User Reviews

W. Chrystie Miller was the oldest member of D.W. Griffith's stock company at Biograph. He has the title role in this two-reel story. Like WHAT SHALL WE DO WITH OUR OLD?, it asks some important questions about the needs and fears of the elderly. As is usual with many of Griffith's movies, it does not pretend to give an answer.

Miller is a respected stage actor, but when he is replaced in a show by a younger man, he sees the end of his career at hand. Noticing the wealth a local beggar has accumulated, he dresses in shabby clothes and takes up the trade himself.

This is not a well known Griffith movie, but it shows the easy skill which Griffith exhibited by this time. Working with what would nowadays be considered a stellar supporting cast (most notably Mary Pickford), Griffith fills the screen with casual action. Notice the shots backstage: while Miller is dealing with his issues, other members of the company are practicing their roles in the show.

Miller handles his role well. If to modern taste he is a bit theatrical, there is nothing odd about that. He is, after all, playing a theater actor. Miller would retire from the screen in 1914, apparently unwilling to work for Biograph without Griffith, nor move to California with Griffith. Instead, he retired to Staten Island, where he died eight years later.

69-year-old W. Chrystie Miller gets a rare leading role in this D. W. Griffith film examining the plight of the elderly when they are considered too old to be of worth. He's supported by a cast of quality, including Mary Pickford, whose natural style provides a nice counterpoint to Miller's more theatrical delivery, and emphasises - intentionally or otherwise - the differences between the generations.

When director D.W. Griffith tackled social issues in the short dramas he made for the Biograph company, he often turned his attention to the plight of older people. One of his best known such films asked in its title, with disarming directness, What Shall We Do with Our Old? That film's leading man, W. Chrystie Miller, an actor born in 1843, appropriately takes the lead in this short, The Old Actor, in the title role.

Miller plays an aging stage performer named Brant. When first seen, he is rehearsing his latest role at home, before his wife and daughter (played respectively by Kate Bruce and Mary Pickford). But when he arrives at the theater he's told that a younger actor has been hired to take his role, specifically because Brant is considered too old for the part. His daughter, meanwhile, is in the midst of a courtship with a young man. When Brant returns home he's unable to tell his family the bad news, in part because his daughter is so happy.

Earlier, when he was on his way to rehearsal, Brant had passed a beggar and given him a coin. Brant happens to be passing again when the unfortunate man collapses. He helps the beggar back to his shabby apartment where the man dies. Soon, unable to find work, Brant has an idea. He approaches the beggar's widow, buys the man's ragged clothes from her, and proceeds to "play" the man—and beg for change in his former location. This novel plan for raising ready cash causes Brant painful embarrassment when his daughter and her suitor happen by. Without offering any spoilers about the ending I can say that Brant's unhappy situation is resolved in a way that is both credible and gratifying.

This is not one of Griffith's better known Biograph shorts, but it's satisfying in its quiet, low-key way. Often I find that a second viewing of these brief dramas reveals small but telling details, those moments that help put the story across with full emotional impact. Here, for instance, while Mary's young suitor is present her behavior is restrained, and we're not certain whether she likes him or not, but the moment he leaves she grins broadly, tosses her hat in the air and catches it—and we know, very well, that she likes him! It's a little detail, but by underscoring her happiness we understand why her father, returning home soon afterward, just can't bear to tell his family that he's lost his job. These subtle dramatic touches remind us why Griffith and his troupe at Biograph were considered the best in the business during their heyday.