Moving Picture World (Jan-Feb 1927)

266 MOVING PICTURE WORLD January 22, 1927 Fitzgerald Now Under Contract to Do Pictures A First National Foursome Richard Rowland, of First National, Natali Barr, writer, are greeted by Coleen Moore and Richard Barthelmess in Los Angeles. To write screen material exclusively for United Artists was a part of the contract to which F. Scott Fitzgerald, Donald McGibney and Wallace Smith affixed their signatures to this week. Fitzgerald is to write an original story for Constance Talntadge's first United Artists feature. She has one more picture after completing her present vehicle “Naughty Carlotta,” for release through First National. McGibney has already written "Two Arabian Knights,” which is now under the direction of Lewis Milestone, as a United Artists special. Smith, who wrote the screen adaptation of “The Dove” which will be Norma Talmadge’s vehicle following her completion of “Camille,” will, as his first effort under United Artists banner, write an original story for Constance Talmadge. George Delaney is playing opposite Sally O'Neil for MetroGoldwvn-Maver in “Frisco Sally Levy.” (Continued from page 263) WHY do you say, ‘yes?’” We personally had our own idea and Langdon had an idea that we did. He knew just why, but pinning him down all at once after the easy intervals of our questions rather ired him. This was just what we wanted. We got him to say this from beneath his own brown derby : “Well, it’s the first thing of this kind I’ve ever done. It’s sad and yet it is funny. There’s a story all the way through it. And the story while really dramatic is funny. After all the funniest things in real life spring from the saddest things. It’s real. That’s why I like it.” Whose who know Langdon will know that saying “greatest” for him in a public interview is practically the impossible. Those who know him will marvel that he said as much as we have quoted. To those who know him, Langdon doesn’t have to talk. They know him for his worth, truly a natural genius — genius, because he has been through the mill and never forgets it. Those who don’t know Langdon personally know that he has made tremendous box office strides. The funny but sad face gets the laughs and at the same time the big hand of sympathy. Now He Directs Ray Enright, a film cutter at Warner Brothers, has been elevated to a megaphone wielder. He has been in the motion picture industry since 1913 cutting the film of many prominent box office pictures. Those who don’t know him therefore may not appreciate that what we have just quoted is one of the longest and most superlative statements he has ever made. In “Long Pants,” however, it is not only Langdon but the story. A small town with two characteristic townsfolk arguing as to whether their gawky son has reached that stage where he should hide his gawkiness in long pants. The mother fears for the changes which come with adolesency. The father scorns an over-grown boy made more loutish by over-worn knickers. A birthday and the long pants proves the mother’s fears to be founded. The boy evades a sweet little townsgirl to follow an unruly vamp. Jail and home and happily married to the right girl. That is the story in less than half a nutshell. But the things that develop in that story — the mother love, the well-intended father, the things that happen daily in this socalled age of jazz mad youth are woven together in a way that critics on the premiere nighjt should acclaim as the much sought something different. In the cold studio Langdon moves one way that makes even the hard-boiled gang on the lot, Hines Finishing Johnny Hines is scheduled to finish work on his comedy release through First National titled “All Aboard” by next week. He plans to make two other pictures on the Coast, the titles of whjch are not known at present. who know the tricks of the game backwards, double with laughter. An instant later they wonder how they could have laughed when what is before them is undoubtedly tragic. But before they can dope out this entanglement there is another Langdon gyration which gets them going. Not gags, either. Just Langdon acting as though there were no camera recording his every movement. Just Langdon as he is on his way home but this time working in something that he enjoys because it is real. While the camera is cranking the musicians do not play the jazz accompaniment which one always hears around a set where a comedy is being made. The sobby strains of the “Camille” set orchestra would synchronize with that of the ‘Long Pants” musicians at this time. Langdon’s right hand man, Don Eddy, best sums up this condition with his description : “A tragedy told in laughs.” So far production work has covered a period of eighteen weeks. It is figured that it will be about twenty-two weeks before actual shooting is finished. This will be eight weeks longer than it took to make “The Strong Man.” It will mean that McGowan At Ease After His Sixtieth Film Bob McGowan has just completed work on his sixtieth Our Gang comedy. He plans to leave shortly for Cuba with the intention of not returning until April. Knowledge that he was contemplating a vacation dispatched a rumor that upon his return he would sever his association with Hal Roach and short subjects and would make his debut as a director of feature length pictures. It was while investigating these reports that Moving Picture World learned in the Roach Studios that upon McGowan’s return from Cuba, his signature will be secured by Hal Roach on a five-year contract providing for the continuance of his making short subjects. During McGowan’s absence, his assistants, Robert Anthony and Charles Oelze will handle the Our Gang unit. McGowan, it is said, has already prepared several stories for the Gang. It is not expected that this group of youngsters will make over two pictures during the absence of their big boss. the cutting room will have to select about 8,000 feet of ‘‘Long Pants,” out of the 400,000 feet or more which it is figured will have been exposed by the twenty-second week. Of the eight reels which will be released February 20, one reel will be done in technicolor. This already has been accomplished. It shows Langdon, gorgeously costumed, as the gallant lover of a beautiful maiden in a fairy castle. It depicts Langdon fighting a duel with his fist as the weapon against a long sword wielded by a huge knight. In the end the fist wins and just after Langdon marries the Fairy Princess, amid much pomp and splendor, he wakes up — the adolescent youth on the brokenspring bed in the small town farmhouse of his mother and father. In all, thirty-two sets were built to accommodate the action in “Long Pants.” One of these represents a forest of sycamore trees, some of which are actually fifty feet high. It is on this set that the adolescent boy first takes his small town bride with intent to murder her so that he may follow the ruthless vamp who has first ensnared his semimannish admiration. Langdon9 s “Long Pants His Masterpiece McGowan To Continue With Roach