The Story World and Photodramatist (Jul-Oct 1923)

In The Foreground (Brief Editorial Chats on Timely Topics FOR the first time in the history of motion pictures, the author — especially the photodramatist writing directly for the screen — has been given official recognition and endorsement by the big men of the industry. The past few years have seen scores of conferences — local, national and international — all devoted to producers, directors, actors, publicity men or exhibitors. But it remained for the Authors' League of America, with the aid of Adolph Zukor and Jesse L. Lasky, of the Famous Players-Lasky Corporation, to call the First International Congress on Motion Picture Arts at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, New York, June 7th and 8th, and to devote the entire program of that unusual gathering to the art of writing the photoplay. It was no assemblage of pygmies. Those who were present — and there were delegates from every large European country, as well as from the ranks of American producers, directors and writers — represented the top of the profession. They were "big" men, and they spoke in a "big" way. They knew their subject, and they did not hesitate to tell their brother delegates just what they believed to be wrong, or right, in the motion picture industry; what practices should be altered and what should be retained; just wherein the film industry is strong, and what constitutes its weaknesses. It is significant that, almost without exception, these speakers declared that, despite the height attained technically in the production of screen dramas, the one great weakness of the Eighth Art lies in the scarcity of good stories. In short, the concensus of opinion was that if motion pictures are to advance, the men and women who write the stories must tell their plots in screen language, must learn the peculiar technique of film drama, and must cease the present futile attempt to borrow from the other mediums of expression. There were some dissenting opinions, of course. W. B. Maxwell, the English novelist, for instance, declared that the book was the thing, and that any good book would make a good picture. But there is reason to believe that Mr. Maxwell may i have been prejudiced. He has never been very close to the film industry — and also, in his own words, he admitted that "few novels are good novels." That, we take it, means that few novels are suitable for adaptation. Consequently the producers must look to the screen writer for the majority of stories they film. Just how authors may learn the art of writing for the camera seemed to be a puzzling problem to many of those present. Will H. Hays, however, offered the suggestion that it is possible for any writer to obtain a thorough course of instruction in the technique of photoplay writing. He mentioned in this connection two of the leading schools — Columbia University and the Educational Department of the Palmer Photoplay Corporation, which oifer the opportunity of studying screen technique by correspondence. Such study need not necessarily bar the author from the writing of fiction; but — as in the case of the late Emerson Hough, creator of "The Covered Wagon," — it will enable the writer to embody screen values in his fiction stories, making his "rights" doubly valuable, and helping him to reach an audience many times greater than possible through the one medium of the printed page. Mr. Adolph Zukor, of the Famous Players-Lasky Company, the largest producers of films in the world, undoubtedly hit the keynote of the convention when,