Picture Play Magazine (Sep 1923 - Feb 1924)

Advertising Section Dramatic scene from Rex Ingram's "Trifling Women" (Metro Pictures Corporation). Write For the Movies Producers are looking for plots. You can turnyourideasintostrong, dramatic screen stories, just the kind producers want. You need no literary ability. It is simple when you have a knowledge of photoplay construction. The successful photoplay writers today are men and women who have only recently started to write. If you want to write stories — if in your day dreams you make up tales about yourself — you are creating. And remember, it does not take fine writing, but just the instinct to create and a knowledge of photoplay construction. If you are ambitious, if you are really anxious to write film stories, certainly you want to find out just what advantages and opportunities this profession offers you. Write Photoplays While You Learn You build a model photoplay while learning. Under the personal direction of a member of our faculty, you construct, step by step, the sort of plot that is in demand. Expert constructive criticism — special assignment plan — Plot Research Laboratory — all train you to write salable photoplays. You learn at home in spare time. Free Book! The Van Vliet Plan of Writing for the Movies fully explained. 32 -page book, fully illustrated — free to all men and women interested in writing for the movies. Just send name and address. Write for this FREE Book today. 2537 So. State St., Dept. 12-86 Chicago HOW TO CHARM OTHERS How to win love and friendship, make money, gain success, cure bashf illness, overcome fear, get more joy and ha-'piness out of life. Free Book teds you what to do. Send oe to help cover postage, mailing, etc. The Key to Success, Dept. U, 15 Charlton St.. New York. //Mvm Yau An idea Fa* A Ma v/B Star ? WRITE FOR THE MOVIES Money In It Ideas for moving picture plays wanted by producers Big prices paid for accepted materia! Submit ideas in any form at once for our free examination and advice. Previous experience unnecessary. This is not a school. We have no course, plan, book, system or other instruction matter to sell you. A strictly bona ride service for those who would turn their talents into dollars. An Interesting Booklet "The Photoplay in the Making" Sent free for the asking. BRISTOL PHOTOPLAY STUDIOS Suite 602 E, Bristol Bu ilding, New York, N. Y. What the Fans Think Continued from page 8 tion? Twice a year should be often enough to see a "Gloria Fashion Show," Rudy's wisdom in refusing to continue the "bill a fare" handed him is a promising occurrence for future enjoyment. He stopped at an opportune moment. Let the girls rave on over Rudy — they hit it right once in a while. If you are sure you have acquired perfect nerve control and that your emotions are well throttled, that you are blase to the pathetic, then I would suggest you see all of Griffith's pulsating heart-breaking tragedies, wherein empty-headed heroines are the innocent victims ; but if you prefer a pleasant evening and a restful night stay at home and play pinochle — you'll feel much better in the morning. Have you wearied of .dice Terry yet? No? Then Rex Ingram is sure to furnish you with delightful entertainment. He is the one director who seems to do the author justice. Just what was it that started the demand for Pola? There are those who cry for "Minter Mints," "Murray Capers," "Mary Lollypops," "Connie Chewing Gum," "Bebe Jubjubs," and "Mabel Gin Fizzes" — but who called for Pola? Wasn't it Du Barry they wanted ? Naldi is a phase in picture development without the promise of La Marr. Men? Oh, what's the use ! They're not very interesting at their best. It's the play that makes them with, incidentally, a few brains thrown in. One of the unsolved mysteries of the century is Doug's seat atop the world. Won't some one start a campaign to find out from what class his devotees seep; it must be from the Babe Ruth stratum. Honestly now, did his smile really ever thrill any girl? Ayes and nays, please ! Adele G. Foster. New York City. The Movies are All Right! I wonder how some of those poor actresses can act at all after reading some of the letters in "Y/hat the Fans Think." If I were Gloria Swanson I think I would have left the movies behind me a long time ago and parked' myself on some farm. How bitter some of the remarks are about her ! I'm either very ignorant or just different, because every time I go out of a theater after seeing a picture which a reviewer like Alison Smith has pronounced rotten and which made her "want to bite an usher," I find it to be the best I have seen in a long, long time. Then, others have said it's a shame that the star can't have any better pictures to act in. My, people must know a lot about the movies ! They know enough about 'em to criticize them. / don't. I've attended movies ever since I was old enough to talk, but they've all been' perfect to me. fWell, I did see a picture once entitled "Behind Masks" which made me feel sick, but that was the only one.) People call Gloria Swanson a poor actress, yet they make a lot of noise about Gareth Hughes' ability. This young man, to my mind, is hopeless as an actor. In "Forget-Me-Not" he showed off too much ; the picture was good otherwise. T don't think there's anything wrong with Gloria Swanson. I don't think there's anything wrong with pictures or with the ones who direct them. I think they're all right ! "Satisfied." Hebbing, Minnesota. A Discouraged Fan. Right now I'm discouraged about the movies as a medium of art. Perhaps it's the warm weather that makes me feel so. But there is always so much blah, blah about art, and no action — no progress. Every picture is the same : gorgeous costumes, expensive sets, beautiful women, handsome men, a punk story, and marvelous photography. I will admit progress is being made in photography. It is almost always safe to deplore the plots and stories of pictures. Authors seem to come and go, but to no profit. Tarkington, the great story writer, loves his flavor on the screen. Ade, whom I never liked extra well, almost made me an enemy by his "Our Leading Citizen." He was better on "Back Home and Broke." The comedies do show a tendency to improve. The "new type" as styled bv Picture-Play are enjoyable. But still the stone-age type goes on. They are still put out with a chase taking up three quarters of the picture and the rest a succession of equally rusty, creaky, hoary, old gags. However, Keaton is fine and getting better and better. Chaplin, when good, is very, very good, but when he's bad, he's horrid. He was very, very good in "The Pilgrim." Of all the Follies beauties, only Jacmieline Logan seems to be any good. I should like to see the "Follies" some time. There must be more to the girls than I see on the screen (figuratively, of course). Despite all these objections which now occur to me, I expect I shall always be a fan. Raymond Keeler. 1443 Elati Street, Denver, Colorado. Lois Wilson Defends the Movies. As I have received from time to time many letters from fans asking me whether or not I would let my sisters enter pictures, I am taking this opportunity of answering them all at once. Let me say before I start that it would not be a question of letting, as my mother and father are the heads of our household and none of us— there are four girls — have ever attempted to exercise any authority over the other. However, we all have the privilege of exercising our opinions, so suppose I put it this way: Would I approve of my sisters entering pictures? My answer is most decidedly yes, and my reasons are easily given. In the first place, it is certainly a very good way in which to make one's life useful, for surely a profession that gives pleasure and happiness to others is a worthy one. Then, too, no one can deny the fact that many pictures teach very good lessons, which makes one feel their work is doubly useful. Secondly, it is work which is always interesting. There is always something to learn, always some fresh field to conquer, and one's interest and imagination receive plenty of stimulus. Thirdly and lastly, it has its material advantage, in that it is more remunerative in its returns than almost anything else a girl can do. Now for the objections. What are they? The dangers of studio life? Do not those same dangers exist anywhere in the world for the girl who leaves the shelter of her home to work? Does it not depend a good deal on the girl just how many of those dangers she encounters? It seems to me I have heard just as man}r wild tales concerning stenographers, teachers, nurses, and girls not engaged in anything but having a good time, as I~ have about actresses, and — as I know a great many very fine girls who are stenographers, teachers, nurses, actresses, and girls just