South African Pictorial - Volume 17 (Jul-Dec 1923)

' Salaries. JANUARY 12, 1924. The Girls on Page Nine. Miss Lois Wilson is a well-known film star, but her sister Constance, whose photograph is inset, is comparatively a newcomer to the screen. Lois Wilson will be featured with Conrad Nagel and Jack Holt at the Johannesburg Bijou next week in a seven-ree] Paramount drama entitled ‘Lost Romance.’’ The principal charact@érs in the play are: Mark Sheridan (an explorer), Jack Holt; Sylvia Hayes, Lois Wilson; Dr. Allen Erskine, Conrad Nagel: Elizabeth Erskine (his aunt), Fountaine La Rue. Both men are in love with Sylvia, and the picture shows which one she marries and what comes of it. House Peters, who, not many years ago, was receiving not much more than £5 a week for acting on the stage in South Africa, is now paid £500 a week for acting for the film-camera in America. Other notable weekly salaries (vouched for by an American authority—in pounds, not dollars) are as follow: Norma Talmadge, £2,000; Dorothy Dalton, £1,500; Constance Talmadge, £1,000 ; Pauline Frederick, £1,000; Larry Semon, £1,000; Tom Mix, £800; Barbara La Marr, £700; Priscilla Dean, £600; Jack Holt, £400; Shirley Mason, £3800. In England, Matheson Lang receives about £2,000 a picture, and Fay Compton about £1 ,000, or £75 a day. Betty Blythe received £4,000 a picture for the British productions in which she appeared, and Betty Compson was paid £1,100 a week while making two films in England. Charlie Chaplin makes from > £75,000 to £100,000 a year. All corporations. SOUTH AFRICAN PICTORIAL. | 5 movie ’’ stars, directors, and Many witnesses will be called before the grand jury, says a Los Angeles despatch to The New York Herald (Paris edition), for the purpose of obtaining an many affairs in the ‘courts for ‘‘ indictment to take the place. of the swom complaint on which Mr. Roth is now held in.£1,000 bail. It is alleged that Roth prepared amended. divorce pleadings for. Ben Deely, Miss La Marr’s husband, citing no fewer than thirtyseven co-respondents. Miss La Marr received a hint that £4,000 would secure the withdrawal of this document. She gent a representative to see Roth, who was arrested with marked money in his possession. ‘* Reconstructing ’’ Zeebrugége. With three Zeebrugge V.C.’s in the ‘“‘cast’’ and a famous British sailor directing passionate battle close-ups, Zeebrugge is to be stormed in an Elstree film studio for a semi-official screen history of Admiral Keyes’ brilliant raid on the Belgian port on April 22, 1918. Some 10,000 ft. of hitherto unpublished ‘Admiralty films of the actual events will form the basis of the production, the ““ reconstructed ’’ scenes being used to link together the necessarily incomplete sections of official negative. The picture is to be made, under the auspices of the Admiralty, by Mr. H. Bruce Woolf. of British Instructional. Films. Many actual survivors of the raid will figure, in their original roles, in the scenes on the historic Mole, which will be staged partly in the studio and partly at Zee| brugge. Among the Admiralty films to be included in the production are pictures of the pre_limmary bombardment of the Belgian coast by destroyers, the effects of the bombardment seen from an aeroplane, the departure of the Vindictive from Dover, and unique night studies of German searchlights probing the darkness as the British approached. The Man Behind Griffith. . An important film man who z never gets his name into the the larger salaries, however, are MISS PRISCILLA DEAN papers is in London just now. He governed by the drawing power of Who is to be “featured? at the Johannesburg 18 Albert L. Gray, the me the “star ’’ at the moment. A Orpheum next week in ‘‘The Flame of Life,” a behind the great American pro single disappointing performance, a new fashion in screen types, or even a private misadventure has been sufficient to transform a million-dollar film empress into.an unwanted out-of-work. Few players manage to sustain their balance for many years on the topmost heights, where hundreds are struggling to replace them. A Battleship Dark-Room. A film dealing with the activities of the British Navy is being made during the Empire tour of the battleships Hood and Repulse and the First Light Cruiser Squadron. The director of the film and several camera-men have their headquarters on the Hood, where a dark-room has been set up so that the film can be developed as it is taken. Some 100,000 feet of film will be exposed during the voyage. The commission for this important work was given by the Admiralty to British Instructional Films, Ltd. It is stated that another firm offered as much as £10,000 for the privilege. A Charge of Blackmail. An alleged’ attempt to extort £4,000 blackmail ‘from Barbara La Marr, of ‘* Prisoner of Zenda ” and ‘ ‘ Trifling Women ”’ film fame, has led to the arrest of Herman Ih. Roth, a New York and Hollywood lawyer, who has handled Universal-Jewel drama in seven reels. ducer, D. W. Griffith. Actually he is Mr. Griffith’s brother, but he uses a different name for business reasons. He is the business genius of the two, and 1s reported to be trying to arrange for Griffith to’ produce a big historical picture in England. Poets’ Corner: Tired Loveliness. I think the leaves do not abhor the cold, After hot, restless months upon a tree; They have borne dust and rain and wind and sun And will not shrink at age and injury. It must have been a deep experience In which their green serenity was lost: What could so alter and illuminate? Was pain as well as glory in the frost? And when these crisp, exciting days are past They will be grateful for a place to rest; For tranquil hours, and some still, sheltered spot, On which to lean their tired loveliness. By Anne Blackwell Payne. Conditions in China indicate that the Confucian there is becoming worse confounded.—Washington Post. ‘PHONES 1375/6, BOX 4755 (MANAGER, B. W. B. DOCKRALL).