We use Optical Character Recognition (OCR) during our scanning and processing workflow to make the content of each page searchable. You can view the automatically generated text below as well as copy and paste individual pieces of text to quote in your own work.
Text recognition is never 100% accurate. Many parts of the scanned page may not be reflected in the OCR text output, including: images, page layout, certain fonts or handwriting.
WHY IS MAKE-UP COMPULSORY IN THE MOVIES ?
V. A. Stewart*
MAKE-UP for the Movies is a greatly misunderstood art. Unfortunately the dramatic or speaking stage has had such an effect on the silent drama that nearly all of the artistes for the latter have been impregnated with wrong ideas as to the purpose of makeup.
When our grandfathers went to the theater, footlighting was the means whereby the major part of the stage was illuminated, and the actors came as near as possible to the footlights, so as to render visible all the facial expression they were capable of presenting, and that when the actual sound of speech might require assistance, unconscious lip-reading would be of great aid to this end.
Let us consider what was this source of light. In the early days candles were used; in Shakespeare's day reference is made to tallow dips for night entertainments, though performances were mostly given in daylight, as stage lighting at that time offered such insurmountable difficulties. Oil lamps later supplanted the candles. About the year 1800 gas for illuminating purposes was being popularized, and it stood to reason that the stage soon fell into line for this style of illuminant, first with the open flame burners, then with the Argand burner (named after its inventor) and then, though somewhat sparingly used, came the Welsbach incandescent gas light. Gas was hailed as a wonderful advance as it permitted dimming or increasing the light at will.
Around 1887 electric light made its presence felt — by the use of the Swan or the Edison carbon filament incandescent lamp.
Particular attention is called to the yellowish color that was given by the forms of illumination referred to, so that make-up became a necessity, and colors were devised to offset this yellowness. The paucity of light of the early illuminants compared with that of modern theater lighting compelled the use of large quantities of artificial coloring of the crudest description. Whitewash off the walls, red bricks rubbed together to produce a fine powder, lampblack or charcoal from burnt matches, were still in use in my younger days, and, later, the red for the lips was obtained from the cork of a bottle of Uquid cochineal.
* Fox Film Corporation.
93