BREAKING INTO

THE MOVIES

CASTING THE PICTURE

This is a typical scene in a casting director's office. Mr. Emerson and Miss Loos, with their stenographer, are studying the faces of the applicants. When a type exactly suited to the story is found, she is sent direct to the studio to begin work.

Copyright, 1921, by

THE JAMES A. McCANN COMPANY

All Rights Reserved

PRINTED IN THE U. S. A.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE

• Introduction [1]
• What the Jobs Are [5]
• Acting for the Screen [9]
• Would You Film Well? [12]
• Make-Up [17]
• How to Dress for a Picture [22]
• Movie Manners [26]
• Reading Your Part [29]
• Inside the Brain of a Movie Star [33]
• Salaries in the Movies [38]
• Scenarios [41]
• How Others Have Done It [44]
• Amateur Movie Making [49]

• Introductory Note to Part II [53]
• Red Hot Romance [55]

ILLUSTRATIONS

• Casting the Picture Frontispiece
• Facing Page

• Rouging the Lips for the Camera [17]
• Making up the Eyes [18]
• Glueing on a Crêpe Mustache [20]
• Rehearsing the Company [29]
• Testing Make-Up and Expression [42]
• Making a "Close-Up" [50]

BREAKING INTO
THE MOVIES

Breaking Into the Movies

CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION

Were the average man suddenly called upon to assemble all the women in his town who looked like Mary Pickford, he might find himself at a loss as to how to commence. In fact, he might even doubt that there were sufficient persons answering this description to warrant such a campaign.

We know a way to get them all together on twenty-four hours' notice. Just insert a small advertisement in the local newspaper, reading:

"Wanted for the movies—a girl who looks like Mary Pickford—apply at such-and-such a studio to-morrow morning."

We guarantee that not only will every woman who looks like Mary Pickford be on the spot at sunrise, but that a large preponderance of the entire female population will drop in during the morning. For it is a puzzling but indisputable fact that everybody wants to break into the movies.

The curious part of it all is that the movies really need these people.

On the one hand are countless men and women besieging the studio doors in the hope of starting a career in any one of a thousand capacities, from actress to scenario writer, from director to cameraman. There are people with plots, people with inventions, people with new ideas of every conceivable variety, all clamoring for admission. And, on the other hand, there are the men who manage the movies sending out all manner of exhortations, appeals and supplications to just such people to come and work in their studios. They drown each other's voices, the one calling for new talent and new types, the many for a chance to demonstrate that they are just the talent and types that are so in demand.

This economic paradox, this passing in the night of Demand and Supply, has come about through a general misconception of everything concerned with the movies.

The first to be in the wrong were the producers. They built up an industry which, in its early days, was vitally dependent upon individual personalities. A picture, according to their views, was made or unmade by a single star or director or writer, and very naturally they were loath to entrust the fate of a hundred thousand dollar investment to untried hands. While on the one hand they realized the pressing need for new blood in their industry, they were, nevertheless, very wary of being the first to welcome the newcomer. Producers preferred to pay twenty times the price to experienced professionals, no matter how mediocre their work might have been in the past, than to take a chance on a promising beginner. The business side of the movies, has, in the past, been nothing more nor less than a tremendous gamble wherein the men who had staked their fortunes on a single photoplay walked about in fear of their very shadows—desiring new ideas, yet afraid to risk testing them, calling for new artists yet fearing to give them the opportunity to break in. The very nature of the industry was responsible for this situation and, to a large extent, it is a condition which still prevails in a majority of the smaller studios. The greatest obstacle which every beginner must surmount is the one which first confronts him—the privilege of doing his first picture—the first chance.

The larger companies, however, in the last year or so have awakened to the fact that by excluding beginners they have themselves raised the cost of motion picture production many times. They have found themselves with a very limited number of stars and directors and writers and technical men to choose from, all of whom, for this very reason, could demand enormous salaries. One by one these companies are instituting various systems for the encouragement of embryo talent. Now, if ever, is the time to break into the movies.

But much more to blame for the general mix-up in the movies are the beginners themselves. In the majority of cases they state in loud, penetrating accents that they desire to break into the movies, here and now; but when questioned as to the exact capacity in which they desire to accomplish this ambition, they appear to be a bit hazy. Anything with a large salary and short hours will do, they say. The organization of the business and the sordid details connected with the various highly specialized jobs in the studios concern them not at all. They let it go with an unqualified statement that they want to break in the worst way—and generally they do.

Now making movies is not child's play. It is a profession—or rather a combination of professions—which takes time and thought and study. True, there are fortunes to be made for those who will seriously enter this field and study their work as they would study for any other profession. But unfortunately, most of those who head towards the cinema studios do not take time to learn the facts about the industry. They do not look over the multitude of different highly specialized positions which the movies offer and ask themselves for which one they are best suited. They just plunge in, so intent upon making money at the moment that they give no thought at all to the future.

Therefore, in writing this series, we shall start with an old saw—a warning to amateurs to look before they leap. No industry in the world presents so many angles, varying from technical work in the studio, to the complexities of high finance. If you really wish to break into the movies, go to the studios and see for yourself what you are fitted for. Perhaps you think you are an actor, and are really a first rate scenarioist. Perhaps you have an ambition to plan scenery, and instead find that your forte lies in the business office. Men who started as cameramen are now directors. Men who started as directors have ended as highly successful advertising managers. So there you are. You pay your money—and—if you are wise—you take your choice.

CHAPTER II
WHAT THE JOBS ARE

Most people seem to think there are concerned in the making of motion pictures just four classes of people—actors, scenario writers, directors and cameramen. It all seems very simple. The scenario writer sits down in the morning and works out a scene; he wakes up the director, who packs some actors and a cameraman in an automobile, together with a picnic lunch, and goes out to make the picture on some lovely hillside. Then, having finished the photoplay, they take it around to your local theater and exhibit it at twenty-five cents a seat.

As a matter of fact, the movies, now the fifth national industry in the United States, has as many phases, and as many complexities as any other industry in the world.

Broadly speaking, the movies are made up of alliances between producing companies and distributing companies. For example, the Constance Talmadge Corporation produces the photoplays in which Miss Talmadge is starred, and this Company is allied with the First National Exhibitors Circuit which takes the completed film and sells it to theater managers in every part of the world. The Constance Talmadge Corporation's duty is to make a photoplay and deliver it to the First National Exhibitors Circuit; the latter company duplicates the film in hundreds of "prints," advertises it, rents it to exhibitors, and sees to the delivery of the film. In the same way, Nazimova makes comedies and releases them through the Metro Corporation, her distributor.

The great distributing companies employ the salesmen, advertising experts, business men, and so forth. All the technical work concerned with the making of the picture, however, is in the hands of the producing company, and, since we are engaged in such work ourselves, it is about these posts that we must talk.

If we are to take the studio jobs in their natural order, the first to begin work on a picture is, of course, the author. Each studio employs a scenario editor who is on the lookout for good magazine stories or plays or original scripts. He himself is not so much a writer as an analyst, who knows what kind of stories his public wants; generally he is an old newspaperman or an ex-magazine editor. Having bought the story, he turns it over to a scenarioist—the "continuity writer." This type of specialist is much in demand, since no story can survive a badly constructed scenario.

The scenario writer puts the story into picture form exactly as a dramatist may put a novel into play form for the stage. It is the scenarioist or continuity writer who really gives to the story its screen value—hence the very large prices paid for this work when it is well done. Next in line is the director, who takes the scenario and sets out to make the picture.

There is a shortage of directors at present, and for that reason, salaries are particularly high in this line, but of course, direction is a profession which takes many years of study.

In beginning work on his picture, the director first consults the studio manager, who is really the head of the employment office. The studio manager consults with him as to the expenses of the scenery and the length of time to be spent in making the picture and then summons the technical staff.

The technical staff of a studio is a rather large assembly. There is the art director, who plans the scenery, the technical man who directs the building, the casting director, who selects the actors, the electrician, who assists in working out the lighting effects, the laboratory superintendent, who must supervise the developing of the film, the cutters, who assemble the completed film, and last, but not least, the cameraman. Of course there are hundreds of minor posts—assistant director, assistant cameraman, property man, research experts, location seekers, and so forth.

The casting director immediately sends out a call for the "types" demanded in the scenario. If possible, he notifies the actors and actresses personally, but more often he is forced to get in touch with them through the numerous agencies which act as brokers in "types." The Actors' Equity Association is now doing excellent work in supplying actors for pictures at the lowest possible cost to the actor in the way of commissions. Presently a large number of actors and actresses appear at the studio and the casting director selects from them the individuals best suited to the coming production. Beginners are warned against grafting agents who on any pretense whatever charge more than the legal 5% commission. They are also warned against signing "exclusion" contracts with any agent, as this frequently compels the actor to pay double commissions.

Meanwhile the art director has built his scenery, and the picture goes "into production." At the end of some six weeks or two months, the directors turn the completed film over to the assembling and cutting department. As a rule both the director and the scenario writer work with the assembler and cutter, and if they are wise, they insist on doing the cutting themselves, for the success of the picture depends largely upon this important operation of assembly. At the same time, another specialist designs and works out the illustrations on the borders of the written inserts. Finally the assembled picture is shown to the studio staff, and if they are satisfied, the negative is forwarded to the distributing company. The studio's work on that picture is ended.

From this brief survey, you can see that the avenues for breaking into the movies are almost unlimited. You can be an actor, director, cameraman, scene builder, cutter, titler, scenario writer, or anything else if you will begin at the bottom and learn the game. All of these positions are highly paid and all require a high knowledge of motion picture technique.

The important thing is to start—to get into the studio, in any capacity. Then choose the type of work in which you desire to rise, and learn it. Everybody will help you and encourage you if you start this way, instead of trying the more common but less successful method of starting at the top and working down.

CHAPTER III
ACTING FOR THE SCREEN

In New York resides a dramatic critic, now on the staff of a great newspaper, who has his own ideas about movie acting. The idea in question is that there is no such thing as movie acting—and the gentleman carries it out by refusing to allow the word "acting" to be printed in any of the notices and reviews in his newspaper. When he wishes to convey the thought that such and such a star acted in such and such a picture he says, "Miss So-and-So posed before the camera in the motion picture."

Now this critic is a good critic, as critics go, but he would be improved physically and mentally by a set of those monkey glands which the medicos are so successfully grafting upon various ossified personalities. Anyone who thinks that there is no such thing as motion picture acting is probably still wondering whether the Germans will win the war. Motion picture acting is a highly developed art, with a technique quite as involved as that of the legitimate stage.

The fundamental principle to remember in undertaking screen acting is that the camera demands far greater realism on the part of the actor than the eyes of an audience. An actor in the spoken drama nearly always overplays or underplays his part. If he recited the same lines in the same tone with the same gestures in real life, he would appear to be just a little bit spiffy, as they say in English drinking circles. On the stage it is necessary to overdraw the character in order to convey a realistic impression to the audience; exact naturalism on the stage would appear as unreal as an unrouged face under a spotlight.

The camera, however, demands absolute realism. Actors must act as naturally and as leisurely as they would in their own homes. Their expressions must be no more pronounced than they would be in real life. Above all, they must be absolutely unconscious of the existence of the camera.

Any deviation from this course leads to the most mortifying results on the screen. The face, enlarged many times life size, becomes clearly that of an actor, rather than a real character. The assumed expression of hate or fear which would seem so natural on the stage is merely grotesque in the film. Unless the actor is really thinking the things he is trying to portray on the screen, the audience becomes instantly aware that something is wrong.

In the same way the camera picks up and accentuates every motion on the part of the actor. An unnecessary gesture is not noticed on the stage. On the screen, enlarged many times, it is instantly noted.

The two most important rules to follow, then, in motion picture acting are: act as you would under the same circumstances in real life, and eliminate all movement and gesture which does not bear on the scene. It is better not to move at all than to make a false move.

Beginners must adjust their walk to the camera. There is no rule for this, however, as every individual's way of standing and walking is different. Only through repeated tests can the beginner discover and correct the defects which are sure to appear in his physical pose the first time he acts before a camera.

Often in making a picture, the director will instruct his cast to "speed up" or "slow down" their scene. Sometimes, also, he will alter the tempo of the scene by slowing down or speeding up the rate at which the camera is being cranked. Beginners must follow such instructions to the letter, for the timing of a scene is a vitally important part of picture production and a duty which is entirely in the hands of the director.

The best way to learn the principles of motion picture acting is to watch the making of as many scenes as possible before attempting to act one. Most of the stars of to-day learned their art by watching the efforts of others before the camera. Only by constant observation in the studio and, more important, in real life, where the actions and reactions of real people can be noted, can an actor hope to become proficient.

CHAPTER IV
WOULD YOU FILM WELL?

Probably the number of people who have not at one time or another wondered in a sneaking sort of way if they wouldn't look pretty well on the screen is limited to the aborigines of Africa. And, believe it or not, two of the aborigines themselves applied at our studio for jobs not long ago. They had acted in several travelogue pictures, taken in darkest Africa, had traveled as porters with the company to the coast, and had finally become so enamored of the work that they "beat" their way all the way to America, with an English vocabulary limited to about fifty words, twenty-five of which were highly profane. It just goes to show that we are all human. Needless to say, both beauty and character are the characteristics in demand in the films, as everywhere else. The curious fact is that faces which in real life possess great beauty or deep character, frequently fail to carry this across to the camera.

The chief reason for this lies in the fact that the camera does not accept color values, and at the same time accentuates many defects which are ordinarily imperceptible to the eye. For example, a wonderful type of Italian beauty appeared at our studio while we were casting "Mama's Affair" for Constance Talmadge. She had never before appeared in motion pictures, and our casting director was quick to seize the opportunity to make a test of her face. When the picture was shown, her extraordinarily fine coloring of course went for nothing, and her beauty was entirely marred by the inexplicable appearance of a fine down over her upper lip and a large mole on her left temple. Both the mole and the down had been entirely unnoticed in daylight, but under the fierce mercury lights of the studio and the enlarging lenses they made her face grotesque. At another time we attempted to make a leading man of a famous war hero. This boy had been a college athlete and had subsequently distinguished himself as a bayonet fighter on four battlefields. When his test films were projected, to the astonishment of everyone he appeared as an anæmic, effeminate stripling, whose every gesture aroused the ridicule of the audience.

The skin of the face must be entirely smooth and unbroken. The slightest eruption or blemish is visible on the screen, especially in this day when "close-ups" are the vogue. The teeth must be perfect.

Considerations which do not matter in the slightest degree in facial beauty on the screen are those of coloring and of fineness of the features. The pinker a woman's cheeks may be, the hollower they appear to the camera, for red photographs as black, and a face which is beautiful, but coarse in its outline, frequently photographs quite as well as the beautiful face which is exquisite in every detail.

A screen star should be equally beautiful in every expression and from every angle. This is not so true of the stage star, for when she is moving about, speaking and gesticulating, the question of her beauty becomes comparatively unimportant. On the screen, however, important scenes are always taken in "close-ups" wherein the star, whether portraying rage or pain, love or hate, must be equally charming, at the risk of making a permanently bad impression upon her audience.

Many people who are beautiful when seen in "full face" are most unattractive in profile. In fact, the matter narrows down still further, for quite often those who have a lovely profile are, for some inexplicable reason, gross and unattractive when the face is turned to show three-quarters. A number of the present movie stars have risen to the top despite such impediments by stipulating in all their contracts that they be never shown in close-up in the pose in which they are unattractive. One star in particular never shows the left side of her face for this reason. This, however, is obviously a great handicap.

The male types which are most in demand are not those whose appeal is through physical beauty. Audiences are sick of large-eyed, romantic heroes, and are demanding a little manly force and character in their heroes.

To film well, a man's head should be large, rugged, with the features cut in masses, like a Rodin bust. Whether he is attempting to play "juveniles," "leads" or "heavies" his face must possess the cardinal requisites of character. Deep-set eyes, a strong chin, a jutting forehead, a prominent nose, are all desirable. Again, the high cheekbones and long face appear desirable characteristics. William S. Hart's success depends largely on these two simple characteristics of facial structure.

Neither in men nor in women is the hair an essential for screen beauty. Wigs and trick arrangements of the hair are a function of the make-up department, and a man or woman with no hair at all could still be made to appear most attractive to the unsophisticated camera.

In analyzing your own face, then, ask yourself the following questions:

Are my eyes large?

Is my skin fine and well kept?

Is my mouth small and are my teeth good?

Is my nose straight?

Has my face character, something which makes it not only beautiful, but which portrays the underlying personality?

If you can answer these questions in the affirmative you may have a career before you in the motion pictures. If you cannot answer any of them but the last in the affirmative, you may still be successful as a movie actor, for "types"—whether of gunmen or millionaires, villains or saints—are much in demand. One man has made himself a small fortune by playing parts in which a particularly villainous expression were required—such as dope fiends. Another chap, in the Western studios, has made a good living for years by acting "stained glass saints," having been equipped by nature with an unusually æsthetic expression.

In any case, if you are to essay a career in the movies, remember that your natural characteristics are all that count. Tricks of rolling the eyes or puckering the lips or setting the jaw are buncombe and are instantly discovered by the camera.

Be natural. Keep healthy and happy. That, in the movies, as in real life, is the way to charm and beauty.

CHAPTER V
MAKE-UP

Rouging the Lips for the Camera

Red photographs black, so particular care must be taken in rouging the lips for movie work. John Emerson is helping May Collins with her make-up, while Anita Loos and the director, Victor Fleming, give suggestions.

Although most women use cosmetics in their every-day life, they are lamentably ignorant of the principles of make-up. For example, not one woman in a hundred knows that she should never rouge her face until she has put on her hat, since the shadow and line of the hat changes the whole color and composition of her face. The average man's knowledge of the subject is limited to the use of powder after shaving. And yet thousands of men and women secure work in the mob and ensemble scenes in the movies and find themselves expected to make up for the camera, the most difficult task of all, with no previous instruction whatsoever. No wonder they are discouraged when they see themselves peering out from the crowd scene with a face they hardly recognize themselves.

Nevertheless, almost all the stars of to-day—Norma Talmadge, Constance Talmadge, Mary Pickford, and dozens of others—have risen from these mob scenes. Their faces, even when seen among hundreds of others, attracted instant attention. Perhaps it was natural beauty. Perhaps, too, they had, by accident or design, solved at the start the great problem which confronts all movie actors, that of finding the correct make-up.

Movie make-up strives only for a photographic effect and has no relation to street or stage make-up. Almost every face contains numerous imperfections which are invisible to the eye, yet which, when enlarged many times on the screen, are very obvious. There are fundamental rules of make-up, but the only way to perfect your technique is by constantly viewing your own "stills" and movies, and changing your make-up to the best advantage.

Red photographs black, and for this reason rouge is little used in the studios, except for special effects. Rouge on the cheeks gives the illusion of dark shadows and makes the face look hollow; it deepens the eyes, and is sometimes used on the eyelids for this reason. Light carmen may be used on the lips.

To start your make-up you will need cold cream, special yellow film powder, film grease paint, and a soft towel. Massage your face with cold cream and then remove it with the towel, so that the surface is absolutely clean. Then apply your grease paint with the fingers, and cover every bit of the face from the collar-line to the hair.

When you have a smooth, even surface of grease paint, spread special film powder upon it and pat it in lightly with a powder puff. There are a number of shades of grease paint and by changing the grease tint before applying the powder you can darken or lighten your complexion in accordance with your part. Before going further, make sure there are no blotches on your make-up's surface and that the grease has left no sheen.

Making Up the Eyes

The eyes are the most expressive of the features and their make-up is correspondingly important. Here John Emerson and Anita Loos are helping Basil Sydney, the noted English actor, to darken his eyes in accordance with movie technique.

The eyes are the most important and expressive features. The make-up which relates to them is all important. First you must ascertain by actual test the correct color with which to line your eyes. Almost every color is used, for the effect seems to vary with different faces. Black, blue, green, brown and red are all used in varying proportions and mixtures by different actors. Naturally, you should try to find the color which makes your eyes look deepest and most luminous.

The edge of the upper eyelid is clearly lined. Then the shade is worked back toward the eyebrow, getting constantly lighter, until it finally blends with the grease paint of the face. The process is reversed for the lower lid, which is darkest at the edge and grows lighter as you work down.

Your eyelids should be lined with black cosmetic. Do not bead them. This shows clearly in close-ups and looks rather ridiculous. The slapstick comedy people sometimes use beaded eyelids to burlesque the "baby-doll" expression.

The corners of the eyes are shadowed with brown or red. It is this shadowing that gives most of the character to the eyes; but at the same time it is apt to age the whole face. For this reason it must be done in conjunction with actual tests.

Finally, apply light carmen to your lips and make sure you do not overdo it.

There are numerous special recipes for producing pallor, scars, bruises, and the like. Blackface make-up is done most successfully with charred cork dust mixed with water to produce a heavy paste. Tom Wilson, the best known player of negro parts in the movies, who played in "The Birth of a Nation," and more recently in our own special production, "Red Hot Romance," advises amateurs to use this recipe and, further, to high-light the natural lines of their faces by scraping off the cork with a sharp stick, wherever a line is to show, and letting the natural white of the skin appear.

High-lighting for most character parts is a special art. Such characters as Indian faces or the weather-beaten and wrinkled countenance of an old sea captain may be done in brown with white high-lights. You should ask your cameraman to help you with high-lighting, as it is very difficult.

There are tricks of make-up which alter the entire character of the face. For example, by shading the outline of the face with red you can make it appear much thinner. In this case the grease paint is slightly reddened—or, if you desire, darkened—near the ear-line. If you desire to make your face rounder and fuller reverse the process and lighten the grease paint at its outer edge.

If your eyebrows and hair are dark, you can tinge them gray by rubbing the hair with mascaro and then combing. If they are light, white and black grease paint, applied alternately and then combed, will do the trick. Beards and bushy eyebrows are made of crêpe hair and glued on with spirit gum. As a matter of fact, if you are really serious about making a career of movie acting, it is best to grow, so far as possible, the hirsute appendages required in your parts. For an unshaven tramp or a Robinson Crusoe effect, for example, it is much better to go unshaven for a week or so than to produce a false effect by attempting to imitate the real thing with crêpe hair.

Glueing on a Crêpe Hair Mustache.

John Emerson is affixing a villainous mustache to Frank Stockdale. Spirit gum and crêpe hair are used.

Finally, lest you be left in the position of the man who starts his first ride on a motorcycle without knowing how to shut the power off, we may add that all this nasty mess of grease paint and powder and gum and hair will come off in an instant when cold cream is applied. It is hard to feel natural in make-up at first; but presently you will forget that you have it on at all.

All of the necessary cosmetics may be secured through any drug store or theatrical costumer. If you want to find out how you will look in the movies, it is not necessary to have a film test made. Just buy some make-up and have someone take a few "close-ups" of your head with an ordinary camera. But do not retouch the negatives—for movies are not retouched, you know.

Look for imperfections of every sort in pose and expression. Then try to find a make-up which will eradicate them. If you solve your make-up problem before you go to the studio you will be well repaid. Among the dozens of flat, uninteresting countenances a well made-up face stands out and attracts the attention of the director at once.

CHAPTER VI
HOW TO DRESS FOR A PICTURE

There is only one drawback to the pleasurable life of the movie actor or actress. They draw big salaries; they get their names in the papers and are deluged with "fan" letters to such an extent that special postal departments are installed in their offices; the work is interesting and the hours comparatively short. But, alas, they have to have a lot of clothes.

To be sure, the buying of clothes is a most pleasurable experience to all women and to many men. And, forsooth, if they draw big salaries, why cavil about the cost of replenishing a wardrobe every now and again?

The fact is, the wardrobes are not replenished every now and again; they are constantly in a state of replenishment, and for that reason the average actor's bank account, no matter how big the salary, is also in constant need of being similarly replenished. For every new scene is apt to require completely new gowns and suits, and, in the case of the actors who play the more important parts, no two suits or gowns can be worn in any two pictures or the fans will be sure to discover it and write uncomplimentary letters to the studio.

In the case of the beginner, however, no such expenses need be met if he or she has one complete wardrobe to start with. People playing minor characters must dress for the part at their own expense, but no one notices or cares whether they wear the same clothes with which they recently graced the studio next door. If they play a part requiring a special dress or uniform the management will supply it without charge.

It is rather difficult for a newcomer to the movies to know exactly what clothes are required for their wardrobe. Therefore we are including the following comments on clothes and styles, as applied to motion picture work:

Men should have at least three business suits, one of which should be light and one dark.

For summer scenes, white flannels, with a blue coat and a soft shirt—not a sport shirt—are required. White duck shoes complete this outfit. Tweed suits are the proper thing for wear in the country club scenes and in most pictures calling for scenes on English estates.

For dress wear three outfits are necessary. There is the cutaway for afternoon weddings, society teas, and so forth, a Tuxedo for club scenes and semi-dress occasions, and finally, full dress for balls and dinners where ladies are in the scene. A dark four-in-hand or bow tie, with a stand-up or wing collar, should be worn with the cutaway, and regulation dress bow ties, black with the dinner coat and white with the dress suit. These clothes are an essential part of a motion picture actor's outfit.

The great difficulty with young actors is a tendency to overdress and to attempt to hide bad tailoring with a flashy design and a freak cut of the coat. Since clothes are an actor's stock in trade, he should patronize only the best, if the most expensive tailors, and stick to conservative lines unless the part requires eccentric dressing. Jewelry should be avoided, unless called for in the character; cuff links and a watch chain are all that should be worn, with the exception of dress studs with the dinner or dress coat.

Girls will need a simple afternoon suit and an outer coat to match. They must have two summer frocks, a sailor blouse with a dark skirt, negligée, and an evening gown and wraps. Hats to match are necessary, of course, as are dancing slippers and white duck shoes.

The evening gown is perhaps the most important part of the young actress's wardrobe, since she is more apt to be called in for ball and dinner scenes than any other. Simplicity should be the keynote of such gowns. Simple French models are very attractive, but few women can wear them well, since most American girls are too broad in the shoulders for the Parisian styles.

Clothes for character parts must be assembled on the moment according to the demands of the director and the imagination of the actor or actress. Realism is the great essential of character dressing. To wear the rags of a vaudeville tramp in the movies would turn the picture into a slapstick comedy. A real tramp's clothes are a mighty different matter.

The greatest difficulty which a casting director experiences is that of finding people to play the part of society folk. These parts require an understanding of drawing-room manners and ballroom etiquette, and the ability to wear smart clothes. If the clothes are not up to the moment they will be obsolete when the picture reaches the country at large, and the audiences will think that because the styles are out of date the picture is out of date also. Also if any extreme styles are worn they are sure to be out of date when the picture is shown. In the same way, the slightest error in etiquette is sure to be noted and commented upon. It is more of a trick than one might think to know, at a moment's notice, how to act as best man at a fashionable wedding, or how to serve a ten-course dinner according to the latest vogue.

The best way is to dress conservatively and to act as any well bred person might be expected to. A man who fails to take off his hat upon entering a fashionable house would be laughed at. A man who took it off with a grand flourish would be hooted out. Recently a director read in a certain short story that the Newport set had instituted the custom of supplying a single green glove for each dinner guest to wear while the olives were served. This was merely a bit of satire on the part of the story writer—but the director took it seriously, and instituted the fad in a dinner scene with dire results when the picture was shown to the newspaper critics.

CHAPTER VII
MOVIE MANNERS

This chapter does not deal so much with how to act in a picture as how to act in a studio.

Motion picture people live, more or less, in a world of their own. It is a world which may seem a bit topsy turvy to the outsider, with its own peculiar customs, and a greater freedom from restraint than is customary in the conventional world outside. Examined a bit closer, these outlandish ideas appear to be the very same ones which are always associated with artists—a bohemian spirit which is the same whether in Hollywood or the Latin Quarter of Paris.

If the newcomer to the studio wishes to establish himself as a bona fide member of the movie world he must always remember that no matter how cynical they may seem, no matter how pessimistically they may talk, these people, in the bottom of their hearts, consider a photoplay a form of art and themselves as artists. The actor or director or author who does really good work, who has something new to offer, or who at least is sincere in his desire to do something big and fine in the motion pictures, will always be tolerated no matter how bizarre his character in other respects. In short, people are ranked according to their artistic understanding rather than according to their ancestry, their bank account or their morals. Most of the leaders of the motion picture world have risen from poverty and obscurity, a fact which accounts for the democracy which prevails in the studio.

There are a few rules which beginners would do well to follow. Here they are:

Be modest. Because you don't understand why something is done, don't believe it is all nonsense. And remember that you have ever so much to learn about the business.

Don't criticize.

Try your best to please everyone, particularly the director, whose shoulders are carrying the responsibility for the whole production and whose manner may be a bit gruff—as it usually is when a man is laboring under a heavy load.

Don't be ashamed of being in the movies. If you think movies are a low-brow form of making a living your associates will surely become aware of your state of mind and you will be quietly frozen out.

In the old days of the movies social status in the studio was determined by a curious system, based upon the pay envelope. Actors—for the movie world is composed for the greater part of actors—are classed as stars, the "leads," the "parts," the "bits," the "extras" and "mobs." The star is, of course, the highly paid actor or actress who is the feature of the production; the "lead" is the leading man or woman who plays opposite the star; the "parts" include all those characters which appear on the program—the minor characters of the play; the "bits" are those who are called on to perform a bit of individual action, such as the butler who opens the door, or the chauffeur who drives the car, but who have no real part in the play; the extras are simply members of the crowd, as the ballroom throng, while a mob is just a mass of people, like an army or the audience at a football game.

The large producing companies frequently give elaborate dinners, seating three or four hundred people, and under this ridiculous old system the star sat at the head of the table, with the "leads" near at hand. Then came the "parts," then the "bits," and finally, away down at the foot of the table, were the "extras." In the same way directors, assistant directors, studio managers, and so forth, were graded down according to how much money they drew from the cashier every week.

To-day all this snobbery has passed away. The movie world has its smart set and its slums, as in any other world, but the criterion is artistic worth, not money. We know of one rather unpleasant personality who has risen to stardom, but is completely ignored by the lesser lights of the profession despite this star's attempts to break into "film society."

CHAPTER VIII
READING YOUR PART

On the legitimate stage actors and actresses are called on to read their parts before beginning rehearsals. In the movies the part is read to them. Before the company begins to make even the first scene in a photoplay the scenario writer and director call a meeting and rehearse the company, reading the scenario and explaining the meaning of each scene. If the author and director are wise the story is then carefully rehearsed clear through, scene by scene, before anything is photographed. In this way the actors learn the sequence of their scenes and the relation of their parts to other parts and to the whole.

Rehearsing the Company

Movie authors should rehearse their own stories, at least, according to John Emerson and Anita Loos. Here these authors, on the left, are rehearsing their scenarios for "Wife Insurance" while the director, Victor Fleming (with the cap) takes notes. Rehearsals are arranged before the scenery is built, and the above tableau is supposed to take place in a restaurant.

It is up to you to make the best of your part. Secure a copy of the scenario, or at least of your scenes, as soon as possible. Then go over the story as many times as possible, trying to grasp the relationship of your own character to that of the other characters in the story. Work out your own conception of the part.

Perhaps at first the director will never give you a chance to do a piece of original acting. He will work out every bit of action for you. Eventually, however, your opportunity will come to "create a part," and you must be ready for it.

All the action of a motion picture story is contained in the numbered scenes of the scenario. Your bit of acting will be in one or more of these scenes. Here is a sample bit of one of our own scenarios, based on the stage play "Mama's Affair," which we recently wrote for Constance Talmadge. These are the last few scenes of the photoplay:

Eve watches her mother go out, then turns to the doctor, goes to him, gives him her hand, and says very quietly:

SP: "Good-by, Doctor."

The doctor looks at her, astonished, and says, "What!" Eve looks up at him sternly and says:

SP: "Good-by; I Can Hardly Hope to See You Again.

She then starts out the door. The doctor hurries after her, stops her, and says, "What do you mean?" Eve turns to look at him, and then says very calmly:

SP: "I Shall Be Leaving To-Morrow."

The doctor, taken aback, steps back a couple of steps, looks at her in astonishment, and says:

SP: "I Just Told You That I'd Marry You!"

Eve looks at him commiseratingly, smiles a cynical smile, and says:

SP: "You Just Told Me You Would Take Me in because You See No Way to Prevent My Becoming A Chronic Neurasthenic."

The doctor looks at her, flabbergasted at the plain way in which she is putting things. She then goes on and says:

SP: "You Don't Want Me, But You'll Take Me in as You'd Take a Patient into a Hospital."

The doctor looks at her, tries to speak, stammers, stops, not knowing what to say. Eve then takes a step toward him, smiles commiseratingly, and says:

SP: "You Don't Have to Do That. I Have Learned How to Handle Mama. You Don't Have to Worry about My Health."

The doctor looks at her, surprised at this new Eve, who is in no need of him at all in his professional capacity. Eve looks at him, throws out her arms with gestures of complete victory over all her worries, and says:

SP: "I am Going Back to New York, And I am Going to Live."

Eve then turns, starts, goes toward the door and starts to go out. The doctor looks at her, struggles with himself, worries over the fact that he is losing her, goes toward her, and says: "Eve!" She turns, looks at him, and says: "Yes?" He looks at her helplessly, trying to find words to express himself, and then says:

SP: "I Can't Let You Go Like This."

Eve looks at him calmly, and asks why. The doctor looks around helplessly, stalls a moment, and then says:

SP: "Because I Love You."

Eve looks at him a moment, and then, dropping all her pose, simply overcome with intense relief, she says:

SP: "Well, That's What I've Been Trying to Get at."

The doctor rushes over to her, grabs her, takes her in his arms, looks into her face, and says:

SP: "You Bold-faced, Shameless Little Darling."

Then gives her a good kiss, and we FADE OUT.

You will observe that in the scenario there are many lines written in for the actors to speak which never appear on the screen (only those in capitals are shown on the screen). This is to give the cast a chance to say the things they would say in real life under the same circumstances, and so to make the scene entirely natural. The actor speaks all the lines in small type and also those in the capital letters, following the abbreviation "SP," which stands for "Spoken Title."

Contrary to common belief, the actors really speak the words of their lines. There was a day when the hero, kissing the heroine in the final close-up, might say something like "Let's go out and get a cheese sandwich, now that this is over." But just about this time large numbers of lip-readers began to write in to the producers, kicking against this sort of thing. It seems that constant attendance at the movies develops a curious power of following a speech by watching the character's lips. And from that day the slapstick comedians who used to swear so beautifully before the camera and the heroines of the serial thrillers who used to talk about the weather in their big scenes began to speak their proper lines.

CHAPTER IX
INSIDE THE BRAIN OF A MOVIE STAR

"But they have no brains!" someone is sure to say.

That sort of thing is rather cheap cynicism. As a matter of fact, they have plenty of brains, but of their own peculiar sort. A movie actor, like any other type of artist, is an emotional, temperamental creature; but the problem which worries him the most is one of intellect rather than emotion; in short, just how to control the reactions inside that discredited gray matter of his.

Every movie actor—and you, too, if you enter this field—is at one time or another confronted with the perplexing problem of just how much thought he should allow to go into his work; that is, whether his acting should be emotional or intellectual. The question resolves itself into this:

Does an actor feel?

Should he feel?

There are two schools of thought on this seemingly academic but in reality most important subject.

First are those who say that an actor must feel the part he is playing. The greatest actors, they say, have always been those who wore themselves out in an hour's time, because they felt the emotions they portrayed. They tell stories such as that of Mrs. Kendall, who, having lost her own child, electrified an English audience by her portrayal of the bereaved mother in "East Lynne" to such an extent that women leaped to their feet in the pit, shouting, "No more, no more." They point to the fact that the great stars of the screen and the stage alike are able to simulate the three reactions which are quite beyond the control of the will—pallor, blushing, and the sudden perspiration which comes with great terror or pain. This, they say, is proof positive that these actors are feeling every emotion as they enact it.

The second group declares that all this is nonsense and that if an actor really felt his part he would lose control of himself, and perhaps actually murder some other actor in a fight scene. Acting, they say, is an art wherein the artist, by the use of his intellect, is able to simulate that which he does not feel—using his face merely as the painter uses his canvas. The moment an actor begins to enter into his part, his acting is either overdone or underdone and the scene is ruined. The whole trick of it, they add, is to keep perfectly cool and know exactly what you are doing, no matter how spectacular the scene.

Still a third school declares that both these views are wrong, and that acting is neither a matter of thought nor of emotion, but is purely imitative. An actor observes his own emotions as he experiences them in each crisis of his real life, they say, and remembers them so well that he is afterward able to reproduce them before the camera.

The truth of it seems to be that all of them are partly right and partly wrong. The great stars of the movies to-day, when one is able to draw them out on the subject, say that when they are acting they are thinking not about one thing but about several things. The brain is divided into different strata, and while one section is thinking about the part, another section is entering into it, while still a third stratum is busying itself with idle speculation about the cameraman and the director.

There are two important secrets, connected with the psychology of screen acting, which every beginner should know, even if he never makes use of them. The first is that of Preparation; the second, that of Auto-Suggestion.

A movie actor or actress is in a more difficult position, so far as the artistry of his work is concerned, than the players of the spoken drama. In the movies the scenes are nearly always taken out of sequence, the first last, the last first, and so forth. For that reason the motion picture stars have great difficulty in working themselves up to the proper "pitch" to play a scene, inasmuch as they have not been through the action which leads up to it.

The movie directors know this, and in most studios try to help them up to this "pitch" by employing small orchestras to play during the important scenes. In nearly every large studio where more than one company is working there are to be heard the faint strains of Sonata Pathetique, where some melancholy scene is being taken, or livelier music for a bit of comedy in another set. Also the directors are always behind the camera to guide their actors with spoken directions as the scene is made. This orchestra business has always seemed to us pure buncombe, but if the director or actor gets any fun out of it, it doesn't do any particular harm.

The wise movie actors of to-day are borrowing these two tricks of Preparation and Auto-Suggestion from their brethren of the stage.

Preparation consists merely of spending a little time before the scene is begun in going over the part, in thinking about it, and in trying really to feel all the emotions of the character in question. This seems a simple matter; but it makes the difference between real acting and routine work. Once an actor has carefully worked out the part for himself he can easily conform to the director's ideas; and once he has let himself feel his part he need waste no emotion upon it when on the "set," for his mimetic powers will reproduce his feelings of an hour before.

Auto-suggestion consists in working oneself up to the part before going before the camera by various expedients. For example, one actor, before playing a part calling for extreme anger, spends some ten minutes in clenching his fists, swearing at the handiest fence post, setting his jaw—and so making himself really angry. It is not hard to reproduce emotion by these tricks of auto-suggestion. Try thinking of something sad—draw your face down—and before long you will be in a very glum mood. That is the way such stars as Norma Talmadge and Mary Pickford produce tears on short notice. Most people think they are tricks of make-up, such as drops of glycerine; as a matter of fact, it is a matter of puckering the face and a few gloomy thoughts.

All this sort of thing sounds very intricate and unnecessary. And yet it is the really practical side of screen acting. The psychology of each actor is different and his manner of preparing for a scene and of enacting it will be different. The important thing is that he be aware that there is such a thing as psychology, and that if he will only understand it as applied to himself he can improve his work as a film player.

CHAPTER X
SALARIES IN THE MOVIES

So much propaganda and press-agentry has been at work during the last few years that no one knows what to believe of the movies. There appears to be a sort of attenuated smoke cloud thrown up about all connected with the artistic, and, more particularly, the financial side of the movies. And naturally the first question to be asked by one who is considering entering this field as a vocation is "What do they pay? Is it all true? Is there money in the movies?"

The leading stars of the screen get anywhere from one thousand to ten thousand dollars a week. There are only two or three stars, however, who get as high as ten thousand. The majority range between one and three thousand.

A few stars are paid a percentage of the profits of the picture. One or two others are paid a lump sum for a picture, rather than a weekly salary, and in one case this lump sum comes to eighty thousand dollars.

A good leading man or leading woman gets four or five hundred dollars a week—some much more. First rate character people, or "heavies," get from three to five hundred a week, or, if called on to play by the day, get anywhere from fifty to a hundred dollars.

The smaller parts bring salaries ranging from fifty to two hundred dollars. "Bits," such as the butler who opens the door, which involve a small bit of individual acting, although really merely atmospheric work, bring ten dollars a day or thereabouts. Extras for the crowd scenes get about five dollars a day.

The salaries of directors range all the way from ten thousand dollars a week, which is the emolument of one great artist, down to the hundred and fifty a week of the fly-by-night concerns. The average director in a large company gets anywhere from five hundred to a thousand dollars a week, especially as at present there is a great shortage of good directors.

Scenario writers are paid according to the type of work they do. If they write original stories they may get from one thousand to twenty thousand dollars for them. Of course, the published works of notable authors or the stage hits of famous playwrights bring more.

Writers doing the adaptations or "continuities" of the stories of others are more often paid by the week. The big scenario writers get salaries ranging up to hundreds of thousands of dollars a year, for this is fast becoming the most important work of the entire industry. The lesser lights seldom receive less than twenty thousand dollars a year.

Cameramen get from one hundred to three hundred dollars a week. Art directors receive several hundred dollars a week, but few companies have as yet realized the necessity of employing specialists in scenic art.

A good five-reel feature picture to-day costs about sixty thousand dollars to produce. If a famous star is employed, the cost of the picture goes to a hundred thousand dollars, or even a hundred and fifty. "'Way Down East," Griffith's latest production, cost just under a million dollars to produce.

The profits of the picture come out of its run, which may last seven or eight years, and even longer in Europe. A one hundred thousand dollar picture may eventually make half a million dollars for it's backers, but, of course, they have a long wait for their money. On the other hand, the risk is stupendous, for the picture may be a flat failure.

One cheering fact, attested by all motion picture magnates, is that, whatever may be the case in other industries, salaries are not going to drop in the movies. On the contrary, the movies are growing bigger and bigger and the demand is greater than ever before. There is money in the movies now, and there will be even more in the next few years.

CHAPTER XI
SCENARIOS

On the legitimate stage nearly every actor at one time or another writes a play. In the same way, in the movies nearly every actor tries his hand at scenario writing. In fact, many of the most successful playwrights and photodramatists have had stage or screen experience as actors.

For this reason, although this series is designed more for those who wish to act than for those who wish to write—and although we have already one book on "How to Write Photoplays"—nevertheless, a chapter on scenario writing is not out of place.

There is a fine career for any writer in scenario writing if the writer will only take the trouble to study it seriously. There is technique in writing plots and still more technique in adapting those plots to the screen, by writing them into scenario form. Studio experience is of vast benefit to anyone who wishes to write movie stories; and that is where the actor has the advantage over the outsider who tries to write scenarios with no practical knowledge of how movies are really made.

First write your plot into a five hundred or thousand word synopsis, just as you would write it for a magazine. Make it brief and clear. Be sure it is based upon action, mental or physical, and try to give real character to your plot people.

In choosing your story be sure it has the dramatic quality. It must not be rambling; and it must have an element of conflict between opposing factors—a man and a woman, a woman and her Destiny, or simply Good and Evil—which leads up to a crisis in which the matter is fought out and finally settled. Stories which have not these qualities are suitable for novels, perhaps, but not for plays.

It is, as a general rule, inadvisable to try historical stories or stories which require elaborate scenes. Battle stories and stories of the Jules Verne or H. G. Wells type are also difficult to place. The great demand to-day is for sane, wholesome stories of modern American life, wherein character is the paramount interest rather than eccentricities of the plot or camera.

Send your story in synopsis form to the scenario editor of the studio which employs the star for whom you think the story is best suited. Send with it a stamped and self-addressed envelope for the return of your script, if it is not suitable for their use. Keep on sending it; don't be discouraged by rejection slips. You may write dozens of stories and then sell the very first one you wrote.

If the studio buys your story it is well to ask for an opportunity to help write the "continuity," or scenario form. This is a highly technical but very well paid task, and one which every screen author should learn. The chance to enter the studio and help work out the scenario of your own story is worth trying for.

Testing Make-Up and Expression.

Every make-up must conform to the part. Here the authors, John Emerson and Anita Loos, are helping their director, Victor Fleming, to make a test of Basil Sydney and May Collins, who played the leading roles in "Wife Insurance." The tests are usually taken in some corner of the studio under the best possible lighting conditions.

Scenarios to-day are more in demand than ever before; but producers are still chary of taking chances on untried amateurs. The amateur author's greatest success is when he sells his first story. The road is comparatively easy after that.

Original plots for five-reel pictures sell from $1,000 to $20,000, depending upon the reputation of the author and the standing of the company which buys them. Of course, some of the smaller companies pay less than this, and two and three reel features sell for less.

Published stories and novels, and plays which have had a run, bring enormous prices. Griffith recently paid $150,000 for the film rights on a play. Fifty and seventy thousand dollars are frequently paid for similar plot material, but that is because of the advertising value in the names of the plays or books, or the reputation of the writers, which assures the producers that the story is almost sure to make a good photoplay.

The highest paid workers in the movies to-day are the continuity writers, who put the stories into scenario form and write the "titles" or written inserts. The income of some of these writers runs into hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. It is extraordinarily interesting work and well worth while learning; but unfortunately the technical training for this sort of thing takes as much time as the training necessary to enter any other profession.

Scenario writing does not require great genius. It does require a dramatic insight and certain amount of training. It is the latter factor that most amateurs overlook. If you are to write scenarios, you must take your work as seriously as you would if you were trying to write music or paint pictures.

CHAPTER XII
HOW OTHERS HAVE DONE IT

The histories of the movie celebrities are as picturesque as the story of their industry. Nearly all of them have risen from the ranks. Few of them, in the days when the motion picture was classed as a freak novelty, expected the present amazing expansion of the industry; still fewer had any conception of their own latent talents in photodramatic art.

But characteristics which they all had in common were determination to succeed in their profession, a modest faith in its future, and a desire to learn the business from the ground up.

It is a curious fact that many of the directors of to-day were once automobile mechanics. This is not because automobile mechanics are as a class better fitted for such work, but because, in the old days of 1907 and 1908 and 1909, when everything started, they had a singular opportunity to apprentice themselves to the profession.

In those days companies worked almost entirely out of doors, and the cameraman transported his paraphernalia in an automobile. The driver of the automobile would usually assist the cameraman in "setting up"; a friendship would spring up between them; presently the driver would be assistant cameraman, then chief cameraman, and finally director. Of course, directors have been recruited from every profession and every class—actors, authors, professors, newspaper men, scene carpenters, artists—for the dramatic gift is not confined to any class. What a man's profession was before he entered the movies has nothing to do with his career thereafter; he has to learn everything all over again, and a very good actor, with years of studio experience, may make a very poor director, whereas an unsuccessful tinsmith might suddenly rise to the top by virtue of an innate gift for this type of work.

The scenario writers of to-day have also grown up with the business. Some were newspaper men who broke into the game as press-agents; some were actors; others were directors. Recently a large number of professional playwrights, novelists and authors with magazine experience have entered the movies to learn scenario writing, but this is a new development.

The writers of this series have been asked to tell how they themselves broke into the scenario offices. Unlike the others, our own story has nothing picturesque about it. Miss Loos was born and bred in a California town; she was the daughter of a newspaper proprietor and inherited that fatal desire to write. At the age of fourteen she sent her first scenario to Griffith; for a miracle, it was accepted—but, of course, it was easy to sell stories in those days, when scenario writing was almost unheard of outside of California. Soon after this she paid a personal visit to the Griffith studios and became the youngest scenario editor in the world, turning out a new story about every six weeks. Some six years ago Mr. Emerson left his post as producer for Frohman on the legitimate stage and went to Hollywood to keep an eye on the filming of one of his own plays which was being adapted from the "speakies." He decided to make the movies a permanent profession, and with this in mind worked as an actor about the Griffith studios to learn the rudiments of the game. Some months after this he was allowed to direct his first picture; and at this time he met Miss Loos, who was to write the scenario. After that they collaborated in the Doug' Fairbanks' pictures—and that's that.

Most of the present-day movie actors and actresses gained their experience as extras, although a few have first made their success on the legitimate stage and then stepped directly into film stardom. Doug' Fairbanks was one of the latter, and so was Mary Pickford. Charley Chaplin and Wallace Reid, on the other hand, have done little of note outside of the movies.

Both Norma Talmadge and Constance Talmadge rose from the ranks. They took small parts in the old Vitagraph pictures; but their extraordinary beauty and talent was immediately recognized by the directors, and they were permitted to try bits, then parts, and finally leads. Norma Talmadge went in for the more emotional rôles, while Constance developed her ability as a comedienne. Within six years they have attained to position of leadership in their respective fields.

D. W. Griffith himself was once an extra. He was a good extra, too, according to some of his former employers who now work under him in his great studios at Mamaroneck, Conn. But he had all manner of queer ideas as to how pictures should be acted, and directed and photographed. For example, he thought that more effective scenes might be made, at times, by photographing actors "close up," cutting off their legs and arms with the frame of the picture and showing only their faces many times enlarged; also he had a theory that one might heighten the dramatic suspense by "cutting back" from one scene to another, instead of following one line of action in a monotonous sequence through an entire photoplay. The directors and actors and cameramen of those days, who would no sooner have thought of taking a character's picture from the bust up than of taking the picture upside down, were nevertheless interested in this eccentric chap, and even asked his advice from time to time. Finally, the eccentric extra got his chance as a director to try out a few of these radical theories. His "The Birth of a Nation" changed the entire technique of the movies.

Many noted directors received their training in directing plays for the legitimate stage, as, for example, Hugh Ford. Others, like Marshall Neilan, or Allan Dwan, came in from outside professions. Victor Fleming, formerly director for Douglas Fairbanks and Constance Talmadge, was one of the latter. His first success, many years ago, was as an automobile designer, but his interest always lay with the theater; he resigned his post with the automobile company at about the age when most young men are seeking their first jobs, and decided to learn the business of making movies. The same creative faculty which made his automobile designs distinctive in the old days manifested itself in his pictures last year, "The Mollycoddle" and "When the Clouds Roll By."

There are a million ways to break into the movies. No one can imitate the career of another. Don't read other people's biographies; go out and make one for yourself.

CHAPTER XIII
AMATEUR MOVIE MAKING

Amateur theatrical clubs, theater guilds, and the like, have done much to make the modern drama the great art that it is. But because of the overwhelming expense heretofore attached to the making of movies there have been no attempts at any similar activities in the films. The movies have never had the advantage of the experiments of amateur societies.

To-day, however, the making of movies by amateurs is a distinct possibility. The possibilities of making a motion picture at comparatively little expense were first drawn to public attention five years ago when two young men, both of whom have become well-known directors, made a saleable photoplay in their own back yard. These boys had many theories about what a movie should and should not be, but they could never find a company willing to give their theories a trial. Finally they hit upon the original expedient of buying their own camera and making a picture in which nearly all the actors were children and which therefore cost very little money. Nearly all the scenes were exteriors, so that practically no scenery was required. The picture was most original and in spite of their technical shortcomings, they found a fairly profitable sale.

If you desire to write, direct or act in the pictures, you can have no better experience than trying to make a picture of your own, even if at first you are not very successful.

The great initial expense for this sort of thing is, of course, the outlay required to buy a camera. In most towns of any size there are now professional movie cameramen who work for the news reel companies and who may be hired for a comparatively small sum. If, however, you desire to make your photoplay an entirely amateur affair, you can buy a usable second-hand camera for outdoor work for as low as a hundred dollars.

Some one of your associates must make it his business to learn to run this camera with sufficient skill to insure that your film will not be wasted.

The next important outlay is that of the film itself. Film costs about eleven or twelve cents a foot when developed and printed. Therefore, the cost of production depends largely upon the length of your picture. For a first attempt we should advise you to keep your photoplay within 2,000 feet, or two reels.

Start by writing a simple story into a scenario with as many exterior scenes as possible. The necessary interiors, such as rooms or hallways, may be built by your own amateurs, outdoors, as they are often built in California, so that no lights will be necessary. You can paint your own subtitle cards—the written inserts—and film them yourself.

Making a "Close-Up"

Sun reflectors, consisting of silvered canvas screens, are used to lighten the shadows, which are apt to make the cheeks seem hollow. The actors are Basil Sydney and May Collins.

It is not necessary to make the scenes in their natural sequence. After the picture is finished and developed, however, someone must assemble and cut it.

This means that you must rent the use of the projection machine at your local theater for a few mornings, and get the local operator to help you splice and cement the film together in its correct order of long shots and close-ups. There is no rule for this work except that of practical values on the screen. Just run your bits of film through the projection machine and stick them together the way they look best. It is a matter of artistic perception rather than any set rule.

If your scenario calls for an outdoor picture—for example, a cowboy story—which does not require costumes, you should be able to make it for a thousand dollars, provided your amateur actors, and amateur cameramen, and amateur authors are working for nothing. There are mighty few amateur theatricals of any pretention whatsoever which do not cost as much as this, and you should be able to take in a good profit if your picture is exploited in your local theaters.

As a matter of fact, pictures have not always been produced on the scale that they are to-day. Ten years ago feature pictures cost from $5,000 to $7,000 to make, and in those days film and cameras were much more expensive. The producers simply made outdoor pictures which required no lights or scenery, and saved on the salaries of actors and directors, which have multiplied twenty times since then. To-day the average feature picture costs from $50,000 to $150,000 to produce. Griffith's "'Way Down East" cost nearly a million to produce. That is because the salaries of actors, directors and authors have risen so enormously.

But there is no reason why an amateur company in which the cost of salaries is completely eliminated cannot make their own picture at a minimum expense. If you want to break into the movies, here is a way to do it, right in your own home town.

INTRODUCTORY NOTE TO PART II

Whether you desire to break into the movies as writer, actor or director, your most important consideration will be the scenario. In the scenario you will find all the elements of the photoplay; everything is built upon that as a foundation. The actor or director who sincerely desires to do good work studies his script assiduously. The ambitious writer analyzes not only his own photoplays, but those of other people.

It is exceedingly difficult to talk technique to anyone who has never read a scenario. For this reason we have incorporated a "continuity" in this book. It is the dramatic form of a screen story which we have made as a special production. The titles, which are the written inserts to be flashed on the screen, are in capital letters. The inserts refer to such articles as letters, telegrams, pictures, and the like, which may be shown in close-up. The "iris" is the broadening or narrowing of the frame of the picture to open or close a scene, or to emphasize some particular object which is "irised" upon. The "fade" effects are used very much as the curtain of the legitimate stage is used to open and close scenes. The abbreviation "Sp" means "Speech," indicating that the title which follows is to be spoken by the actor. Some of the quoted lines—the ones not set off in capitals—are not shown on the screen, but are merely given as a guide for the players.

Most of the directions concerning the scenes are also given in capital letters. "EXTERIOR," or the abbreviated "EXT.," for example, refers to a scene outdoors, while "INTERIOR" or "INT.," is an indoor scene. The terms "LONG SHOT" and "CLOSE-UP" refer to the distance at which the camera is placed from the scene.

"Red Hot Romance" is played as a romantic melodrama, but is intended as a satire upon this very type of story, with its incredibly heroic hero, its American girl, its marines-to-the-rescue and all the rest of it. Basil Sydney and May Collins played the parts of Roland and Rosalie, and Victor Fleming was the director.

RED HOT ROMANCE

T: IT'S BAD ENOUGH FOR SOME TO BOSS THE REST OF US WHILE THEY ARE ALIVE, BUT THE LIMIT IS REACHED WHEN THEY WANT TO KEEP RIGHT ON AFTER THEY HAVE CASHED IN.

T: FOR INSTANCE, THERE WAS OLD HARDER N. STONE, THE VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE BRITISH-AMERICAN INSURANCE CO.

1. LIBRARY, STONE HOME IN WASHINGTON. (Fade in.) Harder N. Stone, an old skinflint, is seated at his desk writing.

INSERT—Stone's hand writing the following:

"I, Harder N. Stone, of Washington, D. C., hereby direct that, should I die before my son, Roland Stone, he is to receive from my estate the sum of $50.00 per week and the use of my residence in Washington, D. C, until his twenty-fifth birthday."

Stone sits back and regards what he has been writing, smiles smugly, and then continues writing.

INSERT—Stone's hand writing the following:

"On his twenty-fifth birthday, provided he has lived according to instructions herein set down, my son, Roland Stone, is to receive his inheritance at the hands of my chosen executor, Lord Howe-Greene, of London, President of the British-American Insurance Co."

Stone sits back and reads over what he has written and is highly pleased. He then rings for a servant and presently Briggs enters. He is a little English butler, who has been in the family for years. Stone turns to him and tells him that he has just been making out his will. Briggs is properly impressed and Stone says to him:

SP: "BRIGGS, I HAVE PROVIDED IN MY WILL THAT IF I DIE BEFORE MY SON YOU ARE TO STAY ON WITH HIM AS LONG AS YOU LIVE."

Briggs is highly pleased, thanks him, Stone dismisses him, goes on writing. (Fade out.)

THE OLD BOY DID DIE, AS HE DESERVED TO, AND LEFT HIS SON AND HEIR, ROLAND STONE, WITH NOTHING TO DO BUT LIVE ON $50.00 PER WEEK.

2. ROLAND'S BEDROOM. (Fade in.) He is lolling in bed in pajamas and dressing gown, smoking a cigarette and opening a stack of bills and reading them.

INSERT—top bill—tailor's bill with a balance from the month before and about $275.00 for this month with a note in heavy letters "PLEASE REMIT." This one is turned over, and the second one is from a club with a statement "You have this day been posted for $179.00 and your credit is hereby suspended until same is paid." This bill is turned over and the third bill is from a florist's for $950.00 worth of flowers sent to Miss Rosalie Bird and has a note reading: "Impossible for us to fill any more orders until these bills are paid."

Roland puts down the bills in disgust, not looking further, as he knows they're all alike.

Briggs, the butler, now enters and takes up the breakfast tray which is lying on the bed opposite beside Roland. Roland looks up to him, then looks at the bills, and says:

SP: "HOW DO YOU EXPECT ME TO PAY THESE BILLS ON $50.00 A WEEK?"

Briggs shrugs his shoulders as though he had nothing to do with it, and suggests that Roland's bills are too big. He then leaves. Roland looks after him, disgusted, runs through a few more bills, throws them on the floor and at this juncture, Tom, Roland's valet, a big husky negro with a child-like, innocent smile, enters the room with letters, goes to Roland and hands him the letters. Roland looks at them and sees they are more bills, puts them down. Tom picks up others from floor and gives them to Roland, much to his disgust. He looks up to Tom and says:

SP: "YOU'RE A FINE 'SECRETARY'! WHAT DO I PAY YOU FOR?"

Tom looks up at him, round-eyed and smiles and says:

SP: "YOU DON'T."

This is a poser for Roland for a moment, he finally regains his composure and says:

SP: "WELL, I AM GOING TO WHEN I GET MY INHERITANCE NEXT APRIL."

Tom nods his head quizzically as he has heard this many times before. Roland then picks up the bills, runs through them again and says:

SP: "THE QUESTION NOW IS—HOW ARE WE GOING TO LIVE UNTIL APRIL?"

He sighs, reaches over to a table which has a little calendar on it, picks up the calendar, sees that it is the 13th of January, and runs through the pages very dubiously. He finally looks up at Tom, shows him how many days they have to live through on the calendar, and says:

SP: "I HAVEN'T A NICKEL AND I CAN'T BORROW ANYTHING NOW. HOW ARE WE GOING TO LIVE UNTIL APRIL?"

Tom looks about very dubiously. Finally he gets an idea, he looks from one object of furniture to another, and his idea grows until he is fairly beaming and he says:

SP: "THEY'S A MIGHTY LOT OF HOCKABLE STUFF AROUND HEAH, BOSS!"

He indicates the things around the room, and Roland is delighted with the idea. He picks up the bunch of bills, looks at the top one.

INSERT—TAILOR'S BILL.

Roland then looks around for something to pay that with and his eye falls upon an antique vase. He jumps out of bed, takes the vase and hands it to Tom together with the tailor's bill, saying that that will pay for that. Roland looks at the next bill.

INSERT—BILL FROM CLUB.

Roland then takes a couple of ornaments from the mantel, gives them to Tom together with the club bill saying that they will pay for that. Roland then looks at the next bill.

INSERT—FLORIST'S BILL.

Roland then takes a picture from the wall, leaving a discolored place behind it, saying that will pay for that. He then thinks a moment and picks up a little antique clock and hands it to Tom, saying: