1897 (or 1899)-1984
Hungarian born film producer (largely of the silent era) Jack White was born Jacob Weiss in Budapest, Kingdom of Hungary on this day. The Weiss family immigrated to the U.S. in 1905, settling in California. Movies then became a family business when the great westward migration of the motion picture industry provided work for him and his brothers as extras (they were early incarnations of "stunt men"). The family's Hollywood(land) home was near a stable that was a frequent go to for the film industry interested in producing westerns. He and a couple of his brothers worked as horse riding extras in films made there. While none of these films seems to have recorded the Wiess/White brothers as extras (there could possibly be a name descrepancy), Jack is recorded as an uncredited "pie thrower" in Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle short comedy Fatty Joins The Force in 1913 (the film--a Keystone production--survives and is currently on Amazon Prime as of this writing). Obviously he and his brothers--all of whom went into various aspects of the movie business--were bitten early on by the film bug. Jack, for his part, starting producing pictures before he was even out of his teens. Over the span of his career, he also amassed more than 60 directing credits and some 80 or so writing credits. By the age of twenty, he was also making his way into the ranks of major studio players in the business. He has both a co-writing and co-directing credit for the 1917 comedy short Roaring Lions and Wedding Bells made for Fox (credit shared with William Campbell). Also in 1917, he began working with slapstick comedian Lloyd Hamilton. Jack, and at least one of his brothers, Jules, were also involved at very early ages with the influential and relatively independent film distribution company Educational Pictures--a company founded by producer Earle (E. W.) Hammons (the company was influential in a number of important ways, not least was employing a blacklisted Roscoe Arbuckle under a pseudo-name). By 1920, White was known as a short comedy man; and with his films guaranteed distribution, he could feel free to direct whimsies in any fashion that he chose. When he wasn't writing scenarios himself, he must have had the liberty to chose stories that he personally liked to produce. A good example of this would be A Fresh Start (1920); the film survives and has been released on DVD collections of slapstick work (it is not a famous silent film survivor, but it does have it's fans--it's detractors point out that there is not much plot to speak of and is a bit cliched, but it is a good example of his work from the time). A prolific director in the late 1910's and early 1920's; only when he got into producing did his directing start to slow, and eventually, stop altogether. The comedic short format carried over into his production work. He eventually founded his own company which bore his name and has been marketed under "Juvenile Comedies." The company produced films by Robert P. Kerr, Del Lord, Hugh Fay (who was mostly an actor), and even Norman Taurog (see: The Yankee Spirit released in 1923). White literally has hundreds of producer credits dating from the 1920's; after all, 10 minute comedy shorts are relatively easy to turn out. There is little point to attempting to parse through them in detail here; but, by all means, please do check out his extensive credits (one can get lost 😊). Most sources cite the 1926 short The Radio Bug, directed by Stephen Roberts and starring Phil Dunham, as his first association with a sound film. The short was film in both a silent version and a full sound talkie using the De Forest Phonofilm system. The film was just a little experiment along the way, because his company was still churning out short silents as late as August 1929 (see Fake Flappers). In fact, the Jack White company only made eight mono films at the end of 1929, ending the decade with Romance De Luxe (29 Dec. 1929). Not skipping a beat, his production company barreled into the new decade and the age of noise. In 1933, he got back into directing, something he had not done regularly since 1923 (he did direct two titles in 1929: Zip! Boom! Bang! and Lover's Delight, both talkies). His production company was slowing and in 1934 ceased altogether, with North of Zero proving to be the company's last production, with White himself in the director's chair. In his early days, he had hired his brothers; in 1935, it was his brother Jules' turn to hire him;hiring him both as a director and writer. Jules is today famous for his work on Three Stooges shorts at Columbia, and far more recognizable than is his older brother; while Jack worked at Columbia under the name "Preston Black" due to a condition of his 1931 divorce settlement. White did not direct beyond 1937, but his writing continued through the 1950's. In the 1950's Columbia essentially shut down it's short comedy film division, but expected to be able to continue to capitalize on the venture. This turned White in a script doctor of sorts, weaving new stories around older or reused footage edited together in novel fashion so as to have the appearance of a new film product. His last original writing product came for the script used in the 1959 Stooges short Sappy Bull Fighters. White remarried in 1955 and retired in 1960. He passed away in North Hollywood on the 10th of April in 1984 at the age of 85 or 87. He is interred at Mount Sinai Memorial Park in Los Angeles. His first marriage was to silent film actress Pauline Starke.
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| [Source: AJM (Find a Grave)] |
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