Motion Picture News (Jul-Aug 1916)

262 MOTION PICTURE NEWS Vol. 14. No. 2 |IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIUIII1IIIIII1IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIUUIIIIUIIIUIIIIII1IIIIIIIUII>>>III>>"II!>»II>>>IIII"^ 1 IN AND OUT OF TOWN | Iniii iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiliiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii: iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiis M. E. Liebensburger of the Standard Film Service, Cleveland, Ohio, spent a week in New York, leaving Sunday, July 2nd. Mr. Liebensburger looked over the pictures on the market and made several purchases. Joseph McKinney, secretary of the Unicorn Film Service, is back in New York after a visit around the circuit of the company's exchanges. Wyndham Gittens, formerly with Biograph and until recently with Melies, left New York on the first of July for Universal City, where he will take up the duties of assistant to Scenario Editor Lewis. Lester Cuneo, heavy lead with Metro, left for Los Angeles, where he will appear in the Metro-Yorke pictures under Fred Balshofer. George Proctor, having resigned his duties of Scenario Editor for Gaumont, leaves for Los Angeles, Thursday, July 6th, where he will join the Lasky scenario department. Amid showers of rice Albert S. Le Vino, of the Arrow Film Corporation, and his bride, left New York last week for a honeymoon in New England. Arthur James of Metro and W. E. Shallenberger, president of Arrow, saw the couple off. Managing Director S. L. Rothapfel, of the Rialto, New York, has returned from a flying trip to Indij^napolis, where he went to assist, in an advisory capacity, in the construction of the new Circle theatre there. R. M. Savini, general manager of the United Film Service, with offices in At•ianta, Memphis and New Orleans.^was in JSFew York last week. ; > .William F. Niel, manager of the Majestic theatre, Birmingham, Ala , was m New York last week. Thomas Dixon Justifies Film Caricature of Public Men Author of " Fall of a Nation " Says Ridicule of Bryan in His Picture Is Not More Severe Than Lampooning of ex-Secretary of State in the Press CLUNE COMPLETES PLAN TO SEND "RAMONA" INTO EVERY STATE The W. H. Clune interests have completed a booking and producing organization for the purpose of sending " Ramona " 1 ompanies into every state in the Union. :w York offices, with H. F. Matthews in c'-iarge, have been opened in the New Amsterdam Theatre Building. In this office routes' will he laid for twelve Eastern companies. The campaign in the Middle West, under the direction of Fred La Comte, was opened last week when Ramona " went into the Auditorium, Chicago, for a , run of sixteen weeks. John J. Holland, who has general direction of all tours, is organizing additional orchestras and working crews for companies to be started early in the fall. KEMBLE TO PROMOTE SPECTACULAR PICTURES The Kemble Film Corporation, of which William T. Kemble, owner of the Triangle theatre, Brooklyn, is president, has entered the field to promote spectacular pictures, such as " The Zeppelin Raids on London and The Siege of Verdun," which it is now •distributing. A Scene from " The Fall of a Nation ": The Hon. Plato Barker at a Peace Meeting on the East Side THOMAS DIXON^ ;jutl>oE o£ " The Fall of a Nation," has come to the front in answer to the criticisms of his caricature of , ex-Secretary William J. Bryan under the' name of Hon. Plato Barker in the filrn. The double of Bryan is seen in the Dixon spectacle pocketing five hundred dollars fees (payable in advance) for his Chautauqua peace sermons. Later the Honorable Barker gofi^ out to wel.cijme with floral offerings the commander of an imperial army invading America. He tries to deliver another peace speech on this occa;sion, but he forgets to remove his hat and this is rudely knocked off his head by the emperor's minions. The imperial commander then consigns him to the army scullery where he is set to peeling potatoes for the general's' dinner, A letter-writer in the New York Sun says : " As a loyal American and a lawabiding citizen I wish to protest against the amazing action of a moving picture company, in holding up to ridicule a former Secretary of State in a film that is designed to promote preparedness. . For a long time I have been a believer in the non-censorship of films, but if there are to be any more deplorable breaches of national respect like this, I should certainly throw my influence on the side of the censor movement." In reply to this and other attacks on the Bryan caricature, Mr. Dixon says in a statement addressed to the press generally : " It appears to me that the film is always singled out for condemnation in respect of matters that do not start even a ripple when presented on the legitimate stage or in the funny columns of the papers. Is Charles Wakefield Cadman, the writer of the Sun letter, aware that Mr. Bryan is being caricatured in almost every summer show or revue in the country? I saw him cartooned in the Ziegfeld ' Follies ' at the New Amsterdam Theatre the other night ■ and in a Columbia .Theatre revue in Chicago last week. Every newspaper cartoonist is privileged to make fun of public characters. Yet when a film author does the same thing hands are held up in horror and ' breaches of decency and national -respect ' are talked of. I'll wager that Mr. Cadman, had he looked back over his files of the Sun and the Evening Sun, would have discovered pictorial and literary ridicule of Bryan far exceeding anything I have attempted. " My answer to the charge is simply that all the statements of fact implied in my caricature are true. Resigning from the office of Secretary of State, Mr. Bryan, so to speak, 'hogged' the Chautauqua platform and became the star lecturer at an emolument of five hundred dollars .per lecture. He raised the price, generally collected the money in advance, and put the other Chautauqua speakers in the shade so. that summer many of them could not obtain, engagements. "The theme of his oratory was 'Peace,' and he zvas surrounded by groups of admiring women and children just as he is shown to be in the picture. The part of the caricature referring to the future is a likely forecast of what would happen should such an orator present to an invading army his Utopian peace proposals. He would be laughed at, handled with indignity, and the result of his efforts would be absolutely nil. " In conclusion I will say that I attacked Mr. Bryan as a public man and as an opponent of the policies of President Wilson which his actions as Secretary and his subsequent resignation at an inopportune moment impeded. I am a firm supporter of Mr. Wilson and his international and domestic policies. I have nothing whatever against Mr. Bryan personally but claim the right to make legitimate sport of his mistakes which might have cost America dear."