The year 1906 in film involved some significant events.
Florence Lawrence was a Canadian-American stage performer and film actress. She is often referred to as the "first movie star", and was long thought to be the first film actor to be named publicly until evidence published in 2019 indicated that the first named film star was French actor Max Linder. At the height of her fame in the 1910s, she was known as the "Biograph Girl" for work as one of the leading ladies in silent films from the Biograph Company. She appeared in almost 300 films for various motion picture companies throughout her career.
Vitagraph Studios, also known as the Vitagraph Company of America, was a United States motion picture studio. It was founded by J. Stuart Blackton and Albert E. Smith in 1897 in Brooklyn, New York, as the American Vitagraph Company. By 1907, it was the most prolific American film production company, producing many famous silent films. It was bought by Warner Bros. in 1925.
James Stuart Blackton was a British-American film producer and director of the silent era. One of the pioneers of motion pictures, he founded Vitagraph Studios in 1897. He was one of the first filmmakers to use the techniques of stop-motion and drawn animation, is considered a father of American animation, and was the first to bring many classic plays and books to the screen. Blackton was also the commodore of the Motorboat Club of America and the Atlantic Yacht Club.
Owen Moore was an Irish-born American actor, appearing in more than 279 movies spanning from 1908 to 1937.
Florence Turner was an American actress who became known as the "Vitagraph Girl" in early silent films.
Henry Lewis Solter was an American silent film actor and director.
The first American film version of William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet was a silent film short made in 1908 made by Vitagraph Studios. Directed by J. Stuart Blackton, it was filmed at Bethesda Terrace in Manhattan, New York.
Linda Arvidson was an American stage and film actress. She became one of America's early motion picture stars while working at Biograph Studios in New York, where none of the company's actors, until 1913, were credited on screen. Along with Florence Lawrence, Marion Leonard, and other female performers there, she was often referred to by theatergoers and in trade publications as simply one of the "Biograph girls". Arvidson began working in the new, rapidly expanding film industry after meeting her future husband D. W. Griffith, who impressed her as an innovative screen director. Their marriage was kept secret for reasons of professional discretion.
Jean, also known as the Vitagraph Dog (1902–1916), was a female collie that starred in silent films. Owned and guided by director Laurence Trimble, she was the first canine to have a leading role in motion pictures. Jean was with Vitagraph Studios from 1909, and in 1913 went with Trimble to England to work with Florence Turner in her own independent film company.
The Call of the Wild is a 1908 American short silent Western film directed by D. W. Griffith and produced by the American Mutoscope and Biograph Company. The short, a "one-reeler", stars Charles Inslee, Harry Solter and Florence Lawrence. Its interior scenes were shot at Biograph's studio facilities in New York City, and its exteriors were filmed on location in Coytesville, today one of the oldest communities in Fort Lee, New Jersey.
Biograph Girl was a phrase associated with two early-20th-century actresses, Florence Lawrence and Mary Pickford, who made black-and-white silent films with the Biograph Company. At that time, all studios refused to give actors on-screen film credit; they did not want them to gain public celebrity status and command higher salaries. This had already happened with stage actors, and the studios did not want to repeat the trend on film.
Albert Edward Smith was an American stage magician, film director and producer, and a naturalized American. He founded Vitagraph Studios with his business partner James Stuart Blackton in 1897.
Between Friends is a 1924 American silent melodrama film based on the eponymous 1914 novel by Robert W. Chambers. The film was directed by J. Stuart Blackton and produced by Albert E. Smith. It stars Lou Tellegen, Anna Q. Nilsson, and Norman Kerry. The feature was distributed by Vitagraph Studios, which was founded by Blackton and Smith in 1897 in Brooklyn, New York. The film is lost.
The Common Cause is a lost 1919 American silent comedy film directed and produced by J. Stuart Blackton and distributed by Vitagraph Company of America. It is based on a play, Getting Together, by Ian Hay, J. Hartley Manners, and Percival Knight.
William Pitt Striker Earle was an American director of the silent film era. He attended Columbia University and worked for a time as a photographer before breaking into the movie business by sneaking onto the lot of Vitagraph Company of America to observe how directors worked. After a few days of this, Earle approached the studio president and was given his first movie to direct, For the Honor of the Crew, a short about a crew race at Columbia University. He subsequently directed a number of features and shorts for Vitagraph. Later he worked with producer David O. Selznick. Earle founded his own, short-lived production company called Amex Production Corporation with J. S. Joffe, and shot the final two films of his career in Mexico.
The Redeeming Sin is a 1925 American silent drama film directed by J. Stuart Blackton and starring Alla Nazimova. It was produced and distributed by the Vitagraph Company of America. The story was remade in 1929 by Warner Bros. as The Redeeming Sin starring Dolores Costello.
The Airship, or 100 Years Hence is an American adventure comedy-drama silent short film written, produced and directed by J. Stuart Blackton. The film stars Blackton and Florence Lawrence. It was released on April 25, 1908 by The American Vitagraph Company; a partial print of The Airship, or 100 Years Hence is preserved in the Paper Print Collection. The Airship, or 100 Years Hence advertised that it would be "a forecast of a probable means of air navigation in the coming century."
Inez Ranous was an actress of the stage and screen who was active during Hollywood's silent era. She was married for a time to pioneering actor/director William V. Ranous of Vitagraph.
The Road to the Heart is a 1909 American short film, a dramedy directed by D. W. Griffith and produced by the Biograph Company of New York City. Starring David Miles, Anita Hendrie and Herbert Yost, it was filmed over two days in March 1909 at Biograph's studio in Manhattan and released that April in theaters as a film reel split with the Biograph comedy Trying to Get Arrested.
