Motion Picture Classic (Jul-Dec 1930)

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O. has Richard Dix under contract and they are going to have to get someone from outside to play the wife. So — the emphasis of the stor> will just have to be gently shifted in order to give Richard more spotlight than the lady. Why should they waste spotlight on a borrowed player? Miss Ferber naturally could not be expected to have these matters in mind when she wrote the book, since she would have no way of knowing who was going to buy the picture rights, or whom they would have under contract. So they have found it necessary to invent some extra incidents and scenes for Yancey, by way of indicating, in no uncertain terms, exactly who is the star of the picture. Novelists should really make a little study of the star system, and write their stories accordingly. It would save so much subsequent trouble for the people who buy their books Anyhow, they brought a bevy of millionaire Osage Indians to Hollywood to play extra roles at seven-fifty a day, as atmosphere. And they are interpwlating the classic bit about the Indian who bought the hearse to use for a family car. I suppose they couldn't have missed that old one! (That, my children, is for "comedy relief.") The delicate and complicated task of adaptation has been entrusted to Howard Estabrook, and I trudged over, a day or so ago, to see how he was getting on and to inquire how in the world he went about such a task. He was most helpful. "First of all," he told me, "I read the book! " Well, that was a surprise. I had never suspected that any adapter ever did such a thing. "Then, we made a scenario of the entire novel. And we found that it would take at least three evenings to run the picture. So we went about deciding what parts of it to discard and how we could tighten it up to get it inside our time limit." Now we were getting down to something. The discarding process has always intrigued me — it is usually so thorough. "Now, the most important thing in any stor>' is the conflict between people. No sweep of history, no locale, no background is important. It is the emotional clash of j'our characters that matters." "Always remembering who is the star — " I reminded him. "Exactly. Then there is censorship to consider. Situations to be suggested — deftly. A novelist can make his characters curse roundly, if it suits his purpose. We can't do that. We have to achieve our effects in some other way." "But what if they are the kind of people who would curse?" "They can't on the screen. There's no reason why they should!" he added, severely. "There is no reason to go into gutters." I was squashed, and he continued, "So we write our story about our two people, trying our best to preserve the spirit of the book. "That is our biggest task — preserving the spirit of the story we are adapting. The atmosphere, the feeling of a story is what people remetnber, much more than the actual sequence of events, as related in it. "We stick as closely as possible to the central theme, try hard to preserve the feeling of the story, and discard as much extraneous material as seems necessary." The process, as described by Mr. Estabrook, does seem a difficult and complicated one to me. But, I still insist, I find the finished product very surprising in a number of cases. And, despite what he says, I she still imagine that censorship must pre its problems in adapting a good modern stories. Sidney Howard, the author of Knew What They Wanted" — the Pulitzl prize play of a few years ago — told me dijj the Hays organization forbade making 1 play into a picture at one time. "I went to see Will Hays, to ask hil why," Mr. Howard said. "And he told nn that it couldn't be put upon the screen cause an adulterous woman in the story forgiven by her husband in the end! pointed out to him that there was a famoij example, in the New Testament, of an adu terous woman who was forgiven — and thd I had imagined that I was expressing a dit tinctly Christian sentiment in allowing th character in my play to enjoy similar giveness. "But he said it would never do to forgrvi her on the screen — even if she suffered fcl her sin. No matter what happened in thi New Testament. The censors wouldn't all low it." Mr. Howard's play was made into picture recently, however — disguised, ol course, under a different title. "A Lady til Love." It was tidied up by neatly amput ing the sign and symbol of her misstte (the baby) from the script, which left, feeble story about nothing in particuL But Mr. Howard did the adaptation him| self, and I suppose he received a ni round sum for it, so he probably didn't mind. And I am sure my own distress] mattered to no one. Babies, as a matter of fact, present a host I of difificulties. (On the screen, I mean.) In. adapting the play called "Little Accident," they were obliged to marry the parents, briefly, in the interests of propriety — and then to annul the marriage in the interests) of the story. The wedding rather took the point out of the title, it would seem. And! it is one of the few titles that remain intact. Another thing which they simply can not resist is to make the sets look expensive, nomatter whether they fit the story or not. In the original version of this same play, the young father fled with his baby to a shabby little apartment, where he attempted to care for her with distinctly makeshift equipment. Which created one of those homely, simple, amusing situations that are delightful. But in the screen version there is the most incredible modernistic hospital — not, I trust, like any hospital anywhere in the world. And the apartment to which he flees is startlingly ornate and enormous. The nursery would shed glory on any newlymade-millionaire's child. And what is more, we find Zasu Pitts introduced as the plaintive nursemaid. This obvious afterthought, of course, not only adds elegance to the establishment, but also the "comedy relief," which must be there at any cost of credibility. Remember Laurel and Hardy in "The Rogue Song"? Somebody had that bright idea after the picture was all finished, and the bewildered pair were simply poked into the picture to balance it. It is explained constantly that a stage play has too little action for the purposes of the screen and that action must be introduced to break up the dialogue. But — there was "Journey's End," which received almost no adapting at all, but was shot almost exactly as it was presented on the stage. And there was "All Quiet on the Western Front," which not only "kept the spirit" of the book — but actually told the same story that Remarque told. And that picture is getting along all right. I wonder if adaptations need be so elaborate, after all! 96