To a young man named Richard Barthelmess, lately a graduate of Columbia College, Griffith gave the part of the “Chinaman,” because he was rather small, very good-looking, with a face that could make up “Chinese.” To Donald Crisp, an Englishman (he had been General Grant in “The Birth of a Nation”), he gave the part of Battling Burrows. Crisp was a realistic person, and had a face that in full war-paint was a thing to put fear into the stoutest heart.
Lillian was just over the influenza—not equal to the strenuous Griffith rehearsing. Carol Dempster, who had been a dancer in “Intolerance,” rehearsed the part under his direction. Lillian rehearsed with Barthelmess, earning his gratitude.
“It was my first important picture,” Barthelmess said recently, “and I was anxious to do it well. Lillian had had six or seven years’ experience, and she was the soul of patience.” Reflectively, he added: “Lillian, Dorothy, and Mary Pickford are the three finest technicians of the screen. I learned more from Lillian than from any other person, except Griffith.”
The labor of production began. Lillian had been promised that she could work short hours, with nine hours each night for sleep. But of course, Griffith could not stick to that. He could not keep away from the studio; nor could the others.
It was during this strenuous period that Lillian evolved what Griffith calls “the one original bit of business that has been introduced into the art of screen acting.” In his ghastly preparation for beating Lucy, Battling Burrows pauses, and commands her to smile. Griffith and Lillian had discussed how this could be done most effectively. Then, in the midst of the scene, Lillian had an inspiration: Lifting her hand, she spread her fingers and pushed up the corners of her mouth. The effect was tremendous. “Do that again!” shouted Griffith, and they repeated the scene until they got that heart-wringing bit of technique to suit them. Griffith couldn’t get over it.
Another classic bit is where the cringing Lucy, to arrest her father’s hand, looks up in an agony of pleading terror:
“Daddy, your shoes are dusty!” And flings herself forward to clean them.
The closet scene was the climax—the terrible moment where Lucy’s father is breaking in, to kill her. Nobody could rehearse that for her. For three days and nights, she rehearsed it almost without sleep. Small wonder, then, that the hysterical terror of the child’s face was scarcely acting at all, but reality. It is said that when the scene was “shot,” there was an assemblage of silent, listening people outside the studio, awe-struck by Lillian’s screams. Griffith, throughout the scene, sat staring, saying not a word. Her face, during the final assault and struggle, became a veritable whirling medley of terror, its flashing glimpses of agony beyond anything ever shown before or since on the screen. When it was ended, Griffith was as white as paper.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were going to do that?” he asked, shakily.
