“East Meets West”–An Interview With Sessue And Tsuru Hayakawa

As a follow up piece to my post about Hayakawa’s life and career, here’s a great interview with him and Tsuru from The Picturegoer, a U.K. fan magazine that was in print from 1911 until 1960. The writer, Viola McConnell, evidently travelled to Hollywood to get some in-person entertainment coverage and was invited to the Hayakawas’ mansion. She was clearly charmed by both of them and admired their beautiful, cultured home.

Sessue and Tsuru in an ad for Black Roses (1921).

We hear a lot about Sessue, but can definitely stand to have more of his interviews floating around. I thought this one fit the bill nicely, capturing both Sessue’s dignity and Tsuru’s liveliness. A couple things I found interesting: Sessue talking about his desire to bring more Shakespeare plays to Japan, where they apparently weren’t well known; and the couple’s mention of their dream to make an epic film telling the story of Japan. An epic silent film version of that country’s entire history–a pity that project was never realized.

I kept the British spellings and other old-timey details. Note the use of “Nippon”, the old, formal way of pronouncing Japan. In 1921, only a year earlier, the U.S. had started requiring that Japanese imports be marked “Japan” instead of “Nippon”, and the English-speaking world gradually stopped using it. Anyways, enjoy!

A Photoplay pic of the couple with their pup Dynomite.

The Picturegoer
Vol. 3, No. 14, February, 1922.

“EAST MEETS WEST”

“Nishiki Ware.”

“No, Satsuma. That’s a Satsuma vase.”

“Not that one. The taller one on the black stand is Satsuma.”

Thus we argued fiercely, a little bunch of guests in the corner our hostess devotes to Japanese curios. The vase in question was, as a matter of fact, Noritake ware. I hastened to tell them so, and was politely but persistently howled down.

“My Friend Charlie”–A 1952 Buster Keaton Interview

Here’s an interesting piece I’ve been wanting to share! It’s from a book called The Legend of Charlie Chaplin, compiled by Peter Haines. This is a collection of essays and interviews by Chaplin’s friends, fellow actors, and other contemporaries, recalling their experiences with him. They’re essentially reprints from hard-to-find publications, the dates ranging from the 1910s-1970s. And we’re talking pieces by greats like Mary Pickford, Mack Sennett, Stan Laurel, etc. I can’t recall hearing anyone discuss this book–although I suppose it was printed back in the early ’80s–and I got it off Amazon a few years ago on a whim (where it’s still available at surprisingly reasonable prices, by the way).

Keep an eye out for it!

One of the pieces is an interview given by our Buster Keaton to the French magazine Arts in October 1952, during the time when Limelight (1952) was being publicized. It’s, err, clearly translated from French, which was already translated from English, resulting in an oddly formal tone for the salt-of-the-earth Buster. But here and there you can decipher a very Buster-ish phrase or two.

“The Altar Of Alcohol”–A Savvy Elinor Glyn Interview

Here’s something a little different–a magazine interview with that famed authoress of Three Weeks, that chooser of “It” girls, that grand dame of romance herself–Elinor Glyn! I wrote a piece on Glyn and her famed novel awhile back, and it’s been one of my favorite “Personalities” articles ever since.

There was a time when Glyn was considered the expert in the “moonlight and magnolias” type of love–and happily marketed herself as such. She had hair dyed “Titian red,” was rumored to travel with a tiger skin rug, and apparently coached Valentino in his romantic scenes. If you aren’t too familiar with this romance novelist-turned-screenwriter, Gloria Swanson’s fantastic description pretty much says it all:

She took over Hollywood. She went everywhere and passed her fearsome verdicts on everything. “This is glamorous,” she would say. “This is hideous,” she would say, as she baby-stepped through this or that dining room or garden party. People moved aside for her as if she were a sorceress on fire or a giant sting ray.

Interview With Steve Massa, Author of “Rediscovering Roscoe”

Silent-ology is pleased to present this exclusive interview with the prolific silent comedy historian Steve Massa, author of the new book Rediscovering Roscoe: The Films of “Fatty” Arbuckle. We talk about why a book on Roscoe’s films was overdue, about his considerable directorial skills, about his wonderful friendship with Buster and Al St. John, and just how many hours he would put into filming a single difficult gag…and more!

I must say, after the impressively hefty Slapstick Divas volume I was surprised (and delighted) to see another sizable book from you so soon! How long has Rediscovering Roscoe been in the works?

I have to say that I was a bit surprised too at how hefty Rediscovering Roscoe turned out to be. It was originally planned to be a smaller format book, like Lame Brains and Lunatics and Divas, but it grew too large. I got very lucky finding material and I wanted each film entry to be as thorough as possible. Every one would have credits, cast, working title, contemporary reviews, and archive sources, in addition to a commentary on surviving films and as much as I could find on missing ones. I have to admit that I “borrowed” the format of the book from Rob Stone’s excellent Laurel or Hardy, one of my favorite film books.