Evening star., 1923-04-01

TACK CUNNINGHAM, who was a
newspaper man for eighteen years
before taking up motion picture work,
and who In motion pictures has been
publicity man. studio manager and
writer for ten years, having to his
credit almost 100 so-called feature
stories, has something to say to the
screen story writer in what follows from
his pen.
ga great many people do not realize
that the construction of a story for mo-
tion pictures calls for technique in a
medium of expression, the life of which
never existed in human experience
prior to the advent of motion pictures
1t is a technique with which 10 one is
Fundamentally familiar. There are a
few souls with the itch for creative
work, adaptive effort and editorial ac-
ttvtty who are striving to find out what
can or cannot be done with the motion
picture camera and it's intestinal strip
of celluloid by way of telling a story
that will interest, thrill or instruct the
public. So far, very few have come
anywhere near doing II and certainly no
one has achieved perfection.
''There are a few things which we
have learned after something less than
a decade OF practice-as pictures are
today. We have found out that we
cannot look to the other and more older
of the storytelling arts for anything
more than a vague guidance and few
ideas. The screen has got to develop
its own technique, its own writers and
its own neutrality-suspicious., as we
might speak of stage directors. for the
direction of motion pictures rather
stands in the shoes of both the stage
director and the man who puts out the
books for a publishing house.
And. chief among the older arts
which the motion picture writer and
director must forget if he is to advance
beyond where we are now, is the stage.
The traditions of the stage have been
moro Of hindrance to motion pictures
than help-except by way of broad
generalizations. True, the writer for
pictures must have the drama sense,
but also so must the novelist IL he
would interest the greater number Of
people. Does the novelist go direct to
the stage for his technique as some
would have the writer Of motion pic
lures do?
Further, the motion picture must
above all things. forget the artificiality
of the stage. That is paramount. I
will tell you why. out Of long and
bitter experience at attempting to make
stories seem true on the screen.
'For centuries people have been going
to the theater And during those CEN
turtles the audiences walking through
the portals of the theater have been
taught to admit and submit to a certain
degree of artif1ciality-nore or less
More in the days when scenery was in
dicated by Iettered placard-and less
during the latter day theater when at
tempts have been made to make the
settings look real. But, with il all
these thousands Of audiences walking
into the theater through the centuries
have all agreed that they could not see
the real thing on the stage. They all
knew that the house was made of card
board, the woods were painted on can
Vass and the rocks were of light mate
rial which a property man could shunt
about back stage at will. Now, If they
agreed that the scenery was artificial.
they would naturally agree that the
characters need not be drawn so true
TO life-as to action, motives and
speech. Also, they might readily agree
that events which could not possibly
happen within the space allotted for
the performance of the play could hap
Pen on the stage and bn quite 'o~i"nl.
Then came the motion picture.
From the very first 1t has been made
went over the cliff In reality; that
Winifred was shot bodily from the
moving train into the tonneau of the
auto and whisked away to safety in
her lovers arms. Also. 1t has been
seen clearly that when man rode
out in front of the camera on horse
he was riding real horse in front
of real mountains and that the ban
dts who were chasing him were lop-
ing over miles of real desert, with
real mountains behind them. A mar
could not ride over miles of real
desert on a stage. He must ride by
trickery and Illusion in that medium
Of storytelling.
rIhs logical upshot OF this realism