Motion Picture Magazine (Feb-Jul 1919)

uJJ.<» » From the Inside Looking Out Geraldine Farrar Discloses Some Studio and Stage Secrets By SUE ROBERTS THE public likes to pry, and it being my duty to play servant to the public's fancy, I not only tell them all the news about finished picture projects, but at certain intervals turn the industry inside out in order to give them a glimpse of the whyfore of the why. The question came up recently, "What is the secret of motion picture art? Why is it some people get across and others dont? What are some of the secrets behind real characterizations ?" Geraldine Farrar is one of the few stars who, in addition to being a popular prima donna and picture player, has also time to give a writer material for a story. When I called upon her she received me 'cordially in her apartment. "Certainly," she said, in her brisk, businesslike manner, "I'll tell you some of my studio secrets and experiences and whatever I can of the art of characterization. I received a letter the other day, signed 'Ardent Admirer,' in which the writer wanted to know how I managed to look so different in each of my movie characterizations and yet remain so wholly myself. I must admit that it is a rather baffling question, since the 'difference' which I assume in the movies, (as well as in the opera), with each of my varying roles is something which so far has evaded analysis; the essence of it is as intangible to me as it is to the 'ardent admirer.' It may be a form of unconscious self-hypnotism. I do not know. Of course, there is the conscious, intelligent conception of a part— the careful study of costuming, local expressions and pantomimic idiom. Having become imbued with all of these, the actress must trust to an unerring instinct. To be guided in acting only by one's intelligence, (by the mechanics of the art), is to sound the death-knell of real accomplishment in this field. "The great actress is not a mimic. She is a thing of plastic fire and spirit that can truly suffer Marguerite's prison anguish and Carmen's mercurial passions, and run the entire gamut of human emotions. "Make-up is always an important factor in any phase of the dramatic profession, not only in giving the desired illusion to the public, but in helping an actress in the metamorphosis from her own private self to the character she is to interpret to the public. It is true that clothes neither make the woman nor the actress, but I confess it would be rather hard, and perhaps impossible, to sing and act 'Butterfly' in an Occidental street dress. Nor could I have fought the villain with all the elemental fierceness of the Western prairie girl of IrishSpanish descent in 'The Hell Cat,' one of my latest Goldwyn pictures, in a Broadway hobble-skirt. "Aside from the costumes and head-dresses, which are essentially distinctive in every role, I never use the same set of pastes or cosmetics for any two roles. In 'Butterfly' I use a facial make-up that is suggestive of the delicately yellow lotus-flower of Japan, and I have a lipstick, especially made for me in Paris, that is the color of ripe pomegranates. As Carmen, my skin takes on a smooth olive, with the radiant colorings that are associated in one's mind with the high spirits of the flirt of sunny Spain. To give my eyes, which are gray-blue, the intensity belonging to the portrait of the character, I rub a brilliant green over my eyes and underline them with as deep a blue as I can procure. This little trick in make-up I have acquired since my experiences in the films. From a seat in the immense Metropolitan Opera 53 PAIS f