Omaha daily bee., 1909-03-21

have access at the present time. That Is
the Grand stree; theater, long the home of
the Ylddish drama,
TIL c~hearness Of the new form Of enter
tainment -. Of course. one OF the causes
and probably the compelling cause of the
present state Of things. But II Is by no
means the only cause. The moving pict-
ure has been vastly improved in several
ways since the days when It's principal use
was as n chaser.
The pictures are better. more varied,
more amusing. and the machines have
been 80 perfected that the pictures are
no longer 80 trying to the eyes of the spec
tators, though even the picture men them
selves admit that there is still room for
much Improvement in this respect. But
the Improvement does not stop here.
one big concern, noting the perfection of
development which the various photograph
companies have reached and the popularity
attained by their records Of songs by fa-
nous singers. instrumental selections by
famous players and m~onologues by cele-
brated vaudeville performers. hit upon the
idea of combining the photograph and the
motion picture. And this is how It hap
pens that IN many Of the cheap theaters
YOU can for 10 cents or even a nickel see
and hear What this combination has done
In the way Of putting such things on and
behind the white screen.
This sort of thing is yet in it's infancy.
The difficulties Of synchronizing the visible
elements of such a show with the audible
factors are considerable and have not
yet been fully mastered. but even now the
thing Is well done at times, and passably
even at the worst.
Aside from the reproductions of he acts
OF great vaudeville performers perhaps the
most popular OF all the moving pictures at
the present time are the trick pictures.
These are varied and multitudinous and
so ingenious that unless you have had a
peek on the inside Of things II Is hard to
see how they could be achieved.
The success of them depends on the abso-
lutte control which the operator of the
moving picture machine is able to maintain
while the pictures are being manufac-
tured, in the first place, his ability to start
and stop It at will, to terminate its process
of recording instantly and to resume it at
any desired moment.
Take, for example, that highly popular
80 iAiS AlnAt wiz lNhAh oAN Oi
a park bench and has "a horrible dream
You see him wandering into the park, sit
ting down to rest and falling asleep.
You see a pretty girl arrive carrying 9
sharp axe. She pauses before the sleeping
figure, raises the axe, takes a good hard
swing with It and cuts off the mans head
You are about to be Mortified when you
observe that the man isn't killed, Fal
from it. He is, however, considerably an
noyed at losing his head. He implores the
pretty girl to give it back to him. She re
fuses, c~lasping the head TO her breast,
The headless man falls upon his knees
stretches out his arms in supplication anC
you see that his entreaties are at last be
ginning to melt the hard heart of tn,
woman with the axe. Ultimately she ca
pitulates and gives the mans head bacl
to him, whereupon he rises from his knees
gives her a warm embrace and they wan
der off down the path hand in hand liz
a couple of lovers.
Now II you don't know anything abou
the mechanism of the moving picture ma
chine you may cudgel your brains for
week and never get any nearer knowing
how the thing is done. This, in brief, 1
the process:
W actors are employed to play the earl,
part of the scene. 1t is perfectly simple a
first, up to the time the woman gets read.
to swing the axe. At that moment the ma
chine is stopped.
Then a dummy figure made up exactl
like the actor who has gone to sleep o
the park bench is substituted in his place
Then the machine is started again an
the girl cuts off the dummy's head. Tn