The Last Edition
About The Last Edition
Tom McDonald, assistant foreman in the San Francisco Chronicle pressroom, is passed over for foreman. His son Ray works in the district attorney's office, and his daughter Polly is admired by reporter Clarence Walker, who is chasing a bootlegger story. The gang frames Ray on a bribery charge. Clarence's story makes the last edition. Tom sees his son's name, tries to wreck the press, and the Chronicle plant burns. Tom is jailed in the same cell as Ray. Clarence and Polly find proof that both are innocent. A new plant goes up, Tom gets the foreman's job, and Clarence marries Polly.
Cast & crew
More about The Last Edition
Emory Johnson directed. His mother, Emilie Johnson, wrote the story and the screenplay. Gilbert Warrenton photographed it. Film Booking Offices of America released it on 8 November 1925. It was the seventh film in Johnson's eight-picture contract with FBO. The company shot in and around the Chronicle's old building at 690 Market Street. The paper finished its move to 901 Mission Street, at Fifth, shortly after the shoot. Seven reels.
Themes
Making
Johnson put a working pressroom at the center of the story and shot it in the Chronicle's own Market Street building while the paper was packing up for Mission Street.
Look
Gilbert Warrenton shot the pressroom inside the Chronicle building at 690 Market Street, and the street views of the city the paper was about to leave.
Music
Silent.
Preservation
It was thought lost. In 2011 Rob Byrne found a nitrate print at the EYE Film Institute in the Netherlands. EYE and the San Francisco Silent Film Festival restored it in 2013 and struck two 35mm prints, one for EYE and one for the Library of Congress.
Notes
- Ralph Lewis plays Tom. Lila Leslie plays his wife Mary. Ray Hallor plays Ray. Frances Teague plays Polly. Rex Lease plays Clarence Walker.
- Daniel J. O'Brien, then San Francisco's chief of police, plays the chief.
- William Bakewell plays the copy boy "Ink" Donovan. Wade Boteler plays Mike Fitzgerald.
- The picture also shows City Hall, the Pickwick Hotel, and the Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Building.
- Dutch intertitles on the surviving print were translated back into English for the 2013 restoration.
Scenes
- Tom reads the last-edition headline and finds it is his son.
- He goes for the press. The Chronicle plant burns, and father and son share a cell.
- A new plant opens with Tom as foreman, and Clarence marries Polly.
Also available
- Wikimedia Commons (The Last Edition (1925).webm)
