The Flapper (1920)
Director: Alan Crosland
Writers: Frances Marion (screenplay), Frances Marion (story)
Cinematography by John W. Brown
Production Co: Selznick Pictures Corporation
Cast:
Olive Thomas ... Genevieve King
[No Photo Available]
Theodore Westman Jr. ... Bill Forbes
William P. Carleton ... Richard Channing
[No Photo Available]
Warren Cook ... Sen. King - Ginger's Father
[No Photo Available]
Katherine Johnston ... Hortense
The Flapper, 10 May 1920, is an adorable featured movie about a teenage schoolgirl, Ginger King (Olive Thomas), who dreams of lovers and jazz cabarets, wanting to escape her mundane life at boarding school and ride off into the sunset with the handsome older man all the schoolgirls are in love with, Richard Channing (William P. Carleton).
She fools Channing into thinking she's 20, and he takes her to a country club, but her "romantic night" is ruined when the bad girl at school, Hortense, gets in her way. Throughout the rest of the film, Ginger pursues her dreams and visits 1920's nightclubs, wears glamorous clothes, but finds that being a flapper is not easy when she gets involved in a mysterious jewel heist and more!
"The Flapper" was written by Frances Marion, who was then writing scenarios for Mary Pickford. This film may have, in some level of development, been considered a Pickford vehicle; and, it's easy to imagine her in the lead. For whatever reasons, Thomas got the assignment. It was kept in the family, as Olive Thomas was then Mrs. Pickford (married to Jack Pickford, Mary's brother).
Olive Thomas was, in the 1917-20 era, considered the most beautiful girl in Hollywoodland. She was certainly very good looking, and had striking violet-blue eyes, the same as Liz Taylor. Men were utterly enthralled with her. Thomas married Jack Pickford, brother of Mary Pickford, but tragically had a very horrible and accidental young death at the age of 25.
Olive Thomas ( Oliva R. Duffy) (Born October 20, 1894, Charleroi, Pennsylvania – Died September 10, 1920 (aged 25) Neuilly-sur-Seine, France) was an American silent film actress and model. Thomas began her career as an illustrators' model in 1914, and moved on to the Ziegfeld Follies the following year. During her time as a Ziegfeld girl, she also appeared in the more risqué show, The Midnight Frolic.
In 1916, she began a successful career in silent films and would appear in over twenty features over the course of her four-year film career. Later that year, Thomas met actor Jack Pickford, brother of one of the most successful silent stars, Mary Pickford, at a beach cafe on the Santa Monica Pier. Both Thomas and Pickford were known for their partying.
Screenwriter Frances Marion remarked, "I had seen her often at the Pickford home, for she was engaged to Mary's brother, Jack. Two innocent-looking children, they were the gayest, wildest brats who ever stirred the stardust on Broadway. Both were talented, but they were much more interested in playing the roulette of life than in concentrating on their careers."
Thomas eloped with Pickford on October 25, 1916, in New Jersey. None of their family was present, with only actor Thomas Meighan as their witness. The couple never had children of their own. In 1920, they adopted Thomas' six-year-old nephew when his mother died.
On September 10, 1920, Thomas died of acute nephritis in Paris five days after consuming mercury bichloride. Although her death was ruled accidental, news of her hospitalisation due to the poison and Thomas' subsequent death were the subject of media speculation. Thomas' death has been cited as one of the first heavily publicised Hollywood scandals.
By most accounts, Thomas was the love of Pickford's life. However, the marriage was tumultuous and filled with highly charged conflict, followed by lavish making up through the exchange of expensive gifts. Pickford's family did not always approve of Thomas though most of the family did attend her funeral. In Mary Pickford's 1955 autobiography Sunshine and Shadow, she wrote:
"I regret to say that none of us approved of the marriage at that time. Mother thought Jack was too young, and Lottie and I felt that Olive, being in musical comedy, belonged to an alien world. Ollie had all the rich, eligible men of the social world at her feet. She had been deluged with proposals from her own world of the theatre as well. Which was not at all surprising. The beauty of Olive Thomas is legendary. The girl had the loveliest violet-blue eyes I have ever seen. They were fringed with long dark lashes that seemed darker because of the delicate translucent pallor of her skin. I could understand why Florenz Ziegfeld never forgave Jack for taking her away from the Follies. She and Jack were madly in love with one another but I always thought of them as a couple of children playing together."
Alan Crosland (August 10, 1894 – July 16, 1936) was an American stage actor and film director. Born in New York City, New York to a well-to-do family, Alan Crosland attended Dartmouth College.
Crosland began his career in the motion picture industry in 1912 at Edison Studios in The Bronx, New York. By 1917, he was directing feature-length films and in 1920 directed Olive Thomas in The Flapper, one of her final films before her death in September of that year.
In 1925, Crosland was working for Famous Players-Lasky (later Paramount Pictures) when he was hired by Warner Bros. He had directed several silent films for Warner's including directing Don Juan starring John Barrymore in 1926. It was the first feature-length film with synchronised Vitaphone sound effects and musical soundtrack, though it has no spoken dialogue. He was chosen to direct Al Jolson in The Jazz Singer (1927). The film would make him famous as the first of the new talkies that changed the course of motion pictures.
Crosland died in 1936 at the age of 41 as a result of an automobile accident on Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles. He is interred in the Hollywood Forever Cemetery.
The Flapper (1920)
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