Joseph White Farnham (December 2 1884 – June 2 1931) was an
AmericanThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
playwrightA playwright, also known as a dramatist, is a person who writes dramatic literature or drama. These works are usually written to be performed in front of a live audience by actors...
and an
Academy AwardThe Academy Awards, popularly known as the Oscars, are presented annually by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry, including directors, actors, and writers. The formal ceremony at which the awards are presented is...
-winning film writer and film editor of the
silent movieSilent Movie is a 1976 comedy film directed by and starring Mel Brooks, and released by 20th Century Fox on June 17, 1976. The ensemble cast includes Dom DeLuise, Marty Feldman, Bernadette Peters, Sid Caesar, Anne Bancroft, Henny Youngman, Liza Minnelli, Burt Reynolds, James Caan, and Paul...
era to the early 1930s. He was also a founding member of the
Academy of Motion Picture Arts and SciencesThe Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is a professional honorary organization dedicated to the advancement of the arts and sciences of motion pictures....
. He was born in
ConnecticutConnecticut is a state in the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, and New York to the west and south ....
.
Farnham got his start in film through his business relationship with
theatreTheatre is a branch of the performing arts. While any performance may be considered theatre, as a performing art, it focuses almost exclusively on live performers creating a self contained drama. A performance qualifies as dramatic by creating a representational illusion...
empresarios
GustaveGustave Frohman was a theatre producer and advance man. He was one of three Frohman brothers who entered show business and he worked for most of his career alongside his brother, Charles Frohman. These two financed a number of theatre productions, often featuring African American actors...
and
Daniel FrohmanDaniel Frohman was a Jewish American theatrical producer and manager, and an early film producer.Frohman was born in Sandusky, Ohio. With his brothers Charles and Gustave Frohman, he helped to develop a system of road companies that would tour the nation while the show also played in New York City...
who owned The Frohman Amusement Corp..
The Big ParadeThe Big Parade is a 1925 silent film which tells the story of an idle rich boy who joins the US Army's Rainbow Division and is sent to France to fight in World War I, becomes friends with two working class men, experiences the horrors of trench warfare, and finds love with a French girl.The film...
is probably the most famous of his works adapted to film.
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Joseph White Farnham (December 2 1884 – June 2 1931) was an
AmericanThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
playwrightA playwright, also known as a dramatist, is a person who writes dramatic literature or drama. These works are usually written to be performed in front of a live audience by actors...
and an
Academy AwardThe Academy Awards, popularly known as the Oscars, are presented annually by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry, including directors, actors, and writers. The formal ceremony at which the awards are presented is...
-winning film writer and film editor of the
silent movieSilent Movie is a 1976 comedy film directed by and starring Mel Brooks, and released by 20th Century Fox on June 17, 1976. The ensemble cast includes Dom DeLuise, Marty Feldman, Bernadette Peters, Sid Caesar, Anne Bancroft, Henny Youngman, Liza Minnelli, Burt Reynolds, James Caan, and Paul...
era to the early 1930s. He was also a founding member of the
Academy of Motion Picture Arts and SciencesThe Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is a professional honorary organization dedicated to the advancement of the arts and sciences of motion pictures....
. He was born in
ConnecticutConnecticut is a state in the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, and New York to the west and south ....
.
Farnham got his start in film through his business relationship with
theatreTheatre is a branch of the performing arts. While any performance may be considered theatre, as a performing art, it focuses almost exclusively on live performers creating a self contained drama. A performance qualifies as dramatic by creating a representational illusion...
empresarios
GustaveGustave Frohman was a theatre producer and advance man. He was one of three Frohman brothers who entered show business and he worked for most of his career alongside his brother, Charles Frohman. These two financed a number of theatre productions, often featuring African American actors...
and
Daniel FrohmanDaniel Frohman was a Jewish American theatrical producer and manager, and an early film producer.Frohman was born in Sandusky, Ohio. With his brothers Charles and Gustave Frohman, he helped to develop a system of road companies that would tour the nation while the show also played in New York City...
who owned The Frohman Amusement Corp..
The Big ParadeThe Big Parade is a 1925 silent film which tells the story of an idle rich boy who joins the US Army's Rainbow Division and is sent to France to fight in World War I, becomes friends with two working class men, experiences the horrors of trench warfare, and finds love with a French girl.The film...
is probably the most famous of his works adapted to film. In the
1st Academy AwardsThe 1st Academy Awards were presented on May 16, 1929, at a private dinner held at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel. Tickets cost $5 and fewer than 250 people attended. The ceremony lasted only 15 minutes. Unlike later events, the winners had been announced months prior to the ceremony...
of 1929, nominees could be considered for an Oscar for an award on the basis of multiple films within the year. Joseph won his
Best Writing - Title CardsThe Academy Award for Best Title Writing was an Academy Award presented in the early 20th century, near the end of the Silent Era of motion pictures....
award for the films
Fair Co-Ed,
Laugh, Clown, LaughLaugh, Clown, Laugh was a 1928 silent film starring Lon Chaney and Loretta Young. The movie was directed by Herbert Brenon and produced and released through MGM Studios.-Plot:...
, and
Telling the World. This was the only year that an Oscar for title cards would be awarded.
Joseph Farnham has the sad distinction of being the very first Academy Award-winner to die. He died of a
heart attackMyocardial infarction or acute myocardial infarction , commonly known as a heart attack, is the interruption of blood supply to part of the heart, causing some heart cells to die...
while living in
Los AngelesLos Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the municipality of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123.445 inhabitants...
,
CaliforniaCalifornia is the most populous state in the United States, and the third largest by area. California is the second most populous sub-national entity in the Americas, behind only São Paulo, Brazil...
and was interred in the Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery in
Glendale, CaliforniaGlendale is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. It lies at the eastern end of the San Fernando Valley, is bisected by the Verdugo Mountains, and is a suburb in the Greater Los Angeles Area...
.
Selected filmography
- The Big House
The Big House is a 1930 film that was written by Joseph Farnham, Martin Flavin, Frances Marion and Lennox Robinson, and directed by George W. Hill....
(1930)
- The Thirteenth Chair
The Thirteenth Chair is a 1929 mystery film directed by Tod Browning. It is based on a 1916 play of the same name by Bayard Veiller.-Cast:* Conrad Nagel - Richard Crosby* Leila Hyams - Helen 'Nellie' O'Neill...
(1929)
- The Unholy Night
The Unholy Night is a 1929 mystery film directed by Lionel Barrymore, starring Ernest Torrence and featuring Boris Karloff. -Cast:* Ernest Torrence - Dr...
(1929)
- The Cameraman
The Cameraman is an American 1928 silent comedy directed by Edward Sedgwick and an uncredited Buster Keaton.The picture stars Buster Keaton, Marceline Day, Harold Goodwin, and others.The Cameraman was Keaton's first film with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer...
(1928)
- Laugh, Clown, Laugh
Laugh, Clown, Laugh was a 1928 silent film starring Lon Chaney and Loretta Young. The movie was directed by Herbert Brenon and produced and released through MGM Studios.-Plot:...
(1928)
- Alias Jimmy Valentine
Alias Jimmy Valentine is a Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer film directed by Jack Conway, and starring William Haines, Leila Hyams, Lionel Barrymore, and Karl Dane. Released on 15 November 1928, it was MGM's first all-talking movie. This film and the two previous film versions were all based on the short...
(1928)
- The Trail of '98
The Trail of '98 is a Western film featuring Harry Carey. The film was originally released by MGM in a short-lived widescreen process called Fanthom Screen.-Cast:* Dolores del Río as Berna* Ralph Forbes as Larry* Karl Dane as Lars Petersen...
(1928)
- London After Midnight
London After Midnight is a silent mystery film with horror overtones. The film stars Lon Chaney, Marceline Day, Conrad Nagel, Henry B. Walthall, and Polly Moran and was directed by Tod Browning. It is also a lost film, quite possibly the most famous and eagerly-sought of all lost films...
(1927)
- Slide, Kelly, Slide
Slide, Kelly, Slide is a 1927 comedy film, released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, directed by Edward Sedgwick, and starring William Haines and Harry Carey.-Cast:* William Haines - Jim Kelly* Sally O'Neil - Mary Munson* Harry Carey - Tom Munson...
(1927)
- The Red Mill
The Red Mill is a 1927 comedy film directed by Fatty Arbuckle and written by Frances Marion. The film never had a VHS release, though it aired on the network channel TCM on January 3, 2008, which was the birthday of leading role actress Marion Davies...
(1927)
- The Show
The Show is a 1927 American drama film directed by Tod Browning, based upon C.T. Jackson's 1910 novel, The Day of Souls.-Plot:A Hungarian carnival troupe follows a young girl who reforms a tearaway after her old suitor tried to kill him with a poisonous lizard.-Cast:* John Gilbert - Cock Robin*...
(1927)
- The Road to Mandalay
The Road to Mandalay is a 1926 drama film directed by Tod Browning.-Cast:* Lon Chaney - Singapore Joe* Lois Moran - Joe's Daughter* Owen Moore - The Admiral* Henry B. Walthall - Father James* Sojin - English Charlie Wing...
(1926)
- The Blackbird
The Blackbird is a 1926 drama film directed by Tod Browning.-Plot:The Blackbird is a thief who uses a second identity when necessary: a rescue mission keeper with contorted legs...
(1926)
- The Big Parade
The Big Parade is a 1925 silent film which tells the story of an idle rich boy who joins the US Army's Rainbow Division and is sent to France to fight in World War I, becomes friends with two working class men, experiences the horrors of trench warfare, and finds love with a French girl.The film...
(1925)
- Greed
Greed is a dramatic silent film. One of the most famous lost films in cinema history it is also considered one of the greatest films ever...
(1924)