Motion Picture News (Mar-Jun 1920)

April j, 1920 3173 MISS MISCHIEF By William C. Lengel Character of Story: Comedy. Theme: LoveCharacters: Winifred Baldwin, known as Miss Mischief ; Hughey Granger, West Point Cadet ; Blinks Bawker, highwayman ; ; Deacon Tinker, bashful bachelor; Martha Wallis, almost an old maid; Mr. and Mrs. Baldwin, Winifred's parents; Miss Prim, principal of Miss Prim's School ; Colonel Waters, West Point commander ; Theophilus Pugsley, a teacher at Miss Prim's. The Plot : Winifred Baldwin, variously called Winifred, Miss Mischief and Billy, is a Tom Boy. She is the leader of the children in her village, and even when approaching young womanhood still continues to play pranks with the little tads and to tease Sergeant Hughey Granger of West Point who is inclined to regard her as a little girl. A highwayman has been loose in the neighborhood and as a joke Winifred leads her band of children into holding up Deacon Tinker and Miss Wallis who are riding in the Deacon's buggy. The Deacon is tied to a tree and afterward is robbed by the real highwayman. When he obtains his freedom he makes such an earnest complaint of Winifred's behavior that she is packed off to Miss Prim's school for young ladies which is in the neighborhood of West Point. Here Winifred resumes her acquaintance with Hughey who now finds her almost grown up. Although at a young ladies' school Winifred still likes to play jokes and becomes a ring-leader in the innocent mischief of the girls. She attracts the attention of an instructor, one Pugsley, who attempts to force his attentions upon her and who takes a great delight in getting her into trouble with the school authorities when she repulses his advances. One night Hughey has leave of absence and Winifred comes down a rope from her window and accompanies him to town where they go to dinner in a restaurant on Broadway. As a joke Winifred sets his watch back. Pugsley discovers Winifred's escape and gives the alarm. Miss Prim notifies the West Point commander that Hughey has eloped with one of her girls and a detail is sent out to arrest them. Meanwhile the highwayman, Blinks Bawker, has broken into the barracks and stolen a good deal of stuff from the boys. The robbery is discovered and an alarm is sent out that he is .in the woods somewhere in the neighborhood of the Prim school. Hughey discovers that his watch is slow and that he scarcely has time to reach West Point in time to avoid being absent without leave, but learning that the highwayman is abroad does not dare send her back to school alone. Ihey arrive at the school to find it surrounded by cadets who are looking for Hughey as well as for the highwayman. She insists that he comes into her room. .He does so only after she agrees to become engaged to him. She then plans to lead the cadets astray by making them think that she is the highwayman. She succeeds in drawing them away from the school while Hughey gets out. The highwayman really has been hidden in her room and now makes for the woods. There he comes upon Winifred and attacks her. Hughey is caught and arrested, but upon hearing Winifred's outcries, breaks away and goes to herrescue capturing Bawker. Winifred, Hughey and Bawker are all taken before the Commandant, who when he hears their story, alters Hughey 's leave of absence to make it twenty-four hours which gives them time to be married. The Deacon and Miss Wallis who have become «^ed Point grounds, contrary to regula Sons, are also arrested but released with a warning to do their courting LotaSS^West Point and another New PiXS Highlights: There are many l^rnlAv details and s tuations not deSHVtWs synods . Good ingenue comedy of the lighter type. A WEEK-END WIFE By Paul H. Sloane Character of Story: Comedy. aem/rU?mpS?Hainmond; Betty, bis Characters, her chum; Vance v£ D SyyS brother; Tom Stafford a friend of Perry's; Mrs. Vane, Tom's sster; Her baby; Carter Row land, a bachelor; Suzanna Simpson, a gay 'old girl Fiction Works Suited To The Screen Special Reviews Weekly The Plot: This is a farce comedy. Perry Hammond commutes daily from Sea Cliff. His wife complains that she is a "week-end wife" because he is usually forced to stop at hotels in town most of the week because of pressure of work. Perry himself feels that a little more continuity in his family life would not be amisss and plans to obtain this by getting a furnished apartment in the city with which he intends to sur se his wife when everything has been 'arranged. It is his idea that they will spend the middle of the week in the city and go to the country together for the week-ends. This particular week he has secured the apartment and is once more forced to stay in town until Friday. Dorothy Vane, his wife s chum, solicits her help in a matter affecting her brother, Vance Vane. It seems that Vance, quite innocently and unintentionally, has inspired a deep affection in an old maid named buzanna Simpson. He has told Suzanna he is a married man but she refuses to believe him and persists in following him about and sending him daily valentines. Could Betty help brother Vance out of this situation by allowing Dorothy and Vance to come to Hammond's house where Betty could pretend to be Vance s wife, just for a day or so while Suzanna visits the suburb? Betty, by reason of their long friendship, consents. Vance is installed in Perry's bed room and Betty takes Dorothy into her own boudoir. Suzanna comes, sees and is convinced, but lingers to knit a pair of wristers for Vance as a last token of her esteem. Perry meanwhile also has a friend in need. Tom Stafford has a sister with no place to go. inis sister has quarreled with her husband and come to New York with her baby where she has thrown herself on Tom's hands. Tom cannot secure any rooms for her and does not know what to do— could Perry help him out for a day or two. Perry could. He will go home a day earlier than he intended and Tom's sister with her baby can use his apartment. So it is arranged. Betty, at home, receives a notice from the real estate people that the apartment in town is ready for occupancy. She knows that this was intended as a surprise by her husband so she thinks she will surprise him by buying for him a certain pipe rack he has admired in a shop window in New York, bne will take this to the new apartment and hang it up in his den. She arrives with the pipe-rack in her grip just in time to observe, from the other side of the street, Perry's descent of. the basement stairs with a baby carriage Then she sees him wave his hand to a woman with a baby in the windows of an upper apartment and go down the the street. So — he has another family ! Climbing the fire escape to investigate she is spied by the janitor and a cry of burglars is raised. Taking refuge in an open window Betty hides under the bed in an empty apartment. Presently the owner, a jolly old bachelor named Carter Rowland arrives on the scene with a bag full of old Scotch. He spies her feet sticking out from beneath the bed and drags her out. The police arrive at the door and he lies like a gentleman, swearing that she is an old friend — a relative in fact — and has been talking with him for hours more or less. The police go away. Rowland offers Betty a drink and is rebuked forcibly. She grasps the bag and escapes from the house. Perry, meanwhile has gone home and found his room full of another man's clothes. He is waiting for her revolver in hand when she returns. Recrim inations are followed by explai when the atmosphe _ns „t full of Scotch. _. claim the bag. Suzanna comes to bid a last farewell and arrives just in time to meet Tom's sister (Perry'a alibi) who proves to be Vance's wife. She left him because of Suzanna's letters. So all ends happily in general reunions and even Suzanna comes out winner, for she makes a hit with the old bachelor. Locale: New York and suburbs. THE SPICE OF LIFE By Ashley T. Locke Comedy. Character of Story Theme: Variety. Characters: Doris Martin; Kendall Crane; Lord Worthington: Spiffy McGuire; Kitty Delavan ; Dick Murphy; Gaston, a waiter; Mike, a barber; Slim Levinsky. The Plot: Doris Martin, a young woman who believes that variety ia the spice of life makes life miserable for Kendall Crane, a serious minded young milllionaire who is desperately in love with her. On the advice of his physical culture trainer, Crane determines to make her jealous. He employs Kitty Delavan, the "lady friend1' of Dick Murphy an East Sider of shady antecedents to play the partShe has a thousand candle power eye but a one horse power vocabulary. Crane takes her to dine at the Ritz where he sees Doris much wrapt up in Lord Worthington. He then determines to show her how much nobility is worth and introduces Mike, a barber, and Gaston, a waiter, as noblemen, When he goes home with Kitty after the dinner, he is attacked by Murphy but the latter gets the worst of the encounter. Kitty and Murphy plot to blackmail Crane. Crane takes Kitty to the artists' ball. While there, masked, Doris is annoyed by a masked man and rescued by another. During the scuffle their masks fall off and she learns that the man who annoyed her is Lord Worthington while her rescuer is Crane. After the ball Kitty pretends to be taken ill and Crane carries her up to her rooms. There Murphy comes with Levinsky, a fellow crook, to blackmail him. Doria has followed them home and overheard their threats. She makes a noise in the hall and gets them out, pushing them downstairs from behind. She and Crane then escape by the fire escape. Doris meanwhile has learned that the whole affair with Kitty was a trick to make her jealous. She does not reveal her identity to Crane and he thinks she is simply the girl at the ball who was grateful because he rescued her from the Englishman. Doris determines to play a joke of her own and pretends to elope with Mike, the barber. Crane hears of this and follows. Worthington, who has seen the elopement, follows sooner and overtakes the pair who wait for him, thinking it is Crane. Lord Worthington knocks Mike out with a wrench and carries off Doris tied to the tonneau of his car. He is arrested for speeding and. while he is in court. Murphy and Levinsky, who have been robbing the country postoffice, come out and make their getaway with the car in which Doris ia tied. They pass Crane on the road and, recognizing Worthington's ca^ he follows them and pursuea them into the woods. He then takes them prisoners and they say that they have not seen the girl. He finds Mike in the road and learns that Lord Worthington ran uway with Doris. Ho starts lor the village JvneTC Lord Worthington was arrested. Dons, not knowing that Crane is now at the wheel, thinks she ia again being carned away by crooks. She manages to work loose and seize the driver by the throat. In the excitement she tumbles over the seat and comes face to face with Crane. She decides that she bus had all of the variety she wants and that henceforth she wilt be content with the compnny of one man — Kendall Crane. Locale: New York. Plcturo High Lights : A humorous melodrama would, perhaps, bo the best description of thin story. Plenty ot action throughout. DUST OF NEW YORK By Conrad Bercovici Character of Story: Short Btorles Theme: Varied typea in Manhattan. Characters: Moishe Goldberg: Sophia, his daughter; Ephraim Waldman; Mrs. Goldberg. The Plot: TUis book Is made up of a scries of short stories of life in the various foreign quarters of New York and deals with tlic reactions of foreigners to American environment. It presents the city from many different angles and has more than a little literary quality but most of flic stories ore more full of thought than of action, so that some of them, to he used lor pictures, would require the injection of action. A typical story is that of Moishc Goldberg, the Roumanian grocer who has come to this country and built up a big business nt the time the Btory opens. Mobile is a popular man and a charitable man who contributes heavily to all worthy causes and joins every lodjic and brotherhood that comes within his knowledge. He is sought after by lria compatriots and regarded as one of the really solid men of his community. His daughter Sophia, instead of selecting a hard-headed business man like her father, (alls in love with a handBome youngster by the name of Ephraim Waldman. Moishe docs not approve of her choice but being an indulgent father does not wish to make her unhappy by putting obstacles in her way. If she cannot fall in love with the right sort of man, he decides, the next best thing is to try to make the right sort of man out of the man with whom she has fallen in love. There is little difficulty about persuading Waldman, the new son-in-law, that he ought to go into the wholesale grocery business especially when he finds that he is offered a partnership. As he must have some official position in the firm and as his fastidious taste revolts at the thought of wearing an apron ond serving customers behind the counter, it is decided that lie shall become the bOOJc-IMepinB ,<ji-P-'l1rt' ment of the firm. Here a difficulty immediately presents itself. Moishc has never kept any books. It has been his custom to take to the bank every day all of the cash and checks accumulated during the day and to draw out of the bank as much money as he needed whenever it was needed. He has carried In* accounts in his head and has always found this a very satisfactory method of doing business. If he needed more money in 8 hurry, he was always good for it at the bank or with any of Tub friends and, on occasion, he would lend money in the same manner on the word of some friend or acquaintance whom he knew to be honest. This free and easy method of doing business had built him up a great trade and made him many friends. Therefore when Waldman begins to complain that he has no books to keep and that he cannot be a book-keeper without them, Moishc objects to the innovation. He sees no need for books. The business has always run without them and run very well, Why should he go to the trouble and expense of keeping books to look up in a book what he already knows in his head? Waldman. however, is obdurate. He insists that no modern business can be run in that fashion. There must be books-^whoevcr heard of a business without books? Without books there is no dignity in the position. Without books he has nothing to do. Without books he cannot be happy. So what Moishe at first regards as a joke has become almost a tragedy. The entire household is upset. Waldman threatens to go elsewhere unless books are had. So Moishe gets the books. And it is only a short time before Waldman discovers what Moishe never knew — that the business is bankrupt That its assets are not sufficient to cover the liabilities. That, in fact, they cannot afford to run the business at all although it appears to be prosperous. Moishc's confidence is destroyed.