Frances Marion, 1888-1973

Today marks the birth anniversary of Frances Marion, seen on the right of the photo with Mary Pickford. Marion was one of Hollywood's most famous early screenwriters, having written the screenplays to films such as The Champ. If you go to that link for The Champ, you'll see that I mentioned Marion, and how she also wrote the screenplays to The Big House, Min and Bill, and Dinner at Eight; the links to those films are in the September 2010 post. One Marion work I didn't mention there was Emma starring Marie Dressler and a younger Myrna Loy in a supporting role. Marion also did the adaptation for Anna Christie which introduced Greta Garbo to talking pictures.

But it would be a disservice to Marion to discuss just the talking pictures. Marion started her career in the 1910s and did story work and adaptation for a whole host of silents. The best known of these might be Gloria Swanson in The Red Mill and Lillian Gish in The Wind.