From Photoplay, August 1923, 35–36.
[This unsigned piece consists of a series of comments, beginning with D. W. Griffith, and continuing with Rex Ingram, Cecil B. DeMille, Allan Dwan, Marshall Neilan, John M. Stahl, Hobart Henry, Charles Maigne, and the following casting directors: L. M. Goodstadt (Lasky), Harry Kerr (Metro), Clarence Jay Elmer (Cosmopolitan), Robert B. McIntyre (Goldwyn), William Cohill (Paramount East Coast studios), and James Ryan (Fox East Coast studios).]
“There is always a good chance for the right sort of beginner. That applies to every field of human activity. Indeed, in making motion picture dramas I am inclined to favor beginners.
“They come untrammeled by so-called technique, by theories and by preconceived ideas.
“If you were to ask me what sort of beginner I liked best, I would say in brief: I prefer the young woman who has to support herself and possibly her mother. Of necessity, she will work hard. Again, I prefer the nervous type. I never engage a newcomer who applied for work without showing at least a sign or two of nervousness. If she is calm, she has no imagination. The imaginative type can picture the glamorous future with its possible great success— and is always nervous. Imagination— and nerves— are highly essential.
“To me, the ideal type for feminine stardom has nothing of the flesh, nothing of the note of sensuousness. My pictures reveal the type I mean. Commentators have called it the spirituelle [sic] type. But there is a method in my madness, as it were. The voluptuous type, blooming into the full blown rose, cannot endure. The years show their stamp too clearly. The other type— ah, that is different!
“When I consider a young woman as a stellar possibility I always ask myself: Does she come near suggesting the idealized heroine of life? Every living man has an ideal heroine of his dreams. Thus the girl, to have the real germ of stardom, must suggest— at least in a sketchy way— the vaguely formulated ideals of every man. Again, she must suggest— and this is equally important— the attributes most women desire. If she is lucky enough to have all these things, she may well look forward to popularity and success— if she has great determination.”