the other hand, you plan to submit it to
a concern which likes to pass on a full script, with both synopsis and
scenario, you can send in the synopsis alone and explain that if they
are at all interested in _that_, you will submit the continuity of
action.

As might be expected, stories of this kind are usually written in the
studio, because the staff-writer has the opportunity of finding out
just when and where the picture can be made, what types of male and
female players will be able to take part in it, and what special
effects he may include. Still, to repeat, many of the bars against
costume plays and stories calling for foreign and other hard-to-get
settings have been taken down in the last year or two; but the demand
for only strong, interesting stories is more insistent than ever, and
you must still observe the rule--which, it may be added, will never
change--of acquiring a thorough knowledge of the different markets if
you wish to sell your stuff regularly and to the best advantage.

Themes! They are everywhere. The pathetic, the tragic, the
humorous--countless admirable photoplays are to be drawn from these
sources. And the most encouraging thought is this: Given the same
basic idea for a plot, no two people will work it out in exactly the
same way. Individuality will make a difference. "Happiness," as Mr.
Floyd Hamilton Hazard has said, "does not always mean the same thing
to everybody. It means many different things to different people. It
is a theme upon which many varied tunes can be played."

In conclusion, we quote and warmly endorse this advice from Mr.
Herbert Hoagland, censor of photoplays for Pathe Freres.

"Select for your theme an idea which embodies _good_ things. Avoid
anything coarse or suggestive. Make your stories clean, wholesome,
happy--a dainty love story, a romantic adventure, a deed
gloriously accomplished, a lesson well learned, an act of charity
repaid--anything of a dramatic nature which is as honest as daylight.
Good deeds are just as dramatic as wicked deeds, and clean comedy is
far and away more humorous than coarseness. Keep away from scenes of
brutality, degeneracy, idiocy or anything which may bring a poignant
pang of sorrow to some one of the millions of people who will see your
story in the pictures, unless the pang will be one of remorse for a
bad deed done or a good deed left undone. In a word, help the
film-makers produce films which will help those who see them, and ma