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Schneider's Anti-Noise Crusade
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Wikipedia article
'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.[https://catalog.afi.com/Film/37402-SCHNEIDERS-ANTI-NOISECRUSADE?sid=18a1bee1-45ae-4ad8-ac7e-db90cf2b7526&sr=4.2865515&cp=1&pos=0 "Schneider's Anti-Noise Crusade (1909)"], catalog, American Film Institute (AFI), Los Angeles, California. Retrieved 31 August 2021.Niver, Kemp R. (compiler). 'Early Motion Pictures: The Paper Print Collection in the Library of Congress', [https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=osu.32435054790779&view=1up&seq=314&skin=2021 "Schneider's Anti-Noise Crusade"]. Washington, D.C.: Motion Picture, Broadcasting, and Recorded Sound Division, 1985, pp. 288-289. HathiTrust 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. This short shared its reel with another Biograph comedy directed by Griffith, 'A Rude Hostess'.[https://catalog.afi.com/Film/37352-A-RUDEHOSTESS?sid=17e5e940-e571-4d95-88c9-c3e392a55054&sr=10.420809&cp=1&pos=0 "A Rude Hostess"], catalog, AFI. Retrieved 1 September 2021.
Original contact-print paper rolls of both motion pictures, as well as projectable safety-stock copies of them, are preserved in the Library of Congress.Bennett, Carl. [http://www.silentera.com/PSFL/data/S/SchneidersAntiNoiseCru1909.html "Schneider's Anti-Noise Crusade"], The Progressive Silent Film List. Retrieved 31 August 2021.
Plot
The film depicts the mounting frustrations experienced by Mr. Schneider, who is living with his wife in an apartment. There he is trying desperately to concentrate on writing a special composition or "poetic effusion" for his "Liederkranz" (choir) while being repeatedly distracted and increasingly annoyed by activities and noises that surround him. He must cope with the rambunctious behavior of his young nephew Fritz playing a trombone, a squawking pet bird, a phonograph, and tolerate his wife and another musician practicing the violin.[https://archive.org/details/moviwor04chal/page/n427/mode/2up "Stories of the Films/Biography Company/Schneider's Anti-Noise Crusade"], 'The Moving Picture World' (New York City), volume 4, number 14, 3 April 1909, p. 412. I.A. Retrieved 28 August 2021.[https://archive.org/details/moviwor04chal/page/n492/mode/1up "Comments on Film Subjects/'Schneider's Anti-Noise Crusade'"], 'The Moving Picture World', 10 April 1909, p. 477. I.A. Retrieved 31 August 2021. The following summary of the screenplay, which is from Kemp R. Niver's extensive 1985 reference 'Early Motion Pictures: The Paper Print Collection in the Library of Congress', provides additional details about the plot:
Cast
* John R. Cumpson as Mr. Schneider
* Florence Lawrence as Mrs. Schneider
* Anita Hendrie as Lena, Mr. Schneider's sister
* Arthur V. Johnson as violinist
* Jeanie MacPherson as maid
* Owen Moore as first thief
* Herbert Prior as second thief
* Tony O'Sullivan in unverified role
* Clara T. Bracy as extra
* Flora French as extra
* Mack Sennett as extra
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 mansion in New York City, in Manhattan, at 11 East 14th Street. The comedy was filmed there on interior sets in just two daysMarch 8 and 9, 1909by Biograph cinematographers G. W. "Billy" Bitzer and his assistant Arthur Marvin.Graham, Cooper C.; Higgins, Steve; Mancini, Elaine; Viera, Joo Luiz. Entry for [https://archive.org/details/dwgriffithbiogra0000unse/page/42/mode/2up?q=Rude "Schneider's Anti-Noise Crusade"], 'D. W. Griffith and the Biograph Company'. Metuchen, New Jersey and London: The Scarecrow Press, 1985, p. 43. I.A. Retrieved 31 August 2021.Arvidson, Linda. '[https://archive.org/details/whenmovieswereyo0000arvi/page/46/mode/2up When the Movies Were Young']. New York: Dover Publishing, 1969, pp. 47-52. I.A. Retrieved 31 August 2021.
Biograph's uncredited actors
Identifying cast members in early Biograph releases such as 'Schneider's Anti-Noise Crusade' 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 trade publications, or in newspaper advertisements until four years after this short's release. John R. Cumpson and Florence Lawrence, although co-stars in this short, were uncredited in their roles on screen and in print, as were the rest of Biograph's relatively small staff of "photoplayers" in the studio's productions in 1909.Brown, Kelly R. 'Florence Lawrence, The Biograph Girl: America's First Movie Star'. Jefferson, North Carolina, and London: McFarland and Company, 1999, pp. 23-32.Brown Kelly. [https://wfpp.columbia.edu/pioneer/ccp-florence-lawrence/ "Florence Lawrence"], The Women Film Pioneers Project (WFPP), Columbia University Libraries, New York, N.Y. Retrieved 27 August 2021. At that time, Lawrence was already gaining widespread celebrity among filmgoers. Few people, though, outside the motion picture industry knew her name, so the actress was referred to by admirers and in news publications as simply "the Biograph girl".Release and reception
, July 1909
After their release on April 8, 1909, 'Schneider's Anti-Noise Crusade' and its split-reel companion 'A Rude Hostess' circulated to theaters throughout the United States for the next year. The two shorts were widely promoted in newspapers and in film-industry publications. One unnamed reviewer for the New York journal 'The Moving Picture World' evidently found 'Schneider's Anti-Noise Crusade' to be refreshing and wholesome entertainment, describing it to readers as "a clean bit of comedy" and "a welcome relief from some of the inane things that pass for comedy."
In the months after the film's release, most published comments about the Biograph production are not independent, non-biased assessments; instead, they are from advertisers or theater owners who simply had commercial interests in attracting audiences. Also, to widen the appeal of vaudeville shows at the time, many theatres routinely presented several films or "photoplays" to complement the traditional offerings of live stage performances. The 'Courier-Journal' in Louisville, Kentucky in its April 26, 1909 issue informs local residents that to mark the "second week of vaudeville" at the city's Hopkins Theatre, audiences could enjoy acts by sleight-of-hand artist "Professor Leo", a clog dancer, storytellers, and singers. The newspaper then states that "the moving pictures" being offered on the program "cover a wide range of interesting subjects", adding that "The leading funmaking film is one called 'Schneider's Anti-noise Crusade.'" At theatres elsewhere in 1909, the "especially interesting" comedy proved to be popular and continued to be featured and promoted as the lead film in variety shows.[https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn85033000/1909-07-14/ed-1/seq-1/#date1=1909 "Air Dome" advertisement], 'The Log-Cabin Democrat' (Conway, Arkansas), 14 July 1909, p. 1; digital copy of newspaper page, "Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers", Library of Congress, Washington, D.C., online reference co-sponsored by the National Endowment for the Humanities. Retrieved 2 September 2021.
Preservation status
Photographic prints and a film negative and positive of 'Schneider's Anti-Noise Crusade' survive in the Library of Congress (LC)), which holds a 206-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 protection for their productions.Niver, [https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=osu.32435054790779&view=1up&seq=13&q1 "Preface"], pp. ix-xiii. While the LC's paper roll of the film is certainly not projectable, a negative copy of the roll's paper images was made and transferred onto modern polyester-based safety film stock to produce a positive print for screening. Those copies were made as part of a preservation project carried out during the 1950s and early 1960s by Kemp R. Niver and other LC staff, who restored more than 3,000 early paper rolls of film images from the library's collection and created safety-stock copies.
See also
* D. W. Griffith filmography
Notes
References
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