- Pola Negri, The Spanish Dancer, 1922. One of the earliest examples of a woman taking a guy’s role… La Negri’s Maritana – more fortune teller than dancer – was originally penned as a man. Valentino passed. Negri grabbed. And made a better (silent) movie than Mary Pickford’s competing version, Rosita.
- Ramon Novarro, Ben-Hur, 1924. MGM considered all possible leads – from Jackie Coogan to George Walsh (who actually started filming). Valentino (who was Novarro’s lover) simply refused the script even though it was by June Mathis, scripter of his breakthroughs, The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, 1921, and Blood and Sand 1922. “I can take any good-looking extra and make a star of him,” said director Rex Ingram, “just like I did with Valentino.” Which meant, according to Paramount chief Adolph Zukor, an acting style “largely confined to protruding his large, almost occult eyes until the vast amounts of white were visible, drawing back the lips of his wide, sensuous mouth to bare his gleaming teeth and flaring his nostrils.”
Birth year: 1895Death year: 1926Other name: Casting Calls: 2