1893-1920
Young but extremely prolific actor Robert Emmett Harron was born on this day in New York City. Affectionately known as "Bobby" he was the second of nine children in a large metropolitan Irish American family. Half of his younger siblings became child actors in the first studio system in the New York/Fort Lee area. When he was just fourteen he was hired at Biograph (home of D.W. Griffith); there he was both a set runner ("errand boy") and an extra in pictures. He is listed as "Boy at Door" in the 1907 Wallace McCutcheon comedy Dr. Skinum (the only other person credited in the short is veteran Irish born actor Anthony O'Sullivan--who is playing a part as a woman). He stayed a principle actor with McCutcheon until falling under the influence of director Griffith in mid-1908 (many of the McCutcheon films in which he appeared, were actually penned by Griffith and a couple also feature Griffith as an actor as well). His first turn under Griffith's direction came in the short comedy written by Griffith A Calamitous Elopement (1908). After this, his short lived career was very closely tied to Griffith and his ever expanding since of film. Along the way, Harron acted with a number of actors who already were, or became, stars. They included: Florence Lawrence (with whom he appeared often), Mary Pickford (and even her brother Jack), Mack Sennett, Marion Leonard, Owen Moore, Kate Bruce, Dell Henderson, Mabel Normand, Christy Cabanne, Lillian Gish (and sister Dorothy), Lionel Barrymore, Harry Carey, and Griffith's own wife at the time Linda Arvidson. It took until 1914 before his appeared in a film not directed by Griffith; when he appeared in one Christy Cabanne's earlier directorial efforts The Great Leap: Until Death Do Us Part with Irene Hunt and Donald Crisp. By the time he went back to appearing in Griffith films, he had appeared in several pictures that were over an hour long (what we generally call "features" today). His first feature with Griffith came in the gothic adaptation of Poe (by Griffith) in what is considered an "silent horror" today--The Avenging Conscience: or "Thou Shalt Not Kill" (1914)--even though the concept of horror films didn't really exist at that time. He would spend his time between features appearing in a series of shorts; until he was cast in probably his most famous--and infamous--role as Tod in Griffith's shameful (and record breakingly long) The Birth of a Nation in 1915. It is this, and his role as "The Boy" in Griffith's supposed apology for Birth, Intolerance: Love's Struggle Through the Ages that Harron is remembered for almost exclusively today. In his short career, however, he actually appeared in well over 200 films. After Intolerance he appeared in just 13 films between 1916 and 1921. By the dawn of the new decade he was actively trying to move on from Griffith's world, having since relocated to Hollywood. He appeared no films that were actually released in 1920. He landed a contract with Metro and appeared in the comedy Coincidence, which was in the can in by August of 1920 and a spiffy "preview" (ie: trailer) was produced for showcase in theaters in the large metropolitan cities. Harron and a friend traveled all the way from Los Angeles to New York expressly for the premiere of Griffith's latest: Way Down East (a film you may remember for it's infamous icy, wet and very dangerous outdoor shoots) in September of that year. The preview for Coincidence was shown at that premiere and apparently didn't go over terribly well with the audience--according to Harron himself (additional to this, he was reported to have been upset by not landing the lead in Way Down East, a report that seemed wholly fabricated by the press). In any case, upon returning to his hotel room, a gun he had in his packing trunk went off and struck him in the lung. Not thinking he was badly hurt, he called down to the desk and asked the hotel clerk for some help. It took some time to convince Harron allow an ambulance to be called. By the time he was removed from the hotel, he had reportedly lost a considerable amount of blood. While in hospital, he was arrested for being in possession of a firearm without a permit--a serious crime in the state of New York at the time. His arrest occasioned his being moved to the hospital's prison ward--which could not have helped his situation. However, he did appear to be on the mend, when four days after the incident, he took a turn for the worse (possibly due to an infection setting in) and died suddenly on the 5th of September. He was only 27 years old. A devout Catholic and a serious teetotaler (and also basically the sole income for his family-who resided with him in Los Angeles), there is almost zero evidence that he was trying to commit suicide. That, and the fact that he was both in good spirits and extremely apologetic with the hotel staff that attended him after his call for help, would lead anyone to conclude that this was nothing more than a tragic accident--an account that he himself repeated several times before his death. He also explained to the police that he brought the gun with him to keep his younger brother from finding it in their home while he was away. Upon his return to California, he was set to begin filming with young director Elmer Clifton (it is possible that film was Down to the Sea in Ships). Harron was, instead, buried at Calvary Cemetery in Queens, New York.
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| [photo: TomDuse] |
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