_More about noses and chins--Costumes as important_
_to the star as a story to the director--_
_Rags and riches._
In the matter of face and make-up we seldom think of the forehead. Yet
I personally admire a pretty forehead very much and think it is as
important as a good mouth or nose, if secondary to the eyes. Comprising
as it does--or should--one-third of the face it is nothing if not
conspicuous.
If to be deep and learned is to have an extremely high forehead then
to be deep and learned on the screen is to labor under one definite
handicap. For the girl with a too high forehead cannot skin her hair
back without appearing ugly.
Those of us with medium foreheads are more fortunate. Whatever may be
said for our mental capacity we can, at any rate, skin our hair back
and thereby add very much to our expression.
The girl with the high forehead compromises by trying to keep some of
it covered but it never gives quite the effect of hair drawn tightly
back.
I should particularly admonish my screen beginner against too much
make-up about the eyes. For blue or gray eyes, a light gray make-up is
used; for brown or black eyes, a light brown make-up.
We frequently hear it said that brown eyes photograph best for the
screen, but I have never heard anyone whom I would accept as an
authority say that. I believe that all colors are equally good. It is
far more important that a screen actress’s eyes be expressive than it
is that they be either brown or blue.
Thus if we have expressive eyes and evade the error of making them up
so heavily as to create the “burnt hole” aspect we shall have nothing
to worry about. Generally speaking the more prominent the eyes and
eyebrows the less of make-up should be used. There are exceptions.
A nose is something we can do nothing about. We either have or haven’t
a good nose. If the nose is so badly out of symmetry with the face as
to be unsightly its possessor will probably have to confine himself, or
herself, to character parts. There are some who have attained stardom,
even with ill-shaped noses, but I think of very few. These by devious
practices conceal the defect as well as possible.
Make-up for the nose is usually for character and not star parts. A
spot of rouge at the tip of the nose will give it a turned up or pug
appearance. When playing a mulatto in “The Birth of a Nation” Miss
Mary Alden inserted within her nostrils two plugs that permitted her
to breathe and yet had the effect of greatly widening her nostrils.
The late and beloved “Bobby” Harron broadened his nose with putty in
the same play in one of the scenes in which he doubled as a negro.
The screen lost one of its sweetest and most lovable characters when
“Bobby” Harron died.
But these cases were characterizations. For star purposes a nose is a
nose. The pity is that sometimes even well-shaped noses seem to lose
something or gain too much when they are reproduced on the screen.
The lips and chin require a light make-up for the very good reason,
again, that to overdo in this respect is to stifle expression. It is
my opinion that those who are becoming addicted to an extremely heavy
make-up of lips are making a mistake. It is unreal. It is not art. Such
thick, sensuous, liquid lips as I have beheld on the screen during the
past year have never been seen on land or sea.
The chin is a good deal like the nose. Very little can be done about
it. If it protrudes too much, or is abruptly receding, its possessor
will probably find himself chosen for character parts. Here what are
otherwise considered facial defects will be no handicap at all. On the
contrary they may be a decided help.
As in the case of the ill-shaped nose there are stars who have
succeeded in spite of an absence, or too great presence, of chin. They
have learned the photographic angles at which they appear to the best
advantage. In one way or another, when working close to the camera,
they keep always within these angles. Thus they prove that there can be
an exception to any rule.
If in the matter of make-up I can convince my candidate that he or she
will be better off by using as little as possible of it, I shall be
willing to pass on to the next topic.
Hands, too, must be kept clean and are usually made up with white chalk.
I often think that costumes are to the star as important as the story
is to the director.
Whatever may be the case in everyday life clothes do make the man,
or the woman, in motion pictures. They establish character even more
swiftly than action or expression. No where so much as in motion
pictures does the general public accept people at their clothes value.
There are the over-dress of vulgarity, the shoddiness of poverty, the
conservatism of decency and so on, each of them speaking as plainly as
words of the person so attired.
Now if mere over-dress, shoddiness, conservatism, and so on, were all
that were necessary the process would be quite simple. But the art of
costuming is more subtle than that.
[Illustration: _Madame Nazimova, one of the few dramatic stars who
quickly mastered the art of the screen._]
In each costume there must be something original and personal. In other
words, something that is peculiarly suited to the precise character
that is being portrayed. There must be also a color contrast or harmony
that will be favorable to good motion picture photography.
In addition, the costume in a broader sense should harmonize with the
scenic setting. The costume, more than anything else, will establish
the fiction of age. To appear very young or middle-aged is to dress
young or middle-aged.
In addition to its value in suggesting character the costume has
attained a new importance in that the screen has become a sort of
fashion magazine. The thousands of young ladies who live outside of New
York, London or Paris have come to look more and more to the screen for
the latest fashions, and are accordingly influenced.
With this phase of costuming my candidate need not particularly
interest herself beyond remembering that women love to see pretty
clothes and that those who give them the opportunity occupy an especial
niche in their affections.
The beginner who learns the knack of dressing for the screen in a
manner that is sharply expressive of the character being played, and,
in a way to bring out what the actress herself has come to regard as
her strong point, will find her pains rewarded.
Mr. Griffith has always been extremely painstaking about screen
clothes. Even in the early days of the old Biograph two-reelers we had
screen tests for costumes. It was no unusual thing to hear him say,
after one of us had been at much pains to select a costume which we
thought did justice to both our part and ourselves, “No, that won’t
do!” Possibly we were trying to do too much justice to ourselves.
Anyhow we often had as many as four costumes made before Mr. Griffith
was suited. Then he invariably suggested a ribbon, a fan, a bit of old
lace, etc., the effect of which upon the screen was always pleasing.
I have been told that one of the sweetest and, at the same time, most
pathetic scenes done in motion pictures occurred in “The Birth of a
Nation” where I, as Flora Cameron, the little sister of the Confederate
soldier, trimmed my cheap, home-made dress in preparing to welcome home
my big brother.
It was Mr. Henry Walthall, himself a southerner by birth, who suggested
this bit of business.
You will remember the situation. The Camerons, an old and distinguished
Southern family, had been impoverished by the war. They were
preparing for the return of the big brother--played capitally by
Mr. Walthall--with the mixture of emotion to be expected under the
circumstances. I, as the youngest member of the family, was least
affected by our cruel poverty. The joy of being about to see my big
brother again overcame any other feeling.
I begin to dress. The sadness of my stricken family cannot affect my
holiday spirit. I have but one dress. It is of sack cloth. I find
that its pitiful plainness is not in keeping with my happiness or the
importance of the event. Looking about for something with which to trim
that dress I find some strips of cotton--“southern ermine,” as it was
called. With these I trim that homely old dress, spotting the “ermine”
with soot from the fireplace, in a manner that I think will be pleasing
to my big brother.
Mr. Walthall suggested the “southern ermine” and it was Mr. Griffith,
always kindly in the matter of accepting a suggestion, who built the
drama about it. I have had many women, from the North as well as the
South, tell me that to them this scene is the most affecting they ever
have seen in the picture drama. I know I have played few, if any, in
which I have felt more deeply the spirit of the action.
In “The Birth of a Nation,” by the way, all of us were forced to do a
great deal of research work upon our costumes. This is a good thing. It
gets one quickly into the spirit of the drama that is to be played.
As I say, I have always appreciated the advantages of modish dress upon
the screen even though I have had in my eight years of acting only one
“clothes” part. By clothes part I mean one in which the star dresses in
modern garments in every scene. I began my career as a screen waif with
the result that the literary men who have to do with the stories picked
for me, have kept me at this style of part.
There is never a story written in which a poor, little heroine conquers
against great odds--usually after much suffering and not a few
beatings--but that many friends rush to tell me that so and so is “a
regular Mae Marsh part.” Such is the power of association.
Yet I very much enjoyed my one dressed-up part. That was “The
Cinderella Man.” I understand that there was great doubt expressed
by the scenario department that I should be able to play such a role
for, since the heroine was the daughter of a wealthy man, there was no
occasion for her appearing in rags.
Miss Margaret Mayo, the well-known dramatist, who wrote “Polly of the
Circus,” “Baby Mine,” etc., was here my stanch advocate. Both she and
Mr. George Loane Tucker, one of our greatest directors, insisted that I
could do the part. It was decided to make the trial.
“Go to Lucille,” suggested Miss Mayo, “explain the story to the
designer and let her show you the kind of costumes she would suggest.”
Expense was to be no object. Mr. Tucker and I met one afternoon on
Fifty-seventh street and, entering Lucille’s, we went into a clothes
conference with a designer. The result was a mild orgy of beautiful
gowns.
It was decided that Lucille should make two dresses of a particular
design, one green and one gray, as the gown which I was to wear in a
great many of the scenes.
Showing that cost does not indicate fitness I remember that the gray
dress--which was $100 cheaper than the green--was the one which we
decided to use. My costume bill for “The Cinderella Man” exceeded
$2,000. There are many actresses who spend far more than that for
clothes on every picture. But compared with the amount that I had been
spending in my “poor girl” roles that $2,000 was as a mountain to a
sand dune.
“The Cinderella Man” was a great success and we were happy;
particularly Miss Mayo and Mr. Tucker, who had never doubted that I
could do a dressed-up part.
The matter of costumes, then, is one of the important things that the
beginner must consider. On the screen clothes may be said to talk;
even to act. The male artists, I am sure, also realize this. But the
actress, particularly, must always dress in a manner to get the maximum
of benefit from her clothes whether they be cheap or expensive.
In “The Birth of a Nation” during the famous cliff scene I experimented
with a half dozen dresses until I hit upon one whose plainness was a
guarantee that it would not divert from my expression in that which was
a very vital moment.