Night Life in Hollywood

1922 film

  • J. Frank Glendon
  • Josephine Hill
  • Gale Henry
Production
company
A.B. Maescher Productions
Distributed byArrow Film Corporation[1]
Release date
  • November 15, 1922 (1922-11-15) (U.S.)
Running time
6 reels[2] (approx. 60 mins)CountryUnited StatesLanguageSilent (English intertitles)Budget$75,000[3] (equivalent to $1,370,000 in 2023)

Night Life in Hollywood, called The Shriek of Hollywood in Europe,[4] is a 1922 American silent comedy film[5] directed by Fred Caldwell. It starred J. Frank Glendon, Josephine Hill, and Gale Henry, and featured a number of cameo appearances of celebrities with their families.

In 1922, Ada Bell Maescher organized the De Luxe Film Company to produce the propaganda picture, which would show the "real" living conditions in the film capital. Instead of depicting Hollywood as a lurid, sensual Babylon, with its reported debauches of depravity and wickedness, it was shown as a model city, beautiful and attractive, and populated with home-loving people.[6][7]

Plot

Joe Powell (Glendon) runs away from his small town in Arkansas to visit Hollywood, anticipating debauchery. After his sister Carrie Powell (Henry) heads there too, their father (McComer), mother (Rhodes), and younger sister follow them out there. Once the family is reunited in Hollywood, they learn that it is great place to live.[2][8][9]

Cast

Main cast
  • J. Frank Glendon as Joe Powell
  • Josephine Hill as Leonora Baxter
  • Gale Henry as Carrie Powell
  • J. L. McComer as Pa Powell
  • Elizabeth Rhodes as Ma Powell
  • Jack Connolly as Wayne Elkins
  • Delores Hall
Cameos

Release and reception

Sheet music of the cues from the film were distributed to theaters, and theater owners were told to distribute them, free of charge, to their customers.[10]

The film received mixed reviews,[8][11][12] but was commercially successful.[13]

Preservation

An incomplete print of Night Life in Hollywood is held by the Library of Congress. The second reel of the film is considered lost.[14]

References

Citations
  1. ^ "Arrow Buys the Maescher Production". Exhibitors Trade Review. Vol. 12, no. 11. 1922. p. 752.
  2. ^ a b c "Feature That Aims to Correct False Conception of Hollywood and Its People". The Film Daily. Vol. 23, no. 60. March 4, 1923. p. 11.
  3. ^ "True Picture of Hollywood". Motion Picture News. Vol. 25, no. 26. June 17, 1922. p. 3253.
  4. ^ Fleming 2013, p. 205.
  5. ^ Munden, Kenneth W., ed. (1971). The American Film Institute Catalog of Motion Pictures Produced in the United States: Feature Films 1921–1930. New York: R.R. Bowker Company. p. 544. OCLC 664500075.
  6. ^ "Moving Picture World". June 1922. Retrieved September 13, 2017.
  7. ^ "Hollywood 'Night Life'". Los Angeles Times. May 3, 1922. p. 21. Retrieved September 13, 2017.
  8. ^ a b c "Night Life in Hollywood". Variety. Vol. 70, no. 3. March 8, 1923. p. 31.
  9. ^ Motion Picture News Booking Guide. Vol. 4. New York: Motion Picture News. April 1923. pp. 76–77.
  10. ^ "Mr. Exhibitor: 'Thematic Music Cue Sheets' Are Now Available at Practically All the Film Exchanges Throughout the Country". Motion Picture News. March 24, 1923. p. 1449.
  11. ^ "Arrow Presents 'Night Life in Hollywood'". Exhibitors Trade Review. Vol. 13, no. 1. December 2, 1922. pp. 12–13.
  12. ^ Fleming 2013, p. 258.
  13. ^ "Who's Who and What's What in Filmland This Week". Camera!. August 25, 1923. p. 13.
  14. ^ "American Silent Feature Film Database: Night Life in Hollywood". Library of Congress. Retrieved March 22, 2024.
Works cited
  • Fleming, E. J. (2013). Wallace Reid: The Life and Death of a Hollywood Idol. Jefferson, NC: McFarland. ISBN 978-0-7864-7725-8.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Night Life in Hollywood.
  • Night Life in Hollywood at IMDb Edit this at Wikidata
  • Night Life in Hollywood at the AFI Catalog of Feature Films
  • A 2-page ad
  • Another 2-page ad
  • Multiple stills from the film
  • A still from the film
  • A still from the film, claiming to depict "one million people"
  • A still of the pool scene from the film


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