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Discounting the occasional star producing his or her own films, William Parsons was the only studio executive who also made films with himself in the lead. Reportedly a former medical doctor and insurance salesman, Parsons entered films in 1915, as the president of the National Film Corp., a company located at Gower St. and Santa Monica Blvd. in Hollywood. Having taken over the MinA (Made in America) production unit from film pioneer David Horsley, Parsons and General Film produced comedies starring the husband-and-wife team of Mr. and Mrs. Carter de Haven and the Hall Room Boys series featuring Gus Flannigan and Neeley Edwards. In 1918, Parsons secured the rights to Edgar Rice Burroughs Tarzan stories and Tarzan and the Apes, starring burly Elmo Lincoln, proved the studio's most successful film. In 1919, Parsons was looking for a comic to head up a series of Capitol Comedies for release by Goldwyn and was persuaded to assume the mantle himself. Rotund, jolly looking, and bald, "Smiling Billy" Parsons, as he was billed, went on to star in a series of extremely well-appointed situation comedies that only ended with his sudden death in September 1919. A victim of complications from diabetes, Parsons left behind his wife of only three months, screen comedienne Billie Rhodes. The National Film Corp. did not survive the death of its founder, but the studio space later housed Columbia Pictures.