The House That Shadows Built (1928)

256 THE HOUSE THAT SHADOWS BUILT Artists into a “talent trust” which would eventually absorb all the actors and directors, great and small, and produce not only the super-film of Pickford, Chaplin, and Fairbanks but the staple programme-films of the rank and file. The rumour of a trust was perturbing; and thesituation at best looked bad enough. Griffith, Hart, and Fairbanks all belonged now to Zukor’s artistic forces; the rising Fairbanks, indeed, had begun to compensate him for the loss of Mary Pickford. Again Zukor hurried West. Amidst the glittering interior decorations of the new Hollywood there were meetings, conferences, and arguments which broke at times into emotion. Schulberg had drawn up “Eighty-nine Reasons for United Artists,” designed to cover every possible point of argument. Fairbanks said afterward, “One night I was up against Zukor. When he had me going and I felt like crying, I would go out into the hall and read over my copy of the Eighty-nine Reasons until I got a grip on myself.” But the four stars held firm. Then, just as they were all ready to sign, a counsellor of one of the stars saw a perturbing danger. Mary Pickford’s marriage with Owen Moore was drawing to its inevitable close. Everyone on the inside anticipated the divorce which came a year later. “Suppose now,” said this objector, “Mary Pickford does get a divorce and Zukor orders his publicity department to hammer on that point Mary stands to