As usual, Lillian had worked up to the last minute, had made one or more
scenes of “The Enemy” the morning of her departure. Little she guessed,
when she walked out of the studio, that those were the last scenes in
silent pictures she would ever make, that all unsuspected, another
beautiful craft was about to be relegated to that limbo of outworn
things which holds the painted panorama and the wood engraving. During
fifteen years, she had been a unique figure in an industry which she had
watched grow, almost from infancy, to a mighty maturity, and which was
now at the moment of dissolution. That Lillian did not see this is not
surprising, but that the great producers, with ears supposedly close to
the ground, their research departments always alert, should have taken
so little account of the warning voices (literally that), is
astonishing.
* * * * *
Of Lillian’s pictures, I believe there are three on which her screen
fame rests. In many there are distinguished scenes: in “The White
Sister,” for instance; in “Romola,” in “Wind,” and in “Way Down East.”
But of those which were consistently good, I should name, in order,
“Broken Blossoms,” “La Bohême” and “The Scarlet Letter” as those for
which she will be longest remembered: and this because of their
exquisite beauty and their suitability to her special gifts.
As to what Lillian did for the picture world, I am troubled by a lack of
knowledge. There are moments when it would seem that very little has
been done for it, by anybody. I suspect, however, that she did more than
now appears. She had a wide following among the picture players, to
whom, through example alone, she must have taught restraint, delicacy—in
a word, good manners. In a hundred pages I could not say more, or wish
to.
X
REINHARDT
Lillian, at the Drake Hotel, in New York was kept busy declining offers
of engagements—ranging from vaudeville through matrimony and pictures to
the so-called legitimate stage. Maurice Maeterlinck wrote to a friend:
I should be all the more happy to undertake the scenario you speak
of, in that it concerns Lillian Gish, who is the great star of the
cinema that, among all, I admire, for no other has so much talent,
or is so natural, so sympathetic, so moving.[3]
Lillian concluded a contract with the United Artists for three pictures,
to be directed by Max Reinhardt, foremost director and producer of
Europe. The company had a contract with Reinhardt, and it was on their
promise that he should direct her, that Lillian signed with them. Her
plan had had its inception a year earlier, she said, during a visit of
Reinhardt’s to Los Angeles.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account