Moving Picture World (Jan-Feb 1927)

February 5, 1927 MOVING PICTURE WORLD 419 Who's Who In “Melting Millions yy The Star Director Cameraman The Extra ALLENE RAY ALLENE RAY this week ordered 10,000 photos oi herself. She will mail them next week. The following week they will be received by some of tue fans not less than 1,000 of whom write her fifty-two weeks in the year. This may be an astounding fact but Miss Ray told us before a grate fire in ler nice little sitting room on Hollywood Boulevard ‘lie other day that the Hollywood post office is kept busiest delivering fan mail in the Film Capital to this Rathe star, Colleen Moore and Alberta Vaughn. Another interesting point in connection with Miss Ray’s fan mail is that she figures the largest percentage of it comes from the pens of twelve year old female admirers. About Miss Ray and Rathe serials : She doesn’t believe in “doubles.” She likes to do her own jumping, swimming and horseback riding. She hasn’t used a substitute at the rickety bridge or the high wall more than less than a handful of times ever since she commenced her work in serials just four years ago. The result is advantageous for the camera man since he can get worthwhile close-ups of the real Miss Raj’ doing all of her own dangerous tricks in the suspenseful stuff which has created a consistent demand for Pathe serials. It was because she Could ride a horse that got Miss Ray her first job in pictures. SPENCE BENNET Here is a director who has never wielded a megaphone on any lot but the Pathe and who has never directed anything else in the varied production market except serials. Spence Bennet started in with Pathe back in 1913 as a stunt man. He leaped from walls, swam in hidden lakes, forded the swiftest of mountain currents. After that he became assistant director to George B'. Seitz. Now that he is a full-fledged director of serials he can be hailed quite truthfully as a man who knows about serials from the ground up. “Melting Millions” is Bennet’s sixth serial for Pathe. In it he tells us he has made every effort to make every one of the ten episodes tell a complete story and yet not be complete enough so as not to make the succeeding episode even something more to look forward to. Shaping episodes up in this way is the most difficult thing in serial production, he told us the other day while resting from the final task of cutting and editing. Each episode like every feature picture has to have its lead and its climax. The tough job is a finis that will satisfy and yet one episode like every feature picture has to have its lead and its climax. The tough job is a finis that will satisfy and yet one which naturally could not be finis unless it were the tenth episode. Another problem in serial making is that the scenes are not shot in sequence as is done' most frequently in big feature productions. EDWARD J. SNYDER Although "Melting Millions” will be released in slightly over 20,000 feet of film yet Cameraman Edward J. Snyder tells us he packed 125,000 feet of exposed negative in the cans that were submitted to the cutting room. Usually 100,000 feet or more of film are “wasted” with the making of every Pathe serial. Snyder’s and the industry’s definition of “wasted” does not jibe with that of the fans in this respect. As a matter of fact the superfluous footage is conservatively low for a picture of the release length of feature productions made out here have “wastage” of several hundred thousand feet before their market length of ten reels is ready for the box office. Snyder started in as a cameraman with Pathe in 1912. Including the present picture he has photographed sixteen serials for Pathe. He has been making four serials a year for the past two years. Snyder recalls how Pathe one time made serials with thirtyfive episodes or a total of seventy reels of film each. Then trick photograph}’ was a characteristic of the serial while now, he observes, it is just as commonplace in feature productions. This chief cameraman believes that more serials with less episodes, as is now the custom of Pathe, will realize considerable more for the box office return. He, also, has observed' that serials are now being based upon better stories and have more substantial backgrounds. RICHARD GILBERT “Richard Gilbert is here to see you,” we were told upon returning to the West Coast Headquarters o f Moving Picture World after one of the regular days spent in ambling from studio to studio. “Don’t call me Richard. I’m Dick to my friends and I guess I’m Dick here,” we heard from another corner of the room. “Dick you are then,” we assured a great big man who plays villanous parts in Pathe serials and who had dropped into the office to tell us how he liked it. “Dick” is the most unusual subject we have yet run in this column. He is unusual mainly because he is the first subject coming under this heading whom we have not had to chase all over Hollywood and finally find just before press time in some outlying bungalow. Dick isn’t the kind of a man who believes in being chased. In Colorado a few years ago he fought Jack Dempsey. He drifted into Hollywood three years ago and almost immediately went to work for Hal Roach. His first appearance in serials was in Pathe’s “The House Without a Key.” And while Dick can slaughter away on a Pathe screen he is no villain in real life. As a matter of fact he prefers farming to anything else. He owns a little ranch in Lankershim and finds no greater diversion than barefooting after his . two husky youngsters in the cabbage patch. Dick has worked in two-reelers and in feature pictures. Stars Who Put The Thrills On Serials