Rex Ingram: visionary director of the silent screen

323 Pages·2014·35.077 MB·English

by  University of South Alabama;Barton, Ruth;Ingram, Rex

Rex Ingram

Rex IngRam
Visionary Director
of the

silent screen
ruth Barton
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Copyright © 2014 by The University Press of Kentucky
Scholarly publisher for the Commonwealth,
serving Bellarmine University, Berea College, Centre College of Kentucky,
Eastern Kentucky University, The Filson Historical Society, Georgetown College,
Kentucky Historical Society, Kentucky State University, Morehead State
University, Murray State University, Northern Kentucky University, Transylvania
University, University of Kentucky, University of Louisville, and Western
Kentucky University.
All rights reserved.
Editorial and Sales Offices: The University Press of Kentucky
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Barton, Ruth.
Rex Ingram : visionary director of the silent screen / Ruth Barton.
pages cm. — (Screen classics)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8131-4709-3 (hardcover : alk. paper) —
ISBN 978-0-8131-4711-6 (pdf) — ISBN 978-0-8131-4710-9 (epub)
1. Ingram, Rex, 1892-1950. 2. Motion picture producers and directors—
United States—Biography. I. Title.
PN1998.3.I557B38 2014
791.4302'33092—dc23
[B] 2014022370
This book is printed on acid-free paper meeting
the requirements of the American National Standard
for Permanence in Paper for Printed Library Materials.
Manufactured in the United States of America.
Member of the Association of
American University Presses
For Willie, Conal, Eoin, and Paddy
And in memory of
Major Reginald (Rex) Hitchcock, MC

contents
Author’s Note on Sources ix
Introduction 1
1. Childhood in Ireland 5
2. New York Bohemia and the Lure of the Movies 21
3. Rex Ingram, Director 41
4. Apocalypse at Metro 71
5. Conquering Metro 89
6. Swashbucklers and Other Romances 99
7. Escape to the Desert 125
8. Escape to Nice 141
9. The Magician of the Riviera 159
10. Final Films 179
11. Sculptor, Writer, Artist, Traveler 195
12. The Life, the Legacy 215
Acknowledgments 221
Notes 225
Selected Bibliography 249
Index 253
Photographs follow pages 54 and 142

author’s note on sources
The only existing monograph on Rex Ingram is Liam O’Leary’s Rex Ingram:
Master of the Silent Cinema, first published in 1980. O’Leary deposited his
personal archive in the National Library of Ireland (NLI) shortly after-
ward. The archive contains much of the source material for the book and
more besides, including numerous photographs given to O’Leary by Alice
Terry. It remains uncataloged. However, the NLI kindly allowed me to go
through the collection. In 1970 René Predal published a French-language
pamphlet titled Rex Ingram, 1893–1950. In 1975 DeWitt Bodeen pub-
lished a two-part account and analysis of Ingram’s life and work, “Rex
Ingram and Alice Terry,” in Films in Review, another invaluable source. In
1978 Paul Kozak completed a master’s thesis on Ingram at the University
of Southern California. He interviewed many former Ingram collabora-
tors, and his thesis is a significant source of information both on Ingram
and on filmmaking practices of the silent era. Kozak kindly donated a copy
of his thesis to the Rex Ingram collection in the Trinity College Dublin
(TCD) archives. Thanks to the guardianship of Geoff Balkan, TCD also
acquired Ingram’s unpublished memoirs, “A Long Way from Tipperary,”
and I have drawn on those for factual material and for a sense of Ingram’s
own perspective on his life. Unless otherwise indicated, quotations by
Ingram in my book have been drawn from his memoirs. However, as with
all memoirs, his must always be taken as only a partially reliable source.
My bibliography has been restricted to book-length sources.
Seeing the films is challenging. Given that original negatives became
unusable after a while, existing viewing copies may be second- or third-
generation prints shot by a second camera or cobbled together from sur-
viving material. The overwhelming impression conveyed by reading
contemporary reviews is one of extraordinary visual mastery. Unfortu-
nately, few of the prints available for viewing come anywhere close to pro-
viding that experience, the version of The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse
that Kevin Brownlow and David Gill restored being an exception. By all
accounts, Where the Pavement Ends was a masterpiece but is currently a
ix