Motion Picture Classic (Jan-Aug 1919)

AlOTlON PICTURE One Man in America can Teach You Motion Picture Writing Correctly By Ford I. Beebe (St'ccial 'di'iitcr “MOTION PICTURE NEWS,” Scenario Editor Iteo years Helen Holmes Serial Co., three years tenth Universal, etc.) There is a constant and tremendous demand for good motion picture stories. Eight now, the studios cannot get enough good stories to fit their stars with suitable roles. And not alone this but stories are getting scarcer all the time. Books and magazine stories have failed to make good on the screen — staff writers are written out. But the film companies must have stories. And they want and must have these from "outside” writers — from the thousands of people outside the studios who have ideas and the genuine ability to write them if only they knew how to put them into proper shape. Foreseeing this demand there has been a flood of so-called "schools,” "systems” and "plans” attempting to teach them motion picture writing. I have spent years in the different motion picture studios. These years convinced me that not one writer in a thousand could teach others this new art of writing for the movies. I doubted that the heads of these various institutions could themselves do what they are trying to teach efthers to do. I did not believe that they were themselves successful waiters of feature .stories. I did not believe, in fact, that they themselves could actually write and sell their own stories. So I investigated. And out of the amazingly long list I found one man. A man who is known to hundreds of thousands of film fans as the author of innumerable successful photoplays. I found that this man — F. McGREW WILLIS — has actually written over two hundred produced film stories. That he has written feature stories for more than TWENTY OF THE BIGGEST STARS IN FILMDOM. That he has worked for Ince, Fox, Pathe, Universal, etc. That he wrote Nat Goodwin’s big starring role in pictures. That he prepared the original synopsis for filming Les Miserables. That he is the author of the first pictures made in this country and sent to France to be hand colored. That the motion picture trade papers speak of him as a man who has an absolutely thorough knowledge of photoplay writing. That he has repeatedly been chosen to write the first stories to inaugurate new brands of films. That June, 1919, has seen still another new brand, bringing back to the screen H. B. Warner in two of tbis man's original stories. So I interviewed him personally. And I found this; He has the fairest proposition of its kind ever conceived. He is helping unknown writers achieve recognition. He is showing writers outside the studios, for the first time in the history of the motion picture industry, the inside way of writing — THE DIRECT, DETAILED METHOD THAT STAFF WRITERS USE IN SELLING THEIR OWN STORIES TO THE PRODUCERS. He has the personal endorsement of the directors themselves, who want their stories written only in this way and in no other. He has made this method so plain and simpie that it can be lenrned in one ovening ’s study. And in addition to all this he is giving his pupils WIillam WorlhIngtcR. Protldent ot the Haworth Film Corporation and aolo director of Seiaue Hayakawa; famoui director of feature) for Univereal, Goldwyn, etc., layi: ycMe/-, cir' /Oeuot ^ ^ A FREE SALES BUREAU to aid tliem in finding a market for their stories. He is acting as a personal representative of these writers at the studios and with the directors. For he knows that unless writers have this personal agent they cannot hope to succeed. And he positively will nod accept any fee or commission on any sale ivhatever. The cost of his course has purposely been placed so low that everyone who wants to write can take advantage of it. The entire course, including his free sales bureau, is but TWELVE DOLLARS. And he protects everyone by an absolute moneybaek guarantee. In the interest of better motion pictures I feel it my duty to give him every aid I can. So if you are in earnest about writing photoplays I want you to get in touch with him. Do not remit any money. Just ask him to send you his FREE BOOK, "The Inside Story of Motion Picture Writing.” See for yourself his wonderful offer. But do this at once. Immediately. Address The F. McGrew Willis Institute ' the WILLIS WAY MAKES WRITING PAY" F. McGREW WILLIS. Sole Head Suite 418 Wright & Callender Building LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA time. .by 1 UmH joq jp^/ inon I tOOftUyv ...... . I. OldutOBd lacgMtSobooi "Bit Bold, work IntoruUng, ~ dooL I I du 1 EARN tie TO t4S A WEEK — “ tiaou •Sib DETROIT SOHOOL OP LETTfeRINQ 1 law. e«8 D. a. ef L. Bid«.. p»WCT. meg. Clear Your Skin WeYouSleep withCuticura All druggists; Soap 25. 01ntment25 460, Talcum 2.5. Sample each free of ''Oatloura, Dept. B, Boston.^' There’s Only Orve Wa^y to secure a satin skin: Apply Satin skin cream, then Satin skin powder. Ask your druggist for free samples Tempered Steel (Continued from page 31) well, it all got me. I didn’t go into it an enthusiast, but I have become one. “All told, it was rather a rigorous experience, far more rigorous than I had any idea of. When we got on the road I found that I had been made assistant stage manager, which might have been simple if there had been a manager, which there was not. At the last moment he had been taken ill, and I found myself, utterly without prior experience, as manager of the entire production, even to the cleaning of the ladies’ gowns. It was rather hard going. I dont know whether you saw ‘The Gay Lord Quex’ or not, but it is more full of props and entrances and exits, which mean the complicated ringing of sundry bells than, I believed at the time, any show in the United Kingdom. But I was in it, and I meant to make good, and I knuckled down and got the thing down to a system— and I may say that I did, besides taking various unimportant roles to help out or to fill in. “I came over here on tour three or four times with ‘The Gay Lord’ and with other plays. With Forbes-Robertson, for instance. The last trip I made the show flivvered out, as you say, in your vernacular, and 1 got interested in the picture game thru Famous Players — and I stayed. I like the pictures particularly for the variety they afford, of scene, of work, of possibilities and of action. There is never a sameness ; hence, never a staleness. Just at present we’re working on ‘The Firing Line,’ one of Robert W. Chambers’ novels. With Mrs. Castle. I find her quite splendid. Really. Particularly in her attitude toward her late husband, which is that of a man who has lost a bully pal. Nothing mawkish about it. She has deep religious convictions and she believes that, some day, they will meet again. In the meantime, she is young, and she is going to enjoy life. In a way, that is illustrative of my own theories, which is why I speak of it. Balance — that is the thing.’’ . Speaking of marriage led us to speak of marriage’s forebear, love. I rather expected a coldly analytical viewpoint from Vernon Steel. In a sense, I suppose ... “I hate to admit it,’’ he said, with a certain precision of thought, “but I believe the physical to be the main fact of, I might almost say, the only fact of, love. For instance, you might meet a perfectly charming woman, cultured, mentally engrossing, finished. You might meet her, and part from her, and never know the vaguest .shade of a regret. On the other hand, you might come into contact with an insignificant little thing who made slaughter of the Queen’s English, and she might revolutionize your world for you — for the time. There is the other rub. It is always ‘for a time.’ Doesn’t seem fair, but it is so. I am convinced of that. And being so, how can one even hope to believe that the physical side of (Continued on page 72) ( Seventy)