Kenji Mizoguchi was born into a barely mid-class family in the Hongo region of Tokyo, Japan. When his father put all of the family's money into an investment selling raincoats to Japanese soldier during Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905); the war ended quickly and the investment went belly up. At this point the family was forced to give his older sister up for adoption and move to the seedy Asakusa area of Tokyo--in close proximity to brothels and theaters. He found out that sister had been effectively sold into "geishadom;" this had a profound effect on his psyche and influenced him for the rest of his life. Ironically, the event would also be the gateway to his entrance into the world of acting and film making. During his very early adolescence, he was pulled from school--his parents too poor by this time to continue to pay for it-- sent north to Morioka to live with relative for a year; and spent another year back with his parents back in Tokyo in bed with a crippling case of juvenile arthritis. After he began to recover, it was his sister who got him a job as an apprentice designing kimonos and yakatas. This was the beginning of his path to the theater. He moved in with her, and she effectively took the best care of him that he had ever received in his young life. She paid for him to study western painting in school and to pursue a new found passion in opera. He managed, through this interest, to get a job at the Royal Theater helping design and put up sets for performances. When he found himself out of work, his sister again came to the rescue, securing work for him at a newspaper in Kobe. All of these experiences would inform both his style of writing screenplays and their subject matter. In his writing he was also greatly influenced by Eugene O'Neill and Tolstoy. In his film making, German expressionism was a profound influence and inspiration. He was a quick film maker; often he was able to complete a full length feature in mere weeks. It is a sad fact that so many of his early work starting in the 1920's and through the 1930's is lost. The body of work accounts for anywhere between over 50 to 130 films (some sources cite that he made 90 silent films in the 1920's alone!); only a handful survive. Still, his films managed to greatly influence a litany of younger directors from Orson Welles to Jean-Luc Goddard. It is thought that his first film was Yor yami no sasyakî, which dates from 1923. The first film that he wrote the story for also came in 1923 with Kokyô. So many of his early films have been lost, that there has only been 1 release of any of his works dating from the 1920's, and even that is a partially lost film. Tôkyô kôsghinkyoku dates from 1929, and has only ever been released domestically in Japan. His first sound film dates from 1930, which fortunately still survives; Fujiware Yoshie no furusato is a sparsely worded film, using the Mina Talkie System (we would probably categorize the film as partial silent, though it's clear from his direction, that the talking parts are meant to be "sprinkled in"). It would not be until after World War II however, that he would come into his own as a director. By the time of a his untimely death in 1956, he had become world famous and greatly admired by industry insiders--being named one of three great golden age Japanese directors. He was, for example, the director of the original The 47 Ronin (1941). He probably best remembered for the 1953 Ugetsu (it is certainly a personal favorite of mine). The last film that he completed was Street Of Shame; at the time of his death, he was working on a film entitled Osaka Story--the film was never completed by another director. Mizoguchi died at the age of 58 on August 24th after battle leukemia. He is buried at the Ikegami Honmonji Temple with a full stone memorial marker.
Irish composer Michael William Balfe was born on this day in Dublin. He showed extreme musical talent at a very early age; in fact, by the time he was just 7, he had already composed a polish style dance. Also by this time, he was playing violin for his father's dancing class business. He made his public musical debut at the age of 9 on the violin and had also composed a ballad entitled "Young Fanny." His father died in 1823, so the teenager moved by himself to London, England. He was then hired as a violinist by the orchestra of the Theater Royal in Drury Lane. While continuing in that capacity, he also attempted to make a career for himself as an opera singer--a venture that failed. In 1825, a member of the aristocracy arranged for him to travel to Italy for music and voice lessons. While there, he was introduced to Italian composer Luigi Cherubini; through him, he wound up as an protege of Rossini. It was at this time that he started to take up composing seriously. By 1835, he was back in London--where his light opera's began to bring him success after several well thought of performances in Drury Lane. In 1841, he founded the National Opera at the Lyceum Theater, but it was doomed to fail. After this failure, he and his young family moved to Paris, France; and though several performances of his works were successfully staged there, by the end of the year the family was back in London. Upon his return, he successfully staged a production of the work that he is most well known for today The Bohemian Girl. It ran, to packed houses, for over 100 nights and inspired productions to be staged in a number of other countries as well. In 1846, he was appointed musical director and conductor for the Italian Opera at Her Majesty's Theater. He also composed special pieces for the 1851 Great International Exhibition that was set to take place in London. He retired in 1864. In all he had composed around 30 operas, several cantatas and one symphony. The first time a film was made using his music came with the extremely early sound The Heart Bowed Down, dating from 1906; this little film used Chronophone system--the film was produced by the Gaumont British Picture Corp. and was named for one of Balfe's songs. His material was next used in a Charlie Chaplin film dating from 1919 a film that Chaplin also penned: Sunnyside has both a full mono and a silent version--the 1974 mono reissue of the film featured Balfe's song "When Other Lips." Finally, in 1929, his song "Excelsior" was featured in the short musical comedy Satires. The first full length film to feature his music came in 1930 in Song o' My Heart. The latest use of his music in a film came in the 2011 horror film The Shadows. Balfe died in his home, in Romney Abbey, Hampshire, England on 20 October 1870 at the age of 62. He is buried in Kensal Green Cemetery in London.
Austro-Hungarian musician, bandleader and song writer Alphons Czibulka was born on this day in Kirchdrauf/Szepeváralja, Hungary (it is now a town in the Slovak Republic). He got started in music early in his life and actually attained fame in his part of the world by the age of 15. He had toured the Southern Russias giving piano performances and full on concerts; his name spread quickly as a real musical talent. Eventually he was made the musical director of French Opera in Odessa, later the same at the National Theater in Innsbruck. He then enlisted in the military and from 1866 to 1870 he served as a military bandleader in the Austro-Hungarian infantry. He then began to compose his own songs in the salon style. One of his songs became one of the most popular pieces for intimate recitals in the 19th century. This is when his name became known in the west. 1880 to 1887 again found him a military bandmaster. By 1889, he was again a private citizen and was appointed music director of the Concert House Flora in Hamburg. By 1891 he was once again conducting in the military; he would continue in this capacity until his death on the 27th of October in Vienna. He is buried there in the Central Cemetery there. As far as his songs being put into film goes, the first film to feature his song "Hearts and Flowers" came in 1928 with the short comedy The Movie Man, a sound film featuring the Vitaphone apparatus. In all, 5 films were made in the late 1920's that featured his music; all of them featured sound of some sort. Show People (1928) was a partial silent King Vidor film, Synthetic Sin (1929) was another partial silent directed by William Seiter. The Hollywood Revue Of 1929 was a well known MGM extravaganza presented in full sound. Finally, there was Fire Proof (1929) another full sound comedic short that was a vehicle for Lupino Lane. In the 1930's, his songs became popular in to use in animated shorts, or, in other words, cartoons. The first full length film in the 1930's to use on of his compositions was Peach-O-Reno (1931), a romantic comedy. The first time one of his songs was used for television was in the Mister Magoo series in the early 1960's. The most recent use of his music also came in a television series; in 2012 the ultra popular crime vehicle Boardwalk Empire used his song "Stephanie Gavotte" in the episode "Resolution".
The man who considered himself the very first real motion picture director, who the world came to know as J. Searle Dawley, was born James Searle Dawley on this date in Del Norte, Colorado. I would say that it's more accurate to say that he could be considered the very first director of purely narrative films; but the honor of very first director really should go to the man who hired Dawley at the Edison Co., and that would be Edwin S. Porter. Dawley at first wanted to break into the acting circuit, securing a position in the acting house run by Louis Morrison; however the tour that he was hired to work on was canceled and his was obliged to return home to Colorado. This was in 1895 and came just after his high school graduation. He rejoined the group in 1897, and worked both as a actor and a stage manager for 3 years. He then left for the vaudeville circuit, with ambitions to become a writer. He worked there both as a writer and actor, before joining the Spooner company, where he plied all of his talent accrued to date: acting, writing and stage managing. Having gained attention of the Edison Co. and of Porter, he was hired in 1907 specifically to direct. This was indeed a first. He was hired to direct a short film that already had a scenario attached to it: The Nine Lives Of A Cat became his directorial debut in 1907. Though D. W. Griffith was two years older than Dawley, he wouldn't make his directorial debut until 1908. In fact, Dawley would direct Griffith in a film that survives to this day; Rescued From An Eagle's Nest was filmed in 1908, before Griffith made his debut later in the year. It is a remarkable film, because it contains some of the earliest complicated special effects--films had formally moved on from good old fashioned trick photography. Some of Dawley's early work in Fort Lee for Edison available on disc include: A Little Girl Who Didn't Believe In Santa Claus 1907, A Suburbanite's Ingenious Alarm 1908, Fireside Remembrances 1908 (all up to this point co-directed with Porter), and Cupid's Pranks 1908. Dawley made the move to California in 1910, earlier than most directors--though he still worked for Edison Manufacturing. He began to focus of films on works of literature. He brought works by Twain, the Brothers Grimm, Dickens, Dumas, and Stevenson amongst others, to the moving picture. But it would be one work of literature by a female author that Dawley would forever be known for. In 1910 he made the first ever filmed adaptation of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. The film, though a short, features extremely sophisticated special effects--cutting edge for it's time.
It was released on March 18th and starred Augustus Phillips (in his first film appearance) as Frankenstein and Charles Ogle as his monster. Being the person chosen to set up Edison in a new studio in the Hollywood area, he also brought in new directors that would go on to have a big impact on silent cinema. The first non-Edison film that he directed was for Solax (Alice Guy's studio). The film was Between Two Fires (1912), this was quite a long time before he severed work for Edison. In 1912 and 1913, he began filming outdoor documentaries, most in Yellowstone National Park, but at least one film was produced in Yosemite as well (Dawley had developed a penchant for photographing and filming in the locations as he made his way from the east coast to the west coast--many of these films were actually filmed during the his time of travel and released later). In 1913, he made his first film for Zukor's Famous Players, a adaptation of Thomas Hardy'sTess Of The D'Urbervilles. Though known as a famous silent film director, it should not be forgotten that one of his first skills in the theater was writing, and though he was adept and literary adaptation, he also wrote original scenarios for films as well. The first of these came in 1909 with The Legend Of Sterling Keep. In all, he has 40 writing credits to his name. And though he would never make a film in the sound era, his films were not all silent, in fact, the one credit that he has for cinematographer comes in a De Forest Phononfilm demonstration entitled Adolph Zukor Introduces Phonofilm, a film that has Zukor explaining the Phonofilm sound on film system, it dates from 1923. In fact, his last 3 films used the De Forest Phonofilm system and were full sound movies: Abraham Lincoln dates from 1924 and Roger Wolfe Kahn Musical Number dates from 1925. Dawley's last film came out in 1926: Brooke Johns and Goodee Montgomery, it is a formally lost and now restored film. After this, Dawley decided to retire from the movie industry; he eventually made his way over to radio, where he worked successfully through the 1930's. Dawley would also go on to be one of the founders of an organization to would eventually turn into the Screen Director's Guild. He certainly influenced a whole host of other directors, both contemporary with him and a younger generation coming into their own when he decided to retire. Walt Disney mentioned several times how influential Dawley had been for him on multiple levels. Dawley passed away in Hollywood at the age of 71 on the 30th of March 1949. Strangely there is no information about a funeral service of any sort.
Actress Julia Dean (not to be confused with the actress of the same name who was born in 1830 and who was the younger Dean's aunt) was born on this day in St. Paul, Minnesota. She made her Broadway debut in 1902 and her motion picture debut in 1915 in Judge Not; or The Woman Of Mona Diggings; a Universal production that she landed the leading role in--it also featured Harry Carey. She acted in film up through the year 1919, but being first and foremost an actress of the stage, silent movie acting was just not appealing. The last silent film that she made was the drama short An Honorable Cad (1919). She did not return to film acting until the 1940's. Her first sound film was the film that she is most remembered for today, the Val Lewton produced The Curse Of The Cat People in 1944. She continued to work in film right up until her death in 1952. Her last film appearance came in the romance comedy Your For Me (1952). Dean died on the 17th of October; she was 74. She is buried at Forest Lawn Memorial Park.
French academic artist Jean-Léon Gérôme was born on this day in Vesoul, France. In 1840 he went to Paris to study under painter Paul Delaroche; the two made a teaching trip to Italy--visiting major cities and The Vatican, the pair even made a trip to Pompeii. Gérôme, however, developed a dangerous fever and was forced to return to France in 1844. He then became a fixture in the studio of resident Swiss artist Charles Gleyre; his stay there, though, was brief. He then moved on to study at the Prix de Rome, but failed to graduate. This was a blow to him personally at the time, but would prove short lived due to that fact that he found renown and fame soon after. His subjects within the movement of Academic Art were quite varied; ranging from portraits, flirting with Oriental subjects, Greek Mythology, historical works and works depicting nature. Though primarily remembered as a painter, Gérôme was also a sculptor. His medium was primarily bronze, though he did experiment with the developing art of working with tinted marble. As far as why he is being written up here, stems from his influence over one motion picture. Usually, artists have credits in films that actually show case their works. In Gérôme's case, we have a rare case where one of his works inspired a scenario for a film, where he receives a "writer" credit. The film is The Slave Market and the scenario for the film is based on his painting The Slave Market In Rome. It is a later American Mutoscope and Biograph production that dates from 1920. It is a short film that interestingly is in the 1:36:1 aspect ratio. Gérôme died in his studio in Paris on the 10th of February in 1904 at the age of 79. He is buried in Paris' Montmartre Cemetery in front of a bronze statue he called Sorrow that he had cast for his son upon his death in 1891. Please follow the Wikipedia link below for lots more!
American film director Clarence Leon Brown was born on this date in Clinton, Mass. His father Latkin was in cotton manufacturing. The family moved to Tennessee when he was 11, and he would go on to attend the University of Tennessee after gradturating high school in Knoxville. He impressively graduated with not one, but two degrees in engineering at the very young age of 19. Automobiles had always been a passion for him, so he went to work for a car company, working his way to independence and founding his own company, Brown Motor Car Co., in Alabama. In 1913 he developed a keen fascination with the motion picture business--then centrally located in Fort Lee, New Jersey. He sold out of the car business and headed north. He was hired by Peerless and became an assistant to Maurice Tourneur there. The first film that he worked on was Tourneur's The Cub, on which he served as both assistant director and editor in 1915. In the late 1910's he served in World War I, temporarily halting his film career. His first director credit comes in 1920 in The Great Redeemer, a film he co-directed with Tourneur, who by this time had founded his own production company. During the early 1920's he racked credits in several other categories; for example, he has a writing credit from 1922 for A Light In The Dark, a short crime drama that he also directed and starred Lon Chaney. Alfred Hitchcock was famous for finding niches in his own movies to make a cameo appearance in...but, Brown did it before his did. He first "camoed" himself in 1924 in The Signal Tower starring Wallace Berry as the villain. Having made no films in 1927, he came back in 1928 to help produce The Trail Of '98, a film that he also directed; it also happens to be the first film that he worked on that contained sound (partial silent, with sound elements in the soundtrack and sound effects). The first full sound film that he directed also came in 1928; starring Greta Garbo, A Woman Of Affairs was also nominated for an Oscar for best writing. In all, Brown himself was nominated for a total of 6 Oscars; his films would gain a total of 38 such nominations, with 9 of them resulting in wins. During his career, Brown had been a very successful real estate investor, so in the early 1950's he decided to retire. The last film that he directed was Plymouth Adventure in 1952, featuring a truly all star cast! A quirk of Brown's personality had him refusing to watch any new pictures that came out for fear that he would get the urge to re-start his career. Brown died in Santa Monica from kidney failure on the 17th of August 1987, he was 97! He is interred at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in the Columbarium of Honor.
Richard Semler Barthelmess, known as "Dick", was born on the day into a theatrical/movie acting family in New York City. His mother was the silent film actress Caroline Harris. His father died when he was 1, so he spent his childhood with his actress mother, doing stage walk-ons in stage plays that she was in New York. He followed in the family tradition while attending Trinity College in Connecticut, performing on the stage there, setting up training for a professional career in acting. His mother was a great friend of the silent star Alla Nazimova; through her, he was offered a part in the film War Brides (1916), in which she starred. He had, however, made his actual film debut earlier in the year in an uncredited role in the adventure/drama Gloria's Romance. He had been studying finance in school, but was once quoted that he saw his friends struggling in banking, he thought that he should, perhaps, consider acting instead. So, after appearing in the Nazimova film, he never returned to school. The next film that he appeared in, in which he landed to starring role; Just A Song At Twilight (1916), was one of only two films made by the Dixie Film Company. War Brides reportedly gained the attention of director D. W. Griffith, but he would not appear in a Griffith film until 1919. It seems more likely that two films he made with Dorothy Gish and director Elmer Clifton that actually got the grandiose director's attention. It is the movies that Barthelmess made for Griffith that the actor is most remembered for today. It is often cited that the well known Broken Blossoms was Barthelmess' first appearance in a Griffith film, but he was actually in The Girl Who Stayed At Home (1919) first. He was then in the famous Broken Blossoms (1919), with he and Lillian Gish appearing in an early "yellow face" roles. Other films that he made with Griffith are: Scarlet Days (1919), The Idol Dancer (1920), The Love Flower (1920), and Way Down East (1920). In 1921 he formed, with Charles Duell, his own production company, which they named Inspiration Films. The first film that the company produced was Tol'able David (1921) starring Barthelmess. The company stayed in business until 1930. The company would dominate him as an actor between the years 1921 to 1926 and also garned him two producer credits in 1925. The first sound film that he was in came in 1929 with Weary River a First National Pictures film shot at the Warner Brothers studio lot. Though he was a super-star of the silent screen and became one of Hollywood's highest paid actors in the 1920's, he did not really make the transition to sound in the 1930's. He struggled through that decade and only made two films in the 1940's, the last of which was The Mayor of 44th Street in 1942. He decided to enlist in the U.S. Naval Reserves at the start of World War II and served as a lieutenant commander. After the war was over, he decided not to return to acting of any sort, and never made another picture. He lived instead on his shrewd investments. He moved back to his home state of New York, where he lived life out, dying in Southhampton on the 17th of August due to complications from throat cancer. He is interred in the mausoleum at Ferncliff Cemetery in Hartsdale, NY. The first of his two marriages was to silent film actress Mary Hay.
Foreign born American film director Phil E. Rosen was born on this date in Marienburg, East Prussia, Germany (now Malbork, Poland) to a Jewish family. His family must have immigrated to the U.S. when he was quite young, as he grew in a small town in the state of Maine. He got his start as a cinematographer at the Edison company in Fort Lee, N. J. It is thought that the first film that he photographed was The Littlest Rebel in 1914. Though he remained a successful cinematographer through 1921, he made is directorial debut early on in 1915 with The Beachcomber. By the late 1910's, he had moved to Hollywood, where he continued to work as a cinematographer. He, for example, was behind the camera on The Miracle Man (1919) directed by George Loane Tucker and starred Lon Chaney (the film is partially lost, but the surviving 23 minutes have been restored). He would not direct another film again until 1919; The Double Hold-Up was a short western made for Universal, starring Hoot Gibson. In 1918, he became a founding member and first president of the ASC (American Society of Cinematographers). His years active as president span from 1918 through 1921. He made his debut as a producer in 1923, when he produced the short documentary Will He Conquer Demsey, an expose' on boxer Luis Firpo and his upcoming battle with famed boxer of the time Jack Dempsey. The first sound film that he directed came in 1929 with the Crime/Thriller The Phantom In The House, sound by the RCA Photophone System. He is best remembered for being a director who specialized in what is now known as "yellow face" films--the use of white actors who are dressed as Asians for the purposes of mostly mystery films (a practice now fiercely frowned on!). He is best known for directing several Charlie Chan films with Sidney Toler. He also directed the Bowery Boys and Bela Lugosi in Spooks Run Wild in 1941 and an Lugosi in Return Of The Ape Man in 1944. He made his television directorial debut in 1951, directing the episode The Lonely One for the series Front Page Detective; it would turn out to be the last thing he ever directed. Rosen died on the 22nd of October of that same year in Hollywood at the age of 63. He is buried in the Hollywood Forever Cemetery. One of his two marriage was to silent film and early sound starlet Joyzelle Joyner.
French born director George Archainbaud was born on this day in Paris. He got his start in his native country in the theater. He immigrated to the United States in 1915 to serve as an assistant to Émile Chautard, who had been hired by Lewis J. Selznick's World Film Company. They went to work immediately in Fort Lee. The first film that he worked on with Chautard was Sudden Riches (1916). He made is debut as full director in 1917 with As Man Made Her. He even dabbled in writing (see One Week Of Love (1922) and The Common Law (1923)). With the demise of Selznick's role in the company that he founded, David O. Selznick, his famous son, who had been able to independently found his own production company apart from his father, was able to add Archainbaud to his list of up and coming talented directors. This is how Archainbaud made his way west to Hollywood. Though by the late 1920's he was no longer working for Selznick, going to work instead for Tiffany-Stahl Productions; it is a sad fact that the vast marjority of late silent films that he directed for them are lost. The first film that he worked that had sound elements was a melodrama: The Voice Within in 1929--it is among the long list of his films that were lost. It featured a few talking sequences utilizing the RCA Photophone System. By 1929, he was working for Columbia and the first full sound film that he directed was The College Coquette in 1929. In the 1930's he went to work for RKO, and by the 1940's he was at Paramount. He made his television directorial debut pretty early on, directing several episodes of the series The Lone Ranger. By this time he had begun to specialize in the directing westerns. In the 1950's, he was a much sought out director of western television shows, in fact the last thing he directed was and episode of The Texan entitled Letter Of The Law. In 1921, he married silent film actress Katherine Johnston to whom he remained married until his death on the 20th of February 1959 of a heart attack. He is interred at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in California. Follow the link below to Internet Movie Database to view the impressive list of silents that he directed.
