The Great Gatsby is a 1926 American silent drama film directed by Herbert Brenon. It is the first film adaptation of the 1925 novel of the same name by F. Scott Fitzgerald. Warner Baxter portrayed Jay Gatsby and Lois Wilson as Daisy Buchanan.[1]
| The Great Gatsby | |
|---|---|
 1926 Lobby card | |
| Directed by | Herbert Brenon Ray Lissner (assistant) |
| Written by | Becky Gardiner (scenario) Elizabeth Meehan (adaptation) |
| Produced by | Jesse L. Lasky Adolph Zukor |
| Starring | Warner Baxter Lois Wilson Neil Hamilton Georgia Hale William Powell |
| Cinematography | Leo Tover |
Production company | |
| Distributed by | Paramount Pictures |
Release date |
|
Running time | 80 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Languages | Silent film English intertitles |
The film was produced by Famous Players-Lasky, and distributed by Paramount Pictures. The Great Gatsby is now considered lost.[2][3][4]
Cast
- Warner Baxter as Jay Gatsby
- Lois Wilson as Daisy Buchanan
- Neil Hamilton as Nick Carraway
- Georgia Hale as Myrtle Wilson
- William Powell as George Wilson
- Hale Hamilton as Tom Buchanan
- George Nash as Charles Wolf
- Carmelita Geraghty as Jordan Baker
- Eric Blore as Lord Digby
- Gunboat Smith as Bert
- Claire Whitney as Catherine
- Claude Brooke - Bit part (uncredited)
- Nancy Kelly - Uncredited role
Background and production
The screenplay was written by Becky Gardiner and Elizabeth Meehan and was based on Owen Davis' stage play treatment of The Great Gatsby. The play, directed by George Cukor, opened on Broadway at the Ambassador Theatre February 2, 1926. Shortly after the play opened, Famous Players-Lasky and Paramount Pictures purchased the film rights for $45,000.[5]
The film's director Herbert Brenon, designed The Great Gatsby as lightweight, popular entertainment, playing up the party scenes at Gatsby's mansion and emphasizing their scandalous elements. The film had a running time of 80 minutes, or 7,296 feet.[2]
Survival status
Professor Wheeler Winston Dixon, James Ryan Professor of Film Studies at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, made extensive but unsuccessful attempts to find a surviving print. Dixon noted that there were rumors that a copy survived in an unknown archive in Moscow but dismissed these rumors as unfounded.[2]
However, the trailer has survived and is one of the 50 films in the 3-disk boxed DVD set More Treasures from American Film Archives, 1894-1931 (2004), compiled by the National Film Preservation Foundation from five American film archives. It is preserved by the Library of Congress (AFI/Jack Tillmany collection) and has a running time of one minute.[2] It was featured on the Blu-Ray release of director Baz Luhrmann's 2013 adaptation of The Great Gatsby as a special feature.
References
- ^ Tredell, Nicolas, ed. (2007). Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby: A Reader's Guide. A & C Black. p. 96. ISBN 0-826-49011-5.
- ^ a b c d Winston Dixon, Wheeler (2003). "The Three Film Versions of The Great Gatsby: A Vision Deferred". Literature Film Quarterly. Retrieved March 9, 2013.
- ^ The Great Gatsby at silentera.com database
- ^ The Library of Congress American Silent Feature Film Survival Catalog:The Great Gatsby
- ^ (Tredell 2007, pp. 94–96)