As I mentioned in the first post of this feature, I had been planning for a while, once I got this blog started, to do a series on my favorite stars of the silent screen. The impetus to finally do it (as well as the feature title) came from a Facebook friend who has recently gotten very interested in silent films herself. In particular she's developed a fascination with John Gilbert. So here, in the latest edition of The Silent Majority, that fine actor will be showcased.
Elizabeth, this one's for you.
The boy John Cecil Pringle.
And here he is, at last John Gilbert, in the early 1920s: a perfect profile
With Aileen Pringle (no relation) in His Hour (1924) one of the early films that gained him wide notice.
With Norma Shearer in one of the four films they shot together in 1924, most likely either The Wolfman or The Snob, which is now considered a lost film.
John and Norma would remain friends throughout his life after having shared a brief romance during that busy year of '24. Years later Norma would write to John's daughter Leatrice "I have only the most enchanting recollection of Jack Gilbert for he was a glamorous personality, both on and off the screen...he held a great fascination for me. He was handsome and impudent with flashing brown eyes and a gift of sudden laughter which always seemed to hold a touch of sadness. This, in a strange way, gave him great appeal which could be called 'charisma' or is this too well worn a praise?"
John with Claire MacDowell in The Big Parade (1925)
A lovely colorized shot by the gentleman who runs the Claroscureaux blog of John and Eleanor Boardman in Bardelys the Magnificent (1926). This film was, until just the past few years, considered lost.
John portrayed Rodolphe to Lillian Gish's Mimi in La Boheme (1926)
John with Greta Garbo in Flesh and the Devil (1926). The two had an intense chemistry onscreen and off. They were sometimes lovers and always friends until John's death in 1936.
John and Greta off the set. When John was rather unceremoniously dumped by Hollywood at the close of the silent era, Greta was one of the friends who truly stood by him, lobbying with studio bosses to get John new work.
John with rising star Joan Crawford in Twelve Miles Out (1927)
John (center) with Ernest Torrance and Mary Nolan in Desert Nights (1929), his last silent film.
Though John would make his sound film debut opposite old friend Norma Shearer in The Hollywood Revue of 1929, he was seen as problematic enough (due to his drinking and other issues) by studio boss Louis B. Mayer to be drummed out and blacklisted. Rumors were circulated that his voice was high or even squeaky. This was the same treatment given to other stars who had become too difficult or demanding in the eyes of their studios. Said Norma of his inability to fully break into sound pictures "My impression is that he was a very fine and sensitive actor with great clarity of speech. This very precise diction, I remember, caused some criticism when talking pictures came along a few years later, although I feel that this was terribly exaggerated at the time and later became a 'fable' which in any language means 'untrue.' Jack was a man of great pride and I imagine this unkind criticism destroyed his confidence in himself, the ego which is so necessary to an actor."
John continued to work sporadically after 1929, mostly thanks to the intervention of friends in the film industry. In 1933 he reunited with Greta Garbo in Queen Christina. He was cast only because MGM was determined to do the picture but Greta would have no other leading man. His last film would be the 1934 Columbia Pictures comedy The Captain Hates the Sea.
In 1936, at the age of 39, John Gilbert died. The official cause was listed as heart failure. Perhaps it was not so much heart failure, however, as heart break. As Norma Shearer had also noted in her comments on John's failure to follow the sound trend, "There is more than one way to break a man's heart."
Elizabeth, this one's for you.
And here he is, at last John Gilbert, in the early 1920s: a perfect profile
With Aileen Pringle (no relation) in His Hour (1924) one of the early films that gained him wide notice.
With Norma Shearer in one of the four films they shot together in 1924, most likely either The Wolfman or The Snob, which is now considered a lost film.
John and Norma would remain friends throughout his life after having shared a brief romance during that busy year of '24. Years later Norma would write to John's daughter Leatrice "I have only the most enchanting recollection of Jack Gilbert for he was a glamorous personality, both on and off the screen...he held a great fascination for me. He was handsome and impudent with flashing brown eyes and a gift of sudden laughter which always seemed to hold a touch of sadness. This, in a strange way, gave him great appeal which could be called 'charisma' or is this too well worn a praise?"
John with Claire MacDowell in The Big Parade (1925)
A lovely colorized shot by the gentleman who runs the Claroscureaux blog of John and Eleanor Boardman in Bardelys the Magnificent (1926). This film was, until just the past few years, considered lost.
John portrayed Rodolphe to Lillian Gish's Mimi in La Boheme (1926)
John with Greta Garbo in Flesh and the Devil (1926). The two had an intense chemistry onscreen and off. They were sometimes lovers and always friends until John's death in 1936.
John and Greta off the set. When John was rather unceremoniously dumped by Hollywood at the close of the silent era, Greta was one of the friends who truly stood by him, lobbying with studio bosses to get John new work.
John with rising star Joan Crawford in Twelve Miles Out (1927)
John (center) with Ernest Torrance and Mary Nolan in Desert Nights (1929), his last silent film.
Though John would make his sound film debut opposite old friend Norma Shearer in The Hollywood Revue of 1929, he was seen as problematic enough (due to his drinking and other issues) by studio boss Louis B. Mayer to be drummed out and blacklisted. Rumors were circulated that his voice was high or even squeaky. This was the same treatment given to other stars who had become too difficult or demanding in the eyes of their studios. Said Norma of his inability to fully break into sound pictures "My impression is that he was a very fine and sensitive actor with great clarity of speech. This very precise diction, I remember, caused some criticism when talking pictures came along a few years later, although I feel that this was terribly exaggerated at the time and later became a 'fable' which in any language means 'untrue.' Jack was a man of great pride and I imagine this unkind criticism destroyed his confidence in himself, the ego which is so necessary to an actor."
John continued to work sporadically after 1929, mostly thanks to the intervention of friends in the film industry. In 1933 he reunited with Greta Garbo in Queen Christina. He was cast only because MGM was determined to do the picture but Greta would have no other leading man. His last film would be the 1934 Columbia Pictures comedy The Captain Hates the Sea.
In 1936, at the age of 39, John Gilbert died. The official cause was listed as heart failure. Perhaps it was not so much heart failure, however, as heart break. As Norma Shearer had also noted in her comments on John's failure to follow the sound trend, "There is more than one way to break a man's heart."
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