The public ledger. [volume] (Maysville, Ky.) 1913-1968, 1916-06-10
birth OF A NATION"
Great Moving Picture Spectacle To
Show at the Washington Thcater
on Friday and Saturday,
June 10 and ~.

spectacle, THE Birth of a Nation.
following It's record-breaking runs in
New York, Chicago, Boston, San
Francisco and Los Angeles, will be
seen in one of it's original productions
at the Washington Opera House next
Friday night and Saturday matinee
and night. This work, partly from the
nature Of the new art, partly from the
opposition aroused, has excited keener
curiosity than any other Offering Of
the current season, and the extraor-
binary advance sale indicates that the
playhouse will not prove nearly large
enough to accommodate the eager
throngs.
"The Birth Of a Nation" tells by
film and music the story of a nation
reborn through the storm and stress
of internecine strife Instead Of the
four to six scenes Of the conventional
play, its technique permits Of filming
literally thousands of scenes and COW
ering a wide range of history and
characters. Slavery, the prime cause
of war; Lincoln's call for troops to
subdue the Southern States the ball
on the eve Of Bull Run, and the first
triumph of Confederate arms; the de-
vastation wrought by Shermans
march and the awful ordeal of the
Siege of Petersburg; Lees surrender
to Grant at Appomattox; the assasi-
nation of the Federal President; the
harsh Radical policy to the stricken
South; the uprising of the Ku Klux
Khan, and the overthrow of the car
petbagger regime-these great factors
and events pass in review before the
thrill spectator.
The love interest of the play is
based on the friendships between the
Camerons of South Carolina and the
Stonemans of Pennsylvania, two IA
miles involved in the struggle, Ben
Cameron, the gallant clansman or the
Dixon stories, appears again in the
role of romantic hero; the piquant
Northern girl Elsie Stoneman, as the
heroine. Mr.. Griffith took most Of the
scenes in the great out-of-doors where
Nature painted the backgrounds and
army men directed the battle cam
paign. The notable indoor scenes, like
Ford's Theater on the night of the
Lincoln tragedy, the peace at Apo
mattox, and the South Carolina legis-
lature of 1870, are exact fac-similes of
the originals. Altogether, 1t is the
first time in art-production that His
tory in the large has been presented in
living pictures. To do this, many
times the amount of the time. energy
and expense usually devoted to amuse-
ment enterprises had to be used
Eighteen. thousand people and 5000
horses appear in the picture, which
cost approximately 100000 to pro-
duce.
OF equal Importance to the scenes
is the music that interprets them. 1t
consists of an elaborate symphonic
score arranged after Griffith's sugges-
tons of the musical motifs for the
leading characters. Now grave, now
gay; now sounding the loid diapason
of War, again sweetly harmonizing
loves signs and rhapsodies; anon
bringing back the old plantation mel
odies, or the crash of riot and rapine,
or the welcome Ku Klux Khan call
that fell so gratefully on the ear of
Southern whites sorely oppressed by
the servants in the Masters habit
fits the changing scenes of the story
like a flowing beautiful garment. The
marriage of this music to the film best
Of all entitled the producer to his well
earned laurel of having created a new
art; new kind of grand opera, so to
speak, that had not even been con-
celNeu before.
Among the distinguished principles
are Henry b. Walthall, the distin-
guished Albania actor whose family is
historically connected with the story,
in the role of the Clansman; Lillian
Gish and Elsie Stoneman; Mae Marsh
and Miriam Cooper as Flora and Mar
garet; Ralph Lewis as Congressman
Stoneman; Joseph Henabery, Howard
Gage and Donald Crisp 9s Lincoln,
Lee and Grant respectively, George
Seigmann as the mulatto Lieutenant
Colonel of South Carolina; Walter
Long as the renegade negro Gus;
Raoul Walsh as Wilkes Booth; Mary
Alden as the octoroon housekeeper
LYDIA John McGlynn and Ernest
Campbell as the good negroes. Nelse
and Jake; Elmer Clifton and Robert
Harron as the young soldiers; Spot
tiswood Aiken and Josephine Crowell
as DR. and Mrs. Cameron, and many
others.
The production to be seen here Is
identical in all respects with those of
New York and Chicago. Two baggage