The Devil's Claim and When Dawn Came
The film "The Bleeder" was released under the title "The Devil's Claim," and in it Colleen played Indira, a young Persian woman; a more exotic background for her character than usual, though she pulled it off. The film was produced by Hayworth Pictures Corporation, Sessue Hayakawa's own company, with its offices on the corner of Sunset and Hollywood Boulevard; after years of being shunted into stereotypical Asian roles, Sessue had formed his company to have control over his own material and productions. The film was released in early May, 1920. Just prior to it's release, she has appeared as the blind girl Mary Harrison in "When Dawn Came." Though, blind, she is given sight the hero, who has fallen in love with her. The film was a Hugh E. Dierker Photo Drama Production. Though technically working for Al Christy, he was more than happy tolet her pursue her career.
Towards those ends, in the three months after “The Devil’s Claim” had been released, director Marshall Neilan had begun a campaign to get Al Christie to release Colleen and go to work for him. The handsome actor-turned-director had made a name for himself working with Mary Pickford, directing her in
| Still of Colleen in "When Dawn Came." |
several films including “Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm” and “The Little Princess” in 1917, plus “Stella Maris”, “Amarilly of Clothes-Line Alley”, “M'Liss” in 1918, and “Daddy-Long-Legs” in 1919. In 1920 he had formed Marshall Neilan Productions and made feature-length, most of them distributed through First National Pictures.
First National had started life in 1917 as First National Exhibitors' Circuit, an association of independent theater owners that expanded from mere exhibition to distribution of movies. In 1919 they reincorporated as Associated First National Pictures, Inc.
Dinty
“Mickey,” as he was known, decided he wanted to team Colleen with Wes Barry, the freckle-faced child star, in is production of “Dinty.” It was a good deal for Colleen, a high-profile production. Al Christie, who Colleen would later write had become sweet on her, told her it was the lucky break she was waiting for. He told her she should take the offer.
| Marshall Nielan, from the Jeff Codori Collection. |
She did. However, Colleen had been hard at work for month, almost non-stop, as was pointed out by Grace Kingsley who wrote in the September 1920 Los Angeles Times that “Colleen Colleen can’t get a break.” Without missing a beat, another offer came her way: “Although she signed with Neilan and will begin work in a month, film director King Vidor decided nobody but Colleen would do as costar in his upcoming film opposite David Butler, prevailed upon Neilan to loan her out. …Miss Moore is going to work as a Vidor star beginning next week, instead of partying around with a certain handsome dark young man.”
In a few days Vidor’s company would leave for Big Bear, and then after that they were scheduled to leave for Canada. In what spare time she had, presumably while not out with the unnamed “handsome dark young man,” Colleen kept up her studies: French, Shakespeare, horseback riding, and she had plans to take up classic dance with Theodore Kosloff.
| Colleen in "So Long Letty," from the Jeff Codori Collection. |
In the mean time “So Long Letty” was released in October 1920, and while colleen appears tense in many scenes (almost afraid at some of the antics going on around her, although that could have been part of her characterization) her comic timing can be seen getting better. The film was adapted for an Oliver Moresco comedy/musical play that had been a hit a year or so earlier, the play itself an adaptation of a play just a few years earlier called “Thy Neighbor’s Wife.”
A month and a half later “Dinty” was released to critical praise. Mickey Nielan was a fun man to be around; a happy-go-lucky Irishman with a tremendous sense of humor, quick wit, and appetite for partying that rivaled nearly anyone else’s. He was generous with the people who worked for him, quick to throw a party, and had absolutely no concept of how to save money. The cash flowed out of his pockets like they had holes in them. In spite of his faults, Colleen would always have a soft spot for him.
The Sky Pilot
By this time, Hollywood was becoming famous as a dream factory. People dreamed of moving to the Golden State, most dreamed of being discoverd and finding their way into motion pictures. Though there were scandals, film was becoming thoroughly entrenched in the popular American imagination. In less than a year oil would be discovered in Los Angeles; the the Alamitos # 1 well on Signal Hill would begin to spout crude like there was no tomorrow: 1,000 barrels of the stuff a day. The money was flowing into the town, along with the good times.
Colleen's next film, “The Sky Pilot,” was produced by Catherine Curtis, president of the Catherine Curtis Corporation, cited by the Washington Post in Feb. 1921 as one of the few women film producers. Much of the work was done on location, in Truckee (this according to Colleen in “Silent Star,”) and in the foothills of the Canadian Rockies, on the same terrain as depicted in the book the film was based upon. In California the crew stayed in a hotel overlooking the Truckee Southern Pacific railroad station, and for a while the troupe was snowed in. There was not much to do when they were not shooting: their hotel was isolated, the nearest town a sleigh ride away. The crew came up with activities; everyone came up with an act to perform in the evenings, a sort of amateur vaudeville show for their co-workers. Colleen and King worked out a mind-reader’s act. In fact, the two ended up spending a lot of time together.
Vidor was an energetic, youthful-looking man in his mid-twenties; when Colleen had first seen him she thought he was an assistant, expecting the director to be a much older man. The two hit it off right away. Though she looked like a much younger girl, Colleen was smart and well-read, better educated then the average young starlet who might have found herself on the set the result of winning a contest or catching the eye of some producer.
Exactly what happened between he and Colleen while on location is a mystery. There is no doubt there was an attraction between the two: Colleen writes of long dry stretches between productions where she had virtually no social life, punctuated with occasional flurries of attention. Being isolated from the prying eyes of the Hollywood machine could easily have bred in the twenty-one year old actress (who had been passing herself off as a naive seventeen year old) a sense of intimacy and camaraderie with the young director. Under those circumstances it is not difficult to imagine them falling into a flirting romance. Some speculate that the romance was consummated, though nobody knows for sure. Vidor was married, but he had a reputation for involvement with his leading ladies. Colleen was a staunch Catholic who would not have committed adultery easily regardless of the degree of her attraction to Vidor. Plus, they both had careers to consider.
Hollywood had begun to gain a reputation as a colony of libertines. On the one hand, a popular line in the film magazines was the sudden wealth and notoriety one could gain through films: stars were encouraged to show conspicuous displays of wealth. On the other hand, while the population in general might fantasize about such easy, quick wealth and fame, they still saw it as a character flaw; in a nation that had nearly enshrined the ethic of hard work and its eventual rewards, those who flaunted their easy wealth were viewed with distrust. The industry, while popular, was still in embryonic form the prospect of the media being outlawed, or at least severely restricted, was not unimaginable. If an affair between the two had been discovered, especially with Colleen's squeaky-clean reputation, it could well have ruined both their careers. Even worse for Colleen, it would have devastated her family and her grandmother.
