"With inventiveness and imagination the most commonplace, the everyday-life subject, such as the ills and cares we have to bear, becomes, by a proper exposition of human nature under those conditions, a story both entertaining and instructive. But entertaining first, instructive second; to try to be instructive is to cease to be entertaining.

"The strength of a story consists in the eloquence, vividness, and sincerity with which a given problem in human life or character is presented. Human nature is made up of all sorts of traits—selfishness, cupidity, self-sacrifice, courage, loyalty. All life is made up ... of a compromise between elements in the struggle for happiness. These elements make for the story, happiness being the chief factor for which humanity is searching."

Though written for short-story writers, these words from an article by Mr. Floyd Hamilton Hazard are so true, and so applicable to the writing of photoplays, that we reproduce them here.

Substantially similar ideas were advanced by Mr. Daniel Frohman, the theatrical impresario, in an interview in the New York Sun, and no one will doubt the close relationship which exists between the general principles of plot-structure as applied to the "legitimate" drama and to the photoplay.

We may now see the first big element in all vitally dramatic themes:

1. The Human Appeal

"Your script," wrote a certain editor in returning a young writer's photoplay, "needs to be introduced to the 'H.I.' twins—Heart Interest and Human Interest. Those two elements are responsible for the sale of more manuscripts than anything else with which the writer has to do."

In choosing a theme for your photoplay, then, constantly bear in mind the great truth that, no matter how original, how interesting, or how cleverly constructed your plot may be, it will be sadly lacking unless it contains a goodly percentage of one or both of these desirable qualities. The frequently-quoted formula of Wilkie Collins, "Make 'em laugh, make 'em cry, make 'em wait," simply sums up the proper procedure when you set out to win the interest and sympathy of the spectators. "The greatest aid in selling scripts is the injection of the human-interest bits. Every effective bit of business concisely told helps the sale because it helps the editor," Mr. Sargent remarks in one of his criticisms. "Reach your readers' hearts and brains," says Arthur S. Hoffmann, editor of Adventure, in The Magazine Maker. And then, after citing the dictum of Wilkie Collins, he adds: "Make 'em hate, like, sympathize, think. Give them human nature, not merely names of characters."

When all is said, you can hope to reach the minds of the masses only by first reaching their hearts.

2. Writing for All Classes

Notwithstanding the great advances in the art of moving-picture production during the last few years, and the corresponding improvement in the film-stories shown, the great mass of photoplay patrons are still, as they always were, of the middle class. Better pictures have gradually drawn into the picture theatres a more highly educated type of patron, but very few exhibitors would stay in business if the middle-class spectators were to discontinue their attendance. The average working man can take his little family to the picture theatre, say once a week, for fifty cents, whereas it would cost him about that sum for one poor seat in a first-class regular theatre. Hence the immense popularity of the picture theatre, and hence too the necessity for effort on the part of the theatre manager to please all his patrons.

First, of course, he must please the majority, but he must by no means overlook the tastes of the minority. Every man, as the wise proprietor knows, enjoys most what he understands best. The plain people are not necessarily the unintelligent ones, for the working man can both understand and enjoy pictured versions of Dante's Inferno and Sophocles' Oedipus Rex, but he will feel more at home while watching a picture of contemporary American life; and who shall say, provided the photoplay be a good one, that he is not receiving as much profit therefrom as from the film version of either of the classics!

The really successful photoplaywright is nothing if not versatile. Unless he is content to have a very limited market, he more than any other type of professional writer must be able to write for all classes.

Furthermore, he must be able to write on a variety of themes. The photoplaywright who can produce only Western dramas, or stories dealing with slum life, will find his sales averaging very low as compared with the author who can construct a society drama, a Western story, a photoplay of business life, a story of the Kentucky mountains, or still other types. To be able to write photoplays that will appeal to every class of photoplay patron is the supreme test of the photoplaywright.

These words of a celebrated French novelist and playwright, Ludovic HalÉvy, are worthy of attention:

"We must not write simply for the refined, the blasÉ, and the squeamish. We must write for that man who goes there on the street with his nose in his newspaper and his umbrella under his arm. We must write for that fat, breathless woman whom I see from my window, as she climbs painfully into the OdÉon omnibus. We must write courageously for the bourgeois, if it were only to try to refine them, to make them less bourgeois. And if I dared, I should say that we must write even for fools."

3. A High Quality of Imagination Demanded

Another well-known French dramatist, Marcel Prevost, who is a photoplaywright as well, in a recent issue of the Paris Figaro replied to a question whether motion pictures are harmful to the legitimate theatre, by stating that, while he likes the pictures, their authors are lacking in imagination.

That there is a great deal of truth in what M. Prevost says seems to be proved by the fact that when famous playwrights and best-selling authors have supplied photoplay plots to the manufacturers, they have been exceptionally well paid. We refer, of course, to stories specially written for the photoplay stage, for when a film manufacturer produces a story by a well-known fiction writer, which originally appeared in novel or in short-story form, the manufacturer does business with the author's publishers, unless the author has specifically reserved for himself all dramatic rights—a practice which, by the way, is becoming more and more general.

An editorial in Motography says: "The best motion picture dramas produced today are reproductions of literary classics. These films do not achieve immortality; they merely further assure the immortality of the original work. Why cannot a photodrama be produced that is fine enough to live on its own merit—why must the picture always seem to be secondary while literature and the drama continue to furnish the primary motives?

Electric Lights

Arrangement of Electric Lights in a Photoplay Studio

Dressing Room

An Actor's Dressing Room in the Selig Studio

"The answer lies in the peculiar requirements of photoplay authorship. The writer of printed fiction is a master of words. He revels in artful phrases and unique constructions. He woos immortality not by his plots, but by his clever handling of words—his 'style'." And then the editor goes on to say that the photodrama will become great when it has developed its own great men. "The photoplay author of fame," he says, "must be a specialist."

This also is true; but at the same time he must, as in any other profession, first of all be a student. He must serve his apprenticeship; and while he is serving his apprenticeship he must cultivate the imagination which M. Prevost declares to be so essential.

Imagination cannot be developed by remaining in a rut. Experience is not only the best teacher, but the very finest developer of thought, and of a vivid and facile imagination. Thus constant practice causes the building of plots to become a sort of second nature.

Granting that you have the technical skill to develop the plots you evolve, the question which you have to answer is: What are the most suitable themes for photoplays?

No one can give you such a list, though he may do what has been attempted in another chapter—furnish a moderately full list of what not to choose as themes. Some general positive principles, however, are important, and these are now to be considered.

4. Write of What You Know

The fact that the market is wide makes it the less excusable when a writer courts rejection by attempting themes with which he is not familiar. If you live on an Eastern or Middle-West farm, or in a small town, remember that—especially between the months of May and September—the film companies almost without exception are looking for good stories of country life. Then why try to write stories of business life in a large city, of society, of theatrical or circus life, or even of the far West, until you have succeeded with a few stories that might easily be set within a short distance of where you live? Correct and faithful local color, at times, has much to do with selling a story, though you always need a good idea and a clever plot.

The same rule, naturally, should be followed by the young writer whose home is in a large city. If you can turn out a good, original story truthfully portraying New York's East Side, Broadway, or Wall Street; Chicago's "Loop" district; the social and political life of Washington, or any other such background, there is an editor waiting to purchase that story.

All this is not to say that you must write only of things which are, or have been, within the range of your personal experience. Many a writer has successfully built his story on well-verified second-hand knowledge. If you are not familiar with the subject at first-hand, and cannot get direct, personal information, get the knowledge from books and periodicals, but get it exactly—squeeze the last drop of information from the subject. If there is no library in your town, search your own as well as borrowed books and magazines until you find at least enough correct data to enable you to turn out a script that will not betray second-hand knowledge. Jules Verne had only indirect knowledge of most of the countries which he depicted, yet to read his books one would believe that he had travelled everywhere. Because he had read up on and investigated his subjects he was able to produce such thoroughly convincing, and always interesting, books as "A Tour of the World in Eighty Days," "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea," and "The Clipper of the Clouds," in which he wrote, and apparently authoritatively, of almost every country on the globe.

Until your work is pretty well known by the editors, it is just as well not to attempt to write historical dramas. But if you do write them, the greatest care must be taken to adhere closely to facts, especially in composing scripts in which famous historical personages figure. Three or four years ago a certain company that made a specialty of two- and three-part historical, Western, and military dramas, was called to account by an army officer in Washington for having brought out a photoplay of pioneer life which held up a well-known officer of the United States army in a rather bad light by making him responsible for an act of great injustice to a famous Indian chieftain. The author of the photoplay—whether a staff-writer or a free lance—was doubtless unaware that he was doing an injustice to the memory of a gallant and kind-hearted American soldier; but, however the picture came to be written, it elicited the strong disapproval of someone who knew, and who did not hesitate to tell the makers that a mistake had been made.

Manufacturers have to be careful; they cannot afford to offend anyone. Moreover, the motion picture has come to be looked upon as a great educational factor, and no picture can be truly educational that is not strictly accurate. If you want to write historical photoplays after you have become known to the editors, very well; but be sure that you adhere closely to historical facts. It is far better to spend a week in the reference room of the public library than to have to suffer a rebuke from a manufacturer, even though the director be also to blame for not being familiar with the subject before attempting to make the picture. And the loss of your prestige may prove harder to bear than the rebuke.

5. Write on What Interests You

Next in importance to writing on a subject with which you are familiar is to write about that with which you are in sympathy. You cannot interest your audience unless you yourself are interested in your theme when the story is written. If you would arouse fire in your spectators you must first feel fire within you. To write a story merely because it is timely is not to do yourself justice. Suppose, for instance, it is about time for a new president to go into office. It may occur to you that to send in a script bearing upon that timely subject will be a sure way of "coaxing a check from the editor." You have some slight knowledge of politics and of Washington life, but you are not particularly interested in either. You are, however, anxious to sell a script, so you read up on the subject and work up a photoplay. The chances are that you will continue to own the script, for you did not put the snap into it that you would have done had you been both familiar with your theme and genuinely interested in it.

6. Write on Unusual Themes

Many a writer is deterred from developing an unusual theme for fear that no company will be found to produce it. Enough has been said on this subject to warn the photoplaywright against writing impracticable scenes. But with this limitation in view every effort should be made to strike into untravelled fields. In a day when most of the big manufacturers have two or three, or even more, field-companies operating in different parts of the country, when almost every maker of films has an Eastern and a Western organization, and when several companies have a "globetrotting" troupe working in some distant part of the world, there is very little chance of a thoroughly good and desirable photoplay plot's failing to find acceptance, provided it is intelligently marketed. No matter where you may live, no matter what you may write of, if it is good it will sell—some editor is waiting for it. But you must find that editor.

7. Write Stories Requiring Only Action

In selecting your theme, ask yourself if either dialogue or description may not be really required to bring out the theme satisfactorily. If such is the case, abandon the theme. The comparatively few inserts permitted cannot be relied upon to give much aid—the chief reliance must be pantomime.

For this reason it is inadvisable to write detective stories, unless you have a plot that can be easily and convincingly told in action. The average fictional story of this class depends more upon dialogue and the author's explanation of the sleuth's methods of deduction than upon rapid and gripping action. In a fictional detective story, the crime usually has happened before the story opens. In a film story, this would be impracticable, unless a long explanatory insert were introduced either before or after the first scene or two. But long inserts are not wanted, even in multiple-reel stories. Since events in a photoplay must appear in chronological order, you cannot depict murder without showing the murderer in the act, and that will soon bring you counter to the censors.

Aside from the consideration of the censorship is this point: in a fictional detective story the real murderer is not revealed, in most cases, until the last chapter. In the photoplay, on the other hand, it would be necessary to show the spectator almost at the first who the real murderer is—the other characters in the picture, and not the spectators, being the ones in doubt as the story progressed.

This is a difficult condition to bring about effectively. Still, it can be done, and there is a chance for a writer who can produce logical and interesting detective scripts, as there is always a market for any uncommon theme that is both original and handled with technical correctness.

An author who is anonymous has said "While the story may have for a plot a subject involving complication, or mystery, each scene must be easily understood, or the audience, taxed by trying to fathom motives or emotions with which it is unfamiliar, or with which it is not in sympathy, loses the thread of the story, and consequently pronounces the photoplay lacking in interest. Remembering the brevity of the film drama, compactness and simplicity in every feature are to be desired. It does not require a great cast of characters nor unusually spectacular scenic work to produce the big idea. The depths of human woe and suffering, or the very heights of joy and attainment, can be pictured in a flash. The dramatic story should consist of a strong and preferably unique plot, simple and direct in its appeal to the heart, and expressed or conveyed to the audience by a logical sequence of episodes or incidents, all having direct bearing on the story, and each one of sufficient strength to hold the attention of the spectators. The story must be human, the characters and their motives and actions human and true to life. The drama is perfect as it reflects a correct imitation of nature."

8. Write Mainly of Characters That Arouse the Spectator's Sympathy

Each hero must have his opposite, as each great cause must have its protagonist and antagonist. Indeed, as we have seen, it is this warfare that makes all drama possible. But it will not do to glorify the doer of evil deeds and thus corrupt the sympathies of the spectators. The hero and not the "villain" must swing the sympathies of those who see. Be certain, therefore, that pity for, and even sympathy with, a wrong-doer is not magnified, through the action of your play, into admiration by the onlookers, for in the photoplay as in the legitimate drama the leading character may be a great offender. This way danger lies, however, and you must walk with extreme caution, or the censors "will catch you—if you don't watch out!"—to say nothing of the lashings of your own conscience.

Without repeating what was said in Chapter XVI regarding the introduction of crime into film stories, we would impress upon the photoplaywright the necessity for always having a fully sufficient, though not necessarily a morally justifiable, motive for any crime that is introduced in a story; besides, the introduction of a crime must be necessary to the action and not a mere spectacular scene. But remember that it is not sufficient to avoid "crime without motive;" the motive must be one which will, after the crime has been committed, leave no doubt in the mind of the spectator that the crime was virtually inevitable, if not absolutely unavoidable. If it is the hero of the story who commits the crime, the very greatest care must be taken to show that he had a really powerful motive for his act, if he is to have the sympathy—though not the approval—of the audience after yielding to temptation.[29] This, of course, does not refer to deeds of violence which are really not only excusable but actually right, in the circumstances—like the killing of an attacking desperado in self-defense.

As an example of the point we are trying to emphasize, take a story like "The Bells," the play in which Sir Henry Irving appeared so often. Mathias the innkeeper, who later became the Burgomaster, was a character, who, by reason of Irving's superb art, won and held the sympathies of the audience from the start. Yet after Mathias had murdered the Polish Jew and robbed him of his belt of gold, even the art of Irving could not have made us sympathize with the character had we not been shown that Mathias was urged on to his crime—a crime for which he was constantly tortured ever afterward, and which occasioned his tragic death—by two very compelling motives. His primary motive was the urgent need of money. But he had a two-fold need of money: he had been notified by the landlord that he must pay his over-due rent or be turned out of his home; and he had been told by the doctor that unless he could immediately remove his sick wife to a milder climate she would certainly die. Thus, impelled by the thought that only by the speedy acquisition of sufficient money could he hope to save the life of his wife, he commits the deed which he would never have committed had his only motive been the necessity for raising money to pay the rent. Mathias was esteemed by his neighbors as an honest man; he was a man whose conscience smote him terribly when he was contemplating the murder of the Jew; and after the crime had been committed—fifteen years later, in fact—that same guilty conscience, wracking his very soul, drove him on to his death.

Shakespeare's Macbeth is a character with whom we are forced to sympathize measurably, because we know that he is not naturally a criminal. Yet, after all, Macbeth is a man who—as Professor Pierce has pointed out—"has been restrained in the straight path of an upright life [only] by his respect for conventions." Mathias, on the other hand, is not held in check by conventions; he is essentially an honest man. He commits a crime, but what stronger motive could a man have than the one that drove him on to its commission? And yet—and this is the mistake that we wish to point out to the young writer—seven years ago a certain company released "The Bells" as a two-part subject, in which, according to the synopsis published in the trade journals, Mathias's only motive for committing the most detestable of all crimes was that he was behind in his rent! Even the magazine that gave in fiction form the story of the picture failed to mention what is brought out so strongly in the play—the innkeeper's distress at the thought that his wife's life depended upon his being able to raise the money to send her to the south of France without delay. The author mentioned that Mathias had a sick wife, but that was all. The whole treatment of the story in fiction form, moreover, was farcical, such names as "Mr. Parker" being intermingled with those of the well-known characters, "Mathias," "Christian," and "Annette," while the wealthy, dignified Polish Jew was turned into a typical East-side clothing merchant. The real fault lay with the producer who, ignoring the great and pressing necessity that prompted Mathias's crime, garbled the original plot to the extent of allowing the innkeeper to murder the Jew because (according to the fiction-version in the magazine) he needed one hundred and seventy-five dollars to pay the rent! First, last, and all the time you must remember that your story is not a good story if the leading character is not, at all times, deserving of the spectator's sympathy, even when his action is not worthy of approval.

It is a matter for real regret to have to be compelled to state that, in spite of the many artistic advances made in motion-picture production during the past six or seven years, this most important point was deliberately overlooked when the PathÉ Company made its very fine feature-production of "The Bells" in the Fall of 1918. We say "deliberately overlooked" because the writer who prepared the scenario for this modern five-reel version had the same opportunity as had the scenarioist who made the other adaptation, years ago, to read the original stage-play and to introduce this most compelling motive for Mathias's crime. If anything, the fault is more glaring in the PathÉ production than in the older picture, for the wife is shown as a woman in apparently perfect health, although naturally worried by the fact that her husband's inability to raise the required amount of money may result in their losing both their home and their means of livelihood. All the fine acting of Mr. Frank Keenan as Mathias, and all the wonderful scenic and lighting effects, were not sufficient to make us lose sight of the fact that the ones responsible for the picture's production had not given proper thought to the necessity for showing that the innkeeper had an unusually compelling motive for taking the life of and then robbing his guest. And, make no mistake, no matter how fine the production may be in other respects, this sort of thing is not overlooked by the intelligent, right-minded spectator of the photoplay.

9. The Theme and the Market

With regard to what are known as "costume plays"—and what we say is intended to apply to original stories, since it is never wise to attempt an adaptation of a popular book or play, even though you are armed with the right to do so, unless you have previously taken the matter up with some producing company—there is, perhaps, as was pointed out in Chapter XV, twice as much chance to sell such stories as there was a few years ago, since today every company is doing things in a much bigger way than in former years. But this must not be construed as meaning that the different companies are simply looking about for new ways to spend money. On the contrary, economy—sensible economy—is becoming more and more the keynote of film production. In every department, unnecessary expense is done away with. This applies to both the purchasing and the producing of photoplays. Better prices are being paid, yes; but stories calling for what appears to be unnecessarily expensive settings or costuming are usually rejected. That is why you may rest assured that no costume plays will sell unless they have a strong and unusual story back of them. Again, by "costume" plays we mean stories ranging all the way from Bible times down to American Civil War times. What is regarded by the editor as a costume play, also, may not be wholly that; it may be a story in which only a few of the scenes are laid in a past age, as when, in the Paramount production of "The Devil Stone," the heroine, in a series of "visions," sees herself as the wicked Norse queen of centuries before, and learns how the fatal emerald first came into her possession.

There is absolutely no way of knowing what company will be most likely to buy a so-called costume play. If you honestly believe that you have the material for an unusual story calling for settings or costumes of other days—or even of our own day but of foreign lands—go ahead and write a comprehensive synopsis of it. If you send it to a company which asks for synopses only, you will be playing safe whether it interests them or not. If, on the other hand, you plan to submit it to a concern which likes to pass on a full script, with both synopsis and scenario, you can send in the synopsis alone and explain that if they are at all interested in that, you will submit the continuity of action.

As might be expected, stories of this kind are usually written in the studio, because the staff-writer has the opportunity of finding out just when and where the picture can be made, what types of male and female players will be able to take part in it, and what special effects he may include. Still, to repeat, many of the bars against costume plays and stories calling for foreign and other hard-to-get settings have been taken down in the last year or two; but the demand for only strong, interesting stories is more insistent than ever, and you must still observe the rule—which, it may be added, will never change—of acquiring a thorough knowledge of the different markets if you wish to sell your stuff regularly and to the best advantage.

Themes! They are everywhere. The pathetic, the tragic, the humorous—countless admirable photoplays are to be drawn from these sources. And the most encouraging thought is this: Given the same basic idea for a plot, no two people will work it out in exactly the same way. Individuality will make a difference. "Happiness," as Mr. Floyd Hamilton Hazard has said, "does not always mean the same thing to everybody. It means many different things to different people. It is a theme upon which many varied tunes can be played."

In conclusion, we quote and warmly endorse this advice from Mr. Herbert Hoagland, censor of photoplays for PathÉ FrÈres.

"Select for your theme an idea which embodies good things. Avoid anything coarse or suggestive. Make your stories clean, wholesome, happy—a dainty love story, a romantic adventure, a deed gloriously accomplished, a lesson well learned, an act of charity repaid—anything of a dramatic nature which is as honest as daylight. Good deeds are just as dramatic as wicked deeds, and clean comedy is far and away more humorous than coarseness. Keep away from scenes of brutality, degeneracy, idiocy or anything which may bring a poignant pang of sorrow to some one of the millions of people who will see your story in the pictures, unless the pang will be one of remorse for a bad deed done or a good deed left undone. In a word, help the film-makers produce films which will help those who see them, and make the whole world a little better for your work."