American director Marshall "Mickey" Neilan was the General Billy Mitchell of movies; he was undeniably brilliant, but alienated too many important people by reminding them of his brilliance. Neilan dropped out of school at age 11 when his father died, helping to support his mother with a variety of odd jobs. Intrigued by the theatre, the teenaged Neilan appeared often as a stock company juvenile. In 1911 he became the chauffeur to Biograph director D. W. Griffith, who cast the dashingly handsome Neilan in small roles. Directing his first picture at the American Film Company in 1913, Neilan continued fluctuating between acting and directing until the late teens; one of his most frequent leading ladies was Mary Pickford, who was both costarred with and directed by Neilan. After his marriage to film star Blanche Sweet, Neilan concentrated totally on directing, gaining critical adulation for such artistic triumphs as Bits of Life (1921) (a multipart drama in which ethnic stereotypes were treated with rare dignity) and The Lotus Eater (1921). He directed his wife in a number of films, the best of which was Tess of the D'Ubervilles (1924), for which Neilan filmed two endings: one tragic (as in the Thomas Hardy novel) and one artificially happy, so that distributors could choose which one they preferred. Though Neilan made a successful transition to sound with Pathe's The Awful Truth (1929), too many of his early talkies were box-office bombs (the Rudy Vallee vehicle Vagabond Lover [1929] being a particularly noxious example). Any other director might have been allowed to regain his lost footing, but Neilan's enemies were legion by the early '30s, and they had long been waiting for an opportunity to slap him down. At best, Neilan's talkies were programmers that any competent director could have handled, such as The Lemon Drop Kid (1934); at worst, they were poverty-row products like the Pinky Tomlin musicals Sing While You're Able (1936) and Swing It Professor (1937). By 1937, the former boy wonder was a 46-year-old hasbeen. Some took pity on this Neilan by giving him small jobs with outsized salaries. One such assignment was drenched with irony: playing an uncredited Santa Anita spectator in A Star is Born, Neilan could be seen snubbing Fredric March, who was playing a once-great star who'd drunk himself into oblivion. In 1957, one year before his death, Marshall Neilan played his last minor role in Elia Kazan's aptly titled A Face in the Crowd (1957).
| Title | Year | Editors' Rating | User Rating | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
A Face in the Crowd
Actor |
1957 | |||
|
A Star Is Born
Actor |
1937 | |||
|
Sing While You're Able
Director |
1937 | |||
|
Swing It, Professor
Director |
1937 | |||
|
Thanks for Listening
Director |
1937 | |||
|
This Is the Life
Director |
1935 | |||
|
Chloe
Director |
1934 | |||
|
The Lemon Drop Kid
Director |
1934 | |||
|
The Social Register
Director |
1934 | |||
|
Catch as Catch Can
Director |
1931 | |||
|
War Mamas
Director |
1931 | |||
|
Hell's Angels
Director |
1930 | |||
|
Sweethearts on Parade
Director |
1930 | |||
|
Black Waters
Director |
1929 | |||
|
Tanned Legs
Director |
1929 | |||
|
The Awful Truth
Director |
1929 | |||
|
The Vagabond Lover
Director |
1929 | |||
|
His Last Haul
Director |
1928 | |||
|
Take Me Home
Director |
1928 | |||
|
Taxi 13
Director |
1928 | |||
|
Three-Ring Marriage
Director |
1928 | |||
|
Her Wild Oat
Director |
1927 | |||
|
Venus of Venice
Director |
1927 | |||
|
Diplomacy
Director, Producer |
1926 | |||
|
Everybody's Acting
Director, Screen Story |
1926 | |||
|
Mike
Director, Producer, Screenwriter |
1926 | |||
|
The Skyrocket
Director |
1926 | |||
|
Wild Oats Lane
Director, Producer |
1926 | |||
|
Sporting Venus
Director, Producer |
1925 | |||
|
The Great Love
Director, Screenwriter |
1925 | |||
|
Dorothy Vernon of Haddon Hall
Director |
1924 | |||
|
Tess of the d'Urbervilles
Director, Producer |
1924 | |||
|
Broadway Gold
Actor |
1923 | |||
|
Minnie
Director, Presented by, Producer, Screenwriter |
1923 | |||
|
Souls for Sale
Actor |
1923 | |||
|
Stranger's Banquet
Director, Producer, Screenwriter |
1923 | |||
|
The Eternal Three
Director, Producer, Screen Story |
1923 | |||
|
The Rendezvous
Director, Presented by |
1923 | |||
|
Fools First
Director, Producer |
1922 | |||
|
Penrod
Director, Producer, Supervisor/Manager |
1922 | |||
|
Bits of Life
Director, Producer, Screenwriter |
1921 | |||
|
Bob Hampton of Placer
Director, Producer |
1921 | |||
|
Lotus Eater
Director, Producer |
1921 | |||
|
Dinty
Director |
1920 | |||
|
Don't Ever Marry
Director |
1920 | |||
|
Go and Get It
Director, Producer |
1920 | |||
|
In Old Kentucky
Director |
1920 | |||
|
River's End
Director |
1920 | |||
|
Daddy Long Legs
Actor, Director |
1919 | |||
|
Her Kingdom of Dreams
Director |
1919 | |||
|
Three Men and a Girl
Director |
1919 | |||
|
Unpardonable Sin
Director |
1919 | |||
|
Amarilly of Clothesline Alley
Director |
1918 | |||
|
Hit-the-Trail Holliday
Director |
1918 | |||
|
M'Liss
Director |
1918 | |||
|
Out of a Clear Sky
Director |
1918 | |||
|
Stella Maris
Director |
1918 | |||
|
Freckles
Director |
1917 | |||
|
Jaguar's Claws
Director |
1917 | |||
|
Little Princess
Director |
1917 | |||
|
Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm
Director |
1917 | |||
|
The Silent Partner
Director |
1917 | |||
|
Those without Sin
Director |
1917 | |||
|
Country That God Forgot
Director |
1916 | |||
|
Cycle of Fate
Director |
1916 | |||
|
Hulda from Holland
Director |
1916 | |||
|
Mice and Men
Actor |
1916 | |||
|
Prince Chap
Director |
1916 | |||
|
A Girl of Yesterday
Actor |
1915 | |||
|
Landing the Hose Reel
Director |
1915 | |||
|
Little Pal
Actor, Screenwriter |
1915 | |||
|
Madame Butterfly
Actor |
1915 | |||
|
May Blossom
Actor |
1915 | |||
|
Rags
Actor |
1915 | |||
|
The Commanding Officer
Actor |
1915 | |||
|
Classmates
Actor |
1914 | |||
|
Ham, the Piano Mover
Director, Screenwriter |
1914 | |||
|
Judith of Bethulia
Actor |
1914 | |||
|
Men and Women
Actor |
1914 | |||
|
The Sentimental Sister
Actor |
1914 | |||
|
Animal
Actor |
1913 | |||
|
In Love and War
Actor |
1913 | |||
|
Man's Duty
Actor |
1913 | |||
|
Menace
Actor |
1913 | |||
|
The American Princess
Director, Screenwriter |
1913 | |||
|
The Harvest of Flame
Actor, Director |
1913 | |||
|
The House of Discord
Actor |
1913 | |||
|
The Picket Guard
Actor |
1913 | |||
| 1913 | ||||
|
The Wall of Money
Actor, Screenwriter |
1913 | |||
|
The Wanderer
Actor |
1913 | |||
|
Two Men of the Desert
Actor |
1913 |