Reel Life (Sep 1914 - Mar 1915)

REEL LIFE Nineteen The Personal Side of the Pictures FAY TIN CHER, comedienne of the Komic Company, was born in Topeka, Kansas, on All Fools' Day — a conjunction of the stars which probably explains her proclivity for fun-making. She always had plenty of "act" in her, and when the family moved to Chicago, she entered the Ziegfeldt Musical College where she studied physical culture and dramatic art. "Ziegfeldt was all very well," says Miss Tincher. "But 1 was impatient for practical experience, and I knew that the requirements of a theatrical company could be learned only by getting into one. So, the second year, after the summer vacation, instead of going back to school, as everybody expected me to do, I jumped into Savage's "Shogun" Company. "I was lucky to get that chance. I played with them several months, and staying that long with Savage is no joke. If an actress wishes to get a first class training, and to inure herself to all the ups and downs of stage life, the best thing she can do is to go to Savage. There's no stricter manager in the country, or one who "makes" people quicker. You have to toe the boards for him, though. He'll never let anybody get it over him the least fraction of an inch. He'd rather discharge his leading man overnight than put up with his being five minutes late at a rehearsal." The "Shogun" discipline led to Joe Weber's "In Dream City," in which Miss Tincher played the ingenue. This engagement lasted a year. Then came an opportunity to see Europe with her sisters. Miss Tincher spent three years touring the British Isles and the Continent— and the footlights grew dim indeed. Her quick intuition absorbed much of the life she saw. She studied all manner of types, and practiced privately the art of mimicry. She was especially charmed by Paris, Vienna and Baden. Again in the United States, she was astonished to feel the old stage ambitions returning with redoubled force. Nothing acceptable in the dramatic line was available, however, and she was attracted to pictures. Good fortune led her to D. W. Griffith who had just been appointed director-inchief of the Reliance and Majestic Companies. Her first day's work as an extra fascinated and delighted Mr. Grif Fay Tincher in a Characteristic Pose Her Favorite Pet Is a Lamb fifth, and she was cast for the role of Cleo, in "The Battle of the Sexes." Her well known success in this part was the beginning of her triumphant career in pictures. Cleo, however, was very far removed from the type which eventually was to be Miss Tincher's own. The adventuress of this tense, psychological drama was scarcely a comic figure. But Mr. Griffith, from the first, discerned in the young actress those qualities which go to make a comedienne of foremost rank, and which are extremely rare. She had the faculty of humorous exaggeration, and the gift of presenting a ludicrous situation with the utmost seriousness. As soon as the Komic Company was formed, she was placed under the directorship of assistant-producer, Ed Dillon, and the strides which she has made in the last few months have been one of the surprises of filmdom. Although Miss Tincher is a strikingly handsome girl — with large, dark brown eyes, dark hair and a magnetic personality — she does not hesitate to make herself grotesque, and actually repulsive, for art's sake. She thoroughly enjoys the reputation of being awkward and hideous on the screen. Miss Tincher's idea of sport and recreation is a trifle vigorous. In her eyes, a prize fight is more interesting than football, and far less brutal. While abroad, she attended all the big bouts in Paris and London, and even smuggled herself in at a Madison Square Garden contest in New York by disguising herself in boy's clothes and cutting off some of her hair. She contends that the conventions of a country have everything to do with the kind of rough games which are tolerated, and that the ring fights here and in Europe are frequently child's play compared to the battles engaged in by the athletic teams of American colleges. Miss Tincher can throw a baseball with the ease and despatch of a professional player. She also is a skilled boxer. Flying is another of her accomplishments. She has made numerous aeroplane ascents, and once soared over Terre Haute, Indiana, to a height of more than 1,000 feet.. In the water she is fearless, and in one of her recent pictures, she dived forty-five feet off the pier at Venice, California, into the Pacific, scoring an artistic dolphin plunge, w h i ch delighted, while it thrilled the startled onlookers. Ready to Leave the Studio