In 1919 and 1920, de Forest, inventor of theaudion tube, filed his first patents on a sound-on-film process,DeForest Phonofilm, which recorded sound directly onto film as parallel lines. These parallel lines photographically recorded electrical waveforms from a microphone, which were translated back into sound waves when the movie was projected.
The Phonofilm system, which recorded synchronized sound directly onto film, was used to record vaudeville acts, musical numbers, political speeches, and opera singers. The quality of Phonofilm was poor at first and while it improved somewhat in later years, it was never able to match the fidelity ofsound-on-disc systems such asVitaphone, or latersound-on-film systems such asRCA Photophone orFoxMovietone.
The films of de Forest wereshort films made primarily as demonstrations to try to interest major studios in Phonofilm. These films are particularly valuable to entertainment historians, as they include recordings of a wide variety of both well-known and less famous Americanvaudeville and Britishmusic hall acts which would otherwise have been forgotten.
In November 1922, de Forest founded the De Forest Phonofilm Corporation with studios at 314 East 48th Street in New York City, and offices at 220 West 42nd Street in theCandler Building. However, de Forest was unable to interest any of the majorHollywoodmovie studios in his invention.[1]
To record on film, de Forest tried using a standardincandescent bulb to expose amplified sound onto film. The bulbs quickly burned out, and, even while functioning, never produced a clear recording. To reproduce his nearly inaudible soundtracks, de Forest used aphotocell that could not react quickly enough to the varying light coming to it as the soundtrack passed through the sound gate, resulting in an incomplete reproduction of sound from an inadequate recording – a dual failure.
Having failed to create a workable sound-on-film system by 1921, de Forest contactedTheodore Case to inquire about using a Case Research Lab invention, the Thallofide (thallium oxysulfide) Cell, for reproducing the recorded sound. Case provided de Forest with that major upgrade and later provided him with another Case Research Lab creation, the AEO Light, to use for recording the soundtrack.
On March 12, 1923, de Forest presented a demonstration of Phonofilm to the press.[2] On April 12, 1923, de Forest gave a private demonstration of the process to electrical engineers at the Engineering Society Building's Auditorium at33 West 39th Street in New York City.[3]
On April 15, 1923, de Forest premiered 18 short films made in Phonofilm — including vaudeville acts, musical performers,opera, andballet — at the Rivoli Theater at 1620 Broadway in New York City. The Rivoli's music directorHugo Riesenfeld co-hosted the presentation. The printed program gave credit to the "DeForest-Case Patents", but according to a letterTheodore Case wrote to de Forest immediately after the event, no credit was given to Case during the presentation itself.
De Forest later took his show on the road, pitching Phonofilm directly to the general public at a series of special engagements across the country. The shorts shown at one such demonstration in 1925, were as follows:
(Overture)
What the Phonofilm Means (Bart Doyle [?])
A Study in Contrasts (comparing sound and silent film segments)
De Forest was forced to show these films in independent theaters such as the Rivoli since Hollywood movie studios controlled all major U.S. movie theater chains at the time. De Forest's decision to film primarily short films (one reel), notfeature films limited the appeal of his process. De Forest kept to one-reel films because he was unable to solve the problem of reel changes, and the disruption in sound which would occur, when a projectionist in a movie theater changed reels. One of the few two-reel films made in the Phonofilm process wasLove's Old Sweet Song (1923), starringLouis Wolheim,Donald Gallaher, and the 20-year-oldUna Merkel.
All or part of theParamount Pictures featuresBella Donna (premiered April 1, 1923) andThe Covered Wagon (premiered March 16, 1923) were filmed with Phonofilm as an experiment. In the case ofThe Covered Wagon, Hugo Riesenfeld composed the music for the film. However, the Phonofilm versions were only shown at the premiere engagements, also at the Rivoli. "Siegfried", the first part of theFritz Lang filmDie Nibelungen (1924) had a Phonofilm soundtrack, but only at the New York City premiere at theCentury Theatre on August 23, 1925.[6][7][8]
Max Fleischer andDave Fleischer used the Phonofilm process for theirSong Car-Tunes series of cartoons which introduced the "Follow the Bouncing Ball" gimmick starting in May 1924. Of the 36 titles in theSong Car-Tunes series, 19 used Phonofilm. Also in 1924, the Fleischer brothers partnered with de Forest, Edwin Miles Fadiman, andHugo Riesenfeld to form Red Seal Pictures Corporation, which owned 36 theaters on the East Coast, extending as far west asCleveland, Ohio.[9]
Hollywood studios largely rejected Phonofilm, and instead introduced different systems forsound film.
In 1924,Western Electric was developing both asound-on-disc system, where the film is synchronized with a phonograph containing the sound, and their own optical sound systems. They had settled on 24frames per second (90 feet per minute) as the standard film speed for sound, as they found slower film speeds could not consistently reproduce sound well.
Warner Bros. was the first to use a sound-on-disc system,Vitaphone. Warner Bros. released the feature filmDon Juan starringJohn Barrymore on August 6, 1926, in Vitaphone, with music and sound effects only. On October 6, 1927, Warner Bros. releasedThe Jazz Singer withAl Jolson in Vitaphone.The Jazz Singer was the firstfeature film to use synchronized sound for talking sequences rather than just for music and sound effects, and thus launched thetalkie era.
Since Western Electric's ERPI division dominated the theater hardware market when the sound revolution finally got underway, its standard 24-frames-per-second speed was universally adopted by Fox and all the other studios as each began making sound films. As a consequence, Case's tests and de Forest's early Phonofilms, shot at about 21 frames per second, gave speakers and singers high-pitched "helium voices" if they are run on a standard sound projector. TheLibrary of Congress and other film archives have printed new copies of some early Phonofilms, modifying them by periodically duplicating frames and correspondingly "stretching" the soundtracks to make them compatible with standard projectors andtelecine equipment.
Case and de Forest had a falling out due to de Forest taking full credit for the work of Case and Earl I. Sponable at the Case Research Lab. The Case Research Lab proceeded to build its own camera. That camera was used by Case and Sponable to film President Coolidge on August 11, 1924, creating one of the films shown by de Forest and claimed by him to be the product of "his" inventions. Case also expressed his displeasure that the program credited only the "DeForest-Case Patents", as Phonofilm's success rested upon the work of Case and his Case Research Lab.
Seeing that de Forest was more concerned with his own fame and recognition than he was with actually creating a workable system of sound film, and because of de Forest's continuing attempts to downplay the contributions of the Case Research Lab in the creation of Phonofilm, Case severed his ties with de Forest in the fall of 1925. On July 23, 1926,William Fox ofFox Film Corporation bought Case's patents, cutting off de Forest's access to them.
Without access to Case's inventions, de Forest was left with an incomplete system of sound film. He gave up on trying to exploit the process — at least in the U.S. (see UK section below). de Forest was in financial difficulty due to his lawsuits against Case, and had resorted to selling cut-rate sound equipment to second-run movie theaters wanting to convert to sound on the cheap. His company declared bankruptcy in September 1926. The Fleischers stopped releasing the Song Car-Tune films in Phonofilm shortly thereafter.
Even so, in June 1927, producerPat Powers made an unsuccessful takeover bid for de Forest's company. In the aftermath, Powers hired former DeForest technicianWilliam Garity to produce a cloned version of the Phonofilm system which became Powers Cinephone.
In July 1925,The Gentleman, a comedy short film excerpt ofThe 9 to 11 Revue directed by William J. Elliott, was made using Phonofilm, the first sound-on-film production in England. In 1926, the owner of a UK cinema chain, M. B. Schlesinger, acquired the UK rights to Phonofilm.[11] Schlesinger filmed short films of Britishmusic hall performers such asMarie Lloyd Jr. andBilly Merson, along with famous stage actors such asSybil Thorndike andBransby Williams performing excerpts of works byShakespeare,Shaw, andDickens, from September 1926 to May 1929.
On October 4, 1926, Phonofilm made its UK premiere with a program of short films presented at theEmpire Cinema in London, including a short film withSidney Bernstein welcoming Phonofilm to the UK. According to theBritish Film Institute website, the UK division of De Forest Phonofilm was taken over in August 1928 by British Talking Pictures and its subsidiary, British Sound Film Productions, which was formed in September 1928; it is believed British Talking Pictures acquired De Forest's primary assets, including patents and designs for theatre audio equipment.
In March 1929, a feature filmThe Clue of the New Pin, a part-talkie based on anEdgar Wallace novel, was trade-shown withThe Crimson Circle, a German-UK coproduction which was also based on a Wallace novel.Crimson was filmed in Phonofilm, andPin was made in British Phototone, asound-on-disc process using 12-inch phonograph records synchronized with the film. However, the UK divisions of both Phonofilm and British Phototone soon closed.
The last films made in the UK in Phonofilm were released in early 1929, due to competition from Vitaphone, and sound-on-film systems such as Fox Movietone and RCA Photophone. The release in June 1929 of the sound version ofAlfred Hitchcock's feature filmBlackmail, made in RCA Photophone as adopted by its production companyBritish International Pictures, sealed the fate of Phonofilm in the UK.
In June 1925, Phonofilm opened its first Australian office at 129Bathurst Street, Sydney. On July 6, 1925, the first program of Phonofilms in Australia was shown at the Piccadilly Theatre in Sydney. A program was also shown at the Prince Edward Theatre in November and December 1925.
Phonofilm had closed all of its operations in Australia by October 1927, and sold its remaining studio facilities to an Australian company in October 1928.
In 1928, Spanish producer Feliciano Manuel Vitores bought the Spanish rights to Phonofilm from DeForest and dubbed it "Fonofilm". He produced four films in the process,Cuando fui león (1928),En confesionario (1928),Va usted en punto con el banco (1928), andEl misterio de la Puerta del Sol (1929). The first three were short films directed by Manuel Marín starring Spanish comedian Ramper, and the last was the first soundfeature film made in Spain. The feature film was released in Spain by Divina Home Video in 2005, after years of being thought alost film.
The Maurice Zouary collection at the Library of Congress holds approximately 45 films made in Phonofilm. A DVD produced by Zouary about the history of Phonofilm says that a short film of opera singers performing the Sextet fromLucia di Lammermoor was made by the "Latin American division" of Phonofilm. No further information is known about this division of Phonofilm. In 1926, DeForest released a short film referred to asCuban Sound Documentary which included theCuban national anthem and excerpts fromThe Merry Widow. However, little else is known of this film or whether other Phonofilms were made in Cuba.
More than 200 short films were made in the Phonofilm process, with many preserved in the collections of theLibrary of Congress (45 titles) and theBritish Film Institute (98 titles). In 1976, five Phonofilm titles were discovered in a trunk in Australia, and these films have been restored by Australia'sNational Film and Sound Archive.
Fannie Ward (1924) performs comedy sketch as the "Perennial Flapper"[40]
Farewell Message of Mr. Levine and Captain Hinchcliffe, Just Before Their Departure on Their Return Flight to America (1927) withCharles A. Levine and Capt.Walter G. R. Hinchliffe[41]
Femina Quartette Nr. 1 (1928) with Elizabeth Hyde (soprano), Brenda Hales (cellist), Yvonne Black (pianist) performing (BFI Database)[42]
Gilland Singer (1927) M. Gilland from France sings, dressed as wounded World War I soldier
Gimme the Hat (1927)
Gloria Swanson Dialogue (1925),Gloria Swanson,Henri de la Falaise, andThomas Meighan[47] directed byAllan Dwan, in film forThe Lambs annual "Spring Gambol" presented at the Metropolitan Opera House, showing Swanson trying to crash the all-male club; Meighan also hosted the live Gambol event (April 26, 1925)[48]
Gwen Farrar and songwriterBilly Mayerl perform "I've Got a Sweetie on the Radio" (1926)[53]
Hal Brown Lancashire Comedian (1928)
The Harlequin's Serenade (no further identification of performer; in original April 15, 1923, program)*
Harrigan and Altworth (1922) early DeForest test film
Harry and Max Nesbitt (1927) film sometimes listed as "Yid Nesbitt" (Max's nickname), brothers from South Africa in "vocal, verbal, and terpsichorean tidbits"
Harry Shalson the Popular Entertainer (1927) Shalson sings "You Go Too Far"
Lee DeForest (1922) De Forest sitting in a chair and explaining Phonofilm
Léon Rothier (1923), operatic bass from the Metropolitan Opera
Lillian Powell Bubble Dance (1923)*Denishawn dancer Powell dances to a theme by Brahms; film also shown at the Engineers Society Auditorium in NYC April 12, 1923[69]***
Lincoln, Man of the People (1923)Edwin Markham reads his poem "Lincoln, Man of the People"
Luella Paikin (1922) early DeForest test film of singer
Lulu (1928) musical short
Luna-cy! (1925) 1922 experimental 3-D film byFrederick Ives and Jacob Leventhal re-released with Phonofilm soundtrack May 18, 1925
Madelon (1927) Camille Gillard in "Madelon", directed by Widgey Newman
Major Issues of the Campaign (1924) compilation of Al Smith, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and John W. Davis short Phonofilms taken at the 1924 Democratic National Convention in NYC (see individual entries)[citation needed]
The Man in the Street (1926) short based on Louis N. Parker play, directed byThomas Bentley, with Wilbur Lenton, John MacAndrews, and Bunty O'Nolan (UK title:Man of Mystery)[71]
Mark Griver and His Scottish Revellers (1927) perform "She Was Just a Sailor's Sweetheart" and "Ain't She Sweet"[75]—see also Chili Bouchier entry (above) and Pilbeam and His Band entry (below)
Max Herzberg (1924) pianist
Medevedeff's Balalaika Orchestra (1929)
Meet the Family (1929) comedy short with Harry Delf, released by Ellbee Pictures
Memories of Lincoln (1925) 91-year-old former legislatorChauncey Depew recalls meeting Abraham Lincoln[76]
Old Pal Why Don't You Answer Me (1926) also sometimes listed as "My Old Pal" of "Dear Old Pal"[89]**
Olly Oakley (November 1927) directed byGeorge A. Cooper; banjoist Oakley was born Joseph Sharpe (b. Birmingham November 26, 1877; d. London January 4, 1943)
The Orderly Room (July 1928) comedy short withErnie Lotinga as Jimmy Josser, directed by Hugh Croise
Oscar Earlweiss (1924) "chorus and novelty concert"
Pilbeam and His Band With Specialty Dance by the Misses Tosch (1927) jazzy version of "Ain't She Sweet?" (?Arnold Pilbeam, father ofNova Pilbeam). See Chili Bouchier entry and Mark Griver entry (above) which feature same song.
Pipe Down (1929) comedy short released by Ellbee Pictures
Plastigrams (1924) 1922 experimental 3-D film by Frederick Ives and Jacob Leventhal, re-released with Phonofilm soundtrack on September 22, 1924[91]
PresidentCalvin Coolidge, Taken on the White House Grounds (1924) filmed August 11, 1924[92]
Punch and Judy (1928)
The Radio Bug (September 1926) comedy short, produced byJack White, directed byStephen Roberts, and co-starring Phil Dunham, Toy Gallagher andClem Beauchamp, about delivery of a new radio, released in sound and silent versions byEducational Pictures[93]
The Radio Franks (May 1926) NYC radio stars Frank Bessinger and Frank Wright sing "Remember" and "Hooray for Radio"[94]***
The Raw Recruit (July 1928) comedy short withErnie Lotinga as Jimmy Josser, directed by Hugh Croise
Scovell and Wheldon (1927) UK radio stars (male duo) sing "Ukulele Lullaby" and "Fresh Milk Comes From Cows"[101]
Scrooge (1928), a monologue from Dickens'sA Christmas Carol, withBransby Williams as Scrooge
Sensations of 1927 (1927) Thorpe Bates in excerpt ofLawrence Wright'sSensations of 1927; full titleA Few Melodious Moments From Lawrence Wright's "Sensations of 1927" atOnchan Head Pavilion Douglas,I.O.M. (BFI Database)
The Sentence of Death (1927) dramatic short directed byMiles Mander and starringDorothy Boyd (US title:His Great Moment)
Sextet fromLucia di Lammermoor (1923) DVD by Zouary shows it to be produced by the ?"Latin American division" of Phonofilm[102]
Ventriloquist (1927) withWilliam Frawley as peddler hawking "Hoak" patent medicine and girl (real-life wife Edna Frawley) who becomes the dummy (BFI database)
Vicarage Trio—Kerbstone Entertainment (1928)
The Victoria Girls (1928) perform "The Doll Dance", their "famous dancing medley"
Violet Heming (1925) appeared in "playlet" filmed in Phonofilm (Variety, September 1925)
Yvette Darnac (1929) radio star Darnac sings Gershwin tune "The Man I Love"
(*) Included in program of Phonofilms at the Rivoli Theater in NYC on April 15, 1923 (**) Fleischer "Song Car-Tunes" series (some titles later re-released by the Fleischers in their "Screen Songs" series, through Paramount Pictures, with new soundtracks recorded in RCA Photophone) (***) Found in a trunk inWindsor, New South Wales, Australia in early 1976, and restored by the National Film and Sound Archive of Australia
