Writing the Photoplay

by J. Berg Esenwein; Arthur Leeds

In a great many cases, pictures containing aëroplanes, burning oil wells, railroad wrecks, houses that are completely gutted by fire, and other exceptionally spectacular features, are the result of the merest chance. For example, a few years ago the Thanhouser studio at New Rochelle, N.Y., caught fire and burned to the ground. The fire was a spectacular one, as the chemical contents of the building burned like powder, and there were several explosions. The fire occurred at 1.30 o'clock in the afternoon, and many of the players were at lunch at their hotels when the alarm was turned in. But the players, the cameraman, and the director quickly got together, and even before the fire was well out they had produced a thrilling fire picture, "When the Studio Burned," in which was shown the rescue of the "Thanhouser Kid" by Miss Marguerite Snow, then leading woman of the company. Thus advantage was taken of an unfortunate happening to add to the fame of the Thanhouser company.

Again, it may happen that several scenes of a big fire are taken while it is in progress, and the film laid aside until a suitable photoplay is either written by a staff-writer or sent in by an outside author. Then the picture is completed, the fire scenes previously taken being inserted between other scenes showing the action of the plot.

One of the most thrilling and realistic fire pictures ever produced was "The Incendiary Foreman," released by Pathé Frères early in 1908. It had a well-developed plot that kept the dramatic interest keyed up every moment, but the features of the film were the many thrillingly realistic fire scenes, in which the Parisian fire department battled with the flames while several enormous buildings were being destroyed. One of the earlier scenes depicted the yard of the Pathé factory, and showed a quarrel between the foreman and one of the workmen. The ensuing action led one to believe that this was the factory that was consumed by the flames, but one or two of the later scenes made it plain to those who could read French and who watched the picture closely that the actual fire scenes had been taken during the destruction of an immense oil refinery. Yet the combination of the rehearsed scenes and the views of the real and disastrous conflagration made a picture that drew record-breaking houses to every theatre where it was exhibited.

Again, whether or not the producing concern releases a weekly or semi-weekly current-events reel, every company at times makes use of portions of such pictures, either made by themselves or procured from other firms. In the same way, educational pictures of every kind are made use of—certain parts of them, that is—to provide fitting and convincing atmosphere for original stories. When the Whartons put out their very fine patriotic serial, "The Eagle's Eye," written and produced with the intention of exposing the plots formed in the United States by agents of the Imperial German Government, the first episode was called "The Hidden Death," and showed on the screen exactly how, in all probability, the sinking of the Lusitania was brought about by Count von Bernstorff and his various agents. The actual advertisement placed in New York City newspapers by the German Embassy at Washington, warning all travelers that they sailed on steamers belonging to Great Britain at their own risk, as a state of war existed between that country and Germany, was shown on the screen, as were several photographs of newspaper first pages with news of the crime after it had been perpetrated. Also, the Lusitania was shown sailing down the North River toward the Upper Bay, starting on her last voyage. This picture, of course, was at least three years old at the time the film was shown in the theatres, and may have been much more than that, since many pictures of this and other great ocean liners have been made in years past, and at times when no one could possibly have guessed their ultimate fate.

Practically every photoplay of the Great War that has been released up to the present time has been made up in part of scenes taken on one of the fighting fronts, at the American, British or other training camps, or during street parades and military reviews, these pictures having first been made for news weeklies, official war pictures, or for patriotic propaganda purposes. Fitted in as a part of a war story, they greatly enhance the effect of those scenes which are entirely the creation of the author's brain.

On one occasion, a certain Edison director was putting on a feature which showed—as originally written—the sinking in mid-ocean of a great liner. While rehearsing the scene on deck which showed the passengers taking to the life-boats, he made repeated experiments with certain lightning effects, none of which quite satisfied him. He also had some trouble with one of the made-to-order life-boats. Finally, rather disgusted with the way things were going, he decided to cut out the lowering-of-the-boats scene and to have a fire at sea instead of a mere foundering. In a very few minutes, with the aid of "smoke-pots" and "blow-torches" a thrilling burning-ship scene was made, with the people scrambling toward the life-boats. Later, several long-distance views of the burning of a real ocean vessel, made by the company several years before, were introduced with most convincing effect, while the action of the story was in no way interfered with on account of the change. The scene described, of course, was made in the studio, with a specially built deck scene. Had there been other scenes aboard ship needed in the story's working out, the director would undoubtedly have secured permission to take all the scenes needed aboard one of the ocean liners always to be found in the port of New York.

So it is that hundreds of pictures released every year contain thrilling, unusual, and beautiful effects which the author has never dreamed of writing into his scenario, but which have been supplied by a careful director with a memory for what the company has made in the past. And the thing to be remembered, of course, is that while it is very easy for a director to use something which is already made and in the company's possession—or readily procurable from another company—it is not so easy, at times, to make the big scene or effect that the novice introduces into his story.

Leaving aside the staff-writers, in almost every company[24] there are one or two photoplaywrights; in many cases the leading man is also the director of the company, writing and producing a great many of the plays they turn out. Where this is so, that company is in a position to take advantage of any unforeseen happening or accident. Being in the vicinity of a railroad wreck, they hurry to the place and take the scenes they need. Then, probably many miles away, and on an entirely different railroad line, with the permission of the company and possibly at a slight extra expense, they take the other railroad scenes—perhaps a week after taking those at the scene of the wreck.

Thus the unthinking amateur writer, seeing the result of the producer's efforts on the screen, takes it for granted that the company has gone to the expense of buying up several old coaches and an engine or two and producing an actual wreck merely for the sake of supplying some thrilling situations in a railroad drama. True, head-on collisions have been planned and pictured, box-cars have been thrown over embankments, automobiles have been burned, aëroplanes have been wrecked, and houses have been destroyed, to furnish thrilling episodes in the pictures produced by various companies, but unless the story itself fully justified the additional expense and trouble, it is safe to say that the company, having the opportunity to purchase some old engines and coaches cheap, took advantage of this to write and produce a picture in which their destruction could be featured—that is, the photoplay was the result of the special scene, and the scene was not made specially for that particular plot.

To repeat, in introducing scenes that call for additional expenditure on the part of the manufacturer, the question to ask yourself is, will the resulting effect really justify the added cost of production?