East Lynne

1916 Drama 75 minutes Directed by Bertram Bracken

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About East Lynne

Lady Isabel Carlyle, played by Theda Bara, believes Captain Francis Levison when he tells her that her husband, the lawyer Archibald Carlyle, has been unfaithful. She leaves him and their two children. The train she takes crashes, and she is thought dead. She comes back in a wig and sunglasses and takes a job as governess to her own children. The household does not know her.

Cast & crew

More about East Lynne

Bertram Bracken directed. Mary Murillo wrote the scenario from Mrs. Henry Wood's 1861 novel and the 1863 play. William Fox produced it, and Rial Schellinger photographed it. Fox released the five-reel picture on June 19, 1916. The New York Clipper reported that the adapters moved the story from England to America and turned Sir Francis Levison into a captain.

Themes

  • A false report of adultery
  • A woman thought dead
  • A mother hired as governess
  • A Victorian plot reset in America
  • Isabel Carlyle
  • Captain Levison
  • train wreck
  • governess
  • wig
  • sunglasses
  • East Lynne

Background

Fox sold Bara in a story Victorian audiences already knew from Wood's novel and from decades of stage versions.

In film history

It is one of the few Theda Bara features that still exists.

Making

Motography of June 17, 1916, had Bara shooting the old melodrama at Fox's Fort Lee studio. The train-wreck scene was filmed on the New Jersey side.

Look

Rial Schellinger photographed it, including the train wreck shot in New Jersey.

Music

Silent, with English intertitles.

Preservation

A 16mm print found in 1971 was bought from Fox by the Museum of Modern Art, which still holds it.

Notes

  • Ben Deeley plays Archibald Carlyle. Stuart Holmes plays Captain Levison. Claire Whitney plays Barbara Hare.
  • AFI lists Bara's character as Isabel Mount Severn Carlyle.
  • Motion Picture News reported that Bara and assistant director Robert Ross were in a car crash after they filmed the train wreck and took the ferry back from New Jersey.
  • A 16mm print turned up in 1971. The Museum of Modern Art bought it from Fox.

Scenes

  • The train wreck leaves Isabel thought dead.
  • She returns in a wig and sunglasses to nurse her own children as their governess.

Influenced by

  • East Lynne by Mrs. Henry Wood (1861)

Also available

  • Wikimedia Commons (East Lynne (1916).webm)