Ah, Theda Bara, the "Vamp" of the silent screen. She was born in the Sahara to a French artiste and his Egyptian concubine. She possessed suoernatural powers. Her name was an anagram of "Arab Death." Publicity photos showed skeletons scattered on the floor before her -- the remains of men she devoured...
At least that's what the studio publicity hacks wanted you to believe about this Jewish girl from Cincinnati, the daughter of a local tailor and his wife. Bara was born Theodosia Goodman in 1885. she wanted to be an actress, so after she graduated high school she dyed her blonde hair black and went off in search of a career. By 1908 she appeared on stage in New York in The Devil. She joined a touring company and returned to New York in 1914, eventually appearing later that year in the silent film The Stain, where she was cast as an extra appearing so far back in the crowd that she was unrecognizable. But she was able to take direction and that led to the lead role of the "vampire" in 1915's A Fool There Was (based on "The Vampire," an 1897 poem by Rudyard Kipling). Thus, the legend of Theda Bara as "The Vamp" -- a creature who would attract, drain, and discard men -- was born. and it made Theda Bara a star, and just in time -- at that time Bara was nearly thirty years old, much older than any other silent film female star. Bara went to star in a string of hits, releasing eleven films in 1915 alone, eight in 1916, eight in 1917, six in 1918, and seven in 1919. Tired of being typecast as a vamp, she let her contract with Fox Studios lapse, and briefly went on the stage in 1920. Without the support of Fox, her career suffered and she made only three more films: The Prince of Silence (1921), The Unchastened Woman (1925. and Madame Mystery (1926).
Bara was perhaps the first "manufactured" star in Hollywood and one of the few true sex symbols. She evidently had a power that could hold audiences of that day, but that is hard to judge because virtually all of her more than forty films were destroyed in a fire at Fox's nitrate film storage lot in New Jersey in 1936. Bara had left copies of all her films, but because they were stored improperly, they. too, were destroyed. Only six films remain, along with a few small clips from her other films.
Madame Mystery was a short, 25-minute humorous spy parody, produced by Hal Roach and co-directed and co-written by Stan Laurel, and also featured Oliver Hardy as Captain Schmaltz of the HMS Royal; interestingly, this was before Laurel and Hardy partnered.
From IMDb: "A female secret agent [Bara] has gotten ahold of a new type of explosive gas. She had to avoid the efforts of two men [Tyler Brooke and Jimmy Finlaysen] who are trying to steal it. They succeed in doing so, but the gas turns out not to quite what they expected."
Perhaps not the greatest comedy to be filmed, but enjoyable for what it is. This was Bra's last film and a far cry from the sex symbol roles shat defined her career. Bara had married British director Charles Brabin (The Mask of Fu Manchu, 1932); Brabin retired in the mid-Thirties to spend time with his wife; they remained married until her death in 1955 from abdominal cancer.
Enjoy.
https://archive.org/details/MadameMystery
No comments:
Post a Comment