Mary Pickford Season: FD Cinematheque
New York Hat, The (1912)
Director: D W Griffith
Cast: Mary Pickford, Charles Hill Mailes, Kate Bruce, Lionel Barrymore, Alfred Paget, Claire McDowell, Mae Marsh, Madge Kirby, Lillian Gish, Jack Pickford, Robert Harron, Dorothy Gish, Mack Sennett
16 min
D W Griffith
The New York Hat (1912)
The New York Hat (1912)
The New York Hat (1912)
The New York Hat (1912)
The New York Hat (1912)
The New York Hat (1912) is a short silent film directed by D. W. Griffith from a screenplay by Anita Loos, and starring Mary Pickford, Lionel Barrymore, and Lillian Gish.
Production
The New York Hat is one of the most notable of the Biograph Studios short films and is perhaps the best known example of Pickford’s early work, and an example of Anita Loos‘s witty writing. The film was made by Biograph when it and many other early U.S. movie studios were based in Fort Lee, New Jersey at the beginning of the 20th century.[1][2][3]
Plot
Mollie Goodhue leads a cheerless, impoverished life, largely because of her stern, miserly father. Mrs. Goodhue is mortally ill, but before dying, she gives the minister, Preacher Bolton, some money with which to buy her daughter the “finery” her father always forbade her.
Mollie is delighted when the minister presents her with a fashionable New York hat she has been longing for, but village gossips misinterpret the minister’s intentions and spread malicious rumors. Mollie becomes a social pariah, and her father tears up the beloved hat in a rage.
All ends well, however, after the minister produces a letter from Mollie’s mother about the money she left the minister to spend on Mollie. Soon afterwards, he proposes to Mollie, who accepts his offer of marriage.
Cast
- Mary Pickford … Miss Mollie Harding[4] (the girl)
- Charles Hill Mailes … Mr. Harding (her father)
- Kate Bruce … Mrs. Harding (her mother)
- Lionel Barrymore … Preacher Bolton (minister)
- Alfred Paget … The Doctor
- Claire McDowell … First Gossip
- Mae Marsh … Second Gossip
- Clara T. Bracy … Third Gossip
- Madge Kirby … Shopkeeper/At Mother’s Deathbed
- Lillian Gish … Customer in Shop/Outside Church
- Jack Pickford … Youth outside church
- Robert Harron … Youth outside church
- Gertrude Bambrick … In Shop/Outside Church (uncredited)
- Kathleen Butler … Windowshopper (uncredited)
- John T. Dillon … Church Board Member (uncredited)
- Dorothy Gish … (uncredited)
- James Kirkwood … Undetermined Role (uncredited)
- Adolph Lestina … Church Board Member (uncredited)
- Walter P. Lewis … Church Board Member (uncredited)
- Marguerite Marsh … Windowshopper (uncredited)
- W. C. Robinson … In Shop (uncredited)
- Mack Sennett … (uncredited)
See also
References
- Jump up^ Koszarski, Richard (2004), Fort Lee: The Film Town, Rome, Italy: John Libbey Publishing -CIC srl, ISBN 0-86196-653-8
- Jump up^ Amith, Deninis (January 1, 2011). “Before there was Hollywood there was Fort Lee, NJ”. J!-ENT.
- Jump up^ The New York Hat at silentera.com
- Jump up^ “The New York Hat”. Library of Congress. Retrieved 28 December 2011.
Film Dialogue 