Among the many to whom it gave opportunities was Marshall Neilan. For his years young Mr. Neilan hadn’t missed much. At the age of fourteen he had run away from Los Angeles, his home, to Buffalo. There he washed cars for a living—which he probably didn’t mind much, for it enabled him to satisfy somewhat his fascination for mechanics. Then, back in Los Angeles once more, he got a job as chauffeur for a kindly person, a Colonel Peyton, who also sent him to the Harvard school in Los Angeles.
From chauffing to the movies was then but a natural step. For Marshall, a nice-looking Irish boy with Irish affability, soon had a “stand” at the Van Nuys hotel, which was a wonderful way to meet the movie people. Alice Joyce it was who enveigled him. She kept asking him, “Why don’t you come on in?” It was just like an invitation to go swimming. So he took the plunge via Kalem, but not until after he had become manager of the Simplex Automobile Company in Los Angeles.
When the Biograph Company returned East after that winter in which young Neilan had met his heart’s desire, he wrote to New York to ask Mr. Griffith for a job. Mr. Griffith asked Miss Bambrick if it was her wish to have Marshall come on, but Gertrude wasn’t so anxious. David had him come just the same.
The K. and E. pictures, especially “Men and Women” and “Classmates,” gave Marshall Neilan his big chance. He soon fell into the producing ranks, where recognition came quickly.
And he married his Gertrude. Marshall Neilan, Jr., is now nine years old. But they didn’t live happily forever after. Many years ago they parted. Just recently Mr. Neilan married Blanche Sweet.
By fall, with four and five companies working, there were so many actors that it wasn’t interesting at all any more. There was Millicent Evans and Georgie O’Ramey, Louise Vale, Travers Vale, Louise Orth, Jack Mulhal, Thomas Jefferson, Lionel Barrymore, Franklin Ritchie, Lily Cahill, Donald Crisp, Dorothy Bernard, Edwin August, Alan Hale, William Jefferson—oh, slews and slews of new ones, besides the old guard minus Mary Pickford.
From Chatsworth’s lonely stretches and prehistoric atmosphere to the spic-and-span-ness, and atmosphere-less Bronx studio came “Judith of Bethulia” to receive its finishing touches. “Judith” was about the last of Blanche Sweet in anything as pretentious directed by Mr. Griffith.
Mae Marsh was coming along and so was Lillian Gish. Lillian was beginning to step some, and it was interesting to watch the rather friendly rivalry between the three, Blanche, and Mae, and Lillian.
Dorothy Gish was still a person of insignificance, but she was a good sport about it; a likable kid, a bit too perky to interest the big director, so her talents blushed unnoticed by Mr. Griffith. In “The Unseen Enemy” the sisters made their first joint appearance.
Lillian regarded Dorothy with all the superior airs and graces of her rank. At a rehearsal of “The Wife,” of Belasco and De Mille fame, in which picture I played the lead, and Dorothy the ingénue, Lillian was one day an interested spectator. She was watching intently, for Dorothy had had so few opportunities, and now was doing so well, Lillian was unable to contain her surprise, and as she left the scene she said: “Why, Dorothy is good; she’s almost as good as I am.”