Motion Picture Magazine (Feb-Jul 1923)

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LC} C\£ K CALIBER £1/~\QC 32 CALIBER TO "IS AUTOMATIC TlU'22 Au'flS&TIC V— ' "*^ AUTOMATIC ;„c,„,,j„j (,xlm Maiazint Trijlf'.™/rt( '9-21 Bolh Models Shoot Any Standard Ammunition ■» .25 cal. model, 4 % in. long by 3 K in. high — an ideal gun for a man or woman. Substantial .32 cal. military model, 6 ys in. long by 4 % in. high. Blue steel, beautifully balanced, swift — accurate! Superb workmanship and materials throughout. A gun that you will be proud to own. Protect your home and loved ones. SEND NO MONEY ■ — unless you wish. Full out coupon, write name and address plainly, showing gun you wish. We will ship by return mail. Write for free catalog. MAIL THIS COUPON TODAY ! California Trading Company Dept. 105 Terminal Bldg. Los Angeles, Cal. In accordance with the terms of your advertisement, send me ASTRA AUTOMATIC. I am enclosing money order for Or, I will pay postman on arrival. Name . Address City State. K£3MtCS£3L AT HOME We start you in business. Furnish everything. You make 1 to 2 dollars an hour at home in your spare time. No canvassing or soliciting. We guarantee to teach you Show Card lettering by our New Simple Method and pay cash each week no matter where you live. Write for Illustrated Booklet and Terms Free DETROIT SHOW CARD SCHOOL 216 Dinan Bldg. Detroit, Mich. From TelepKone Operator to Motion Picture Producer (Continued from page 66) Thus Mankind. But she remained undaunted. She went to one of the well-known Hollywood hotels where most of the directors, producers, "angels," etcetera, foregathered and offered this hotel her services in exchange for her board and keep. She performed all sorts of small duties and in the evenings she attached herself to groups of movie people and began to ask questions and amass such information as she needed. Now and then she got a job as an extra thru some one of the people she had met while with the shipyards. When she felt that she was ready, she tried again, and again unsuccessfully to interest Mr. C and others in her project. "If," finally said Mr. C , "if you can get a contract from some producing company, well and good. . . ." Finally, one of the officials of the Famous Players-Lasky Company offered to vouch for her, and upon the strength of this recommendation along with the obvious sincerity and commonsense of Miss Haskins' plans, the W. W. Hodkinson Company wired her from New York that they were mailing her a contract. "I then," said Miss Haskins, "made my first mistake, altho I still feel that I could have done nothing else. I cast my picture, hired my studio and began to 'shoot' before my contract arrived ; which means that I had absolutely no money and a mounting production cost by the day. I think I had about one hundred dollars in the bank and my secretary had about five hundred or more which she loaned me eventually. Miss de la Motte's salary alone was $750 a week. But if I had delayed until the arrival of the contract, which I assumed, of course, would arrive during the first week of actual production, I would have pushed my overhead up sky-high. The studio in which I made my picture was already equipped with sets which I could use in my story. If I waited, these sets would have to be scrapped and there would have been the great, additional cost of rebuilding sets for me. I couldn't see that. So I said nothing — and took a chance. "It proved a chance indeed! The cast was engaged, including, most notably, Mr. George Fawcett, Mr. Ralph Graves and Miss de la Motte. "The first week all went well. None of the Company knew of the conditions under which I, and they, were working. "Then came the end of the first week and, of course, my inability to pay their salaries, or any part of the production cost. I explained that my contract was due any day and that then their money would be forthcoming. But the contract did not 'forthcome' and neither, of course did the money. "It would take a book for me to tell you all of the details of the pressure they brought to bear on me. "Little things ... the studio manager refused to allow me to go on. I told him that the studio was mine while I was work -rZ^: ing in it; that I had hired him and that that was an end to it. "Miss de la Motte's manager refused to allow her to go on with the story unless her salary was paid. "They got together and decided that I was absolutely mad. "My director went off on a drunk and his son had to step in and lend a hand with the production. "When it came to the third week and still I could not pay Miss de la Motte's salary, her manager put down his foot. I knew that unless I could keep them going until the last scene was shot the game was up. That night I went to a very wealthy woman I knew in Hollywood. I had no concrete idea that she would even listen to me, I thought it likely that she would also brand me as 'crazy,' but my need was desperate and beyond all small considerations. I simply went to her and said, 'Mrs. I have got to have a thousand dollars within the next twenty minutes. She said, 'Why, of course, my dear ; get me my check book.' I could have asked her for ten thousand, perhaps, and had it, but I dont know ! I told her the truth. The thousand for Miss de la Motte was what I did actually and immediately have to have, and I believe in telling the precise truth in such cases especially. In that truth my extremity was revealed. "The upshot of the matter was that I got a permit to carry a revolver and literally at the point of a gun I forced the entire production thru to a conclusion. "At the twelfth hour the contract arrived and the money was paid. They told me, once, that I would never be out of debt. They told me that I would be in jail, or they'd know why. Mr. Graves coaxed and cajoled me into giving the whole thing up, 'while there's time,' he urged. He really feared for my life, I think. They banded together and decided to take the production away from me. They would 'take it over' they said, and I could go. I told them they would get that picture away from me over my dead body, and that if they did not go ahead to a finish neither money nor credit would be forthcoming. "Toward the end I was so direfully unpopular that I stayed away from the studio for three days at a stretch. My secretary reported to me, and I saw that they had what they needed. "Well, it is finished. "I am here in New York. The picture cost me $30,000 and it was valued at $80,000 by Mr. Hodkinson. "I wouldn't go thru it all again for many times the valuation. "I am going to keep on making pictures. Far from being daunted or defeated, I have been made sure of myself, and strong in my own beliefs. It was, simmered down, just Sticktoitveness. . . ." This is an outline of what the "baby producer" has been thru. One can read between the outlines, so to speak. One can see the "baby producer" battling with bare hands. A film Jeanne d'Arc.