Mabel normand

After having said she wouldn’t, and negotiating elsewhere Mabel Normand affixed her signature to a new contract with the New York Motion Picture Corporation and, for the present, will continue as a member of the Keystone company at Fort Lee. Before many days her activities will take on a larger field. It is understood Miss Normand’s salary under her new contract is $1000 a week.

by Randolph Bartlett

“I didn’t raise my wife to be a widow, but --” Roscoe Arbuck­le paused, slanted a critical eye down a steep banister, twenty-five feet as the crow flies, and then added: “We are getting a little behind on Keystone releases, and the thing must be done.”

It was no prop banister, though, as befitted the use to which it was dedicated, it was well propped. The general out­standing idea for which it had been erected in the Fort Lee studio was that Mr. Arbuckle should slide down it, take a flying leap as he neared the jewel post, grab a chandelier, swing around half a dozen times, say “Now I lay me,” and drop. They didn’t want to build the banister; it cost too much. They tried to get “locations,” but the locators would take a look at Roscoe and then a fond look at the old home banister, and guess they would like to keep the family mansion intact yet a while. Besides there are few home grown banisters which would look kindly upon the idea of three hundred and eighty-five pounds of comedy doing an avalanche down their tender spines, so a special banister was built.

Roscoe looked down the banister over and under, and up and down, and decided that, upon the whole, it was a right pert banister. To make sure he exploded a few tons of nitro-glycerine under it, and as it did not budge, the chances were it might hold his weight, when said weight was going at the enthusiastic speed of a French shell on its way toward a German trench. So he tried a slide down it. Half way down something happened. Nobody knows what it was exactly, but the net result was a well-known comedian reclining gracefully upon the floor, with the most of his three hundred and eighty-five pounds sustained by a protesting neck. So he tried it again, and with similar results. You would hardly think a human neck could stand the pressure. But he tried it two or three more times, and always about the same point in the descent he lost his balance, doing an Annette Kellerman to the floor instead of a Wright Brothers to the chandelier. Finally he rubbed his neck and remarked to Ferris Hartman, who was standing sympathetically near:

“I’ll guess we’ll have to take it that way.”

So when you see the Triangle-Keystone release “He Did and He Didn’t,” you will know what it means, to wit: He did survive, but he didn’t take much interest in the fact.

You would have every right to expect that, after a man had been doing this sort of thing a few years, his friends would speak of him in subdued voices, and say how nice and green his grave was being kept. But for three years, Roscoe Arbuckle and Mabel Normand, “Fatty and Mabel,” the team of a thousand laughs, have performed hair-raising feats for the purpose of giving the public comedy thrills, Roscoe the while, putting on weight, and Mabel just about holding her own, which makes for mirth and beauty in both cases. Yet when you ask them why it is they haven’t been killed long ago, they disagree. It is the only point upon which there is not perfect comedy in the Keystone camp.

Arbuckle is very prosaic about it. “I am the only man my size and weight the New York Life Insurance Company ever issued a policy to,” he says. “I am five feet, eleven inches tall, and weigh three hundred and eighty-five pounds, which is forty per cent more than the law allows. But I passed every physical test they put up to me.”

In other words, A, in addition to standing for Arbuckle, stands for acrobatic, agile, athletic, able-bodied, alert, active, animated, alive, astir, and so on.

Mabel Normand lacks this positiveness, and not without cause.

“Why have you never been killed?” I asked her, with the utmost sincerity.

“Why haven’t I? Why -- I have. I guess you don’t read the Los Angeles papers.”

“But it wasn’t permanent.”

“That didn’t make it any better while it lasted,” the fair Mabel insisted.

“How did it happen?”

“Roscoe sat on my head by mistake. I was unconscious for twelve days, and laid up for three months. Don’t talk to me about being killed -- I’ve been through it,” and Mabel’s eyes took upon themselves that dreamy, distant gaze you read about. I think she was offering up a little prayer of thanks for being alive, as I know I always should, if Roscoe Arbuckle sat on my head and I lived to tell about it.

“But that was your only serious death in all your adven­tures, thus far?”

“Yes, but I just live along from day to day. I never make any plans. Nobody in the world lives up to the literal instruction, ‘Take no thought for the morrow,’ like I do. What’s the use of making plans to go places or marry people, when like as not you will have to write a note saying, ‘Excuse me. I did want to become your blushing bride today, but it’s no go. I was killed yesterday doing a high dive into a tank of brickbats.’”

“Then you’re always afraid you are going to be killed when you have a rough stunt to handle?”

“Afraid?” and Mabel was daintily angry. “Who said anything about being afraid? I’m usually in too big a hurry to be scared, but I just absolutely know I am going to be killed. When I come through alive I am so surprised that I feel quite sure it isn’t myself at all, and want to be introduced to the woman that’s hanging around in my clothes.”

So there you have the Keystone policy of preparedness in a nutshell -- sort of filopena. Roscoe believes in strength and speed, and Mabel believes in anticipating the worst. It was to be expected that a quest of this sort would uncover a great assort­ment of lifesaving ideas, elaborate preparations for protecting the players from injury. You naturally look for a fully equipped Department of Accessories, so that when the ambulance corps telephones in a size 8 3/4 left hind leg, or a dark blue eye No. 1986, the order can be filled immediately. You expect to find a supply of ready made artificial limbs that would make a Soldier’s Home seem like a gymnasium, and a Red Cross service beside which those adjacent to the European unpleasantness are mere training schools for the kindergarten. Not so. Here is the remarkable fact:

Notwithstanding all its rough work the Keystone company has a record for freedom from accident and sickness that is the envy of the craft. And Roscoe Arbuckle, who has borne the brunt of battle, never has suffered any injury that has kept him away from work five minutes. Here are a few of his more spectacular stunts:

In “Fatty and the Broadway Stars” he dropped through a skylight and fell about ten feet upon a table, with nothing to ease the percussion. In “The Village Scandal” he rolled down a roof and dropped fifteen feet into a trough of water. In “Fatty‘s Tintype Tangle” he walked along a bunch of telephone wires thirty feet above the ground, and dropped through the roof of a house, lighting upon a bed eighteen feet below. In “Fatty‘s Jonah Day“ he dived seventy feet from the top of an electric light mast above a bridge in Hollenbeck Park, Los Angeles, into twelve feet of water.

The question that keeps arising constantly, is how can they tell it is going to work? How does Roscoe know, when he goes through a skylight, that he is going to land on the table, instead of stabbing out several ribs with its corner? When he rolls off the roof, how does he know he is going to land in the comparatively soft water and not mash out his young life on the edge of the trough? Are preparations made so that if any of these mishaps occur, there will not be a large enough opening for a stout comedian with Keystone?

“Why, we figure it out on paper, and if it looks as if it will work we do it. That’s all there is to it. Now and then it doesn’t work, and we either have to plan it a different way, or do it over again until we get it. Naturally I figure pretty carefully, because I don’t want to roll off a roof more than seven or eight times just for a foot or two of film.”

Then it isn’t a question of tricks?”

Each one of Arbuckle‘s three hundred and eighty-five pounds got mad.

“Say -- if you, or anyone else, can show me a way that I can seem to fall through a roof, or into a river, and not do it, or even do it slow so that I can land gently, you can have just about half my salary. Our stuff cannot be faked. When people see it they know they are seeing real stunts. Of course, now and then we do a trick film, but everyone knows it is a trick when they see it -- there is no bunk about it. In fact, it was in one of these trick pictures that I took the longest chance of all.

“This was the picture called ‘Fatty and Mabel’s Simple Life.’ In one scene I was backed against a tree by a runaway Ford. We had a man crouching down on the floor of the machine, working it from the pedals. All he had to guide him was a line on the ground. He would run the machine up to this line, at which time it pressed close against me; then he would back up a few feet and run into me again. It gave the impression that the machine was acting like a goat. Well, of course no one believed that the car was doing this without some sort of control, so it was a trick picture and yet it wasn’t. But if that man ever had gone past the line I surely would have had an attack of indiges­tion.

“No, the only times I have been injured in the least, is when I have loafed on the job. A child or a drunk can fall all over itself and never be hurt. It is because they simply let go and flop. The same rule works with me. If I go right after the stuff, we get a real picture and I don’t get a scratch. If I happen to be lazy, we usually have to do the scene over again, and I get a few bruises as a result.”

Excepting for her water exploits, the secret of Miss Normand’s immunity from injury is that with her, things are only apparently going to happen, and disaster is averted. The public would not stand for pictures where so pretty a girl was slammed around like a medicine ball. Yet her adventures have been hair-raising, and have varied from aviation and auto racing to deep-sea diving. Notwithstanding her remark that she is positive that each film will be her last, she is game clear through, and cer­tainly her pictures suggest no trepidation. After all the differ­ence in the viewpoint of these two Keystoners is easy to under­stand, viz.: If anything hits Mabel Normand, she is so little that it hits her where she lives. But --

If anything hits Roscoe Arbuckle, the news has so far to go that he does not know about it until it is all healed up.
* from Picture Play, April 1916

Behind The Scenes With Fatty And Mabel ¹²⁷

by Wil Rex

One of the most wonderful places you can find any where is Fort Lee, that magic New Jersey town across the Hudson from New York City, where murders, robberies and Indian chases take place while the police force -- his name is Pat -- leans yawningly, against a convenient lamp-post. The home of the first Keystone comedy, and now because of the crowded studios of California, the “fun factory” of Roscoe Arbuckle, Mabel Normand, and their gang of devil-may-care comedians.

A better place to spend a day for inspiration, perspiration, and real, unvarnished hard wok would be impossible to find. So I was commissioned to have my alarm clock in working order.

We met at the ferryhouses early in the morning, and luck was with us. A racing motor came tearing up, spitting oil and smoke. Almost hidden behind a huge steering wheel was Mabel Normand, the idol of the film fans. Immediately we renewed our acquaintance of years back -- who wouldn’t. And the lady was kind enough to ask us to ride with her.

Reaching the Jersey side of the river our adventures began. every one who motors knows that Fort Lee is one of the most dangerous spots in the East. Mabel started up this young mountain at full speed, but the noble car got tired before we reached the top. Slowly, but surely, it was stopping. I looked around nerv­ously, and my heart rose when I spied the water far, far below.

“Maybe, I’d better walk?” I suggested non-chalantly. “The car might go easier if I get off.”

Mabel just looked at me and laughed.

“Oh, this is nothing,” she said lightly.

“Only yesterday, my machine backed all the way down, and if it wasn’t for the ferryhouse, I would have been doing some water stuff without a camera in sight.”

“Cheerful!” I remarked, and stealthily started for the ground, but returned to my seat meekly when I heard Mabel laugh and murmur.

“‘Fraid cat!”

Strange as it may seem, we reached the Keystone-Triangle Studios -- one of the largest glass-enclosed film factories in the East -- without further excitement. Something was bound to happen though. Entering the yard we barely escaped Al St. John, “The Bouncing Boy of the Films,” into the next country. By a miracu­lous leap, he jumped on the radiator, and rode away to the garage with us. Keystone should employ one camera to do nothing but follow Miss Normand around.

The studio was bristling with activity. Roscoe Arbuckle, the elephantine author-actor-director, was superintending the construction of a set, aided by Ferris Hartmann, his co-worker, and a dozen prop men; Elgin Lessley, the intrepid camera man, who has the reputation of turning out the clearest films of any Keystone crank turner, was loading his magazines. A dozen rough and ready comedians were practicing falls down a stairway. The heavy eight director turned and saw us.

“Oh, Miss Normand, get ready for the hall scenes please.”

“Very well, Roscoe and -- very good!”

The dainty little comedienne going to her dressing room, I strolled over to the busy throng and exchanged greetings with Arbuckle.

“How are you getting along with your new picture?” I asked.

“Slow, but sure,” was the reply. “It’s a new theme, and I want to go at it easily. I’m not trying to be a ‘high brow,’ or anything like that, but I am going to cut an awful lot of the slapstick out hereafter. If any one gets kicked, or pie thrown in his face, there’s going to be a reason for it.”

“How about that staircase?” I queried. “That looks as though something exciting was going to happen.”

“Oh, nothing much,” he answered.

“St. John and I are going to fall down it, but that’s about all. Here, I’ll show you,” and I snapped the picture as he did.

“Oh, it’s great to be a comedian -- if there’s a hospital handy!”

As we stood talking I heard an excited altercation in French and German with an occasional word in good old U.S.A. I looked frightened, but Arbuckle only laughed.

“Don’t get worried,” he said. “That noise is only the favorite indoor pastime of Miss Normand’s maids. One is a loyal French girl, and the other was imported from the banks of the Rhine. Everything went nicely until the excitement started in Europe. Then things happened. The two maids considered themselves envoys to carry the fight on this side, and Mabel hasn’t yet been able to change their opinions.”

As we spoke, a pistol shot rang out.

“Do they shoot, too?” I inquired quickly.

Again Arbuckle laughed. “Oh that’s only St. John shooting apples off Joe Bordeau’s head. I’m going to pull that stunt in my next film!”

Miss Normand presently came out, her hair in beautiful curls, crowned with a dainty boudoir cap the lights were turned on, Lessley got his camera into position and Mabel and Fatty took their places.

“Now, Mabel,” instructed the director, “you start running down the steps, then look over the banister, and start to fall. I’ll rush down and catch you before you go over. Let’s try it once.”

Then to Ferris Hartman: “How does it sound to you -- O.K.?” His co-worker nodded. “All right,” said Arbuckle to Lessley, and the camera turned.

Miss Normand “registered” surprise at the top of the stairs, and then started running down. Suddenly she stopped and looked over the railing. She leaned too far, and started to slide down the banister. At this moment, Arbuckle started after her, and caught her on the way down. The scene was ended, and the players, directors and camera men got together and talked it over. Mabel had some suggestions to make -- she’s quit a director herself you know. Among other pictures, she produced “Caught in a Cabaret“ with Charlie Chaplin.

Once more the scene was taken, but something went wrong, and Arbuckle slipped all the way down, head first. Mabel looked on as though she thought her side partner had broken his neck, but Arbuckle scrambled up, and grunting said: “Try it again.” Time and again the same scene was filmed until it suited all present. “How many times do you take the same scene?” I asked the direc­tor.

“Till I can’t do any better,” he answered. “Often I use 10 or 15 thousand feet of film for a two reel production. The average Keystone costs nearly 20,000 dollars, you know and we’ve got to do our best. Generally, I take a month or more to produce a picture that runs less than thirty minutes on screen.

“In one of my films, ‘Fickle Fatty’s Fall,’ I spent just one week getting the kitchen scenes I was in alone. I used over ten thousand feet of film just for that. In one part of the play, I had to toss a pancake up and catch it behind my back. I started nine o’clock in the morning, did it on first rehearsal, then started the camera and didn’t get it till four-thirty! I’d hate to tell you how long it took me to catch the plate behind my back in ‘The Village Scandal!’ I seldom rehearse since then.”

Arbuckle called to St. John for a scene. He was to hang from a chandelier and kick down a few policemen who were on his trail. Oh, no, no rough stuff in this picture -- not at all! The very first time they rehearsed it, a little English chap, playing a cop, got in the way of St. John’s feet, and had his jaw damaged more or less. Two minutes later, Lloyd Peddrick, an old friend of Mack Sennett’s broke his nose in a scene in which he was playing a butler.

“Gee you got your face in the way!” was the only comment from Fatty.

Later I learned that there is not a member of the Keystone Company who hasn’t broken. Some of them retire after one picture.

By this time luncheon was ready.

“Now that we have a little leisure,” I asked Arbuckle, “how about telling me some of your career. It ought to make interesting reading.

“Nothing to it at all,” he answered; “but I’ll let you have it: twenty-eight years ago I was born in a little two-by-twice town in Kansas. They tell me my weight at birth was 16 pounds and a half. Maybe it was so -- I have to take their word for it, anyway.

“My first experience on the stage was in San Jose, California, in 1904, when I acted as a super on the stage at the request of a hypnotist, who wanted subjects to demonstrate his hypnotic powers. I thought that I made a hit, and decided to take a chance myself. My first venture after this was a ballyhoo with a carnival company, which lasted less than a month.

“My next experience on the stage was a little different. It was singing illustrated songs in San Jose. This job lasted a year, and then I went to Frisco doing the same stunt. From there, I worked all through the Northwest. It was here that I met Leon Errol, the comedian, who persuaded me that I had a voice, ability, and that I would make a good actor. It was he who gave me my first part, and put on my first make-up.

“I then traveled all through the West with a singing act, working anything from single to quartet. I then put together another act in which I sang and danced. It was in Long Beach that I made my first hit, and it was also there that I met and married Minta Durfee. Naturally, I am still very fond of the town.

“Since 1908, I have made Los Angeles my headquarters, work­ing from there, taking out little troupes into Arizona and Texas with some success. I worked in Ferris Hartmann’s Opera Company in 1912; Mr. Hartmann is now associated with me in the production of Keystone comedies, you know. Late in 1912, I left his company for a tour of the Orient, which was a big success. I visited Honolulu, Japan, China, Philippines, and Siam, and returned to Los Angeles the last February, 1913.

“It was while rehearsing an act for my wife and myself that some one told me that Fred Mace was leaving the Keystone Company, and that there was a good opening. I went and interviewed Mack Sennett, who immediately put me on salary. My first picture was ‘The Gangsters.’

“For the past two years, I have been directing my own pictures, and I write most of them. It keeps me rather busy.

“Oh, and by the way, do you know who one of my best actors is? No? Well, I’ll tell you -- it’s my dog -- you’ve probably seen him in my pictures.”

Before luncheon was finished, visitors began strolling in from the surrounding studios. Teddy Sampson dropped in from the World, Helen Gardner from Universal, Douglas Fairbanks from Fine Arts, and dozens of other lesser lights. It was a merry crowd withal, no professional jealousy, but just good-humored jollying one another along. The moving-picture people are certainly a cheerful devil-may-care aggregation. Doug Fairbanks gave a little impromptu speech, Teddy Sampson imitated her well-known hubby, Ford Sterling and Mabel Normand showed us how Theda Bara acts.

After the midday meal, Arbuckle and Lessley decided the sun was right for exterior scenes, and away we all went in motors. Reaching the location, Al St. John practiced a couple of hand­springs and then, when the camera was set up, took a half-a-dozen headfirst dives in a window, and the same number out of it. It’s a wonder that energetic youth doesn’t break his neck! That was all to be done outside, and we returned to the studio, badly damaging the Fort Lee speed laws.

The next scene was to be St. John coming in the window. Nonchalantly he popped in turned a somersault over a chair, another over a table, and then took a headlong dive over a sideboard.

“Oh, that’s nothing,” he yawned, in reply to a question from me. “You ought to see some of the stuff I do out on the coast! I’ve been doing this kind of stunt all my life. First I was a minstrel man, then a trick bicycle rider, then a clown, then in a musical show with Roscoe, and for the past two years I have played under his direction at Keystone. He’s my uncle, you know,” he added proudly.

Next, some scenes were taken in a bedroom set. Poor Arbuckle certainly bruised himself up! He and Mabel got on their hands and knees and crawled around the floor looking for Fatty’s collar button. First Arbuckle banged his head on an open bureau drawer. Then in a rage, he slammed the drawer shut, and got his finger caught in it. I could see that he really hurt himself. A servant was then sent in the scene, and joined the hunt. Time and again his head and Arbuckle‘s would come together with a crash. Mabel keeping at a safe distance. Finally, Fatty kicked the servant headfirst into a bureau. The unfortunate fellow hit it so hard that he pushed it against the scenery, nearly knocking it over.

“Retake,” said Arbuckle to the camera man.

“Arnica [sic],” said the servant to a prop boy.

And thus it went all day long. First one, then another, would work me up to a point where I almost ran for an ambulance. The recruits, who joined the company in the East, resembled nothing more than a trenchful of wounded soldiers. The veteran from California just stood on the side lines and laughed. Getting half killed is second nature to them now. Even little Mabel is not immune from injury. Just before coming to Fort Lee, she was released from the hospital, where she had been confined for over a month. She had brain fever and a few other sicknesses and injuries, which goes to prove that no matter how hard your head may be, a brick wall is harder!

The last scene was a free-for-all pistol fight, in which Fatty and Mabel disposed of Al St. John and Joe Bordeaux. Then it was a case of “nothing to do till to-morrow.” That is what we thought, but later learned was wrong.

I went in Arbuckle‘s dressing room, as he removed his make-up.

“Where do you get your ideas from, anyway?” I asked in wonder.

“Easy!” he laughed. “I get a plot in my head, gather up the company and start out. As we go along, fresh ideas pop out, and we all talk it over. I certainly have a clever crowd working with me. Mabel alone, is good for a dozen new suggestions in every picture. And the others aren’t far behind, I take advice from everyone. It’s a wise man who realizes that there are others who know as much, if not more then he does himself. Some of my great­est stuff comes from the supposed dull brains of ‘supers’.”

Looking through the door, I spied Mabel all dressed up in velvet and furs. I leaned over to a camera man and told him I wanted an unusual picture of Mabel -- one where she looked sad -- then I went over to where she stood.

“Want to go for a ride?” she called.

The long, skinny fingers of fear clutched my heart, but bravely I answered “Sure!” She sent some one for her car, and I helped her up on a window seat, and asked her to tell me the history of her life while waiting for the buzz wagon. I saw my camera man come up quietly, but paid no attention to him. Later, I found that he had taken the picture I asked for -- while Mabel was talking to me.

“I was born in New York,” she said, “and nearly all my life, it seems has been spent in moving picture studios. First, I was with the Vitagraph, then played for Mr. Griffith at the Biograph Company, and now I’m with the Keystone. You know, I am one of the original Keystone players. Four years ago, Mack Sennett broke away from the Biograph, and took Ford Sterling, Fred Mace, and myself with him. The four of us organized the Keystone film company.

“At first it was a hard struggle. Money was scarce, and it was a long time before we were sure of our paycheck at the end of the week. Our first picture was produced right here in Fort Lee, but we soon went west. This is my first trip back to good old New York in four years, that is, with the exception of a few days a year or two ago, when my mother was very ill. For a long time, I directed all the pictures I played in, the best known of which are the Chaplin series. Lately, however, I have given up that end of the game, finding enough to do with acting.”

That was all the information this modest little actress would give on her great life. I’ll add something that Miss Nor­mand omitted, and say that she is the most popular comedienne in the world, and also the best. She is remarkably pretty, more charming off the screen than on, if that is possible, and as lovely as she is pretty. She is the champion woman swimmer and diver of the Pacific Coast, and I look to see her capture many trophies East this coming summer.

She is athletic to a degree, and is fond of all outdoor sports, on many of which she excels her male competitors.

Miss Normand’s car was brought to the door, and I happened in after bidding “Good by!” to Arbuckle and his various assist­ants.

“Going to the big city?” I queried, looking for a nice ride all the way home.

“Oh dear no!” she said. “I’ll take you to the ferry, but I’ve got to hurry back to the studio to see the scenes we took to-day run off. You know Roscoe never leaves the place until he O.K.’s or N.G.’s the day’s work, and I always look it over with him. It keeps us busy.”

A little more talk, and the ferry was reached. “Too bad you can’t come across the river with me,” I said as I was about to leave the pretty little star.

“We might go right over, without the ferry, if this car was a -- “ Mabel started, but I silenced her in time. This isn’t an automobile -- joke book.

A brand-new field of motion picture activity, it is announced, is to be opened to Mabel Normand by the Triangle interest, with whom she has just signed a new contract. She is to be a star in comedy-drama, with a director of her own, whose mission will be to select plays for her that will be along the lines of “Peggy,” the story of rustic life in Scotland in which Billie Burke scored such a pronounced success.

Three reasons are given for this move -- first, that Miss Normand’s dramatic abilities have burst the bounds of Keystone comedy; second, that she is too god a comedienne to be allowed to get away from that field entirely; third, she has a personal following of movie fans who will be eager to see her in something affording more scope for her talents than the uproarious productions which have given fame to the name of Mack Sennett.

It is true of Miss Normand that despite her fun-making abilities, and her willingness to risk her life in the startling stunts of the Keystone studios, there has always been a distinct appeal in her work, apart from either comedy or thrill. In the most grotesque situations she has had a way of ingratiating herself into the sympathies of her audiences, and of evoking heart interest as well as laughter. There has always been drama in her comedy, and it seems safe to assume there will always be comedy in her drama.

Whether Miss Normand will make her first picture, in the unique field, in the east or on the coast has not yet been announced. She is now in New York enjoying a vacation from strenuous Keystone activities.
* from Arcata Union (California), August 12, 1916

[from a biography of serial star Helen Holmes] “While on a trip to Los Angeles some five years ago, Miss Holmes¹²⁸ met Mabel Normand, who was at that time working with the Keystone Company and who later was with Charley Chaplin. Having known her previously in Chicago, Miss Normand prevailed upon her to join the Keystone Company, with whom she remained a couple of months. She then went with the Kalem company, in which Mr. McGowan was the director and while working in this company, she won fame in her ‘Hazards of Helen’ pictures and also a husband, the director and the movie queen joining forces for a life partnership.”