A pictorial history of the silent screen (1953)

IVU5 1 tK & DIAL d IYIUOIU HALL | Thirty-fourth Street, Herald Square. Proprietor* ^ Bole M»nifor. Boatoeu Nvmrcr. KOSTER, BUL&^JO., ALBERT DIAL, V/. A. McConnell, ■£#. V/*ek ComciSDCbtg' Monday Erenlng, April 80, 1S»6. Evenings, 8:19 Saturday Matinee, 2: 15 THIS PROGRAMME Is subject to alterations at the discretion of the management. r 1 OVERTURE, "Masaniello.' WM. OL8CHAN8KY The R»<«W> Clown CORA CASELLI Eccentric Dancer. EDISON'S FIRST KINETOSCOPE (1889) KINETOSCOPE PARLOR (1895) 4 THE THREE DELEVINE8 In their original act "Satanic Gambol*'* ~s PAULINETTI and PICO The Athletic Gymnast and Gymnastic Comedian. WONS. and MME. 6 OUCREUX-CERALDUC 7 THE BROTHERS HORN Assisted by HU8S CHARLOTTE HALLETT "London Life." THOMAS A. EDISON'S LATEST MARVEL ' THE VITASCOPE, Presenting selections (ram the following: "Sen Waves," "Umbrella, Dance." "The Barber Shop," "Bnrl*sque Boxing," "Monroe Doctrine," "A Boxing Bout," "Venice, showing; Gondolas," "Kaiser Wilhclm, reviewing hln troops," "aklrt Dance," "Butterfly Dance," "The Bej Boom," "Cuba Libre." PROGRAM OF FIRST PUBLIC VITASCOPE PRESENTATION (1896) £4 .&&fj£\ pi ft ®* ^ ft ft ft ' ^-#^1 ft ft * ■ -$ ft Ik. »-^ ; ■• . -'Sir? 1 i $» ft 1 : ^;^ . FRED OTT'S SNEEZE (1893) To Thomas Alva Edison goes the credit for motion pictures, though at the time he did not regard his invention too seriously. He considered movies, as did many others, a novelty that would soon wear off. In 1889 the original motion picture machine came into being. It was called the Kinetoscope. It consisted of a cabinet inside which a length of film revolved on spools. When a coin was dropped into a slot an electric light shone on the film which was projected on the end of the cabinet. You saw the "moving picture" through a peephole just big enough for the human eye. These films were about fifty feet in length and ran for less than a minute. The subjects of Edison's films were simple— a baby being bathed, a dog with a bone, portions of boxing matches, dances and vaudeville turns— all suitable to show movement, jerky of course, but movement. To supply these films for the peepshow Kinetoscopes the first motion picture studio in the world was built by Edison in East Orange, New Jersey, at the cost of $637. Completed on February 1, 1893, it was dubbed "The Black Maria" and was swung from a pivot post to permit the stage to follow the light of the sun. In 1894 the Edison Kinetoscope machines were sold in the open market and presented commercially to the New York public in what was called Kinetoscope Parlors. Before the end of the year natives of Chicago, San Francisco, Atlantic City, Washington and Baltimore were introduced to the new wonder and soon Kinetoscope Parlors were flourishing all over the United States. This same year Alexander Black, who later became a wellknown writer, discovered the photoplay. A series of photographic slides taken from life were projected on a screen by a magic lantern machine. They illustrated a story Black would read from the stage. He showed four slides a minute for his presentation and each picture was a step forward in action. For his first picture play he wrote 14,000 words and took as his subject the adventures of a girl reporter, "Miss Jerry." Blanche Bayliss, a well-known artist's model, played the title role and William Courtenay, who later became a celebrated stage star, was the hero. The first recorded film, in 1893, was made of a sneeze performed by Fred Ott, an assistant in the Edison West Orange Laboratory. The list of films made during those early years included Mme. Bertholdi, a contortionist; Annie Oakley; Colonel William Cody, the original Buffalo Bill; Eugene ANNABELLE'S BUTTERFLY DANCE (1897) "WASHDAY TROUBLE' (EDISON-1895) FIRST MOTION PICTURE STUDIO (1893) MAY IRWIN, JOHN C. RICE IN KISS" (EDISON-1896) "THE