:16:02
And he lobbied to dispense
with his congenital ugliness since
:16:05
"physical deformity", he claimed,
"inspires disgust, not pity".
:16:10
Little is known of Jacoby. Phantom is one
of only four screen credits he received -
:16:14
only top-billed once,
for Tarzan and the Amazons.
:16:17
His surviving treatment shows that he was
a very well-educated and well-read man.
:16:22
With such a pre-sold title, Jacoby knew
there were certain expectations to be met.
:16:27
"The audience" he said "wish to
recognise the old picture in the new one."
:16:30
He conceded that the unmasking and
the fall of the chandelier had to be kept.
:16:36
The script describes Marie the landlady
:16:39
as "an Amazonian Frenchwoman
with the face of a tyrant".
:16:42
She's played by Kate Lawson,
sometimes billed as Kate Drain Lawson,
:16:46
built like a brick outhouse and best
remembered as tactless Mama Delgado,
:16:51
who locks her daughter out
in Val Lewton's The Leopard Man.
:16:55
Kate specialised
in big, bullying prison matrons
:16:58
in pictures like City Streets, Remember
the Night, Torchy Plays with Dynamite
:17:03
and the ever-popular Girls on Probation.
:17:05
As originally written, in this scene
Claudin brought out not only his concerto
:17:10
but a plaster bust of Christine which he'd
place on the piano and then perform to.
:17:15
The bust appears later in the picture,
having been stolen by Claudin.
:17:19
But the explanation for his having it
was lost when this scene was refilmed.
:17:23
John Jacoby submitted 14 pages of notes
the day before Hallowe'en 1941,
:17:29
following production meetings with
the creatives, including Henry Koster.
:17:33
Jacoby professed admiration
for the silent movie,
:17:36
but he felt that modern audiences
wouldn't buy it any more today.
:17:39
"What they will insist on above all"
he said "is to feel horror."
:17:46
Jacoby found MGM's remake of Dr Jekyll
and Mr Hyde with Spencer Tracy
:17:51
a useful barometer. He watched it
"three times, in three different theatres,
:17:55
and each time the audience laughed
when Dr Jekyll changed into Mr Hyde".
:17:59
"But they did not laugh
at the old versions of the picture."