D.W. Griffith at The Biograph Company

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D.W. Griffith and Billy Bitzer check lighting at the Biograph studio in 1910

With his financial footing secured for the first time since his childhood, Griffith was soon turning out the type of productions that the Biograph Co. was looking for, namely films that would make good money.

For Griffith, the newfound security left him free to turn his mind and attention to methods of improving upon the standards with which he was now beginning to work.

He noticed that older actors photographed poorly under the handicap of the low speed orthochromatic film stock that was the standard of the era.

Griffith directing The Stage Rustler, 1908

As a counter to this fact, he began to develop much younger talent, a part of his job that he would find to be a great enjoyment to him.

The quality that made these young actors and actresses special was a certain, almost undefineable quality that Griffith saw in them.

Actress Jean Gauntier and Mack Sennet

It was quickly noticed in some, in others a more gradual process would bring the quality to the front.

For many of the company that Griffith would bring together, this quality was a dormant commodity until it was exposed to a pseudo-Svengali, a "Bergman" of the past, a David Wark Griffith.

Griffith himself would speak of it as "soul" when discussing the acting of his players and felt that the actor with "soul" could enter into his or her work with all the ardor they had to offer; they would feel and live their parts, and the results would be superior performances and a good picture.

Gertrude Robinson in Pippa Passes or The Song of Conscience, 1909 based on Pippa Passes poem by Robert Browning -click for video-

For his productions, he needed these people with Soul, who could express every single feeling in the entire range of emotions with their muscles.

It isn't what you do with your face or your hands, it is the presence of that Light Within.

If you have that Light, it didn't really matter what you did in front of the camera. Griffith seemed to instinctively know who was in possession of this Light Within.

Those who stayed with him gave him a great measure of devotion and loyalty. In the case of those whose time would come to leave for a better offer from one of the many emerging companies, he let them go as easily as he had located them.

He would never show any hurt over their decision, he would just go on to look for another to take their place.

During a particular late night screening session with Harry Salter, who was Griffith's assistant and parttime actor, they viewed a production of one of Biograph's competitors, and a young, blondehaired girl's performance captured Griffith's attention.

With Salter performing the liaison work, a meeting is arranged between D.W. Griffith and this girl for the purpose of trying to talk her into moving over to Biograph and leaving her employers at Vitagraph.

Florence Lawrence is her name and she is all of sixteen years old. For the Vitagraph Company, she had been paid twenty dollars a week for both her acting as well as her supportive duties of sewing costumes and canvas.

The deal that Griffith struck with her provided for a raise to twenty-five per week with no secondary chores augmenting her acting responsibilities.