Cecil M. Hepworth

Cecil Hepworth

Cecil Hepworth
Born	19 March 1874 Lewisham, England
Died	9 February 1953 aoremovetag(aged 78) Middlesex, England
Occupation	Film director Film producer
Years active	1896 - 1926

Cecil Milton Hepworth (March 19, 1874 – February 9, 1953) was an English film director, producer and screenwriter. He was among the founders of the British film industry and continued making films into the 1920s.

Hepworth was born in Lambeth, South London. His father, Thomas Cradock Hepworth, was a famous magic lantern showman and author. Cecil Hepworth became involved in the early stages of British filmmaking, working for both Birt Acres and Charles Urban, and wrote the first British book on the subject in 1897. With his cousin Monty Wicks he set up the production company Hepworth and Co., which was later renamed the Hepworth Manufacturing Company and then Hepworth Picture Plays. In 1899 they built a small film studio in Walton-on-Thames. The company produced about three films a week, sometimes with Hepworth directing.

Rescued by Rover (1904), co-directed with Lewin Fitzhamon and starring a collie in the title role, was a huge financial success. The film is now regarded as an important development in film grammar, with shots being effectively combined to emphasise the action. Hepworth was also one of the first to recognise the potential of film stars, both animal and human, with several recurring characters appearing in his films.

The company continued making popular films into the 1920s, despite Hepworth's now unchanging and increasingly old-fashioned film style. Boosted by the international success of Alf's Button (1919), the company went public to fund a large studio development. He failed to raise the necessary capital and, also suffering the box office failure of Comin' Thro the Rye (1923), the company went into receivership the next year. All of the original film negatives in Hepworth's possession were melted down by the receiver in order to sell the silver, and his feature films have been considered lost for many decades. However, an original 35mm. print of his 1920 film Helen of Four Gates was located in a film archive in Montreal, Canada in 2008.

Filmography (partial)

References

• Came the Dawn, Cecil Hepworth. London: Phoenix House, 1951.
• Raising the Flag: Constructing a National Cinema in Britain, Andrew Higson. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995, ISBN 0-19-812369-8. Chapter on Comin' Thro' The Rye: pp. 26–97.

External links

• Cecil Hepworth at screenonline
• Cecil Hepworth at the Internet Movie Database

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