Motion Picture News (Sept-Oct 1916)

2516 MOTION PICTURE NEWS Vol. 14. No. 16 INCE RECEIVES LETTER FROM PRESIDENT Upon Thos. H. Ince, producer of " Civilization," now showing at the Park theatre, New York, N. Y., has been conferred a most unusual honor. President Wilson invited Mr. Ince to Shadow Lawn that he might personally congratulate him on his achievement in creating such a spectacle as " Civilization." After Mr. Ince returned to New York he received the following patriotic sentiment in the President's own handwriting. The President's message reads : " The nations of the world must unite in joint guarantees that whatever is done that is likely to disturb the whole world's life must first be tested in tlie court of the whole world's opinion before it is attempted, and the United States must be ready to join in the guarantee and back it up by her whole force and influence. Settled and secure peace can be made sure of in no other way when the present war is over. " WooDROW Wilson." Mr. Ince has added the President's message to " Civilization " in the form of an insert, and together with a portrait of Mr. Wilson. World Film Buys Large Tract for New Studio Purchase Eight Thousand Acres Near Poughkeepsie for Largest Studio and Production Plant in the East JOHN EMERSON TO DIRECT DOUGLAS FAIRBANKS AGAIN Director John Emerson, loaned by Triangle to the Famous Players for the past two months, has been recalled, and will leave at once for the Triangle-Fine Arts studios at Hollywood, Cal. The reason for the haste in the departure of Director Emerson lies in a telegram received by Harry E. Aitken, president of Triangle, from Douglas Fairbanks. In his wire Fairbanks announced that he was on the ground and ready to start on his next picture, but that he craved two boons —first, that John Emerson act as his director; second, that Anita Loos write the titles for his plays. Miss Loos had just left for the coast after a brief vacation in New York, and is ready for her assignment. On Emerson's arrival Fairbanks will begin work on his first coast picture since " The Half -Breed." Emerson directed Fairbanks in " His Picture in the Papers," one of the earliest Triangle-Fairbanks releases. The last production he made for the Triangle company before coming east two months ago was the Sir Herbert Tree film presentation of " Macbeth." HELEN STARR LEAVES FOR UNIVERSAL CITY Helen Starr, for the last year editor of the Universal Eastern Scenario Department, has gone to the Pacific Coast to join the Universal forces there. Miss Starr is a versatile young woman, having played in stock, vaudeville and the legitimate stage, in addition to doing magazine and newspaper work. She was formerly editress of The Mutual Girl Weekly and a contributor of Reel Life. Her articles have appeared in all the leading publications devoted to the interests of women, as well as in the standard magazines of general circulation. THE World Film Corporation has secured a final option upon a tract of approximately 8,000 acres not far from Poughkeepsie with a view to building a large studio and general production plant. Architects and builders have already been consulted and active construction operations will begin as soon as the numerous titles have been formally passed to the realty concern which has been engaged in assembling this extensive property. A man prominently identified with World interests said in relation to the contemplated move : " Naturally, we cannot go very far into details at this time without danger of embarrassing the gentlemen who have been buying up the numerous parcels of land required for so large an area as the one desired for our purpose. But I may say that the property is extremely desirable for its accessibility by boat and rail, as well as for the extraordinary variety and beauty of its scenic advantages. " These are practically inexhaustible, including lakes, streams, mountainous ridges, broad, fertile valleys, forests, old farms and lumber camps and a number of private estates. In getting all this together, piece by piece, at prices within reason, the real estate promoters have been occupied for many months, and they expect to be able to turn the entire accumulation over to us within the next few weeks. " The World Company's contract with the Paragon studio terminated the other day and will be continued only in so far as our printing is concerned. We are so exceptionally well advanced with our completed releases, which cover the next six months, that it will not be necessary for us to overcrowd the facilities of our Peerless studio during this period, and considerably before its expiration the big new plant will be at our disposal in additon to the Peerless. " The new studio will be the largest in the East, and, as a matter of course, this and the other buildings will be ultra modern in every particular." to dislodge the key-log. The first episode closes with the woman being whirled away through the rapids, clinging to a log and holding her baby in the flying spray. The current sweeps her past a rocky point beneath a cliff, where the widow of the Indian chief mourns with her infant son beside the broken body of her lord. New Helen Holmes Serial Melodramatic Thriller First Episode of "A Lass of the Lumberland," Released October 23, Filled to Overflowing with Unusual Thrills HELEN MOLMES' admirers— and they are numerous — have a brand new set of thrills in store for them at an early date. The first episode of " A Lass of the Lumberlands," the fifteen-chapter Signal picture made for the Mutual Film Corporation, will be released October 23, and the succeeding episodes will appear weekly thereafter. Miss Holmes — says that this is the biggest and best chance she has had to display her love of meeting physical perils face to face. It is a story of the lumberlands, as its title suggests, and the action of the play extends from the silences of the great woods, broken only by the ringing of the logger's axe, the crashing of giant pines, and the noises peculiar to a timber camp in the snow-covered wilderness, out into the world of Big Business, on to the Capitol at Washington, and even intrudes into the sacred precincts of the Supreme Court of the United States. " ' A Lass of the Lumberlands ' is melodrama pure and simple — but melodrama of a surpassing sort, unmarred by recourse to improbabilities," says the President of the Signal Company, producer of the film. The plot takes big human situations and treats them in a big, human way. Witness Rupert Holmes cursing wife and child in birthbed, because it is a daughter instead of a son ! Neatly capped by the climax of the outraged physician putting the brute out of his own cabin ! Here is breathless suspense of the sort that beckons the crowds. Among the realisms of the picture is the forming of a great log jam, over which Holmes' wife, fleeing with her babe in terror of her husband, because she knows he has seen her watching him murder an Indian chief, springs from log to log only to be hurled into the stream when a charge of dvnamite is set ofT beneath the water "MY COUNTRY FIRST" FOR PREPAREDNESS BAZAAR A committee headed by Sterling P. Story, director of the Committee of the Preparedness Bazaar, to be held in the Grand Central Palace, from December 14 to 21, under the auspices of the American Patriot and Relief Society, has practically decided to adopt the Variety Film Corporation's motion picture photo-play, " My Country First," as the feature of the gathering. Mr. Story and his associates viewed the picture during the past week and were unanimous in saying that they would recommend it to the attention of the Committee on Preparedness, which includes among other notable personages. Major William H. Elliott, Adj. General of the Junior American Guard ; Mrs. William Cummings Story, president of the Daughters of the American Revolution ; Mrs. Elphinstone Maitland, Honorary Secretary of the Blue Grass Fund; Mrs. Lee R. Boardman, president of the American Womens' League for Self Defense; George H. Masten and Arthur De V. Storey. " My Country First " is a photoplay which depicts vividly the imminent danger of America from the machinations of foreign spies. Tom Terriss, the international star, is featured in the picture, for the plot of which he is also responsible. He is supported by a notable company, which includes Jill Woodward and Helene Ziegfield.