An Evening's Entertainment: The Age of the Silent Feature Picture, 1915-1928

371 Pages·1990·73.81 MB·English

by  Richard Koszarski

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HISTORY O F THE
AMERICAN CINEMA
Volume 3
-
1915 1938

HISTORY OF THE
AMERICAN CINEMA
CHARLES HARPOLE, GENERAL EDITOR
3
A N EVENING'S
ENTERTAINMENT:
THE AGE O F THE
SILENT FEATURE PICTURE
1915 - 1998
Richard Koszarski
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
MACMILLAN L I B M Y REFERENCE USA
Simon & Schuster Macmillan
NEW YORK
Simon & Schuster and Prentice Hall International
LONDON MEXICO CITY NEW DELHI SINGAPORE SYDNEY TORONTO
Copyright O iggo by Richard Koszarski
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Koszarski, Richard.
An evening's entertainment: the age of the silent feature
picture. 1915-1928 1 Richard Koszarski.
p. cm.-(History of the American cinema; v. 3)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN o-684-18415-X (alk. paper)
1. Silent films-United States-History and criticism. 2. Motion
pictures-United States-History. 3. Motion picture industry-
United States-History. I. Title. 11. Series.
PNlgg3.5.U6H55 vol. 3
[PNlgg5.751
791.43'0973 4 ~ 2 0
179 '-43'09731 90-48305
CIP
ISBN 0-684-18415-X
Charles Scribner's Sons
An Imprint of Simon & Schuster Macmillan
1633 Broadway
New York, NY 10019-6785
All rights reserved. No part of this book
may be reproduced in any form without the permission
of Charles Scribner's Sons.
Impression
Printed in the United States of America
Advisory Board
Coordinators
IANJ ARVIE E. ANN KAPLAN
York Uniuersity State University
of New York
at Stony Brook
JOSEPHL . ANDERSON DANIELJ . LEAB
WGBH, Boston Seton HaU Uniuersity
JAMESL EAHY
TINOT . BALIO
University of Wisconsin-Madison Slade School of Fine Art, London
JAYL EYDA~
EILEENB OWSER
New York Uniuersity
Museum of Modern Art
JOHNM ERCER
HENRYS . BREITROSE
Southern Illinois Uniuersity at
Stanford University
Carbondale
PETERJ . BUKALSKI
Southern Illinois University at
PETERM ORRIS
Edwardsuille
York Uniuersity
NOEL BURCH
JOHNE . O'CONNOR
JACKC . ELLIS New Jersey Institute of Technology
Northwestern University
EDWARDS . PERRY
RAYMONDFI ELDING Middlebury CoUege
Florida State University
VLADAP ETRIC
DONALDF REDERICKSEN Haruard Uniuersity
Cornell University RAYMOND RAVAR
Centre International de Liaison des
MICHAELG LENNY
Ecoles de Cinema et de Television,
RONALDG OTTESMAN
Brussels
Uniuersity of Southern California
ROBERTR OSEN
JOHNG . HANHARDT Uniuersity of Calt$ornia, Los Angeles
Whitney Museum of American Art
DONALDE . STAPLES
LEWISJ ACOBS Uniuersity of North Texas
GARTHJ OWETT ALAN WILLIAMS
University of Houston Rutgers Uniuersity
JOHN B. KUIPER VITALY ZHDAN
University of North Texas VGIK State Film School, Moscow
The Cinema History Project and the
History of the Ametican Cinema
have been supported by grants from the
National Endowment for the Humanities and the
John and Mary R. Markle Foundation.
Contents
Preface
An Industry and an Art
I
Going to the Movies
2
3 Corporate Organization
4 Making Movies
5 Technology
6 The Show
7 Watching the Screen
8 The Filmmakers
g The Stars
lo The Envelope, Please
List of Abbreviations
Notes
Bibliography
Picture Sources
General Index
Index of Films