Marguerite Clark

File:Actress Marguerite Clark.jpg

File:Marguerite-Clark-1913.jpg

Born in Avondale, Cincinnati, Ohio on February 22, 1883, she was the third child of Augustus "Gus" James and Helen Elizabeth Clark. She had an older sister, Cora, and an older brother named Clifton. Clark's mother Helen died on January 21, 1893. Her father worked in his self-owned successful haberdashery located in downtown Cincinnati before his death on December 29, 1896. Following his death, Clark's sister Cora was appointed her legal guardian and removed her from public school to further her education at Ursuline Academy.Nunn 1981, pp. 3–4.

Marguerite Clark finished school at age 16, decided to pursue a career in the theatre, making her first stage appearance as a member of the Strakosch Opera Company in 1899.O'Dell, 1970 p. 147

She made her Broadway debut in 1900. The 17-year-old performed at various venues. In 1903, she was seen on Broadway opposite hulking comedian DeWolf Hopper in Mr. Pickwick. The {{convert|6|ft|6|in|m|adj=on}} Hopper dwarfed the "petite and daintly" Clark who stood four-foot-ten-inches (1.5 meters).O'Dell, 1970 p. 147: "...the four foot ten fairy..." O'Dell quoting Alice Hall, see Bibliography, p. 148 note no. 39. She starred opposite Hopper again in Happyland in 1905. Several adventure-fantasy roles followed. In 1909, Clark starred in the whimsical costume play The Beauty Spot, establishing the fantasy stories which would soon become her hallmark.Blum 1988, p. 109. In 1910, Clark appeared in The Wishing Ring, a play directed by Cecil B. DeMille which was later made into a motion picture by Maurice Tourneur. That same 1910 season had Clark appearing in Baby Mine, a popular play produced by William A. Brady.

In 1912, Clark performed in a lead role with John Barrymore, Doris Keane and Gail Kane in an English adaptation of Arthur Schnitzler's play Anatol, which was later made into the film The Affairs of Anatol by Clark's future movie studio Famous Players–Lasky and directed by DeMille. That same year, she starred in a retelling of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.{{Cite web |url=http://www.silentfilm.org/snow-white |title=Snow White |author=Kaufman, J. B. |date=2019 |publisher=San Francisco Silent Film Festival |website=Silentfilm.org |access-date=June 29, 2019 }} The classic tale was adapted for the stage by Winthrop Ames (writing under the pseudonym Jessie Braham White), who closely oversaw its production at his Little Theatre in New York and personally selected the lead actress. Clark expressed her delight in the role, and the play had a successful run into 1913.

After seeing Clark’s performance in a revival of Merely Mary Ann (1914), film producer Adolph Zukor signed her to make motion pictures with his Famous Players Film Company.

File:Snow White (1916).webm, full 63 minute 1916 film starring Clark]]

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At age 31, it was relatively late in life for a film actress to begin a career with starring roles, but the diminutive Clark had a little-girl look, like Mary Pickford, that belied her years. Also, film was not developed or mature enough to showcase Clark at her youthful best at the turn of the century. These were some of the reasons established Broadway stars refused early film offers. Feature films were unheard of when Clark was in her early 20s.

Once signed with Adolph Zukor's Famous Players Film Company, she was cast in starring roles in more than a dozen features. Her first appearance on screen was in the short film Wildflower (1914), directed by Allan Dwan.Ballard. Mike. [http://www.greatlivesinhistory.blogspot.com/2010/02/blog-entry-february-22-marguerite-clark.html "Marguerite Clark, Film Fantasy Queen."] greatlivesinhistory, February 22, 2010. Retrieved: January 9, 2012.

File:Marguerite Clark in "Molly Make-Believe" (1916).png

Marguerite Clark's emergence as an outstanding film actor was acknowledged by 1915, when Moving Picture World, in a review of The Goose Girl, based on a 1909 best-selling novel by Harold MacGrath, reported that Clark "conquers her audience in an instant." She performed in the feature-length production The Seven Sisters (1915), directed by Sidney Olcott, and then reprised her stage role in a film that would define the Clark persona—the influential 1916 screen version of Snow White.

Clark was directed in this by J. Searle Dawley, as well as in a number of films, notably when she played the characters of both "Little Eva St. Clair" and "Topsy" in the feature Uncle Tom's Cabin (1918).

File:Marguerite Clark in Come Out Of The Kitchen.jpg

Clark starred in Come Out of the Kitchen (1919), which was filmed in Pass Christian, Mississippi, at Ossian Hall. The same year, she enrolled as a yeowoman in the naval reserves. Clark made all but one of her 40 films with Famous Players–Lasky, her last with them in 1920 titled Easy to Get, in which she starred opposite silent film actor Harrison Ford. Her next film, in 1921, was made by her own production company for First National Pictures distribution. As one of the most popular actresses going into the 1920s, and one of the industry's best paid, her name alone was enough to ensure reasonable box office success. As such, Scrambled Wives was made under her direction, following which she retired at age 38 to be with her husband at their country estate in New Orleans.

Critic Alice Hall, writing in Picturegoer magazine (April 1921), observed that the 34-year-old Clark, near the end of her film career "seems to have discovered the secret of perpetual youth; and with it moreover, to have combined the grace and charm which the wisdom of experience alone can bring."

File:LatterLibraryToCarriageEntrance.jpg in Uptown New Orleans now houses the Latter branch of the New Orleans Public Library]]

Mary Pickford and Marguerite Clark were working at the same movie studio, Famous Players–Lasky,

as they emerged as major Hollywood stars of the silent film era. While the two remained personally disengaged, a "definite rivalry" developed over their respective critical and popular successes.O'Dell, 1970 p. 149: "...the stars themselves showed little interest in each other..."

According to film historian Paul O'Dell, the competition was evidenced primarily by the apparent hostility between Pickford's mother Charlotte and Clark's mother Helen and older sister, Cora.O'Dell, 1970 p. 149

The rivalry became explicit in 1918 when Motion Picture Magazine conducted a poll among movie fans that garnered Pickford 158,199 votes to Clark's 138,852 (53% to 47%).Basinger, 1999 p. 35: Similar statistics provided here on popularity poll.

As to Pickford's narrow margin of success over Clark in popularity, film producer Samuel Goldwyn, writing in his 1923 memoir Behind the Screen, provides this assessment:

{{blockquote|Mary Pickford long outlasted her fair rival. Why was this? Marguerite Clark was beautiful, she was exquisitely graceful, and she brought to the screen a more finished stage technique and a more spacious background than did Miss Pickford. My answer to this question applies not only to Miss Clark, but all other actresses who have flashed, meteor-like, across the screen horizon. First of all, she did not have Mary Pickford's absorbing passion for work. Secondly, she did not possess the other artist's capacity for portraying fundamental human emotion: simple and direct and poignant. Mary goes to the heart, much as does a Stephen Foster melody. Herein is the success of a popularity so phenomenally sustained.O'Dell, 1970 p. 149–150: See footnote source p. 159, footnote no. 42}}

On August 15, 1918, Clark married New Orleans, Louisiana, plantation owner and millionaire businessman—then a US Army Lieutenant—Harry Palmerston Williams,[https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=Fm9WAAAAIBAJ&sjid=DOQDAAAAIBAJ&pg=6971,3074852&dq=harry+palmerston+williams+death&hl=en "Noted actress taken by death."] The Spokesman-Review, September 26, 1940, p. 3. Retrieved: May 19, 2013.O'Dell, 1970 p. 149: Married "August 15, 1918" to "Lieutenant" Williams. a marriage that ended with the death of Williams on May 19, 1936 in an aircraft crash."Marguerite Clark, ex-actress, dies." The New York Times, September 26, 1940, p. 21. Retrieved: May 19, 2013. After his death, Clark owned Wedell-Williams Air Service Corporation, which had built and flown air racers, along with other aviation enterprises, until sold in 1937.

After the death of her husband, Clark moved to New York City where she lived with her sister Cora. On September 20, 1940, she entered LeRoy Sanitarium where she died five days later of pneumonia.[https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=JrRQAAAAIBAJ&sjid=kiIEAAAAIBAJ&pg=2104,4137382&dq=marguerite+clark+pneumonia&hl=en "Marguerite Clark, ex-actress, dies."]{{Dead link|date=October 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }} The Milwaukee Journal, September 25, 1940, p. 10. Retrieved: May 19, 2013. A private funeral was held at Frank E. Campbell Funeral Chapel on September 28."Marguerite Clark honored at funeral; Associates pay tribute to the former actress at rites here." The New York Times, September 29, 1940. She was cremated and buried with her husband in Metairie Cemetery in New Orleans.[https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=nFYyAAAAIBAJ&sjid=M7YFAAAAIBAJ&pg=5972,4424393&dq=marguerite+clark+harry+palmerston+williams&hl=en "Star of silent films given simple funeral."]{{Dead link|date=October 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }} The Palm Beach Post, September 29, 1940, p. 12. Retrieved: May 19, 2013.

For her contribution to the motion picture industry, Marguerite Clark has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6304 Hollywood Boulevard.[http://projects.latimes.com/hollywood/star-walk/marguerite-clark/ "Hollywood Star Walk: Marguerite Clark."] Los Angeles Times. Retrieved: May 19, 2013.

{{reflist|colwidth=30em}}

• Basinger, Jeanine. 1999. Silent Stars. Alfred A. Knopf, New York. {{ISBN|0-679-43840-8}}
• Blum, Daniel. Pictorial History of the American Theater. New York: Random House Value Publishing, First edition 1950. {{ISBN|0-517-53022-8}}.
• Nunn, Curtis. Marguerite Clark: America's Darling of Broadway and the Silent Screen. Fort Worth, Texas: The Texas Christian University Press, 1981. {{ISBN|0-912646-69-1}}.
• {{cite book |last1=O'Dell|first1=Paul|title=Griffith and the Rise of Hollywood|date=1970 |publisher=A. S. Barnes & Co.|location=New York |isbn=0-498-07718-7 |page=163 |edition=1970}}

• {{cite book|last1=Wilson|first1=H.W.|title=Current Biography Yearbook|publisher=H.W Wilson}}

{{Commons category}}

• {{IBDB name}}
• {{IMDb name|0164244}}
• [http://www.public.asu.edu/~bruce/Taylor91.txt Contemporary interviews with Marguerite Clark]
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20121127110513/http://www.corbisimages.com/Search#q=marguerite+clark&p=1 Marguerite Clark page at Corbis]
• [https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/search/index?utf8=%E2%9C%93&keywords=marguerite+clark Marguerite Clark] gallery NY Public Library
• [http://broadway.cas.sc.edu/index.php?action=showPerformer&id=50 Marguerite Clark bio & pics]
• [https://archive.today/20130821002604/http://content.lib.washington.edu/cdm4/item_viewer.php?CISOROOT=/sayre&CISOPTR=12568&CISOBOX=1&REC=17 portrait of Marguerite Clark and DeWolf Hopper on Broadway in Happyland (1905) Univ. of Washington/Sayre Collection]

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Category:1883 births

Category:1940 deaths

Category:19th-century American actresses

Category:20th-century American actresses

Category:Actresses from Cincinnati

Category:American film actresses

Category:American silent film actresses

Category:American stage actresses

Category:Articles containing video clips

Category:Burials at Metairie Cemetery

Category:Deaths from pneumonia in New York City

Category:People from Avondale, Cincinnati