1880-1928
Wallace McCutcheon Jr. was the eldest son (most sources cite eldest child) of early in-house director Wallace McCutcheon Sr., who was known as "Old Man McCutcheon" at Biograph where he he was head directing honcho before he was lured away by Edison, then lured back again (you can find his entry on Wikipedia here.*). The younger McCutcheon was one of eight siblings. With the McCutcheon Jr. was born in New York City on this day in 1880. Because of his father's profession, he became enamoured of acting--without ever really showing any talent in the arena. He did get his acting start on the stage in the New York area; but owed of his father's position at Biograph, he was also able to put his son to work acting in films. The younger McCutcheon's film debut actually came in a film that his father did not direct, instead he had a part in Over the Hill to the Poorhouse, which was released in June of 1908; the film was directed by Stanner E.V. Taylor--the film also featured his mother billed as Mrs. Wallace McCutcheon in her only film appearance, and a young Mack Sennett as the bartender. He was directed by his father in The Kentuckian also from the summer of 1908; the film featured D.W. Griffith in one of his acting roles--and though he got no credit for contributing to the writing, the title invites suspicion that he made a contribution (Griffith had a life-long obsession with romanticizing Kentucky, the place of his birth). McCutcheon Jr. also has three credits for directing which apparently came about when his father took ill mid-1908 (he probably directed more titles; it is highly probable that some of his handy work had been put under this father's name--which is a shame for the later really). "Wally" was allowed to take over directing duties from his dad, until it was determined that he was profoundly untalented in the area and easily distracted (not to mention murder on scripts). The first film that he directed actually survives: At The Crossroads Of Life, which also featured Griffith as an actor, was indeed also written by Griffith (the film is available to purchase on DVD). The film is also notable in that it featured Griffith's wife Linda Arvidson and is probably the film debut of Marion Leonard (later a staple actress for Griffith's shorts at Biograph). In fact, Wally's directing was so bad, at least two of his titles were co-directed by Griffith...and the rest, as they say, is history on that score! One of those titles is The Black Viper (1908), the poster for which is shown above. The other title, The Fight For Freedom, has the younger McCutcheon hiring himself as actor...though the film apparently did show some of Griffith's talent for directing that earned him a permanent job at Biograph as a major director. It should be noted that there is a problem also with proper attribution of films at Biograph. For example, the 1908 film King of the Cannibal Island has his father credited with directing, but the ham-fistted style of directing most surely gives away that it was his son who "helmed" the project not McCutcheon Sr. Wallace Jr. did manage to make his way back into films about 10 years later, showing up in the Goldwyn film The Floor Below starring Mabel Normand in 1918. After this he had a short and disastrous marriage to action star Pearl White and a even worse turn in World War I, where he was gassed and probably suffered from some type of traumatic brain injury--if he didn't have an actual head wound, he most certainly returned "shell shocked" (with PTSD). He just four other credits in the world of film to his name, the last of which dates from 1920: The Thief, a short film produced at Fox and starring....Pearl White (by this time he had moved to the west coast to be near the new hub of movie production). McCutcheon fell off the radar by 1921, finally taking his own life by shooting himself on the 27th of January in a run down Los Angeles hotel. He was 47 years old. Details of his burial or cremation are unknown.
*It is worth reading as McCutcheon Sr. was indeed a pioneer in the truest since of the word in regards to the structure of studio systems and the role of directors in them. Whether that is a good or bad thing is up to debate; nonetheless his contribution to early narrative film has largely been over looked. There will be no entry here (unless I get into writing entries on days when silent film participants died--not likely), as his date of birth is unknown and his death certificate is also not available (certainly there is no information on a grave site). There is more about "Old Man" McCutcheon at Who's Who of Victorian Cinema. His principle cinematographer was the camera pioneer A.E. Weed. He is also, probably rightly, credited with being the person who green lighted the first purchase of the D.W. Griffith scenario/screenplay.
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