When the movies were young (1925)

106 When the Movies were Young anything as improbable as a legitimate competitor in a field where she had reigned as queen undisputed and unchallenged. It is often asked whether Mary Pickford is a good business woman. My opinion is that she's a very good business woman. And I am told that she had a head for business as far back as the days of Patsy Poor. She must have an understudy and no one but sister Lottie was going to be that understudy. Lottie stayed the season even though no emergency where she could have officiated, presented itself. I know Mary brought a business head with her to Biograph. Mr. Griffith had told her if she'd be a good sport about doing what little unpleasant stunts the stories might call for, he would raise her salary. The first came in "They Would Elope," some two months after her initiation. The scene called for the overturning of the canoe in which the elopers were escaping down the muddy Passaic. Not a second did Mary demur, but obediently flopped into the river. The scene over, wet and dirty, the boys fished her out and rushed her, wrapped in a warm blanket, to the waiting automobile. It was the last scene of the day — we reserved the nasty ones for the finish. Mary's place in the car was between my husband and myself. Hardly were we comfortably settled, hardly had the chauffeur time to put the car in "high," before Alary with all the evidence of her good sportsmanship so plainly visible, naively looked up into her director's face and sweetly reminded him of his promise. She got her raise. And I got the shock of my young life. That pretty little thing with yellow curls thinking of money like that!