1877-1948
Stanner Edward Varley Taylor may be better remembered as the husband of silent Biograph starlet Marion Leonard, but he was a director and screenwriter in his own right. Taylor was born on this date in St. Louis in 1877. Taylor started out as a newspaper man, writing news stories and editing copy. He apparently worked on shifts for the morning edition publication and therefore had time to write his own material in the afternoons. In this capacity, he began as a playwright until he went to work at American Mutoscope and Biograph as a screen or scenario writer. He would become, basically, their head writer in time. His first scenario gig with them consisted of adapting a play for the screen: he worked out the adaptation of a western play--The Kentuckian--written by Augustus Marvin, for a short form film directed by the elder Wallace McCutcheon in 1908 (the film, incidentally, sported an appearance the younger McCutcheon Jr., who would go on to make rather a big fool of himself at the company as a "director"). Without a doubt, his most famous enduring work from the time period is the screenplay for The Adventures of Dollie, today famous for it's (co)direction by D. W. Griffith released in July of 1908. Taylor also made his directorial debut that same year on the short Biograph melodrama Over the Hill to the Poorhouse, which was interestingly based on a poem by Will Carleton and not his own original work. He would not direct again until 1911 (with The Left Hook), and that was the only film he directed that year. It was not until 1912 that this part of his career really took off, when he and Leonard went to work for Rex Motion Picture Co/Universal. Throughout the rest of his career, both in writing and direction, he is seen as a western specialist; and despite directing his wife in many non-westerns like Carmen in 1913, it for westerns that he is best remembered today. Many of the his earliest "frontier" scenarios were worked up in partnership with Griffith and he in fact has the writing credit on In Old California in 1910, which was the very first film ever made in Hollywood (the film was thought lost, but was discovered--at least in par--in the early part of this century). Despite being associated with westerns/Native American scenarios, Taylor directed a large number of melodramas in the years 1912 and 1913--and he in fact continued to write for Griffith at Biograph during this time (see, for example, The Yaqui Cur--1913). Marion Leonard was a very big movie star in the teens (her engagement to Taylor was big news in 1911), and she was able to found--with Taylor--her very own production house, which bore her name. The two worked in this capacity until she decided to retire from film acting in 1915. While the company was in operation, Taylor wrote and directed exclusively for the house; and many of their films featured respected stage actor Henry B. Walthall. [It was during this period of his career that he is credited as Stanley E. V. Taylor or S. E. V. Taylor.] Their last production together under the auspices of the studio appears to be The Vow, released in the spring of 1915. His very next film was for Balboa, with whom he worked for a very short time; his 1915 Balboa directed film was the Noah Beery drama The Purple Night. The film that he wrote while with the company--The Dragon's Claw--was also his wife's last acting job in the business. After her exit from film acting, he would stay in the business both as a director and writer for a further 13 years. His first production after his career collaboration with his wife ended was Her Great Hour starring the Scottish born Molly McIntyre. He next directed Clara Kimball Young in the Hal Young produced melodrama The Rise of Susan, released in December 1916; that film also featured Warner Oland. It was at this time that his directing career slowed and he saw a resurgence of his writing career. He wound up writing under a pen-name for Griffith again in 1918, when Griffith was directing for Paramount (that would be the war drama The Great Love under the name Captain Victor Marier--which by the way, Griffith, who co-wrote the film with Taylor, also used). From this time forward he penned 15 screenplays, and directed four features. Of those, only The Mohican's Daughter and The Lone Wolf has him adapting short stories and directing as well. His last time in the director's chair was on the self produced project The Miracle of Life in 1926. He wrote four more films after this--all produced in 1928 and 1929--all of which were westerns or adventure scenarios of some sort. The last of these was the Robert Vignola film The Red Sword, a fully silent picture released on the 17th of February of 1929. He then joined his wife in retirement from the business, but not much is recorded about their life after this, except they stayed in the Los Angeles area. He passed away on the 23rd of February there at the age of 71. There is NO information on his interment, but when Marion joined him in death some eight years later, she was cremated at the Chapel of the Pines and her ashes interred at the Memory Hall there.
