The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1915-04-25

N picture corporation was watch
n ing rehearsals for a little Aim
drama one morning seven
years ago when a complication de-
veloped and 1t was patent that, as
arranged for, the idea, in the lam
guage of the studio, would not get
over. one of the players in the COM
pany, a slend,r young leading man,
went up to the producing director
and said: why couldn't 1t he done
so and 500" indicating his plan.
The producing director nodded en-
phatically. Right" he said, and it
was right. Wherupon the observ-
ing officer first mentioned turned to
the actor, saying seriously: why
don't you try producing, Griffith?'
to work out a few little IDEAS" was
the answer
Work them out, them was the
decision.
Up at the Liberty Theatr.. during
the last few weeks people are stand
ing in a line which stretches from
the box office nearly over to Seventh
avenuL suffering for the privilege
u paying 50 seat in many cases.
to see nothing but a moving picture
drama. The man who produced that
50 movie is the man addressed in the
studio seven years before, the man
who said he had a fw little ideas
10 work out
He was Griffith then, now he is
David Wark Griffith, for whom even
the most surfeited regular dramatic
rr!tic had words of praise when that
movie had its first night IN New York
and Of whom also other men who
study and observe rather than direct
declare that he has raised the film
drama 10 an art with capital \.
md that he has unfolded new possi-
Mtics, pioneered in hitherto unsus-
pected fields.
In brief. Mr.. Griffith took The
C.ansmdn,' novel by the Rev.
Thomas Dixon, and from it evolved
an ambitious spectacle for tn camera
IN which, working on a stage roughly
speaking five miles long and two
miles deep, he employed altogether
$4,000 persons and 5000 horses. He
"ordiHg 10 the records preserved in
he War Department at Washington,
using artillery, cavalry and infantry
as they We're used in a real battle of
The civil war.
His artillery duels were real artil-
lery du"'s, his cavalry charges We're
passed hy the men who participated
IN SUCH a charge fifty years before.
HIS men died as men had died in the
trenches Of the South and they suf-
;ered just as the men who did suf-
fer said they had. He built or caused
TO De built no less than five complete
southern towns, faithful to the last
.Fchtcctural detail, and he burned
'Aree # them.
lie massod and handled great mobs
~ whites and negroes as history said
ne rca. md''s acted. He reproduced
'He theatre exactly life size and de-
inea'ud the great national tragedy of
'ne ass ~-iration f President Lin
ON just as history says it occurred
lie huit The legislative halls of a
southern state and with an actual
'l' Photograph as a model brought
"rk 20 {" scene in that chamber
f'E y"rs ago. Above all throughout
". hours and forty minutes ne ran
.ar threads Of a love story.
Thus . was that Mr.. Griffith leaned
.ack .n DIS chair putting contentcdly
'l an after luncheon cigar, taking
A' hr-' .aCatiOn is about fourteen
Months III" was at that moment IL
9o,'iua among other things four
Questions which would take several
A"lrS ~ answer.
w arr you?"
"h". id you learn how"
Ito" ail you do this"
what viii come after"
Mr. Griffith told how he was born
I'd kentucky some thirty odd years
ago, ~" son Of Jacob Wark Griffith
hro.'- ir"adier- General of the Con-
"a"rH'' army. His family comes near
70 being '.s,hlc for about all the pa
lriotc societies, for his grandfather
was '... Dlllc! Griffith If the wal
~ I'l-. iu the generation further az
,h"f" '.s Il great grandfather in th'
I"''.t Try war. Before that tins
'h'r" "'. GriffIths in Virginia
After 'n" war, of course, the Grit
m'hS"i hru'ucky had, like many Other
'"'n.l's mainly their memories to Hive
-" memories and the products OF
.nflH d.. IN" edge Of the blue grass
~" hn" "us born in that situation
i""o, H.t education at the nearb!
''0''" hool.
TIL. wonder year came to the 10!
In,