Cecil B. DeMille's Hollywood

13. Chimmie Fadden

13 Chimmi~ Fadd~n Produced by the Jesse L. Lasky Feature Play Company for Paramount release. Director: Cecil B. DeMille. Scenario by Cecil B. DeMille, from the book by E.W. Townsend and the play by Augustus Thomas. Art director: Wilfred Buckland. Photography: Alvin Wyckoff Picture started: May 3, 1915. Picture finished: May 18, 1915. Length: 4,809 feet (five reels). Cost: $10,504.39. Released: June 28, 1915. Gross: $78,944.49 Cast: Victor Moore (Chimmie Fadden), Raymond Hatton (Larry Fadden, his brother), Mrs. Lewis McCord (their mother), Ernest Joy (Van Cortlandt), Anita King (Fanny, his daughter), Camille Astor (Hortense-"the Duchess," her maid), Tom Forman (Antoine, Van Cortlandt's valet), and Harry deRoy (Perkins, the butler) Chimmie Fadden was created by E.W. Townsend, a writer for the New York Sun, who based his fictional character on the toughs and pugs who were a fixture on the Bowery in the 1890s. First appearing in a series of newspaper sketches, the Chimmie Fadden stories were collected and published as a book in 1895 and transformed into a stage play by Augustus Thomas the following year. Thomas fleshed out Townsend's character pieces with a plot that has Chimmie befriended by a society woman and hired as a rather bumbling butler. Complications arise when Fadden's brother robs the home of Chimmie's patron. DeMille and Jeanie Macpherson would later rework some of these elements in a more serious vein in creating the scenario for The Golden Chance. Having seen VictorMoore in Chimmie Fadden on Broadway, Beatrice deMille persuaded her son that Moore was the only actor for the screen role. A good part ofMoore's appeal was the distinctive nasal whine ofhis voice. The silent screen deprived the star of this vocal trademark, but Moore nevertheless created a strong impression in Chimmie Fadden. According to DeMille, and based on the evidence of their second film, Chimmie Fadden Out West, the director and star deliberately avoided 52 Chimmie Fadden / 53 wild slapstick in favor of a quiet but amusing style of character comedy. Unfortunately, we can only imagine how funny Chimmie Fadden was, because today no prints of the film are known to exist in any archive or private collection. ...