ball-room; but, if the play did not already
contain a ball-room scene, could not the reconciliation be shown just
as well in the library or on the street near her home or in a
drawing-room scene where only a few guests are assembled, the guests
all being regular members of the stock company?

Some pictures calling for special properties and extra people fully
justify the additional expenditure; others do not. He is a wise writer
who knows his own script well enough to be able to judge.

_3. How Some "Too Expensive" Scenes Were Taken_

In a great many cases, pictures containing aeroplanes, burning oil
wells, railroad wrecks, houses that are completely gutted by fire, and
other exceptionally spectacular features, are the result of the merest
chance. For example, a few years ago the Thanhouser studio at New
Rochelle, N.Y., caught fire and burned to the ground. The fire was a
spectacular one, as the chemical contents of the building burned like
powder, and there were several explosions. The fire occurred at 1.30
o'clock in the afternoon, and many of the players were at lunch at
their hotels when the alarm was turned in. But the players, the
cameraman, and the director quickly got together, and even before the
fire was well out they had produced a thrilling fire picture, "When
the Studio Burned," in which was shown the rescue of the "Thanhouser
Kid" by Miss Marguerite Snow, then leading woman of the company. Thus
advantage was taken of an unfortunate happening to add to the fame of
the Thanhouser company.

Again, it may happen that several scenes of a big fire are taken while
it is in progress, and the film laid aside until a suitable photoplay
is either written by a staff-writer or sent in by an outside author.
Then the picture is completed, the fire scenes previously taken being
inserted between other scenes showing the action of the plot.

One of the most thrilling and realistic fire pictures ever produced
was "The Incendiary Foreman," released by Pathe Freres early in 1908.
It had a well-developed plot that kept the dramatic interest keyed up
every moment, but the features of the film were the many thrillingly
realistic fire scenes, in which the Parisian fire department battled
with the flames while several enormous buildings were being destroyed.
One of the earlier scenes depicted the yard of the Pathe factory, and
showed a quarrel between the foreman and one of the workmen. The
ensuing action led one to believe