Trivia: After a considerable career on stage as an actor and director, Dublin-born Edwin Maxwell made his screen debut as Baptista in the Doug Fairbanks-Mary Pickford version of Taming of the Shrew (1929). The stocky, balding Maxwell spent the 1930s specializing in oily bureaucrats, crooked businessmen and shyster lawyers. Once in a while, he'd play a sympathetic role, notably the scrupulously honest Italian-American detective in Scarface. More often (especially in the films of director Frank Capra), his characters existed merely as an easily deflatable foil. One of Maxwell's most flamboyant performances was as the maniacal serial killer, in Night of Terror(1933), who rose from the dead at fade-out time to warn the audience not to reveal the end of the film or else! Essaying more benign characters in 1940s, he was seen as William Jennings Bryan in Wilson (1944) and as Oscar Hammerstein in The Jolson Story (1946). From 1939 to 1942, Maxwell served as dialogue director for the films of Cecil B. DeMille. Edwin Maxwell holds the distinction of appearing in four Academy Award-winning films: All Quiet on the Western Front (1930), Grand Hotel (1932), The Great Ziegfeld (1936) and You Can't Take It With You (1938).

Trivia: American actor Douglas Fairbanks Sr., instilled with a love of dramatics by his Shakespearean-scholar father, was never fully satisfied with theatrical work. A born athlete and extrovert, Fairbanks felt the borders of the stage were much too confining, even when his theatrical work allowed him to tour the world. The wide-open spaces of the motion picture industry were more his style, and in 1915 Fairbanks jumped at the chance to act in the film version of the old stage perennial The Lamb. Fairbanks became the top moneymaker for the Triangle Film Company, starring in an average of 10 pictures a year for a weekly salary of $2000. He specialized in comedies--not the slapstick variety, but free-wheeling farces in which he usually played a wealthy young man thirsting for adventure. Fairbanks was a savvy businessman, and in 1919 he reasoned that he could have more control--and a larger slice of the profits -- if he produced as well as starred in his pictures. Working in concert with his actress-wife Mary Pickford (a star in her own right, billed as "America's Sweetheart"), his best friend Charlie Chaplin, and pioneer director D. W. Griffith, Fairbanks formed a new film company, United Artists. The notion of actors making their own movies led one film executive to wail, "The lunatics have taken over the asylum!", but Fairbanks' studio was a sound investment, and soon other actors were dabbling in the production end of the business. Still most successful in contemporary comedies in 1920, Fairbanks decided to try a momentary change of pace, starring in the swashbuckling The Mark of Zorro (1920). The public was enthralled, and for the balance of his silent career Fairbanks specialized in lavish costume epics with plenty of fast-moving stunt work and derring-do. While several of these films still hold their fascination today, notably The Thief of Baghdad (1924) and The Black Pirate (1926), some historians argue that Fairbanks' formerly breezy approach to moviemaking became ponderous, weighed down in too much spectacle for the Fairbanks personality to fully shine. When talkies came, Fairbanks wasn't intimidated, since he was stage-trained and had a robust speaking voice; unfortunately, his first talking picture, 1929's Taming of the Shrew (in which he co-starred with Mary Pickford), was an expensive failure. Fairbanks' talking pictures failed to click at the box office; even the best of them, such as Mr. Robinson Crusoe (1932), seemed outdated rehashes of his earlier silent successes. Fairbanks' last film, the British-made Private Life of Don Juan (1934), unflatteringly revealed his advanced years and his flagging energy. Marital difficulties, unwise investments and health problems curtailed his previously flamboyant lifestyle considerably, though he managed to stave off several takeover bids for United Artists and retained the respect of his contemporaries. Fairbanks died in his sleep, not long after he'd announced plans to come out of retirement. He was survived by his actor son Douglas Fairbanks Jr., who'd inherited much of his dad's professional panache and who after his father's death began a successful career in film swashbucklers on his own.

Trivia: Joseph Cawthorn launched his seven-decade show business career at age four as a performer in "variety" revues (the precursor to American vaudeville). At age five, Cawthorn was appearing in minstrel shows, and at seven he moved to England, where he became a successful child performer. Back in America, he toured in vaudeville as a "Dutch" comic, fracturing audiences with his Yiddish dialect and hyperkinetic gestures. He first appeared on Broadway in the 1895 musical Excelsior Jr; two years later he got his biggest break when he replaced William Collier as principal comedian in Miss Philadelphia (1897). A popular Broadway attraction for the next 25 years, Cawthorn starred or co-starred in such tuneful extravaganzas as Victor Herbert's The Fortune Teller (1898), Mother Goose (1903, in the title role!), Little Nemo (1910), The Sunshine Girl (1913), The Girl From Utah (1914) and Rudy Friml' s The Blue Kitten (1922). By the time he appeared in the 1925 Marilyn Miller vehicle Sally, however, Cawthorn was being written off as a "fading star. Rather than stubbornly cling to his Broadway fame, Cawthorn moved to Hollywood in 1927, where he began a whole new career as a movie character actor. He revived his old dialect routines as Cornelius Van Horn in Dixiana (1930) and Joe Bruno in Peach o' Reno; both of these films starred Bert Wheeler and Robert Woolsey, who'd known Cawthorn "way back when" in New York (Woolsey in fact had supported Cawthorn in The Blue Kitten). Not always confined to "Dutch" roles, he was effectively cast as Shakespearean suitor Gremio in the Mary Pickford/Doug Fairbanks version of Taming of the Shrew(1929) and as a French physician in Lubitsch's Love Me Tonight (1932). Nor was he limited to comedy parts: he was most persuasive in the largely serious role of Dr. Bruner, the "Van Helsing" counterpart in Bela Lugosi's White Zombie (1932). Because of his celebrated Broadway past, Cawthorn was often cast in period "backstage" musicals, essaying such roles as the title character's father in The Great Ziegfeld (1936) and Leopold Damrosch in Lillian Russell (1940). Joseph Cawthorn died peacefully at his Beverly Hills home in 1949. His wife, actress Queenie Vassar, lived until 1960.

Trivia: Before she established herself as a feisty movie ingenue, dark-haired Dorothy Jordan trained in ballet and studied acting at New York's American Academy of Dramatic Art. A veteran of Broadway musicals, Jordan came to Hollywood in 1929, securing such roles as Bianca in the Fairbanks/Pickford version of Taming of the Shrew (1929) and the daughter of Marie Dressler and Wallace Beery in Min and Bill (1930). From 1932 onward, Jordan's film assignments became increasingly humdrum, prompting her to retire from moviemaking when she married producer Merian C. Cooper. At the request (and cajoling) of her husband and their mutual friend John Ford, Dorothy Jordan made a brief comeback in three Ford-directed films of the 1950s, The Sun Shines Bright (1953), The Searchers (1956) and The Wings of Eagles (1957).

Trivia: A performer from age 12, Australian comedian/acrobat Clyde Cook rose to theatrical fame as "The Kangaroo Boy." Arriving in the U.S. after World War I, he worked briefly for Mack Sennett, then switched to the Sunshine Comedy unit at Fox. A tiny man with a huge paintbrush moustache, Cook was an amusing screen presence, but his lack of a well-defined character kept him from becoming a major star. He played supporting roles in such features as He Who Gets Slapped (1924) before trying his luck again as a two-reel star at Hal Roach Studios. The comedian's fortunes improved when he signed on at Warner Bros. as comedy relief in a number of silent features, in which he was frequently teamed with William Demarest or Louise Fazenda. With the coming of sound, Cook's Australian accent enabled him to secure good supporting roles in such British-based films as Dawn Patrol (1930) and Oliver Twist (1935); he also returned to Roach for a brief series of knockabout comedies titled The Taxi Boys. His roles dwindled to bits by the late '30s, but Cook never wanted for work. He was still at it in the 1950s, showing up in movies (Abbott and Costello Meet Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde [1951]) and on television (The Adventures of Superman). Clyde Cook retired after completing his one-day assignment on John Ford's Donovan's Reef (1963).

Trivia: Mary Pickford was Hollywood's first superstar. As "America's Sweetheart," she was the greatest screen icon of the silent era, virtually defining the role and influence of celebrity within the context of contemporary society. Born Gladys Smith on April 8, 1892, in Toronto, Ontario, she was thrust into show business while still a child following the death of her father, and she toured in a series of road companies under the billing "Baby Gladys." Upon winning a role in Broadway's The Warrens of Virginia, the 14-year-old was rechristened Mary Pickford by producer David Belasco, and a year later she flirted her way into extra work on D.W. Griffith's 1909 film The Lonely Villa. After earning five dollars for her day of work, Pickford met Griffith's request that she return the following morning with a demand to earn ten dollars daily; the next day she was back on the set, and swiftly emerged as one of the key players in the legendary director's stock company. Pickford soon arranged for an audition for her friend, Lillian Gish, and within months the two young women were among the most popular talents in the burgeoning film industry. Known to the public as "Little Mary" or "the Girl With Golden Hair," she starred in dozens of Biograph Studios films annually under Griffith's supervision, and ultimately left the theater completely behind to focus on movie work. As her stature and fame grew, Pickford began to take increasing control over her career; she often dictated the terms of her productions, and not even the likes of the prestigious Edwin S. Porter could override her decisions on how best to approach her performances. Her popularity extended well beyond North America; early films like 1909's The Little Darling were systematically copied in Russia and distributed throughout the European underground market, and although the loss of income suffered by Biograph was staggering, the piracy of her work made Pickford an international superstar.Pickford's massive popularity made her the motion picture industry's first real icon, and she parlayed her success into more and more lucrative financial rewards. At the insistence of her manager, mother Charlotte, she demanded frequent raises from her employers, and by 1913 she was also the first of the Biograph players to receive almost total creative control. However, believing herself overshadowed by the powerful messages of Griffith's work, in 1916 Pickford signed with Adolph Zukor's Famous Players Company, which in turn charged theaters a premium to screen her movies. Her deal with Zukor was unprecedented: Not only did she sign for an astounding 10,000 dollars a week, but she also netted a 30,000-dollar signing bonus, as well as a significant share of all profits from her films. Pickford honored the deal for less than a year before moving on to an even bigger payday -- a staggering agreement of 350,000 dollars per movie -- and by the age of 24, she was Hollywood's first millionaire. Ultimately, Pickford's fame grew to such unprecedented proportions that no studio in town could hope to afford her salary and accommodate her demands; when Charlie Chaplin, the only other star of a similar magnitude, found himself in the same situation they decided to join forces and form their own studio. United Artists was born in 1919, and also included among its founders swashbuckling actor Douglas Fairbanks, Pickford's husband. Together they were a virtual royal couple, with their lives at the massive Beverly Hills estate Pickfair achieving a kind of fairy-tale quality. At the peak of Pickford's success, however, she began to grow restless. Her standing as "America's Sweetheart" -- a winsome image perpetuated by films like 1914's Tess of the Storm Country, 1917's Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm, and 1917's Poor Little Rich Girl -- began to straitjacket her creative ambitions, and after 1920's Pollyanna, which cast the 27-year-old as a girl 15 years her junior, she defiantly chopped off her long, angelic curls into a short bob and set about updating her image once and for all. Toward these aims, Pickford lured director Ernst Lubitsch from Germany to the U.S. to helm 1923's Rosita, and out went the Cinderella tales on which her stardom rested. By 1929's Coquette, for which she won an Academy Award, her transformation was complete. However, when 1929's The Taming of the Shrew proved to be a major disaster, Pickford's stardom began to wane, and after only two more films, 1931's Kiki and 1933's Secrets, her career as an actress was finished. After the dissolution of her marriage to Fairbanks in 1935, she and Chaplin bought out their partners, selling United Artists at a significant profit in 1953. Even upon leaving filmmaking, however, Pickford remained a prominent member of the Hollywood community; among her most important endeavors was the formation of the Motion Picture Country Home and Hospital, which aided former film-industry figures left without insurance and retirement benefits in times of dire financial need and illness. Upon retiring from the screen, Pickford bought up many of her early silent films with the aim of having them destroyed upon her death, believing that their artistic value had diminished in the years following their initial release. She later recanted and donated them to the American Film Institute. Still, her work was long out of circulation, and as a result her legacy suffered greatly. Once the biggest star of her era, her movies' relative disappearance from the market made them inaccessible for revival and restoration, and consequently her stature among subsequent generations of movie scholars and fans has been eclipsed by figures of lesser talent and celebrity. In 1955, Pickford wrote her autobiography, Sunshine and Shadow, and two decades later was the recipient of a lifetime achievement Oscar. She died in Santa Monica, CA, on May 28, 1979.