''A Rude Hostess'' is a 1909 American silent film comedy written and directed by

D. W. Griffith David Wark Griffith (January 22, 1875 – July 23, 1948) was an American film director. Considered one of the most influential figures in the history of the motion picture, he pioneered many aspects of film editing and expanded the art of the na ...

, produced by the

American Mutoscope and Biograph Company The Biograph Company, also known as the American Mutoscope and Biograph Company, was a motion picture company founded in 1895 and active until 1916. It was the first company in the United States devoted entirely to film production and exhibition ...

in New York City, and co-starring

Marion Leonard Marion Leonard (June 9, 1881 – January 9, 1956) was an American stage actress who became one of the first motion picture celebrities in the early years of the silent film era. Early career Born in Cincinnati, Ohio, Marion Leonard began her a ...

and

Arthur V. Johnson Arthur Vaughan Johnson (February 2, 1876 – January 17, 1916) was a pioneer actor and director of the early American silent film era. Career Born in Cincinnati, Ohio, the son of Rev. Myron A. Johnson, Arthur Vaughan Johnson left college at 19 t ...

."A Rude Hostess (1909)"
catalog,

American Film Institute The American Film Institute (AFI) is an American nonprofit film organization that educates filmmakers and honors the heritage of the motion picture arts in the United States. AFI is supported by private funding and public membership fees. Lead ...

(AFI), Los Angeles, California. Retrieved 28 August 2021.Niver, Kemp R. (compiler). ''Early Motion Pictures: The Paper Print Collection in the Library of Congress''
"A Rude Hostess"
Washington, D.C.: Motion Picture, Broadcasting, and Recorded Sound Division, 1985, p. 281.

HathiTrust HathiTrust Digital Library is a large-scale collaborative repository of digital content from research libraries including content digitized via Google Books and the Internet Archive digitization initiatives, as well as content digitized locally ...

Digital Library. Retrieved 31 August 2021. At its release in April 1909, the short was distributed to theaters on a " split reel", which was a single reel that accommodated more than one film. ''A Rude Hostess'' shared its reel with another Biograph comedy short directed by Griffith, ''

Schneider's Anti-Noise Crusade ''Schneider's Anti-Noise Crusade'' is a 1909 American silent film comedy written and directed by D. W. Griffith, produced by the American Mutoscope and Biograph Company in New York City, and co-starring John R. Cumpson and Florence Lawrence.

''. Original contact-print paper rolls of both motion pictures, as well as projectable safety-stock copies of the films, are preserved in the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The librar ...

.Bennett, Carl
"A Rude Hostess"
The Progressive Silent Film List. Retrieved 28 August 2021.

Plot

This light comedy's plot portrays a burglar's unsuccessful attempt to steal "money and jewels" from a wealthy woman's home."Stories of the Films/Biography Company/A Rude Hostess"
''The Moving Picture World'' (New York City), volume 4, number 14, 3 April 1909, p. 412. I.A. Retrieved 28 August 2021. The following is a summary of the screenplay provided in Kemp R. Niver's extensive 1985 reference ''Early Motion Pictures: The Paper Print Collection in the Library of Congress'': Biograph-Studios-NYC-1908

Cast

as Mrs. Leffingwell *

as the burglar *

Frank Powell Frank Powell (born Francis William Powell, May 8, 1877) was a Canadian-born stage and silent film actor, director, producer, and screenwriter who worked predominantly in the United States."Ontario Births, 1869-1912", digital copy of original ha ...

as visitor * Anita Hendrie as visitor * Jeanie MacPherson as maid *

Owen Moore Owen Moore (12 December 1886 – 9 June 1939) was an Irish-born American actor, appearing in more than 279 movies spanning from 1908 to 1937. Early life and career Moore was born in Fordstown Crossroads, County Meath, Ireland. Along with his ...

as Mrs. Leffingwell's butler or "

footman A footman is a male domestic worker employed mainly to wait at table or attend a coach or carriage. Etymology Originally in the 14th century a footman denoted a soldier or any pedestrian, later it indicated a foot servant. A running footman deli ...

" *

Mack Sennett Mack Sennett (born Michael Sinnott; January 17, 1880 – November 5, 1960) was a Canadian-American film actor, director, and producer, and studio head, known as the 'King of Comedy'. Born in Danville, Quebec, in 1880, he started in films in th ...

as police officer

Production

The screenplay for this short is credited to D. W. Griffith, who also directed the picture at Biograph's main studio, which in 1909 was located inside a large renovated

brownstone Brownstone is a brown Triassic–Jurassic sandstone that was historically a popular building material. The term is also used in the United States and Canada to refer to a townhouse clad in this or any other aesthetically similar material. Type ...

mansion in New York City, in

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five Boroughs of New York City, boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the List of co ...

, at 11 East 14th Street. At the time cast and crew were working on ''A Rude Hostess'', Griffith had been directing Biograph productions at the Manhattan facility for almost exactly one year.Graham, Cooper C.; Higgins, Steve; Mancini, Elaine; Viera, João Luiz. Entry fo
"A Rude Hostess"
''D. W. Griffith and the Biograph Company''. Metuchen, New Jersey and London: The Scarecrow Press, 1985, p. 43. I.A. Retrieved 30 August 2021.

Filming

Filming ''A Rude Hostess'' was done at the Manhattan studio on a single interior set in just one dayon March 3, 1909by Biograph

cinematographer The cinematographer or director of photography (sometimes shortened to DP or DOP) is the person responsible for the photographing or recording of a film, television production, music video or other live action piece. The cinematographer is the c ...

G. W. "Billy" Bitzer. In addition to summarizing this release's plot, the previously noted 1985 reference ''Early Motion Pictures: The Paper Print Collection in the Library of Congress'' provides a basic description of Bitzer's camerawork in shooting the production: Bitzer collaborated with Griffith for many years, and his extensive experience behind the camera made him an expert at gauging not only the "screen presence" or photogenic qualities of actors but also, respectively, their strongest attributes on film. During the period when ''A Rude Hostess'' was being shot at the old Manhattan studio, Bitzer judged Marion Leonard to be "the best actress on the screen".Bitzer, G. W. ''Billy Bitzer: His Story''. New York: Farrah, Straus, and Giroux, 1973, p. 51. . He also ranked two of the actors in this short"big, handsome" Arthur Johnson and Owen Mooreas Biograph's most dapper performers, "who looked great in costumes or dress suits", as in the formal "dinner clothes" worn by Johnson in this production. Biograph_Films_advertisement_for_1909_split-reel_releases

Biograph_Films_advertisement_for_1909_split-reel_releases

"'Just grinding out sausages'"

The rapid pace of film production at Biograph by 1909 and the brief runtimes of those screen projects, in particular the six-to-seven-minute split-reel releases like ''A Rude Hostess'', proved to be especially frustrating for Griffith, who often compared the repetitive split-reel process to the work of a sausage-maker.Simmon, Scott. ''The Films of D. W. Griffith''. Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press, pp. 6-7. . In fact, in the 1993 book ''The Films of D. W. Griffith'' published by

Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press is the university press of the University of Cambridge. Granted letters patent by Henry VIII of England, King Henry VIII in 1534, it is the oldest university press in the world. It is also the King's Printer. Cambr ...

, film historian Scott Simmon specifically includes ''A Rude Hostess'' in his discussions about the director's frustrations and his growing desire to create much longer, more visually complex motion pictures:

Biograph's uncredited actors

Identifying cast members in many early Biograph releases such as ''A Rude Hostess'' is made more difficult by the fact that the studio, as a matter of company policy, did not begin publicly crediting its performers on screen, in film-industry publications, or in newspaper advertisements until almost exactly four years after this short's release. Marion Leonard and Arthur Johnson, although in starring roles in this short, were among the uncredited actors on Biograph's relatively small staff of "photoplayers" in 1909. In its April 5, 1913 issue, the Chicago-based trade journal ''

Motography ''Motography'' was an American film journal that was first published in 1909 and ran until mid-1918. The magazine was published in 1909 and was originally named ''The Nickelodeon'',"Motography." The Bioscope. 9 Feb. 2009. Web. 4 Nov. 2015 http:/ ...

'' in a news item titled "Biograph Identities Revealed" announces that "at last" Biograph "is ready to make known its players.""Biograph Identities Revealed"
''Motography'' (Chicago), 5 April 1913, p. 222. I.A.; refer to Kelly R. Brown's ''Florence Lawrence, the Biograph Girl: America's First Movie Star'' (1999) about Biograph's policy of using anonymous or "unnamed" actors. That news item also informs filmgoers that for the price of ten cents they can purchase a poster from Biograph on which the names and respective portraits of 26 of the company's principal actors were featured.

Release and reception

The film and its split-reel companion ''Schneider's Anti-Noise Crusade'' circulated for many months to theaters throughout the country and were widely promoted in newspapers and

trade publication A trade magazine, also called a trade journal or trade paper (colloquially or disparagingly a trade rag), is a magazine or newspaper whose target audience is people who work in a particular trade or industry. The collective term for th ...

s. Shortly before the release of ''A Rude Hostess'' on April 8, 1909, an anonymous reviewer for ''The Moving Picture World'' in New York saw a preview of it and succinctly reported, "The subject is most cleverly acted and sumptuously staged." In Vermont, two months after the comedy's release, ''

The Barre Daily Times The ''Barre Montpelier Times Argus'' is a daily morning newspaper serving the capital region of Vermont. It was established in 1897. The newspaper claims that "80% of all adults in the Barre/Montpelier area read the Times Argus for local news, ...

'' agreed, describing it as "superbly mounted, effectively and powerfully acted.""Talk Of The Town"
''The Barre Daily Times'' (Barre, Vermont), 5 June 1909, p. 1, col. 3.

Chronicling America ''Chronicling America'' is an open access, open source newspaper database and companion website. It is produced by the United States National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP), a partnership between the Library of Congress and the National Endowm ...

: Historic American Newspapers, 1777-1963 (hereinafter cited as "ChronAm"); co-sponsored by the

National Endowment for the Humanities The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) is an independent federal agency of the U.S. government, established by thNational Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act of 1965(), dedicated to supporting research, education, preserv ...

and administered by the Library of Congress, Washington D.C. Retrieved 31 August 2021. Most published comments about ''A Rude Hostess'' and other printed references to the short in 1909 and during the first half of 1910 are not independent, non-biased assessments of the Biograph production; they are instead from newspaper advertisers or theater owners who simply had commercial interests in attracting audiences. In

Brunswick, Georgia Brunswick () is a city in and the county seat of Glynn County, Georgia, Glynn County in the U.S. state of Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia. As the primary urban and economic center of the lower southeast portion of Georgia, it is the second-largest ...

in the summer of 1909, the local newspaper promoted the picture's presentation at the town's Grand Theatre and reached for superlatives to praise its performers, declaring that the "acting in this picture is without doubt the most perfect ever seen in Brunswick.""Amusements"
''The Brunswick Daily News'' (Brunswick, Georgia), 5 August 1909, p. 7. ChronAm. Retrieved 28 August 2021. ''The Brunswick Daily News'' in its promotion also mentions a series of short stories written in 1898 by English author E. W. Hornung that likely inspired Biograph's 1909 screenplay, stories that center around the exploits of a gentleman thief. "'The Rude Hostess'", notes the newspaper in its August 5 issue, "is a reproduction of the famous story of Raffles, the amateur cracksman."

Outwitting "a rogue of the sterner sex"

Not all newspaper promotions for the film confined themselves to simple observations or advertising

catchphrase A catchphrase (alternatively spelled catch phrase) is a phrase or expression recognized by its repeated utterance. Such phrases often originate in popular culture Popular culture (also called mass culture or pop culture) is generally recogni ...

s about the comedy. Yet, there were some viewers of the short who offered more thoughtful opinions about the release, although those opinions too may have been imbedded with commercial motivations, namely in targeting a particular demographic. The same month, for example, that ''The Brunswick Daily News'' was commenting about the film in Georgia, more than 4,500 miles away, in the United States territory of Hawaii, theaters were already screening the short as well. In the August 30, 1909 issue of Honolulu's local newspaper, ''The Pacific Commercial Advertiser'', the publication informs it readers about ''A Rude Hostess'' and other films being circulated between two theaters there, the Empire Theater and the Art Theater."Amusements / The Empire Theater / Art Theater"
''The Pacific Commercial Advertiser'' (Honolulu, Hawaii), 30 August 1909, p. 6, col. 3. ChronAm. Retrieved 29 August 2021. The newspaper states in the cited issue that the Biograph comedy is one offering that will have special appeal for the theaters' female patrons. "Tonight", asserts ''The Pacific Commercial Advertiser'', "there will be a couple of comedies that will shatter the seams of the dresses of the ladies who go to see them." The paper then alludes to the film's subtle messaging of portraying intellectual equality between the sexes and even hinting at the ongoing efforts by women to gain equal voting rights, adding "the Rude Hostess will bring to mind the claims of

suffragette A suffragette was a member of an activist women's organisation in the early 20th century who, under the banner "Votes for Women", fought for the right to vote in public elections in the United Kingdom. The term refers in particular to members ...

s." Elaborating on those points in promoting the short as a "ladies" comedy, the Honolulu newspaper in the same issue states:

Preservation status

Photographic prints and a partial film copy of ''A Rude Hostess'' survive in the

(LC)), which holds a 172-foot roll of paper images printed frame-by-frame directly from the comedy's original 35mm master negative. Submitted by Biograph to the United States government in 1909, shortly before the film's release, the roll is part of the original documentation required by federal authorities for motion picture companies to obtain

copyright A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, education ...

protection for their productions.Niver
"Preface"
pp. ix-xiii. While the LC's collection of paper print rolls are certainly not projectable, negative copies of the paper images were later made and transferred by archival staff onto modern polyester-based safety film stock. That negative footage was then used to produce positive prints for screening. All that work was performed during a comprehensive film-preservation project carried out in the 1950s and early 1960s by Kemp R. Niver and other LC staff, who restored more than 3,000 early paper rolls of images from the library's collection, transferring them to negative safety stock and many to positive prints.

Notes

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Rude Hostess, A 1900s crime films 1909 films 1909 comedy films 1909 short films American silent short films American black-and-white films Biograph Company films Films directed by D. W. Griffith D. W. Griffith American comedy short films One-shot films Films shot in New York City Films shot in New York (state) 1900s American films Silent American comedy films