HOW I BECAME A PHOTOPLAYER By Bessie Eyton October 1, 1916 I have been told that my entrance and my success in motion pictures were somewhat unusual for the reason I had no previous dramatic experience. As you know, a large majority of those prominent in the art of the silent drama were formerly players […]
Born in Louisville, KY., [Billie West] inherited the name “Billie,” with some changes, from her mother, who was called “Willie” West by her friends. She was an only girl and had two brothers. She confesses to being a tomboy…In 1910 she left home and went on the stage to begin a varied career in stock, […]
NUMBERS HER ADMIRERS BY THE MILLIONS Bessie Learn Rises to the Topmost Heights of Popularity. Aug. 15, 1915 That five feet of femininity, even “with heels” should – could – rise to such heights of popularity as has the dainty little Edison ingenue lead, Bessie Learn, is a picture paradox – but no mirage. Her […]
“A member of a family that has been prominent on the American stage for many years, Dorothy Davenport has been engaged as a regular member of the Lasky Feature Play Company, and is busy on two elaborate productions in which she has leading roles, at the studios in Hollywood, Cal….Miss Davenport is a daughter of […]
“I write mush and melodrama. I love melodrama myself, and I have no secret disrespect for my audience when I regale them with it. I don’t feel that I am at all condescending.” — Leah Baird Source: Jack Jungmeyer (1924)
“May came to the studio – she did her work. Her amazing loveliness made her a star of the silent pictures. She couldn’t act. Nobody then expected her to act. Why should they? All she had to do was be photographed. So she was the mystery girl of Hollywood. The girl you never saw at […]
William Webster Campbell of the American Film Manufacturing company was, to quote himself, “born in Kansas City in 1891 on a night in January when the wind howled miserably and all the world was white and cold.” Seventeen years later he graduated from high school in Kansas City. At about that time he developed a […]
Mystery Of What Burned Martha Mansfield To Death How Were They Kindled, and by Whose Hand — the Flames That So Strangely Wrapped the Lovely Young Film Star in Their Cruel Embrace and Quickly Killed Her? The Philadelphia Inquirer, December 30, 1923 As her thousands of sorrowing admirers already know, Martha Mansfield, the charming young […]
“…Marion Leonard had become the best know actress of the movie world. She was even more popular than Florence Lawrence and Mary Pickford…Miss Leonard is said to have been the first actress before the camera to receive a salary of $1000 a week. It was in 1913 that she signed a contract for 42 weeks […]
“Accident creates more chances than anything else. My best advice is for the young woman who wants to get on, to keep going to the studios and trying to get a place in mob scenes. If she is fairly good-looking and wears clothes well, she has a good chance to get in the line. Keep […]