has the redemption a happy finale affords. The present grim reality provides more than enough worry, and therefore our fiction must be light and diverting. In the latest Lockwood feature, “The Haunted Pajamas,” we are given little else but screamingly amusing comedy, the very prescription which is sure to cure the mental ailments the stress of the world war produce. Everything is funny in this picture. Even the title forces a smile. It is, moreover, notable because it brings to us our debonair Harold with light society comedy salad a la toothsome for the first time. Always heretofore he has been the hero who has had to battle for his happiness. Now we see him as a natural comedian. The story is replete with clever and intricately confusing situations, which, brought about by the haunting of a pair of Oriental pajamas some three thousand years before they fall into the hands of the “hero,” weave a net of extraordinary circumstances. Another noteworthy feature of “The Haunted Pajamas” is, it is the vehicle by which Carmel Myers, a sixteen-year-old discovery of D. W. Griffith and the daughter of a well-known Jewish Rabbi, rides into prominence as a leading lady. Miss Myers makes good, the picture makes good, and Mr. Lockwood makes decidedly good.
The marvels of animated photography will never end. Now comes another amazing moving picture “snapped” under the sea. It is called “The Submarine Eye,” and it is the clever work of the Williamson Brothers [J. Ernest Williamson | George M. Williamson], who gave to the world a remarkable picture version of Jules Verne’s “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.” In The Submarine Eye is introduced a marvelous invention — an inverted periscope which points the way to effectual preparedness against skulking U-boats and other perils of the mighty deep. Besides giving a vivid view of “scenes” no human being could ever hope to see without the aid of the clever water-defying devices of the Williamsons a thrilling upside-down aspect is given to the whole thing, which makes you gasp your surprise while you’re broadening your knowledge by leaps and bounds. Adroitly woven in all this unusual action is a gripping story of a castaway whose buried treasure is found many years after he had perished. It is then lost at sea and is recovered with the aid of the extraordinary periscope. We must all pay homage to the genius of the Williamson Brothers — George and Ernest — because they have enriched the screen with its most astounding wonders of nature. By all means, Fans and Fanettes, let no opportunity go by to see The Submarine Eye.
The story of a country lad, whose feet, A accustomed to roughly plowed fields, carry him to Broadway and riches and back home again to save those who misunderstood him, cannot be otherwise than interesting to the average American who takes very keen interest in meteoric successes. Therefore Charles Ray, in “The Clodhopper,” is sure to enjoy a national popularity. In this excellent photoplay we see Ray as Everett Nelson, a raw country lad, in his daily grind as his father’s hired man — all work and no play. He has no fun innings, and his only companions are his mother and Mary Martin, who lives on the adjoining farm. Finally the boy breaks with his close-fisted father, which leads him to New York, where he scores a hit with his natural and inimitable dancing. Mary goes to New York to impart the disturbing knowledge of his father’s impending financial doom, and the son grasps the opportunity to return good for harshness to his parent by saving him from ruin. The narrative comes to a satisfactory conclusion in the midst of a series of exciting moments, and you feel you’ve spent your time profitably in watching it all.
Collection: Photoplay Magazine, July 1917
(The Photo-Play Journal for July, 1917)