Screenland (May–Oct 1925)

7S SCREENLAND Somebody in the Movies Has to Have Some Brains (Continued from page 31) magazine -or book publisher, and keep your photoplay rights! Then sell those to a film company." Having done this, Miss Marion went to the studio to attend to negotiations in person, decided to study the new art of screen writing, got a small part in Mary Pickford's company, made friends with the star, and promptly wrote thirteen stories, one after another, for her! Jeanie MacPherson came from the stage to Hollywood, tried to see D. W. Griffith, who was out, and left this — certainly intriguing — message: "Tell him I'm half-Scotch and halfFrench. On my French days, Fll act for him. On my Scotch days, Fll make money for him." She says she was hardly back in her room before the telephone bell rang. "Which are you today — Scotch or French?" asked Mr. Griffith. "French!" "Put on a pretty dress and come and act for me!" he directed. And fr she graduated into acting, writing. Bess Meredyth hails from the footlights, also, but it was back in the old Biograph days that she first ventured before the camera. After she had been every kind of heroine imaginable, the .supply of stories ran out, when Miss Meredyth was at Universal. "Wait a minute and Fll write one!" said Miss Meredyth. "I didn't exactly mean 'wait a minute'," Miss Meredyth explains, in speaking of the incident, "but I don't think it took me very much longer. You see, Fd had early training. When I was fourteen, I used to write a short story a day for the Buffalo Times. I got a dollar each! "After my first Universal picture 'got over,' without any casualties, I was drafted to write a story a week. No, it wasn't hard. We had no rules and regulations in those good old days. I acted while I wrote!" Fiction was the gate through which Dorothy Farnum entered into the golden game of scenario writing, but now that she has her own office at Warner Brothers' stately studio, she works entirely upon adaptations of the works of other people, for Warner Brothers never produce an "original." Agnes Christine Johnston sold her first scenario while she was still in high school. Vitagraph bought it. "So when, shortly afterwards, the family fortunes took a turn for the worse. I dashed out to the Vitagraph studios in Brooklyn and applied for a job writing more of 'em," says Miss Johnston. "They hadn't any writing jobs open, but when I told them I simply had to have some sort of work, they asked : 'Can you type?' I could — with two fingers — so I said: 'Yes, indeed!' and they let me type manuscripts for a few months at ten dollars a week. "I think the best thing to do, if you want to break into screen writing, is to get inside a studio and see how it's done — get the atmosphere — learn the possibilities and desirabilities. "But get in, even if you have to get in as a scrub-woman!" MADGE BELLAMY Her part in "The Iron Horse" is still fresh in the minds of most fans. A Motion Picture College A recent conversation with Mr. Will Hays gave SCREENLAND a glimpse of the elaborate plans under consideration by him for a motion picture college. Shaping his thought somewhat upon the existing universities, and also upon the practical trade school of the printer's arts, Mr. Hays voiced his hope that in the near future a real institution could be brought into existence. A university, with all that university life means, having for its mission the development of the proper mental attitude for motion picture acting and having also athletic fields, gymnasiums, swimming pools, etc., to develop the essential grace and strength on which pantomime so largely depends. Perhaps the first step toward such an institution is the announcement by the Famous Players-Lasky Corporation of their school to train young men and women for screen-acting. The location will be the Paramount Long Island studio. Twenty students, ten young men and ten young women, will compose each class. Adolphe Zukor, president of the Famous Players-Lasky Corporation, is chairman, and many noted names are on the board of directors. Each section of the country will be provided with a representative of this school, and local talent will be examined. If you would like to get in touch with these local commissioners, write to ScreenLAND, 236 W. 5 5th Street, New York City. How to Be A Painted Lady (Continued from page 27) now, although heretofore the same complexion was deemed good enough for both ingenue and vamp, and only eyes were changed. Doris and Aileen Pringle shared the discovery. "Aileen and I noticed that actors who were normally too old for their parts whittled down the years by using a pink make-up instead of the customary yellow. Results on the screen showed. A man of nearly forty became a perfect twenty-six. You could see the — well, call it the bloom of youth. Because our parts today might be as eighteen-year-old girls, tomorrow as sophisticated women, we wondered whether the camera would catch the difference in color-values as satisfactorily for us as for the actors. It did. And the hint holds good for off-stage use as well. Yellow powder will do the trick for a girl who wants to look older, while pink will hide the years." Since black on some occasions must be worn, it also must be overcome. That is the only time Miss Kenyon borders extremes. Either she rouges higher — or not at all, paling down instead until her whiteness dominates. White has a mean little trick, too. By contrast it develops shadows in the fairest skin, unless liquid-powder covers arms, neck and shoulders. That's for evening, of course. It's hard to imagine Doris strolling down Fifth Avenue these bright afternoons with anything more elaborate in the way of cosmetics than a touch of powder and lipstick, out of habit, not necessity. Women simply must do it; for the world's first powder-puff was the apple Eve picked. Before she ate it she rubbed it on her cheeks to see if the color would come off. Incidentally the clock rules Miss Kenyon's lipstick — Guerlain, if you're interested in the brand. She has no assortment of shades, but applies the one more heavily at night. We arrived at hair. "What have the movies taught you about hair?" I asked. One of these questions that accept the screen as a profound educational force to be inflicted on children along with Latin and wiggly things under a microscope. "To keep it," said Doris. The hair, of course. And she has, too, against the million scissors that humble woman's crowning glory at one dollar per humble. Not every heroine can be bobbed. Her hair is spun-gold — honestly, and with apologies because every blonde on the screen claimed or endured that word; and while it's unfair to Doris, spun-gold is the only description possible. It's wavy, too, and so vibrant that you think of electric currents running through silk threads. I fiad to know how she kept it thus — as though studio lights played on it all the time. "Every other time I wash my hair I put about two tablespoonfuls of washing-soda in the water. Then I rinse once in clear water; for the second rinsing I add the juice of one lemon; and for the last I use clear water again." For her gray eyes Miss Kenyon has found black and red eyebrow pencils too harsh, whereas dark gray softens them; and if in working moments she must cry, cosmetic takes the place of mascara on her lashes — because the sting of mascara has dammed more tears than were ever shed in behalf of suffering womanhood.