The Washington herald., 1916-01-16

that win bring US fresh talent and your
students ready money!"
And in this way 1t was decided that
one OF Americas greatest institutions of
learning would try the experiment of es-
tablishing a movie department First of
all, the new department is not going 10
spend its time talking about plays. The
students are going to be made to write
them and to learn by writing and then
more writing. 1t is to be a practical
course. Managing directors will talk to
the students so that the students will
have a frst-hand knowledge OF the d.
reetor's demands and the benefit of his
experience in plays that ran and plays
that failed
There will also be visits to film studios
to study all the physical limitations in
producing film plays, the expense in
Cured for different settings, where the
possibilities of the camera end, the
physical dimensions of the film, the ex-
pressional power of pantomime, the
economy and convenience of the pro-
dueers. But DR. Freeburg will consider
that his plans have failed unless the
course can bring more originality and
idealism into the motion picture business.
81 believe In the photoplay," says DR..
Freeburg. To me II has as great pos
sibilities for joy and beauty as any other
art form. And ! think the time is not
far of when the pho'o playwright will
receive Just as much credit as the writer
of the spoken drama"
The possibilities of the moving pictures
have likewise struck the artists full
force. 1t was only the other day that
New York's Latin quarter received a dis
tinct shock when Il learned that c. Allan
Gilbert, who, with Charles Dana Gibson,
Harrison Fisher. Hamilton King and
Howard Chandler Christy, made the pret-
ty American girl famous on canvas, had
succumbed to the fascination of the
movies.
This doesn't mean that Gilbert has
Joined the ranks of the movie actors but
that he has become a designer and pro-
ducer of movie pictures. Nor does he
work in the conventional manner. His
contribution to the movie world is a new
form Of photoplay which he calls
silhouette fantasies, which are whimsical
tales told in silhouette form.
McDougall's alley, New York's Bo-
hernia, where the artist lives, was
shocked out of its gay young life when
1t was learned that commercialism in the
guise of the movies had entered the
colony and stolen one of its most esthetic
members. But whatever his Bohemian
friends think OF the undertaking, Gilbert
himself is as pleased as a new playwright
always is.
He says he has been interested in IL
for some time. But he won't give up
painting for 1t by any means. He in
tends first to make his fortune with bis
movie stunt and then return to his paint
ing.
He is not the only artist connected with
this project. Henry Bryant. c. B. Falls
and others of the fraternity are assisting
him and already are enthusiastic film
shadowgraph fans. Gilbert himself writes
out ell the scenarios that are being turned
out by the Bray-Gilbert studio in New
York at ~ Washin gton News
The whole thing is a brand-new ex-
perience to Washington News with it's
rows of studios and truck-horse stables
to have moving picture establishment
in its midst. But for the last six months
il has been the seat of mysterious opera
tions whose nature only recently has
come to light. Big arc lights, odd stage
properties and curious Photographic ma
chimes have replaced faithful Dobbin and
his cart in one of the old-time stables.
stage and dies have been added tc