The Count of Monte Cristo (1908)
Released 15th February 1908
In November 1907, two men visited southern California looking for somewhere to finish a one-reel movie of The Count of Monte Cristo. One man, Francis Boggs, was a former stage director hired by ‘Colonel’ William N. Selig. He learned the basics of filmmaking at Selig’s Chicago studio before filming Monte Cristo’s interiors there that winter. Poor light prevented him from shooting exteriors, so Boggs travelled west to a part of the country that enjoyed year-round sunshine. Selig had decreed that only Boggs and cameraman Thomas A. Persons could travel, so new cast members had to be found in California to complete the movie. Persons recalled shooting the movie in an interview for Picture Play magazine in 1916:
“As I recall it, most of the studio stuff for ‘Monte Cristo’ had been made in Chicago. We had to find someone to double the Eastern Edmond Dantès, and it was in the cards that the double was going to get wet aplenty. Our great scene was to show Edmond emerging from the sea, shaking his white whiskers, and saying, ‘The wor-rld is mine!’ No production of Monte Cristo would be complete without that.
“Boggs found the right man at last – a hypnotist in a dime museum – and after we had seen him work we knew he had nerve enough for anything. He said that hypnotism was not being recognised to any great extent, and that for a dollar and a half a day he was ours for anything short of manslaughter. We rented the white wig and beard for him at the shop of a theatrical costumier, who took one look at me and demanded a ten dollar deposit.
“We went down to the coast to make the big scene and found a place with plenty of rocks and breakers in it. We dressed our hypnotist up in rags, helped him on with wig and beard, and warned him to be careful of ‘em. While I set up the camera so as to get a good shot at the breakers, Boggs explained the business of the scene to the actor.
“’You duck down in the surf behind that big rock,’ said he, ‘and get wet all over because you’ve been swimming, see? Don’t come out until I tell you to. When I yell, get up on the rock, spread your arms and look in the air.’ There was no talk about registering this and that in those days; a director’s instructions had to be dealt out in words of one syllable. The patter talk of the trade came later.
“The hypnotist said that he understood; but no sooner was he down in the surf than he began to yell for help. It was deeper than we thought. Boggs was furious.
“‘Stay where you are! We want to get a good water picture before you come out!’
“I kept on turning the crank, because a big boomer was rolling in and I wanted to get it as it broke, and the hypnotist kept on yelling, but he quit as the wave hit the rock. When the spray had blown away, Boggs yelled for Edmond.
“‘Come on there! What’s the matter with you?’
“In my capacity as camera man I kept on turning the crank, but I began to have misgivings when Edmond failed to show. Pretty soon I caught sight of him, going out to sea with the undertow. He was clear out of the picture too, so all that film was wasted.
“‘Jump in after him!’ I yelled to Boggs. ‘He’s drowning!’
“‘Never mind him!” Boggs was excited for the first time on the trip. ‘Save the wig and beard!’
“Our actor finally hung up on a big rock, and the next wave brought him ashore, more dead than alive. The first boomer had knocked the breath out of him; he was bruised from head to foot and half full of salt water, but he was game – with a business slant to his gameness. He said that for fifty cents extra he would make the scene over again, and he did. I’ve often wondered what became of that fellow – the pioneer film stunt actor of the Pacific Coast!
“Just for comparison, in those days we made one-reelers at a cost of three hundred dollars and that, mind you, included everything – Bogg’s salary and mine, the actors, the costumes, the properties, the raw film, and the rent of the studio.”
The Count of Monte Cristo would be forgotten today if film historians hadn’t considered it the first narrative film shot in California. However, those historians are wrong: Biograph cameraman Otis M. Gove shot A Daring Hold-Up in Southern California in Los Angeles on 12th July 1906. He persuaded a detective to re-enact his capture of two men robbing passengers on a trolley car. Unfortunately, the studio neglected to copyright the film, which is now lost.
Boggs directed over 90 movies, and would no doubt have filmed many more had he not died when he was just 41. At around 10am on 27th October 1911, he was in a meeting with William Selig and a contractor at the Selig Polyscope studios in Edendale when Frank Minnematsu, a Japanese gardener employed by the studio, burst in and fired four shots, hitting Boggs twice and Selig once, in the right arm. Minnematsu also fired a shot at the actress Bessie Eyton while trying to escape. Selig survived, but Boggs died on the way to the hospital. The gardener wouldn't explain his actions and spent the next twenty-six years in prison.