Motion Picture News (Jul-Aug 1916)

July 22, 1916 MOTION PICTURE NEWS 403 thing to be desired. A big cafeteria occupies one entire floor of the four-storj building built for dressing rooms on the first floor, technical shops and wardrobe on the two upper floors, giving to the emplo3-ees of the plant exceptional service. The scenario department occupies a comfortable bungalow away from the remainder of the studio, and the oflices of the company occupy all of the buildings of the original plant. General Manager Mack Sennett has a ver\ efficient staffs, which includes George W. Stout, business manager ; Harry Kerr, assistant business manager ; Tony 0"Sullivan, assistant general manager ; Hampton Del Ruth, manager of production ; John J. Glavey, assistant production department ; George Chapman, technical director, and John Grey, Frank H. Buck, Walter S. Fredricks, Robert Carr, and Albert Glassmyre, scenario writers. The directors are Richard Tones, Clarence Badger, \Mlliam Campbell, Eddie Cline, Fred Fishback, Edward Frazee, Charles l arrot, Walter \\'right, Harn, \\'illiams. Harry Edwards, \"ictor Hcrrnian, Charles Avery atid Roscoe Arbuckle. The stock company includes more than fifty well-known photoplayers. Signal, One of the Youngest Companies One of the youngest film companies is the Signal Film Corporation, with studios at Signal, on the Salt Lake Railroad, between Los Angeics luc. Pasadena. It was formed in October, with S. S. Hutchinson, president, and J. P. ^IcGowan, director general, for the purpose of continuing independently the production of the tj^pe cf railroad storj which Helen Holmes and J. P. McGowan liaa iirst iiroui^hi to prominence three years before. The Western Lubin studio was purchased and fitted with modern railroad equipment. With the consent of the Salt Lake General View of the Signal Studios in Los Angeles Railroad, a station was built on the studio grounds fronting the tracks, and placed on the railroad's time cards. Lines were run for spurs, and a passing track at Signal to assist in the picture making, and a corps of workmen were put to work building box cars at the company studios. Xow a round-house is being tuilt. The gathering together of a cast to support Miss Holmes and Mr. McGowan in railroad pictures, meant the selection of men who had seen actual service in this work as well as pictures. Leo D. Maloney, Chance E. Ward, Paul C. Hurst, \Mlliam Brunton. Thomas G. Lingham, X. Z. Woods, C. H. Wisschussen. F. N. Van Xorman and Samuel Appel are members of the Signal Company, and all have the railroading qualification. The first production to be taken up was the fifteen episode serial, ■' The Girl and the Game." Xext the Frank H. Spearman Western novel, " Whispering Smith,'' was made in ten reels, the first five released under the title of " Whispering Smith and the second in July as " ^ledicine Bend." Recently the company spent ten days in Honolulu, where they made scenes for a South African mine story, " The Diamond Runners," and have just completed the filming of " Judith of the Cumberlands." They will next take up " The Manager of B. & A." The business management of the studio is vested with G. A. Hutchinson ; Orrin Denny is laboratory' superintendent. Ford L Beebe publicity manager, G. E. Jenks scenario writer, and G. A. Sues cameraman. i Horsley Spends $200,000 on Improvements in Two Years 1 During the past year David Horsley has expended close to two hundred thousand dollars for the improvement of his Los Angeles studios, for the construction of new buildings and obtaining equipment which permits only the most modern methods of manufacturing motion pictures. The most notable of Mr. Horsley's achievements was the con South Side of the Horsley Outdoor Stage, with the Indoor Studio in the Background struction of a gigantic arena devoted exclusively to the making of animal pictures. This came closely following his purchase of the Bostock collection of wild animals. The arena is constructed like a great hexagon. It is enclosed by massive reinforced concrete walls. In the center is a concrete platform, where the director and cameraman station themselves. F'-om this platform, one camera can cover all parts of the arena from one setting. Surrounding this is a moat, six feet wide and four feet deep, filled with water and divided by six fences. A player in danger of attack by an animal may plunge into the water and come up on the opposite side of a fence in a zone of safety. Jungle scenes are depicted in arena number one ; Northern woods locations occupy the second ; the wilds and tropics the third ; Rocky Alountains, the fourth ; the tropics are also contained in the fifth, and the sixth the desert. The last-named, by a clever device, is quicklj prepared for marine views by a change of the background, and other effects are possible if desired. Of the large structures erected during the year by Mr. Horsley, the outdoor stage stands out as the crowning work. This studio is 75 by 150 feet, the foundation of concrete and hardwood flooring. It is spanned by sixteen structural steel trusses, carrying diffusers and a canvass roof, operated by means of geared shafting. At the west end is the scene dock. North of the outdoor stage is the big indoor studio slightly greater in dimensions. Alassive scenes and night work are devoted to the indoor structure. Work may be carried on at any time and in any season here. Among the features of this studio are the electrical equipments, lighting facilities particularly. This department consists of a dozen Cooper-Hewitt mercury bank lamps of great power and also a large assortment of the new Wlnfield-Kerner lights. The gardens adjoining the outdoor studio are also maintained at a large cost, their presence inside the plant being of beauty as well as of enormous value in manj' respects. Here garden scenes are filmed and picturesque backgrounds for " sets " on the stage furnished. Other buildings constructed within the past year include the executive ofiice building; projecting room and still department building; laboratories, consisting of developing, printing, drying and cutting rooms ; the emergency hospital building and the garage, all of reinforced concrete.