New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1915-09-18
BREAKS SILENCE
OF THE FILMS
Moving Picture by Rich
ard Harding Davis Has
Good Dialogue.
"pLAYING DEAD" Is
PUT ON THE SCREEN
Sidney Drew Does Clever Work
for New Feature Play of
the Vitagraph.
BY HEYWOOD RROUN.

By HAYWOOD BROUN.
Henrik Ibsen on Thursday and yes
tcrday Richard Harding Davis! Will
The progress of the pictures never stop?
playing Dead" a fve-part comedy, by
Mr.. Davis. for the Vitagraph Company
wai screened yesterday in the projec-
ton room Of the Wise. The picture
play was adapted by the author from
one of his recent short stories.
An interesting plot has been deity
put in form for motion pictures, and
Sidney Drew acts The CHIEF part with
much skill. We were interested to note
the extremely effective use of dialogue
in this picture play. the old idea, we
understand, was to throw lines upon
the screen only when absolutely neces-
sary, but MIR. Davis has not hesitated
TO use scraps Of dialogue in places
where the action IS perfectly clear
merely to get heightened effect of
humor, pathos or what not. The lines
indeed are screened for their own sake,
and they add not little TO the merit
Of the play.
There are, il seems to US, great pos
sibilities in this use Of dialogue in
motion pictures. Speech was given to
the mutes of playing Dead" only rare
ly, but why not a picture play with
every word set down? To flash the So
liloquy Of Hamlet on the screen, and
then 10 follow it up with the picture Of
the soliloquizer in full, bay, would not
be particularly effective, but we did not
have in mind the perturbation of the
dialogue of plays conceived for the
stage. 1t was a play written with not a
single speech more than twenty words
long. Outside the theatre many dramas
are acted with no greater allowance of
conversation for any character.
Back and forth this play would go
from picture to the printed word. At
first such film might seem a bit jerky,
but il must be remembered that the
skilful author would arrange his play
in such way as TO interlard his con-
sensational scenes with stretches in
which there was no talk. Robinson Cru
soc before the coming of Friday, for
instance, or, indeed, some of those
blessed scenes in which two or more
are gathered together to keep silence.
Such a play would lack nothing which
the spoken drama could give except the
sound of the human voice, and that in
these days of Evolutionary depression
never would be missed.
Speaking of voices, there is Jane
Cowl. Here is a sound-producing organ
concerning which one cannot be neu-
trail 1t is vastly different from other
voices. Some like it and others dis
like it, but judging from the throngs
which Common Clay" is drawing to the
Republic Theatre the "ayes" have it.
Once it was English actors. and now
1t is dogs which are crowding out
American players. In the legitimate
drama Jasper has usurped the star part
in Young America" while an unidentl-
fed police dog plays one Of the chief
roles in Playing Dead" the picture
play by Richard Harding Davis. BY
the way, it is not the dog who plays
dead, for he is no imitator of Jasper's
big scene. He is called upon to wag
his tail and show frantic JOY upon dis
covering Sidney Drew in the act Of
robbng his own house.
As the dog was not a pet, but com
mercial animal, hired for the day, the
demonstration of affection shown by
the animal in the picture is great
tribute TO the personality of Mr.. Drew
or the dramatic talent of the dog.
Sidney Drew is a staunch foe of one
form of picture photography, which
was invented by d. W. Griffith and is
still a favorite of that stager Of big
screen spectacles. Mr.. Drew can't abide
the closeup. A closeup? Why, it's
one of those scenes in which characters
are pictured from a distance of two or
three feet a picture in which you see
only the head and the upper part of
a characters body, and those much en-
larged.
"The closeup" says Sidney Drew,
reveals the actors makeup and dis
forts his features. If an actor cannot
register every emotion plainly to his
audience at a distance of at least nine
feet from the camera he has no bust
ness in moving pictures"
Griffith I'VE quote from an article by
him in "Photoplay Vogue says: TO
day the closeup is essential 70 every
motion picture, for the near view OF
the actors lneaments conveys intimate
thought and emotion that can never be
conveyed by the crowded scene"
Peer Gynt, upon being asked what 1t
Is to live, replies. at is TO be waited
dryshod down the stream of life,
whereupon the producer of the picture
Peer throws Cyril Maude into two
oceans and river