Tales from the Archives: The Movie Church - Dec. 9th 1928

The schedule at the "Movie Church" for December 9th 1928 contained one feature film, The Wreck of the Hesperus (1927), followed by the short films Ride 'Em Cowboy (1928) and Seeing the World (1927).

The Wreck of the Hesperus was based on the 1842 narrative poem of the same name by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. I can neither confirm or deny if the movie still survives so unfortunately I have to assume it is a lost film.
The Wreck of the Hesperus starred Canadian actor Sam De Grasse, pictured above in a still shot from the film, as the captain of the doomed Hesperus ship. Like many of the movies shown by this Church, The Wreck of the Hesperus was produced by the DeMille Pictures Corporation. Sam De Grasse appeared in several films that were directed by Cecil B. DeMille himself such as The Birth of a Nation (1915), Intolerance (1916), and The King of Kings (1927).
De Grasse was known for playing villainous roles, such as Prince John opposite Douglas Fairbanks as the eponymous hero in Robin Hood (1922). De Grasse was also in the classic silent film The Man Who Laughs (1928) starring Conrad Veidt.
De Grasse retired from the film industry shortly after the silent era ended and died in 1953 in his seventies. His grave says he was born in 1880 but IMDB and Wikipedia place his birth year as 1875 so I'm not sure which is correct as actors often lied about their ages.

The motion picture industry was the family business for Sam De Grasse as his brother was actor/director Joseph De Grasse (pictured above) and Sam's nephew was cinematographer Robert De Grasse. Joseph De Grasse was one of the founders of the Motion Picture Directors Association in 1915 along with John Ford and William Desmond Taylor. The Motion Picture Directors Association was a precursor to the present day Directors Guild of America. Joseph De Grasse directed about 90 films including The Scarlet Car (1917) which featured his brother Sam and starred Lon Chaney, Sr.
Robert De Grasse started his career in the early 1920s and continued working as a cinematographer into the 1960s. Robert De Grasse received an Oscar nomination for Best Cinematography for Vivacious Lady (1938) which starred Ginger Rodgers and Jimmy Stewart. Robert De Grasse also worked on classic TV shows such as I Love Lucy, The Jack Benny Program, and The Dick Van Dyke Show.

Slim Summerville was also in the cast of The Wreck of the Hesperus. Summerville was one of the original Keystone Cops, appearing in the first film of the famous series, Hoffmeyer's Legacy (1912). Summerville was mostly known for his comedy work. Besides the Keystone Cops Summerville appeared in other films with famous silent comedians Charlie Chaplin and Fatty Arbuckle. After the silent era Summerville continued to have supporting roles in "talkies" and made films until his death in 1946.
Summverville was able to take some more dramatic roles in "talkies" appearing in the classic All Quiet on the Western Front (1930) and the Western Jesse James (1939) which starred Tyrone Power and Henry Fonda. Summerville still tended to get comedic parts and was frequently paired in films with comedienne Zasu Pitts. Summerville was also in a couple of Shirley Temple movies such as Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm (1938). For his contributions to the film industry Summerville earned a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Another actor in The Wreck of the Hesperus was Alan Hale Sr. Like Sam de Grasse, Alan Hale Sr. was also in Robin Hood (1922), as Little John. I wrote more about Hale in a Tales from the Archives post from last December. Hale was the father of Alan Hale Jr., the Skipper on the classic TV show Gilligan's Island.

Ride 'Em Cowboy (1928) was a cartoon in the Aesop's Fables series which this Church showed quite often. I don't know if this particular cartoon still survives, but there are some episodes of Aesop's Fables available on YouTube. I covered this animated series in depth with a post for the Short Animation blogathon so check it out here to find out more.

Besides Aesop's Fables, another series of short films this Church loved to show was Our Gang. Seeing the World (1927) was the 57th Our Gang short released. This Our Gang episode is notable for featuring Stan Laurel, one half of the famous comedy duo Laurel and Hardy. Both Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy have appeared in other films shown by this Church. Hal Roach created the Our Gang series and his studio also had Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy under contract which explains Laurel's appearance here. Seeing the World still exists and has even had a home video release.

Tales from the Archives: The Movie Church Nov. 1928 Part 3

After being on hiatus since December 2011 (except for a special post back in April that was part of the Short Animation blogathon) my Tales from the Archives series is finally back! To catch up on my previous posts simply click on the Tales from the Archives tag at the bottom of this post. New Tales from the Archives entries will be up every Tuesday.

I'm picking up exactly where I left off, which was in the middle of going through schedules of movies shown by the Catholic Church of the Holy Infancy in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania in the 1920s. My last entry was about the movies shown on November 18th 1928, so without further ado let's get to the movies people watched at this Church the very next week!

Like November 18th, the Church showed another double feature the following Sunday the 25th. The first movie was The Girl From Chicago (1927), a crime film with romance starring Conrad Nagel and Myrna Loy. Myrna Loy was in another movie this Church showed a few weeks earlier titled Ham and Eggs at the Front (1927). Like that film, this movie was another early role for Loy before she would breakout as a superstar playing Nora Charles in The Thin Man series which started in 1934. Like many of the movies shown by this Church, The Girl From Chicago was a Warner Bros. Vitaphone production. This meant that even though it was a silent film, there was a recorded musical score and sound effects which were synched with the movie when shown. It appears that is a lost film, but I was able to find a contemporary review of the movie! Check it out here.

Conrad Nagel received top billing for The Girl From Chicago, and unlike Myrna Loy this is his first appearance in my Tales from the Archives series. Nagel was a prolific actor with over 135 credits spanning from 1918 to television appearances into the mid 1960s! Nagel was in a famous lost film, London After Midnight, which I discussed in this post last summer. Nagel had no problem making the jump from silent movies to "talkies" and later television. He must've had a great voice since he also hosted the popular radio program Silver Theater in the 1930s and 1940s.
Conrad Nagel was one of the founders of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the organization best known for giving out the Academy Awards or Oscars! Nagel hosted the 3rd Academy Awards in 1930 and the 5th Academy Awards in 1932. Nagel would later co-host the 25th Academy Awards in 1953 with none other than Bob Hope! The 21 years between hosting Oscar ceremonies still holds the record for the longest gap between hosting the Academy Awards. Nagel was given an honorary Oscar in 1940 for his leadership and involvement in the Motion Picture Relief Fund. In 1960 Nagel received three stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for his work in Motion Pictures, Radio, and Television.

The second movie of this week was a romance film titled Dress Parade (1927) about a boxer who enrolls at West Point and falls in love with the commandant's daughter. The star of Dress Parade was actor William Boyd, who was featured in many of the movies shown by this Church. William Boyd would later become famous for role as the cowboy Hopalong Cassidy. The Hopalong Cassidy character was extremely popular as the series lasted from 1935 to 1947 for a grand total of 66 films! Hopalong Cassidy was so well received that the movies even spawned an amusement park in Los Angeles named Hoppyland! Boyd made regular appearances at the park but it ended up not being a success as it only lasted from 1951 to 1954.

The director of Dress Parade was Donald Crisp, pictured above. Crisp was also an actor and won an Oscar for Best Actor in a Supporting Role for How Green Was My Valley (1941). Crisp co-directed The Navigator (1924) with Buster Keaton and worked as an actor and assistant to D.W. Griffith for many years.
Dress Parade survives today and has even been released on DVD.

The Flight That Failed (1928) was an animated short in the Aesop's Fables short film series. The Flight That Failed is not on YouTube and I'm not sure if it still exists. I covered these cartoons in depth with a post for the Short Animation blogathon so check it out here to find out more.

Short Animation Blogathon: Aesop's Fables

This week is the Short Animation Blogathon over at Pussy Goes Grrr. I will be discussing the silent short film series, Aesop's Film Fables.

I first discovered this series while doing research for my Tales from the Archives series of posts, which is currently on hiatus. While helping out at an archives last summer one of my projects was to go through old parish monthly calendars, which are essentially church bulletins, to catalog them so that researchers could find them online. While surveying these calendars I came across some from a church that showed movies in the 1920s and used the calendars to list what movies they were showing and when. The church would often show a short or two along with their feature film, and they apparently loved the Aesop's Fables series and they would show up in the listings quite often.

The Aesop's Fables animated shorts were created by American cartoonist Paul Terry. Terry's first work was on a series of animated shorts starring Farmer Al Falfa (pictured above). These cartoons were produced at John R. Bray Studios. Terry later left Bray Studios but was able to retain the Al Falfa character. In 1920 Terry partnered up with Amadee J. Van Beuren to start "Fables Studios." The first short Terry and Van Beuren produced was "The Goose That Laid The Golden Eggs" which was released on May 13th, 1921. Although the early short films in the series were about the actual Aesop's fables, they later dropped that gimmick but kept humorous morals which often had nothing to do with the story. The Aesop's Fables series was extremely popular in the 1920s. Walt Disney even said that Paul Terry was an influence on his own work which is interesting as the two would later have their works be in direct competition with each other.

One Aesop's Fables short that the church showed was called "Small Town Sheriff." The cartoon is pictured above and dates from 1927. This is also the only cartoon from the series shown by the Church (so far, as I still have more calendars to get through in the project) that is on YouTube! You can watch it here.

"Small Town Sheriff" features good ol' Farmer Al Falfa as he deals with animals who have opened a speakeasy, although they sell soda! Keep in mind that this short was made during the Prohibition era. Wacky hijinks ensue such as a cat throwing a bottle at an elephant in a top hat, a fish stealing Al Falfa's car, and a blind pig (another name for a speakeasy was a "blind pig") running around with a barrel strapped to its back! The feline bartender has saved a bottle of booze for Al Falfa, who then drinks it and goes on a surreal journey into space. Al Falfa meets an invisible man on the moon, gets poured out of the Big Dipper, and flies through space in a rowboat being driven by a cat! Of course it turns out that none of this really happens as he was under the influence of alcohol (seems more like LSD to me!). The animals of the town all make fun of him so Al Falfa responds by reminding them him is the sheriff and pulls out his gun and starts firing to scare them away. Overall I think the cartoon holds up pretty well, especially considering its age. There are even some nice meta jokes like the Aesop's Fables film delivery truck and Alfalfa moving a question mark over his head! "Small Town Sheriff" is silly, a lot of fun, and only six minutes long so check it out now!

In 1928 Fables Studios released "Dinner Time," the first cartoon released to the public with a synchronized soundtrack. Unfortunately for Terry and Van Beuren it was overshadowed by the release of Disney's "Steamboat Willie" one month later. Fables Studios closed in 1933 but Paul Terry then started the successful animation studio Terrytoons. The Terrytoons cartoons were distributed by 20th Century Fox. Who is the most famous Terrytoons character you ask? Why it's none other than Mighty Mouse!

Thanks for reading and please check out the other entries in the Short Animation Blogathon!

Reconstructing Lost Film: London After Midnight (1927)

My film topic posted have now officially moved to Thursdays starting today. Enjoy!

                                         

Turner Classic Movies (TCM) is doing its Summer Under the Stars program this summer, which dedicates every day in August to showing movies strictly from one movie star each day. August 15th was Lon Chaney day and one of the films aired was the reconstruction of London After Midnight, which is one of the most sought after lost films. The only known surviving print burned in the 1967 MGM Studio Fire. As someone interested in film history, I had to check this out.

London After Midnight was reconstructed using more than 200 still photographs and a "complete continuity script" in 2002 (coinciding with the film's 75th anniversary) by filmmaker and archivist Rick Schmidlin. The film is considered to be one the "holy grails" of lost cinema for several reasons. First of all it starred Lon Chaney, the "man of a thousand faces" and was directed by Tod Browning who is most known for directing Dracula (1931) and Freaks (1932). The film was based on the Tod Browning original story, "The Hypnotist." December 17, 1927 was the premiere date for London After Midnight. Even though the film did well financially, critical reception at the time was mixed. Lon Chaney made ten movies with director Tod Browning and London After Midnight was the pair's highest grossing film. Below is a picture of Browning.

London After Midnight was also the first American vampire film and influential on the imagery of vampires in popular culture (creepy eyes and teeth, plus a cape). One of the most interesting stories about this film is that in 1928 a man accused of murdering a woman in Hyde Park, London used the film as part of his defense. He claimed that Lon Chaney's performance drove him to temporary insanity. However, his excuse did not hold up in court as he was still convicted of the crime.

This reconstruction is almost like reading a comic book since we have still images and text, although obviously music was added. Being a silent film is advantageous to doing this type of reconstruction. With a sound film I'm not even sure how something like this could be done. Would you hire new actors to dub lines? At that point you are basically re-making the movie to some extent.

It's hard to judge the film itself based on this reconstruction as it is essentially a historical artifact to recreate the original for future generations in case it is never found. That said, Lon Chaney's vampire make-up is creepy even by today's standards. The praise he received for his ability to "become" other people in his acting and make-up is definitely deserved, and he played a dual role in this film. I liked the twist ending as it tied up everything and felt organic to the story and not forced like many twist endings often are. London After Midnight was re-made by Browning in 1935 as Mark of the Vampire (with Bela Lugosi as the vampire) which I am now interested in seeing. I wonder if Lon Chaney would have reprised his role as the vampire in the remake had he not died in 1930.

This is a fascinating re-creation of a film that is most likely (although hopefully not) lost to time and may be as close as we will ever get to the original. I know that there have been reconstructions of other lost films but I wonder if any of those films have eventually been found. If you have seen a reconstruction of this or any other lost film please let me know your thoughts in the comments section. If London After Midnight is ever found it would be interesting to compare the original with the reconstruction to see how close it came.

Links:
See the Reconstruction here at google video!

Wikipedia
IMDB
TCM

Come back Sunday for the weekly wrap-up!