His Picture in the Papers

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His Picture in the Papers (1916)

His Picture in the Papers is a 1916 American silent comedy directed by John Emerson, who also co-wrote the story with Anita Loos. It stars Douglas Fairbanks and Loretta Blake, with Erich von Stroheim in a small role.

Plot
Pete Prindle, son of wealthy Proteus, runs a vegetarian health-food business and wants to marry Christine Cadwalader. Proteus thinks Pete is lazy and not deserving of the family fortune. Pete’s sisters sometimes get newspaper attention for promoting the company, but Pete wants to prove himself. He tries to attract headlines by various stunts: a fake car crash, winning a boxing match in an illegally run ring, and a mishap that leaves him on a cruise ship in his pajamas, where he ends up beating two police officers. The paper withholds his name. In the end, Pete saves people on a train from thugs and prevents a crash with another rail car. This earns him front-page coverage and a large photo, making everyone happy.

Production
The film was produced by Fine Arts Picture Company for about $42,600 and released by Triangle Film Corporation. Parts were shot at the Willat-Triangle Studio in Fort Lee, New Jersey, with other scenes filmed in Yonkers and Atlantic City. A boxing scene was shot at Sharkey’s Athletic Club on Columbus Avenue in Manhattan. This was Fairbanks’s first film with a Loos-scripted intertitle style, known for self-parody, sarcasm, slang, and puns. A notable line appears on screen: “Ain’t he the REEL hero?” The success of the intertitles led Fairbanks to hire Loos for his later films.

Preservation and release
Prints of the film survive in the Library of Congress, the George Eastman House Motion Picture Collection, and other archives. It was released on DVD by Flicker Alley.