Screenland (May–Oct 1927)

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"Books for FANS DIRECTORS DON'T DO ^Mystery Films Bj' 'William Johnston Author of "The Affair in Duplex 9B" Campbell StuJu D[ William Johnston, author of mystery boo\s and short stories who \nows his suspenses. ■y OTHING delights me more than trying to solve a mystery. I read all the mystery novels issued and I have written nearly a dozen myself, so you can see I am pretty well up on mysteries, but there is one mystery I never have found the solution for. Why do film producers and film directors fight so shy of screening mystery stories? I could name a score of mystery novels, by prominent authors, well-written, full of suspense and action, offering an abundance of intense situations, stories that would hold audiences spellbound, tales that afford every facility for character parts and for the highest degree of artistry, widely read books that if filmed would uphold the highest standard of the screen, not one of which has ever been seriously considered by scenario editors or producers. As a writer of mystery novels with a wide acquaintance in screenland, I naturally have discussed the subject frequently both with scenario editors and directors. All I ever can get out of any of them is the unsupported statement: "The public does not like mystery stories." Doesn't it? An unsolved murder mystery every time will shoot newspaper circulation up by leaps and bounds. Any newspaper editor will tell you that it never fails. Any book publisher will tell you that mystery novels are read by business men, bankers, lawyers, everybody. Two presidents of the United States that I happen to have known personally were voracious readers of mystery yarns. E. Phillips Oppenheim has been writing three novels of this sort every year for many years and finding readers by the million. Maybe the reason is that film directors take the toplofty attitude assumed by some book reviewers toward mystery novels — that they are not real literature. In reviews of my books I not infrequently find the phrase "For a mystery story it is well-written." As if it was not as easy to write good literature in a mystery novel as in any other kind of a novel. Did not that great master of English, Edgar Allen Poe, write mystery stories? Has not every great novelist tried his hand at it? As a matter of fact it is only one author in a thousand who ever succeeds in mastering the peculiar technique of the mystery story. Some day some extra-intelligent director is going to wake up to the possibilities of this vast, almost untouched field of mystery fiction. He is going to take cognizance of the great popular interest in mystery. He is going to study mystery technique until he has mastered the art of translating it into screen action. It would not surprise me, if after he has put over one or two successful mystery pictures and counted up the profits if he does not organize a company to produce nothing but "mystery pictures", and whoever does it will make a clean-up. When that director does wake up I want to be at his bedside. There are at least four of my own mystery novels I would like to call to his attention. My book "The House of Whispers" did not make a bad picture, but there is still a better one in