DW GRIFFITH A CORNER IN WHEAT 1909

A Corner in the Wheat 1909 Cast: Owen Moore ,George Nichols ,Charles Hill Mailes ,Jeanie Macpherson, Blanche Sweet, Frank Powell Mack Sennett Billy Quirk Henry Walthall Kate Bruce William J. Butler Linda Arvidson, James Kirkwood, Arthur V. Johnson, Edward Dillon, Grace Henderson, Frank Evans, D.W. Griffith - Screenwriter, Frank E. Woods - Screenwriter, Billy Bitzer - CinematographerThis is the first film in which Griffith attempts social commentary. The scenario parallels the problems of a poor farmer and the dealings of an ill-fated "wheat king." Based on the novel "The Pit" by FRANK NORRIS http://www.YouTube.com/DIRECTO... http://www.YouTube.com/THEATRE... http://www.YouTube.com/IRARONA... http://www.YouTube.com/TVNETWO... http://www.YouTube.com/TVDAYS http://www.tvdays.com (400 DVD TITLES)DW GRIFFITH AT BIOGRAPH COMPANY BY IRA H. GALLEN New York City - 1908 - While David Wark Griffith was looking for work on the theatre circuit, he meets Max Davidson, an actor friend with whom he had worked years before in the Louisville Stock Company. At Davidson's suggestion, D.W. Griffith accompanies him to a nickelodeon movie parlor in lower Manhattan, where Griffith encounters moving pictures for the first time.Afterwards, it becomes apparent that Davidson's reasoning was simply to show Griffith where he could earn some extra money until some work on the legitimate stage could be secured. Davidson himself had already begun accepting acting jobs in moving pictures and stressed to Griffith that the standard rate of pay was five dollars a day with the added incentive of a fifteen dollar fee if you could sell them a scenario. To David Wark Griffith, with the Southern heritage and scholarly attitudes, he couldn't see himself condescending to the level of moving picture acting.An additional consideration was that legitimate actors could be placed on a "blacklist" by appearing in moving pictures, a policy implemented by some Broadway producers, such as David Belasco, who held to the opinion that the moving pictures were a degradation of legitimate theatre. Where moving pictures once shared the bill on the vaudeville stage; upper class patrons who had once accepted the form as entertainment now were of a scornful opinion and left moving pictures for the lower classes to derive whatever enjoyment they could find from the medium.Griffith and his wife, Linda, decide to try it out with Griffith beginning first. He used the stage name of Lawrence Griffith, preferring to leave his real name until he could associate it with some-thing more dignified, and attempts to sell a script to the American Mutoscope & Biograph Company.

Channel: Entertainment
Uploaded: November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am
Author: GriffithMovies

Length: 14:15
Rating: 4.67
Views: 6047

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