Camera (May 1922-April 1923)

CAMERA I "The DiQest of the Motion Picture Industry" Page Eleven COUE HAS FAITH IN HIS FILM AS AID-ALL UPON "The Message of Emile Coue," Educational's sensational tworeel attraction, is completed. The final scenes were finished a few days ago at the New Rochelle studios of Motion Picture Arts, Inc., just a day or two before the great teacher of autosuggestion sailed for France after his triumphant visit to the United States. M. Coue arrived in New York after a sensational lecture tour which carried him as far west as Chicago where he was received with the greatest enthusiasm by the crowds that packed the lecture halls and clamored in vain for admission. He sailed for France Saturday, Feb. 10. Just before sailing time M. Coue issued a signed statement in which he gave the picture his heartiest endorsement and expressed the hope that the picture would prove of benefit to the millions who were unable to hear his lectures. "Despairing of being able to carry my message of self-help through auto-suggestion to all those who waited for it here, I accepted the plan of my friends and gave it to the cinema which reaches millions throughout the entire country," said M. Coue. "I found a sympathetic group of men who make moving pictures and working with them I have endeavored to place my message on the screen in such a manner as would be understood by everyone. Before the picture was made I went over the scenario time and again, and made sure that each point was brought out in the clearest possible way. "The completed picture carries my message in the most graphic manner possible and I am glad to endorse it and give it my approval as the best possible picturization of what I have taught for a score of years and will teach until the end. Anyone seeing the picture will be able to understand, and I feel sure that hundreds of thousands will be helped to help themselves by seeing the lesson it tells. "I consider the picture a masterpiece and I have no hesitation in entrusting to it the task of carrying my message to the people of America and the world, knowing full well that it will instruct millions where I can only reach hundreds. The message of helpful auto-suggestion must go on, and I feel sure this picture will carry it to every home in this country. More than this, I feel sure that the message will be properly carried and will give the greatest possible help to all who see it." MAX LINDER'S ADVICE, AMERICA GAINS ANOTHER LAUGH-MAKER Louis Natheaux is playing the character of "Mitchell" for Louis Gasnier in "Mothers-in-laws," which picture features Gaston Glass. Max Linder, the great French comedian, is responsible for Maurice Canonge, another great French comedian and likewise a great French tragedian, being among the very late arrivals in the Hollywood film colony. "America will welcome you, because you can make them laugh when they want to laugh and you can make them cry when they want to cry, for in America they want what they want when they want it," Linder told Canonge. "Ah, if that is so, I shall go to America and do my best for them," Maurice replied. So that was that, and, Maurice is on the ground and all ready to begin his versatile efforts before the clicking cameras of Southern California. For the last three years Canonge has been "the rage of Paris" so far as the stage was concerned. Wherever he played, the gendarmes had to be to prevent the crowds from pushing in the front of theatres. His performance as star of the Revue De Marigny was proclaimed by all Parisian critics as the master comedy performance of the decade and he was so amusing to the theatre-goers of the gay French capitol that they kept him busy in the one show in the same playhouse for two whole years. Previously he had been the foremost favorite at the Theatre Nationale De L'Odeon, where he not only established himself as a great comedian, but also won acclaim as one of his native land's best tragedians, for he played in a variety of productions. Even before this he was one of the most popular of screen favorites throughout France and most of Europe, he having been Maurice Canonge a leading star of the Pathe organization for nearly three years. "The American city most talked-of in France is Hollywood and after my first week in this place I can understand why it is so famous," Canonge says. "It is because it is the undisputed center of a very, very great American art, the cinema, the art which everybody in Europe recognizes as the great American way of expressing ideas and ideals of this fine New World. Naturally I am happy to be here and 1 shall try my best to help make the cinema grow to bigger thijgs by contributing in my own modest way whatever of dramatic and comedy art I have learned in my twenty years' pursuit of it in my native land." ACTOR FINDS A TWO-HEADED SCORPION Joe Roberts, well-known favorite of countless screen comedies, lays no claim to an ability as a hunter and wants it impressed that he just naturally found that two-headed scorpion about which there has been so much ado this week. He literally stumbled across it while "on location" at Chatsworth Lake with the Buster Keaton company and he captured it by letting it crawl into his hat and then making a retaining lid out of a board which happened to be handy. Scorpions of all kinds abound in the Chatsworth district, but this is the first one on record to boast two heads, each of which is perfectly formed and complete within itself. Equipped with four good eyes and two practical mouths, this reptile had the advantage of Its fellows of the species by being able to both see and eat double. Unfortunately for the side-show business, it co\ild not endure captivity and diPd the day after being placed in a cage. Joe Roberts ACTOR WANTS NONE OF POLICEMAN'S LOT NOW Now E. W. Borman is more determined than ever to escape the fate of being consigned permanently to the duties of a screen defective. He never has liked the idea and the more he has disliked it, the oftener he has been selected to play such roles in prominent productions. But, he just has had an experience which throws the balance decidedly in favor of finding some way out of being a sleuth in the world of make-believe. He is drawing one more such characterization in the Richard Thomas production of "The Silent Accuser," now being made at the Hollywood Studios, and, Thursday noon of this week while he was strollin'fe along Santa Monica Boulevard for exercise, something happened on the inside of a residence and before he knew it, he was literally dragged into the vortex of a domestic storm to settle a few disputes. In the dragging, the "dragger" discovered the "dragee" wore the badge of an ofhcer, a badge Borman wears in the picture for the sake of realism only, and — but anyway, before the actor was able to extricate himself from the entanglement he had to exchange punches with a couple burly men. "And now I'm cock-sure I want none of the policeman's unhappy lot for mine," he says. "As soon as I finish my present engagement, I'm going to concentrate on avoiding being cast as a film detective another time. In my twenty-five years' experience as an actor, I have played too great a variety of parts to settle down to one line anyway for the present and the last line I would choose would be that of the sleuth. It may be that I have been 'it' so many times that I'm weary of it." It so happens that Mr. Borman looks precisely like the kind of detectives one reads about in all manner of fiction and he is generally regarded as the ideal type for portraying the character of an officer of the law. However, he has done other things in pictures. His most notable recent screen appearance was made in Marshall Neilan's success, "The Strangers' Banquet." McKay Has Big Job James McKay holds the responsible position of head cutter for Rupert Julian at Universal City and is directly supervising the cutting of "Merry-Go-Round." McKay is confronted with the gigantic task of cutting the more than 200,000 feet of film to between 15 and 20 reels before Julian holds the first preview. Working with McKay are Frank .\tkinson and Charles Craft.