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106 Hollywood Rajah
equipment and themselves to his stage and begin work for him. Of course, complaints were made."
They were, indeed I And there were plenty of others. But Mayer, Thalberg, and Rapf worked day and night to straighten out the difficulties and get everyone in proper place. Apparently, they were sufficiently successful to satisfy Marcus Loew, for in June he issued a statement that had an enthusiastic ring:
"Mr. Mayer, as everyone knows, has no equal as a producer. His past record speaks for itself, and during the short time that he has been in charge at the Culver City studios, he has accomplished wonders. There are twenty-two companies now at work. We are way ahead of our schedule. By the first of September, there will be prints of twenty-five productions in our exchanges. That is going some!"
But there was one mighty cloud on the horizon, one project in the works that disturbingly dwarfed all the others. That was the lagging production of Ben-Hur.
This huge enterprise, then shooting on locations in Italy, was supposed to be outside the interest and responsibility of Mayer. It had been acquired as a separate and special project of the Goldwyn Company, and it was clearly understood that the '"Mayer group" would not share in any profits it might earn. Indeed, from the way things were going, it was doubtful whether there would be any profits at all. It was rapidly becoming the most expensive motion picture ever made.
The spectacular project had been launched by the Goldwyn Company as one of its last extravagant efforts to salvage waning prestige. Screen rights to the famous stage drama, which was based on the equally famous book by General Lew Wallace, Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ, had been acquired from a syndicate that owned them in a truly fantastic deal which specified that this syndicate would receive one-half of every dollar the picture earned. June Mathis was the Goldwyn employee who had done most to push the project along, and she was the one accepted by the scrupulous syndicate to prepare