Majestic Monthly (Feb 1916)

• nlc-'c.wC' 7.<i ,v<| C?fc]v[AJESTIC • MONTHLY • Vol. I. No. 6. FEBRUARY, 1916. Columbus, Ohio. | EDITORIAL! ■ ■ THE play’s the thing” is an oft-quoted aphorism of Shakespeare. It applies just as truly to motion pictures as to the spoken drama which the bard of Avon knew. A well known moving picture manufacturer recently took this saying for his text and made a confession. At first, he says, people were satisfied with motion pictures, just so they moved. Then little plays were put on. The public demanded more. The producers began to put great throngs of people in them, but pretty soon the public demanded something new. The next thing was to use big sets. Thousands of dollars were spent just to make one cabaret scene or a prince’s ball room. But the public wanted something else. That proved to be well-known stars. They were supplied. Then well-known plays by wellcnown authors. Some companies have overemphasized one or other of these details. But this man has come to the conclusion, and a good one, we believe, that the play is the thing, no matter who wrote it, how big sets it displays, how many people are in it or how long it is. It seems to this writer that the companies whose productions the Majestic uses have pretty consistently been following some maxim like this one of Rare Will’s. The Famous Players have presented some wonderfully well known stage stars, but those who have had greatest success and which the company has given the greatest encouragement to have really made good on the screen. And some of them, like Mary Pickford, have achieved nearly all of their fame on the screen alone. The Lasky company has divided its affection pretty evenly between stage and screen people and has produced excellent works with both. Geraldine Farrar and Fannie Ward are two of the stage people who have more than made good in pictures. Cleo Ridgeley, Blanche Sweet and Wallace Reid are some of the screen folk who have excelled in work for the same company. The Moroscoans have included some of the best stage people — Constance Collier, Cyril Maude, Dustin Farnum, Anna Held and Maclyn Arbuckle — but we must not forget on the other hands such a player as Myrtle Stedman, primarily a screen development, the one exception that tests the rule. So much for the personnel. Then, too, these companies have not made the mistake of overemphasis on bigness, either in sets or in casts or upon well-known-ness, if we may coin a word in a different meaning from popularity, of either book or play or author. Very often — Dustin Farnum in “The Gentleman from Indiana” by Booth Tarkington and Pauline Frederick in “Bella Donna” by Robert Hitchens come readily to mind — the well-known player, play and author are strongly combined. That way success, whether artistic or commercial, is sure to lie. □ □□□□□□□ The young actor with a smile, providing it is an intelligent smile, has made a long step toward screen success. Dustin Farnum and Hazel Dawn are two players who make good, effective use of the smile. There is another player of quite equal fame who misses some of her best opportunities, because she practically has no smile and yet should be adaptable to lighter roles Of course an attractive mouth and perfect teeth naturally enhance this detail of appearance. And right in that connection, our prime favorites, Miss Pickford and Miss Clark, are not a whit behind.