SENSING A STAR.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Issue 1380, 5 October 1916, Page 35

SENSING A STAR.

Mae Marsh, one of the high-salaried picture actresses, appears as the little girl who kills herself to escape the negro in “The Birth of a Nation,” the spectacular picture now showing at His Majesty’s Theatre, Auckland. Her story might also be another version of “The Ugly Duckling” (writes E. Lloyd Sheldon in the “Delineator”). Several years ago her sister, Marguerite Loveridge, who was in the Biograph Stock Company, took her to watch the staging of pictures. No thought had been bestowed on her appearance. Her hair had been brushed back in a practical way and plaited into a braid. She was timid, even ungainly, and her arms and her face were sunburned. But during the rehearsal of the scenes in which her sister appeared Griffith happened to pass her, as she sat on a property stool, looking on from the distance. The very manner of doing her hair revealed to him the finely-shaped head and intelligent brow which he characterised as spirituelle. He forgot his company and crossed to her. “Look up at me! Now over there! Now up at the ceiling!” he said, intently watching each motion, as, somewhat frightened, she obeyed. Then, without clearing the puzzled wonderment in her face, he left her with the abrupt request: “Come to the studio to-morrow.” “What did he mean?” she asked. “He means that he has given you a job,” said her sister, who was quite as mystified. Her first lead was “The Sands o’ Dee,” and that spirituelle beauty which Griffith had more sensed than seen, registered so alluringly on the screen that she was immediately numbered among the new-found stars.

Two hundred and fifty motion picture theatres in the United States are giving special juvenile programmes. * * * * Sir Herbert Tree is at present engaged in filming “Old Folks at Home ' irom a novel by Rupert Hughes, at the Triangle Fine Arts Studio. Summer, the fr end of Longfellow, is a picturesque figure that makes an occasional appearance on t.ie screen in “The Biith of a Nation.’ - v * * It Is interest.ng to note that in the first 10U,(Jv0 feet the Film Censor for the Dominion, Mr. Wili am Joliffe, condemned two p.ctures. Bud Fisher, who draws for Sunday American papers, originated Mutt and Jeff, moving figures who bring many a laugh at the pictures. * * * * A new screen star has arisen in the United States. She is Joyce Fair, a twelve-year-old prodigy, who is appearing- in fullfiedged ingenue roles. ***** “London Opinion” says the latest recruit to the kinema play business is Ellen •ferry, who has accepted the offer of an English film firm to appear in a specially written play. The distinguished actress has a particularly good part, and it is -expected that if this one pans out as the promoters hope it will, Miss Terry will be seen al other screen dramas. * * * * A canvass of the motion picture industry just completed, shows that there are 15,000 “movie” theatres in the United States, with a daily attendance of 12,000,000. Saiar.es paid aggregate 1,500,000 dollars a week, and the gross receipts of the houses displaying films are 1,200,000 dollars daily. « * * • Nicholas McDonald, a camera-man for the Selig-Tribune Co., was arrested by Mexican soldiers and deported while endeavouring to take a moving picture of an anti-American demonstration in Juarez. Customs officials had previously warned Mr. Donald that it was dangerous to visit the Mexican town. However, he evaded the officials, and got his camera through. As he started to turn the crank he was surrounded by Carranza soldiers, who prodded him with their rifles, and shook their fists viciously in his face. He was then arrested and marched across the border. “What did they say to you?” a Customs official asked McDonald. “It sounded like ‘Murtos gringo,’ ” he replied. “Murtos les gringoes,” explained the inspector. “Why, they were shouting to kill you.” “I’m glad 1 couldn’t understand them,” returned McD. “It was a shame to spoil that picture.” * * * * “They tell me Tottie Tiptoes has gone back something awful.” “She surely has. Two or three years ago she could have had a minor part in any moving picture company in the country and this year she is only the star in a Broadway production.”— “Puck.”