Moving Picture World (Jul 1916)

July 8, 1916 THE MOVING PICTURE WORLD 247 i:v. "... :;■ ;■■: : • " . .' . y] THE PHOTOPLAYWRIGHT Conducted by EPES WINTHROP SARGENT 1 , . : ■ :': ' : ' ' i ' ' Inquiries. Questions concerning the writing (but NOT the marketing) of photoplays will be replied to without charge if addressed to the Photoplaywright Department and accompanied by a fully addressed stamped envelope. Questions must be typewritten or written with pen and ink. Questions as to the financial standing of concerns or the probable markets for specific or certain styles of stories cannot be answered. In no case and under no circumstance will any manuscript or synopsis be handled and if sent will be returned without reply. A list of addresses of producing companies will be sent if the request is made direct to the publication office, but not where request is made to this department. Please Note. WILL readers of this department please note that William A. Brady is running the World Company contest. If you want to know about it, write to that corporation and not to this department. No reply will be made to any question bearing on this or any other contest. Special Chances. Lately a good friend told us of a chance to land stuff if we could fit a certain star. We passed the hint up. The style of script is not one that would sell elsewhere if this particular producer turned it down and the probabilities that any given story would please both the star and the man who passes on the scripts were too remote to make it profitable to essay a sale. It never pays to write to one individual star, but, on the other hand, do not get the idea that your story can be played by only one person. Lately an author wrote in great distress. He has a story that only one man could possibly play. That man, it was reported, was about to return to the drama stage. The author did not know what to do. We told him to write the story and send it anywhere. If John Smith can play a certain part, there is no particular reason why John Jones cannot make good in the same part, even though he is not the precise type. This does not apply, of course, to stories calling for certain physical peculiarities, but even here the rule is less rigid than would be supposed. If it is a type of story that is being made by more than one studio, then any studio making that type of story can find a player to fit the part if the story is worth while. You would hardly expect Eddie Foy to shine in a part suited to John Drew, but there are other players who can play Drew parts, not so well, perhaps, but well enough to please. Don't get too short a view of your script. Don't write for one man. Write for a certain type of character and broaden your market. A Sold Synopsis. (Continued from last week.) Only in one particular has the original Harris synopsis been changed. His title was "The Road to Nowhere" and Caprice was called Flower. "Grandpa Edmunds," "Dean, City Chum of Jacks" and "Mr. Edmunds, Jack's Father," have .been changed, as will be noted, and Aunt Susan has been added. Mr. Kellette notes : The story is by Clarence J. Harris and the script was written from this synopsis, so it is safe to presume that there was meat enough in the idea to build a good five-reel script from it. Mr. Harris also wrote a script so that Director Adolfi got the benefit of his ideas, but we incorporated many changes in the presentation of his story, BUT STUCK TO HIS ORIGINAL STORY, which can not be called "Changing" his theme. We presented it in a different manner than he pictured it, made the continuity perfect, and he can recognize his story when he sees it on the screen. Now, go on with the story : An original photodrama by Clarence J. Harris. CAST. Caprice Talbert, a mountain maid Ingenue. Jack Edmunds, tired of city society Lead. Tim Baker, in love with Caprice Mountain heavy. Dave, big-souled and lazy Caprice's father. Marie, Tim's sister and Caprice's stepmother Matron. Tom Edmunds, retired, Jack's uncle Caprice's friend. Dick Deane, Jack's pal, loves Caprice Gentlemanly heavy. James Edmunds, Jack's father Gruff old man. Aunt Susan, Dave's sister Kind old lady. THE STORY. Dave Talbert, a big-souled, lazy mountaineer, lives on Hardscrabble Mountain in a' forbidding environment, with his daughter Caprice, a girl of 16 innocent and lovable. The home is the center of great happiness, the only possible cloud being the marked attentions of Tim Baker for Caprice, rather encouraged by Dave, but feared by Caprice, Who does not understand the meaning of his intention, nor his manifestatoins of cruelty, evidenced by his ruthless destruction of one of Caprice's bird friends who had just flown from a nest of eggs to a clothesline where Caprice was giving it attention when Tim knocked it off the line. The happiness of the home ends as Tim's sister Maria marries Dave, and with the incoming of the stepmother, with her instinctive brutality, the heart of Caprice breaks and she turns her eyes to the mountains, longing for the happiness she hopes to find beyond them. Caprice finds herself the possible means of grave trouble, but bears the cruelty of Maria rather than make Dave unhappy, but quietly plans to go away. Conditions grow tragical, culminating in physical abuse by Maria, and when Caprice finds that her beloved rag doll had been thrown into the yard her reserve force comes to her aid and she climbs out of the window to her doll Lucinda and to freedom. In the woods, some distance from the home of Caprice, lives Thomas Edmunds, a retired New York business man, in a hunting lodge he had built to be near the simple life. He loves to be with the birds and the flowers and wander in the great silent places of nature, and between Edmunds and Caprice has come a great friendship. She now turns to him with her little aching heart and her doll and her worldly belongings, to find that the lodge is locked and "Uncle Tom," as she calls him, is away on his wanderings. Caprice continues down the old turnpike road that leads over the mountains, for there lies the city and to her youthful imagination, happiness and surcease from sorrow. Aunt Susan lives there, and Aunt Susan always loved Caprice. Jack Edmunds, nephew of Uncle Tom, with a group of joy-riders, is on his way to the hunting lodge to bring Uncle Tom some new books. Jack's life has been spoiled by wealth. He had never worked and had always a general allowance, and his friends were "fast" and he always paid the bills. The visit is his first one. The road is very rough for automobiling and his friends — Dick Deane, Cora Linton and Gracie Beaumont, object to continuing, and one of them discovers Caprice coming down the road as the chauffeur stops, undecided which road to take to lead them to the lodge. A signpost, broken near the bolt that holds it, reads — ROAD TO NO To the joyriders it meant nothing. But Caprice informed them that "the road leads to nowhere, that it had been throwed up these many years, and no one ever traveled it." Deane, in a spirit of jest, stoops to pick charcoal from where a fire had once been built, and wrote under the "NO" "where," that the sign might read "Road to Nowhere." Deane is struck with the girl's beauty and attempts to kiss her and Jack prevents the insult, pushing Deane back to where the laughing girls are kidding Jack on his new mash. Jack learns from Caprice that his uncle is away from the lodge and he asks her to show him where the lodge is. She does, taking the books to deliver, and as Jack rides away with the party love has entered her heart and all thoughts of running away has vanished. She must stay to deliver the books to Uncle Tom. When Uncle Tom returns from his jaunt he finds Caprice waiting for him. He learns the cause of Caprice's misery and strongly advises against running away, and tells her a story of "The Key Flower," how a little girl in wretchedness was visited by a good fairy, who told her that she did not have to go away for happiness ; the key to happiness was right by her as a flower, and he told her that the key was her purity, innocence and goodness. The girl of Uncle Tom's story found the key, which opened at once to her a wonderful world right where she was and where the prince found her. All was well, but like so many little girls, she did not realize the value of her key, she lost it through the cunning of an evil prince, and her life and beauty faded into its former wretchedness. Caprice turns back home and is found at night by her father, who tells Maria that he is all that Caprice has made him, big-souled and generous, and that if Caprice and the rag doll cannot find happiness in the old home, it were better that the family should dissolve and each go their own way. Maria cunningly wins Dave over by claiming that Caprice's injury was an accident and that she really loved her stepchild. In the meantime Jack and his pals, stopping at a roadhouse for rest and refreshment, carry their joy into a late hour. Jack is haunted by the memory of the little mountain girl and becomes disgusted with his aimless life. He carries the remembrance back to the city with him and finds that Uncle Tom has returned to look after a business propotition for his brother. Jack wants to return to the mountain country, declaring that he realizes he has been traveling along the road to nowhere, and that he has found nothing thereon but tears, sighs and hell, and Uncle Tom gives him his key to the hunting lodge. (.Continued next week.) ORDER NOW The THIRD Edition of Technique of the Photoplay will be published early in July. Place your order now. This is virtually a new book under the old title. More than double the text and with an arrangement especially adapting it for the student. The most complete book ever written on this subBy Mail, Postpaid Three Dollars Address all orders direct to THE MOVING PICTURE WORLD 17 Madison Avenue, New York City