The Billboard (1920)

PIC TORE S 4S the Stepping stone A Triangle flve-reeler, starring Prank Keenan with Mary Boland. It la not likely a recent release and was caught for a one day snowing at the Stanley, New York. There's not much to" the picture, other than Mr. Keenah's fine playing. .Perhaps Miss Boland would have loomed up more brilliantly with more to do It with. A noticeable per- formance was given by the unknown vacilli- atlng husband, who was raised to prosperity and dropped to despondency in the first two reels. • The story Is of Keenan as a Wall Street ruler becoming attracted by Miss Boland as the wife of the useless one. He decides to establish ihe family in wealth and position, suspecting that the husband will walk out when everything Is coming bis wa" The magnate forgot to figure on ono thing—and the wife walked Jout first when she saw the finish, without leaving word where she had gone. The Wall Street man and the hus- band suspected the. wife had killed herself. So the husband killed himself. About a year after the magnate met the widow In the office of a broker, for a scene that It had taken up about two reels to reach. Then he married her and the picture was over. It could have been told in one reel. Bime. Monte M. Katterjohn has completed the con- tinuity of his first original story alnoe Joining Paramount. Production will start this week. THE MANTLE OF CHARITY. Just when one thinks that there wasn't much of an excuse for making this subject, "The Mantle of Charity" (American) and a Fathe "future," the scenario takes a sudden twlat and right bango In the eye-o comes a climax that Is sure to have picture audiences laughing unexpectedly during a scene that is supposed to be as serious as death Itself. The story Is old, but this unexpected climax isn't, that la, It hasn't been drummed to death in the pictures. The nice looking young man in the picture is running a charitable organi- sation and seems so wrapped up In the project he unexpectedly meets a charming young woman whom he takes under his char- itable wing, and because she has a baby—at. Fourth Liberty Lean Distributor Alice Joyce < V Gladys Leslie V Corinne Griffith - V Harry T. Morey & Betty Blythe. V William Duncan V Earl* Williams V W.S.Hart FP Lillian Gish FP Mack Bennett FP Charles Bay FP Dorothy Dalten FP Enid Bennett FP MaryPickford FP Dona-las Fairbanks FP Wallace Held FP Elsie Fergnson FP Marguerite Clark FP George M. Cohan FP - William FsTersham FP "Fatty" Arbuckl* FP George Beban FP Mr. and Mrs. Sidney Drew FP Harold Lockweod M Edith Storey M Emily Stevens M Naslmeva M Alice Brady 8 Norma Talmadge S Geraldine Farrar G Goldwyii All Star Cast......... G Mae Murray U Charles Chaplin ,.., FN William Farnum F Seisue Bayakawa Ma Dustin Farnum GF Kalem All Star Cast. GF Frank Keenan P V —Vttagraph Company of America FP—Famous Pisjm-Laiky Corporation M —Metro Picturw Corporation B —Select Motor** Corporation Q —Qoldwyn Picture* Corporation rj —DnlTeraal Film Mfg. Corporation FN—Km National Exhibitors' Circuit Mu—Mutual Film Corporation F —Fox Film Corporation OF—General Film Company F —Pataa Exchange. Ina $1,000,000,000 Is Our Pledge! imillllllllllllllHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIHIIIimTTITTn least, the little bundle she carries gives him every reason to suspect that It is her offspring —he gives her a Job.as a stenographer. In due time he takes It upon himself to believe that her condition wa% due to an old scoundrel who in truth is her guardian. The audience knowa that the girl la as rich as a treasury mint, and that the supposed baby is her pet dog. She goes through with the deception and when she slips a poverty- stricken woman money because the needy ono had a baby that was HI, the young man who ' bad denied the father charity for reasons best known to bis line of investigation, learns that she has rendered financial help and fires her out of his office. This rich girl, known as Norah Malone, opens across the street a competitive organ- ization that rendered aid first and made an Investigation afterward. The man had them all rushing back when he tack<& up a sign reading that "We help and never investigate." Then the mother that the girl had helped comes into vision, telling of anotbsr climax at home. The drunken father wont go to ■work and demands that the woman go on the streets and pick up coin that way. The young woman says if the young man «f charitable inclinations Is half a man he would go up there and whale the everlasting out of the drunken brute. He retaliates, "If yen are half a woman, you will come along and watch It." She goes. Then comes a merry fight. The. drunk starts to whale the daylight out of the other man. The latter plucks renewed courage and sails in, giving the drunk a knock-out punch. As he stands- there, looking at his fallen adversary, the mother, the very same -woman who had been helped by the • rich young man, with a poker gives the young raam a k. o. from the rear. At the private showing this unexpected angle, and it was no doubt meant for a seri- ous twist of the story, caused a loud guffaw from the reviewers present. It's really a-; gen* . ulnely comedy development that will receive laughter despite any intentions of the aat>' narlo otherwise. It Is a scenario that Jumps a wide dltoh at the beginning, leaves much to bs Imagined and really runs through an absurdly far- fetched channel until that fight, and than the comedy fracas saves the film from doing a Brodle. There is nothing else to tba flint. Not much acting. Margarita Fisher Is featured. - She la the rich young girl with the "disguised baby." Photographically this AmsrteM-Pathe an- swers all purposes, with some of the scenes- capitally staged. Mark. LAUGHING BILL HYDE. Laughing BUI Hyde..... .Will Rogers Ponotah ..Anna Lehr Black Jack Burg .John Salnpolla Dr. Evan Thomas Clarence Oliver Joseph Wesley Biayforth, Joseph Herbert Denny Slevln. .....Robert Convllle Danny Dorgan ............Dan Mason Will Rogers, erstwhile lariat thrower, of later years a monologiat, makes hla debut as a screen star in Rex Beach's "Laughing BUI Hyde," a Goldwyn picture, directed by Hobart Henley. A new star to fil-dom is necessarily a mat- ter of importance to the trade and It should ' •be stated early Rogers is a success. He isn't an actor on the screen any more than he' is on the stage, hangs his head in the same man- ner, comporting himself with the same shamb- ling awkwardness. Nevertheless he relgsters humor and pathos as' incisively as hla mono- logs are punctuated with humor. A close-up of him depleting grief over the loss of his pal shows him gulping his "Adams apple," and for the portrayal of humor he has a most engaging smirk. The star is surrounded by a well selected supporting company with painstaking and In- telligent direction. The story Is western in locale and is in Rex Beach's best vein. "Laugh- ing Bill"-is a man who bad been "borrowing" things in the absence of their respective own- ers since he was ten years old. The tale opens with Bill and his pal breaking Jail. It develops later he was doing Ave yeara for assaulting his brother-in-law for abusing Bill's sister. In the escape Bill's crony is mortally In- jured. He sticks by him, carrying him to the home of a physician. When hla pal dies Bill heads for the Alaskan gold fields. On board the ship he Is In a stateroom robbing it when' its occupant enters. It is the doctor, who determines to reform him and cure ■ him of consumption. BUI Is a bad one, morally and physically. A warm friendship Is thus created. The doctor has gone to Alaska to make his fortune, being poor and In love with a sweet young girl, who will wait for him. BUI meets a halt breed Indian girl who has been robbed of her mine by an unscrupulous promoter. He in turn is being robbed of a goodly portion of the mine's output by s hto foremen. Bill straightens things out for the girl and the doctor and wins the Indian maiden for a wife. That he has to resort to dishonesty by "salting" a worthless mine be- longing to the doctor and foisting It on the unscrupulous promoter does not take away from the attractiveness of the sympathy far the Jall-blrd lead; '"-»^Th8re'-~ia--ocit'Siderabltt~'oemed>r-'-thO"Stl'iK>tl-: audience last Sunday afternoon laughing at some of the titles. Rogers makes of "Laugh- ing Bill" a very human Individual, not an idealized romantic porsonage, but Just an or- dinary mortal with a soul. The first Will Rogers picture may be set down as a success. If future ones fit his per- sonality as snugly we shall have another star for the screen, /oft*. . . ,>j I'l 1 i-h-VJ *.*•*