WEBVTT - SYMHC Classics: Theda Bara 0:00:02.400 --> 0:00:04.480 Happy Saturday. On Unearthed. 0:00:04.559 --> 0:00:08.160 This week we talked about some graffiti that might be 0:00:08.320 --> 0:00:12.520 a depiction of Theta Barra if you thought while listening 0:00:12.600 --> 0:00:15.160 to Unearthed, who's that and what does the word vamp 0:00:15.200 --> 0:00:17.840 have to do with it? Today's Saturday Classic, we'll solve 0:00:17.880 --> 0:00:21.840 that mystery. This originally came out May fourth, twenty twenty two. 0:00:22.200 --> 0:00:28.080 Enjoy Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a 0:00:28.120 --> 0:00:38.120 production of iHeartRadio. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm 0:00:38.159 --> 0:00:40.159 Holly Fryne and I'm Tracy V. 0:00:40.280 --> 0:00:40.720 Wilson. 0:00:41.120 --> 0:00:43.400 Today we are going to talk about someone I love 0:00:43.720 --> 0:00:46.680 in history, which is Theda Bara, who is often referenced 0:00:46.720 --> 0:00:49.960 as the first sex symbol or the first celebrity to 0:00:49.960 --> 0:00:54.200 have an entire persona crafted by a PR team. Photos 0:00:54.240 --> 0:00:57.880 of her are pretty synonymous with the word vamp. I know. 0:00:58.000 --> 0:01:01.240 Tracy mentioned to me that she didn't have any name recognition, 0:01:01.280 --> 0:01:03.720 but the second she saw a picture, she's like, oh that's. 0:01:03.520 --> 0:01:04.800 Oh that person yep. 0:01:06.160 --> 0:01:09.040 And one hundred years later, pictures of her still have 0:01:09.319 --> 0:01:14.880 a certain mysterious appeal. But she was a very different person, 0:01:15.319 --> 0:01:18.720 I think than most people might know. And it always 0:01:18.720 --> 0:01:20.720 cracks me up a little when people kind of model 0:01:20.760 --> 0:01:22.720 their look after her, and I'm like, yeah, but you know, 0:01:22.800 --> 0:01:27.320 she was actually pretty tame. So today I thought it 0:01:27.319 --> 0:01:30.400 would be interesting to look at how this early film 0:01:30.440 --> 0:01:34.640 celebrity was basically created through careful planning by a PR team, 0:01:35.200 --> 0:01:37.560 and how the real woman was a whole lot different 0:01:37.640 --> 0:01:40.360 from that faux persona that they made up. Yeah, to 0:01:40.400 --> 0:01:44.640 start with totally different name. She was born Theodosia Goodman 0:01:45.040 --> 0:01:48.559 in Cincinnati, Ohio, on July twenty ninth, eighteen eighty five. 0:01:49.400 --> 0:01:53.680 Her parents were Bernard Goodman and Pauline Louis friends was 0:01:54.400 --> 0:01:58.600 Dick Cope. Bernard was originally from Jorsela, Poland and worked 0:01:58.640 --> 0:02:02.800 as a tailor. Pauline's father was French. Her mother was German, 0:02:02.960 --> 0:02:06.000 although she had been born and grew up in Switzerland 0:02:06.040 --> 0:02:09.079 and worked as a wig maker. Bernard and Pauline got 0:02:09.080 --> 0:02:12.560 married in eighteen eighty two, and Theodosia was their first child. 0:02:13.040 --> 0:02:15.919 Then in eighteen eighty eight they had a son named Mark, 0:02:16.080 --> 0:02:18.640 and then in eighteen ninety seven, Bernard and Pauline had 0:02:18.639 --> 0:02:23.480 another daughter named Esther, who would eventually go by Laurie. 0:02:23.639 --> 0:02:26.720 Theodosia was named after Aaron Burr's daughter, who we have 0:02:26.800 --> 0:02:30.280 an episode on. Yeah, she's some versions of her name. 0:02:30.320 --> 0:02:32.959 You'll see Burr as a middle name, and I never 0:02:33.080 --> 0:02:36.360 was able to verify whether that was true or maybe 0:02:36.440 --> 0:02:39.960 a little confused when people noted that she was named 0:02:39.960 --> 0:02:45.960 for Theodosia, br Auto completed that middle name right. Her childhood, though, 0:02:46.080 --> 0:02:49.120 was a pretty comfortable one. The good Men's lived in 0:02:49.160 --> 0:02:52.520 an affluent neighborhood, and Theodosia, Mark, and Laurie were all 0:02:52.600 --> 0:02:55.280 quite close. They had two women who worked for them 0:02:55.280 --> 0:02:58.320 as house staff named Anna Tusenig and Ida day Birth 0:02:58.880 --> 0:03:02.160 and Theodosia loved to read, and she would often opt 0:03:02.200 --> 0:03:05.280 to do that over any other activity. But she was 0:03:05.320 --> 0:03:08.720 not a quiet, bookish child, because she could also be 0:03:08.760 --> 0:03:12.560 a handful. She frequently pilfered her mother's closet to create 0:03:12.639 --> 0:03:15.519 elaborate dress up ensembles, and she was prone to getting 0:03:15.880 --> 0:03:18.519 all dressed up in those and then running away from home. 0:03:19.320 --> 0:03:21.480 She was so likely to run off when she was 0:03:21.480 --> 0:03:24.000 still quite small that her parents had to have a 0:03:24.040 --> 0:03:28.400 new tall fence specially installed around their yard. As she 0:03:28.560 --> 0:03:32.160 grew up, Theodosia's love for dress up evolved into a 0:03:32.240 --> 0:03:35.640 desire to stage tableau and that was a popular parlor 0:03:35.760 --> 0:03:39.760 entertainment at the time. She would recreate scene after scene 0:03:39.960 --> 0:03:43.760 and perform recitations to go with these scenes there with 0:03:43.800 --> 0:03:46.320 no surprise. This led her to want to get involved 0:03:46.320 --> 0:03:49.720 in acting. Soon she was staging her own productions in 0:03:49.760 --> 0:03:53.680 a neighbor's barn. She continued to act as she grew 0:03:53.720 --> 0:03:56.840 into her teenage years. She read everything she could about 0:03:56.840 --> 0:04:00.840 the actors of the day. She was really focused on this. 0:04:01.200 --> 0:04:04.160 I find this very charming as somebody who put on 0:04:04.200 --> 0:04:07.800 plays in the basement of the family home. Oh yeah, 0:04:07.840 --> 0:04:10.880 oh icnned teachers into letting me do full blown, like 0:04:11.360 --> 0:04:16.000 multi act puppet shows in elementary school. So it's interesting 0:04:16.000 --> 0:04:19.200 because she was obsessed with the idea of actors and 0:04:19.279 --> 0:04:23.360 acting at a time when, like stage actors were really 0:04:23.400 --> 0:04:27.200 the thing, but there was some transition going on to film, 0:04:27.279 --> 0:04:32.240 and she apparently read like every article she could about 0:04:32.320 --> 0:04:34.560 everything they did in their day to day lives. Like 0:04:34.800 --> 0:04:37.200 she was that kid that was like could tell you 0:04:37.279 --> 0:04:40.159 everything that like any given actor of the day, like 0:04:40.279 --> 0:04:41.559 to eat, like to wear. 0:04:42.040 --> 0:04:44.320 Oh wow, Yeah, she was that kid. 0:04:44.680 --> 0:04:47.679 Theodosia, who was known to her friends largely as Theo, 0:04:48.040 --> 0:04:51.320 attended Walnut Hills high school. Starting in eighteen ninety nine, 0:04:51.880 --> 0:04:54.000 she worked on the school paper, and she joined the 0:04:54.040 --> 0:04:57.400 drama club, and she was known always for her ambition 0:04:57.520 --> 0:05:01.040 to go into acting as a career. After graduating high 0:05:01.040 --> 0:05:04.360 school in nineteen oh three, she attended University of Cincinnati 0:05:04.440 --> 0:05:07.680 for two years, but at that point she was starting 0:05:07.720 --> 0:05:10.800 to feel frustrated glee club, which she was a part of, 0:05:10.920 --> 0:05:13.640 did not offer her the theatrical outlet that she really 0:05:13.720 --> 0:05:16.599 longed for. She frankly wanted more than she felt like 0:05:16.640 --> 0:05:20.080 Cincinnati had to offer, So in nineteen oh five, the 0:05:20.120 --> 0:05:23.479 age of twenty, Theo decided to pursue a career on 0:05:23.520 --> 0:05:27.320 the stage. In that effort, she moved to New York City, 0:05:27.680 --> 0:05:31.200 and her father was reportedly not pleased with any of this. 0:05:31.960 --> 0:05:34.800 Once she got to New York, Theodosa changed her last 0:05:34.920 --> 0:05:38.640 name from Goodman to her mother's maiden name of de Coppet. 0:05:39.680 --> 0:05:41.760 She would later riff off of this name. She would 0:05:41.839 --> 0:05:45.359 change out the vowels, try out different variations. We know 0:05:45.440 --> 0:05:48.000 that she lived in Greenwich Village in an apartment just 0:05:48.040 --> 0:05:51.240 off Washington Square, but beyond that we don't know a 0:05:51.279 --> 0:05:54.080 whole lot in terms of the specifics of her first 0:05:54.120 --> 0:05:57.520 couple of years of New York. The first play she's 0:05:57.640 --> 0:06:00.719 documented as having been cast in was the nineteen oh 0:06:00.760 --> 0:06:03.800 eight summer production of The Devil. She was a minor 0:06:03.920 --> 0:06:07.320 character in that one. After that, There's another Gap, and 0:06:07.360 --> 0:06:10.200 then she was part of the second string touring company 0:06:10.240 --> 0:06:13.719 for a musical called The Quaker Girl. She was paid 0:06:13.760 --> 0:06:17.000 twenty five dollars a week initially, although after some pretty 0:06:17.040 --> 0:06:20.600 bad reviews her salary was reduced to eighteen dollars a week, 0:06:20.640 --> 0:06:24.200 and then she left the troop. Those reviews were quite scathing, 0:06:24.440 --> 0:06:27.840 things about how really abysmal her French accent was, and 0:06:27.880 --> 0:06:30.680 how even like a five year old wouldn't be confused 0:06:30.720 --> 0:06:35.440 or convinced they were mean. Theo continued to pursue acting, 0:06:35.520 --> 0:06:38.599 and she kept taking parts in touring companies, but that 0:06:38.800 --> 0:06:42.040 was not at all to her liking life on the road. 0:06:42.360 --> 0:06:45.760 The tight quarters shared with other performers and the decidedly 0:06:45.920 --> 0:06:50.080 non luxurious accommodations were things that she would later describe 0:06:50.120 --> 0:06:54.760 as quote unpleasant associations. This was just not the acting 0:06:54.800 --> 0:06:58.599 career she had envisioned. She left a touring company that 0:06:58.680 --> 0:07:01.599 was running a farce called Us Like John in nineteen 0:07:01.680 --> 0:07:04.280 twelve and At that point, she went back to New York. 0:07:05.040 --> 0:07:08.480 Her mother, Pauline, and her teenage sister Laurie soon joined 0:07:08.480 --> 0:07:11.440 her there. And just as she was feeling her most 0:07:11.440 --> 0:07:14.880 frustrated and dejected over what seemed like a career that 0:07:14.920 --> 0:07:19.000 would never happen, another bad thing happened, which is at 0:07:19.000 --> 0:07:21.400 the apartment she shared with her mother and sister had 0:07:21.440 --> 0:07:24.760 a fire and it basically was unlivable. It burned out. 0:07:25.000 --> 0:07:27.640 They were able to get by thanks to insurance money, 0:07:27.640 --> 0:07:30.400 but there was this very real concern kind of looming 0:07:30.440 --> 0:07:33.520 over the whole thing that Theodosia's dreams were just not 0:07:33.680 --> 0:07:37.320 going to work out. In late nineteen fourteen, Theo was 0:07:37.360 --> 0:07:39.720 approached by a man who asked her if she might 0:07:39.760 --> 0:07:43.520 want to try being in movies. The man who approached 0:07:43.560 --> 0:07:47.440 her was Frank Powell. Powell hailed from Ontario, Canada, and 0:07:47.520 --> 0:07:51.200 had become an actor himself before transitioning into the director's chair. 0:07:52.120 --> 0:07:55.200 He had worked for Pathay Pictures before Fox lured him 0:07:55.240 --> 0:07:58.200 away from them, and it was just before he started 0:07:58.200 --> 0:08:01.440 at Fox that he saw Theo and saw something in 0:08:01.480 --> 0:08:04.520 her that he thought might be great for film. There's 0:08:04.600 --> 0:08:07.360 no record of the specific place where the two of 0:08:07.400 --> 0:08:11.000 them had this first conversation. This was, of course a 0:08:11.080 --> 0:08:13.920 time when the movie industry was in its infancy, but 0:08:14.000 --> 0:08:17.920 it already had some established stars like Mary Pickford. A 0:08:18.000 --> 0:08:21.600 career in film was not really something Theodosia had been pursuing. 0:08:22.080 --> 0:08:25.880 According to her later accounts of being discovered, she saw 0:08:25.920 --> 0:08:29.360 herself as a stage actress. She wanted Broadway, and she 0:08:29.520 --> 0:08:33.360 was not particularly interested in jumping into the still fairly 0:08:33.480 --> 0:08:37.480 new medium of moving pictures. But at the same time 0:08:37.760 --> 0:08:40.440 she had to acknowledge that her theater career was not 0:08:40.600 --> 0:08:44.760 exactly going gangbusters. She was also thirty, so she was 0:08:44.760 --> 0:08:46.719 starting to hit the point where she was seen as 0:08:46.840 --> 0:08:51.160 too old for most of the lead roles that she wanted. Initially, 0:08:51.280 --> 0:08:54.079 she was curvy, and that figure had fallen out of favor. 0:08:54.200 --> 0:08:59.200 People were looking more for longer, leaner physique. So she gambled, 0:08:59.240 --> 0:09:02.360 and she took Fred Powell at his word on this. Yes, 0:09:02.559 --> 0:09:04.960 I want to talk about her as a curvy person 0:09:05.920 --> 0:09:11.720 in our behind the scenes. Yeah, because I really think 0:09:11.800 --> 0:09:13.920 she looks quite thin in most of her pictures. 0:09:13.920 --> 0:09:14.640 But yeah. 0:09:14.679 --> 0:09:17.760 The first project that Frank Powell put Theo in was 0:09:17.840 --> 0:09:20.320 actually a film called The Stain, which he made while 0:09:20.320 --> 0:09:24.600 he was still finishing up his contract at Patha. Theodosha 0:09:24.720 --> 0:09:27.120 was cast in just a tiny role. This was really 0:09:27.160 --> 0:09:30.760 her screen test. Powell made sure that she was positioned 0:09:30.800 --> 0:09:32.880 near the camera so that he could see how she 0:09:32.960 --> 0:09:36.640 played on screen, and he was very pleased after that. 0:09:36.880 --> 0:09:39.679 William Fox, the head of the studio, also reviewed the 0:09:39.679 --> 0:09:42.600 footage and liked it, and so sat down with THEO 0:09:42.679 --> 0:09:46.200 for an interview. Both men thought that she was right 0:09:46.280 --> 0:09:49.520 for a very unusual and difficult to cast role they 0:09:49.559 --> 0:09:52.200 were working on, and they offered her a five year 0:09:52.240 --> 0:09:54.680 contract at the studio at a rate of one hundred 0:09:54.720 --> 0:09:58.720 dollars per week. THEO negotiated that up to one hundred 0:09:58.720 --> 0:10:02.000 and fifty dollars per week before she signed, and that 0:10:02.240 --> 0:10:05.120 is how an unknown landed a leading role in the 0:10:05.240 --> 0:10:09.160 upcoming project called A Fool There Was for Fox Film Company. 0:10:09.720 --> 0:10:13.480 The studio, though also knew this was a gamble. Theodosia's 0:10:13.520 --> 0:10:16.440 co star in the picture was Edward Jose who was 0:10:16.559 --> 0:10:19.840 a famous Broadway actor at the time, so casting this 0:10:20.000 --> 0:10:24.240 complete newcomer to film was something that William Fox, who 0:10:24.280 --> 0:10:27.320 was the head of Fox Films, was concerned about. So 0:10:27.480 --> 0:10:32.080 the solution was to construct this really alluring persona for her, 0:10:32.679 --> 0:10:35.800 and her name had been the first to go. She 0:10:35.960 --> 0:10:38.560 was going by Theodosia de cape or to cop It 0:10:39.440 --> 0:10:42.080 or as we said, many other variations she tried out. 0:10:42.600 --> 0:10:46.079 None of them were really zinging, So after considering her 0:10:46.200 --> 0:10:49.840 nicknames of Theo and Teddy, which her family members also 0:10:50.120 --> 0:10:54.680 sometimes called her, they landed another nickname, Theta, and decided 0:10:54.760 --> 0:10:57.400 that was the one. And then for the last name, 0:10:57.559 --> 0:11:00.720 they wanted something far easier than any of the on 0:11:00.800 --> 0:11:04.680 Dakopit or Decape, and her maternal grandfather had been named 0:11:04.720 --> 0:11:08.640 Francois Berngais, and that last name was shortened to Bearra. 0:11:09.040 --> 0:11:11.920 As a quick aside, you'll see different versions of how 0:11:11.960 --> 0:11:13.960 this played out, how much of it was her idea 0:11:14.040 --> 0:11:18.440 versus the studios, which studio executives kept credit for which pieces, 0:11:18.840 --> 0:11:21.920 But I'm calling it a group effort because there are 0:11:21.960 --> 0:11:25.240 so many different versions. So once her name was figured 0:11:25.280 --> 0:11:27.840 out and rendered on that Fox contract, it was time 0:11:27.920 --> 0:11:30.040 to get to work, and we will talk about that. 0:11:30.200 --> 0:11:42.760 After a quick sponsor break in the autumn of nineteen fourteen, 0:11:42.880 --> 0:11:45.840 with the contract for Theta Bea in place, filming for 0:11:45.920 --> 0:11:49.120 a fool, there was could finally get under way. The 0:11:49.200 --> 0:11:52.160 picture was shot in part on location on the Florida 0:11:52.200 --> 0:11:54.679 coast at Saint Augustine, and right out of the gate 0:11:55.200 --> 0:11:58.840 there were some interesting problems. The cast and crew for 0:11:58.880 --> 0:12:01.520 the film were sent down to the location along the 0:12:01.559 --> 0:12:05.720 Atlantic coast on a steamer that was a German steamer. 0:12:05.760 --> 0:12:08.320 It was called the Essen, and because World War One 0:12:08.440 --> 0:12:11.960 was freshly underway, this raised some concern. They also were 0:12:12.000 --> 0:12:15.360 not flying a US flag, which apparently was part of 0:12:15.360 --> 0:12:18.960 the problem. The British Navy stopped them, and things got 0:12:19.000 --> 0:12:23.559 more tricky because Theda's co star, Edward jose answered questions 0:12:23.600 --> 0:12:25.920 that had been posed to him in German by also 0:12:26.000 --> 0:12:29.000 speaking German. He was fluent and that was just the 0:12:29.080 --> 0:12:32.160 natural way to do it. But this made the British 0:12:32.240 --> 0:12:35.440 utterly convinced that they had trapped a boatful, perhaps of 0:12:35.520 --> 0:12:38.560 spies or other operatives, and it took a lot of 0:12:38.600 --> 0:12:42.080 frantic explaining and finally a cable from the studio to 0:12:42.200 --> 0:12:44.680 get things smoothed over just so they could get to 0:12:44.720 --> 0:12:48.320 the shooting location. Even once they were on location and 0:12:48.400 --> 0:12:52.200 filming started, none of this project was the glamorous scenario 0:12:52.400 --> 0:12:55.560 that Theda had envisioned. There was a huge crowd of 0:12:55.600 --> 0:12:58.439 onlookers that had come to see a movie being made 0:12:58.600 --> 0:13:01.959 the pier where she shot her first scene. The early 0:13:02.080 --> 0:13:05.480 makeup for film was not something that looked good in 0:13:05.559 --> 0:13:08.120 real life, so she felt like she was being gawked 0:13:08.200 --> 0:13:12.040 at while also not feeling pretty at all. The whole 0:13:12.120 --> 0:13:15.960 thing was harrowing. Barra later said of the moment, quote, 0:13:16.120 --> 0:13:19.240 the whole world seemed to have turned into human eyes. 0:13:19.559 --> 0:13:22.160 I trembled, I shook, I all but died right there 0:13:22.200 --> 0:13:25.080 on the dock. She also had to wear a bathing 0:13:25.120 --> 0:13:27.760 suit in the film, and she was so mortified by 0:13:27.800 --> 0:13:29.120 that that she almost quit. 0:13:29.280 --> 0:13:31.320 She didn't need to be worried, though. 0:13:31.360 --> 0:13:33.760 Even though she wore this bathing suit for the shot, 0:13:34.080 --> 0:13:36.640 there were objections from the censors and that led to 0:13:36.679 --> 0:13:40.160 that scene being cut out. Yeah, that was a time 0:13:40.200 --> 0:13:42.480 where there were places you could still get arrested for 0:13:42.520 --> 0:13:45.959 wearing a bathing suit because it was seen as obscene. 0:13:47.880 --> 0:13:53.000 The entire transition into film acting was really incredibly stressful 0:13:53.040 --> 0:13:55.960 for Theda. She did not get to rehearse, and a 0:13:56.000 --> 0:13:58.400 lot of the earliest scenes she shot are kind of 0:13:58.440 --> 0:14:02.080 extra pantomimey because of course these are all silent. You 0:14:02.120 --> 0:14:05.120 can watch the film online easily enough and see for yourself. 0:14:05.679 --> 0:14:09.360 Even after filming, there was more work and more than 0:14:09.720 --> 0:14:13.240 Theda Bara had expected. As the film was being edited, 0:14:13.400 --> 0:14:16.200 Edward Jose got in a contract dispute with Fox, and 0:14:16.280 --> 0:14:20.160 he left the studio and refused to do any promotion 0:14:20.400 --> 0:14:24.120 For a fool there was so suddenly this total newcomer 0:14:24.280 --> 0:14:27.160 was the only person they had to promote the film 0:14:27.200 --> 0:14:30.400 as one of its leads. The studio had already been 0:14:30.440 --> 0:14:33.440 working on ways to turn Theda into a sensation, but. 0:14:33.520 --> 0:14:36.120 Now all the eggs had to be in one. 0:14:36.000 --> 0:14:41.520 Basket, So the studio created a whole biography of her. Uh. 0:14:41.560 --> 0:14:44.480 They had actually been working on it while filming was 0:14:44.520 --> 0:14:48.200 going on, and the story they ended up with was 0:14:48.240 --> 0:14:52.840 a doozy and it was completely captivating to kind of 0:14:52.880 --> 0:14:56.440 everyone but for various reasons. But they also didn't know 0:14:56.560 --> 0:14:59.040 if this was gonna work. At first. This was such 0:14:59.080 --> 0:15:02.600 an outlandish tape and it was so overboard in so 0:15:02.680 --> 0:15:04.440 many ways as you were going to see because we'll 0:15:04.440 --> 0:15:06.920 walk you through it, that there was concern that no 0:15:06.960 --> 0:15:09.880 one would buy it. It was just too sensational. So 0:15:10.600 --> 0:15:13.920 the PR department put together a press conference that was 0:15:14.000 --> 0:15:18.000 really a big stunt. So the framing of this bogus 0:15:18.080 --> 0:15:20.520 event was that it was for the first run of 0:15:20.680 --> 0:15:23.840 press before the premiere of a fool there was the 0:15:23.920 --> 0:15:26.800 studio is going to have an event in Chicago and 0:15:27.040 --> 0:15:30.440 invite a select group of reporters. The team turned a 0:15:30.440 --> 0:15:33.800 hotel meeting room into an Egyptian fantasy just to set 0:15:33.800 --> 0:15:36.200 the stage for the introduction of Theta. 0:15:35.960 --> 0:15:37.000 Bara to the world. 0:15:37.920 --> 0:15:41.320 Al Sellig and John Goldfrapp worked for the studio as 0:15:41.360 --> 0:15:45.800 its public relations team, and while mingling with the assembled reporters, 0:15:45.840 --> 0:15:48.640 they talked about how Borrow was the toast of Paris 0:15:48.760 --> 0:15:51.920 and what a fine she was, and how excited they 0:15:51.920 --> 0:15:55.600 were to be debuting her talent in the US. Again, 0:15:55.720 --> 0:16:00.480 she had never even been to Paris. According to their story, 0:16:00.840 --> 0:16:03.320 which was presented to members of the press before the 0:16:03.360 --> 0:16:08.360 introduction of Fox's new thrilling talent, her mother was a 0:16:08.360 --> 0:16:12.440 French actress named Theta Delize, and her father, Giuseppe Bara, 0:16:12.680 --> 0:16:16.920 was a sculptor from Italy. To give Theodosia's new persona 0:16:16.960 --> 0:16:21.440 an entirely new level of exoticism, she was born quote 0:16:21.600 --> 0:16:25.160 in the shadow of the Pyramids, This happened after her 0:16:25.160 --> 0:16:29.200 mother had met her father while touring in Egypt. Even 0:16:29.360 --> 0:16:32.440 the fake parent meet cute was sort of needlessly, in 0:16:32.480 --> 0:16:36.160 my opinion, dramatic. According to it, Delize had found the 0:16:36.200 --> 0:16:40.200 sculptor wandering and lost in the sands of Egypt, disoriented 0:16:40.240 --> 0:16:44.440 and having abandoned everything he had as he wandered the desert. 0:16:44.880 --> 0:16:47.680 Giuseppe was saved by Delze, and they fell in love, 0:16:47.760 --> 0:16:50.360 and they lived in a tent near the Sphinx. 0:16:51.120 --> 0:16:52.360 So if this sounds. 0:16:52.080 --> 0:16:57.440 Ridiculous, brace yourselves, because this story went even further. There 0:16:57.560 --> 0:17:01.880 was a foolish account of Theda's early life in the desert, 0:17:02.000 --> 0:17:05.160 with dialogue written as though it had been captured by 0:17:05.160 --> 0:17:10.320 the actor. Wistfully remembering her childhood, describing their tent home 0:17:10.480 --> 0:17:13.960 as quote like the garden of Eden, she described how 0:17:14.000 --> 0:17:16.680 her mother had taught her about acting, while her father 0:17:16.800 --> 0:17:20.880 had educated her in art, and after describing this early, 0:17:21.200 --> 0:17:25.560 totally fictional homeschooling, she would end with quote and through 0:17:25.600 --> 0:17:29.200 the instruction of both, I learned the symphony of the soul. 0:17:30.240 --> 0:17:32.960 When Theda was still a child. According to this story, 0:17:33.000 --> 0:17:36.960 her parents moved from Egypt to Paris, and just for clarity, 0:17:37.080 --> 0:17:40.040 This is not her saying these things. These are press 0:17:40.119 --> 0:17:44.080 people claiming these quotes were from her. It was all 0:17:44.200 --> 0:17:48.800 very ridiculous. According to the studio story, Bara performed with 0:17:48.960 --> 0:17:53.159 all of the noteworthy theatrical companies of Paris, including with 0:17:53.240 --> 0:17:56.119 actor Jane Hadding at the Grand Guignot, which we have 0:17:56.160 --> 0:18:00.960 an entire episode on the gymnase and the te Flenttoine 0:18:01.160 --> 0:18:04.600 Cellig and Goldfrap just gushed to the attending members of 0:18:04.640 --> 0:18:08.280 the press that Theda had this massive following in Paris 0:18:08.560 --> 0:18:11.400 and that she had been discovered there by Frank Powell. 0:18:12.000 --> 0:18:15.760 Since this press event took place in January of nineteen fifteen, 0:18:15.800 --> 0:18:19.520 it offered the Fox pr team an opportunity to use 0:18:19.560 --> 0:18:23.080 the events of World War One to further elaborate on 0:18:23.200 --> 0:18:27.520 Bara's arrival in the United States. When Germany had declared 0:18:27.560 --> 0:18:31.400 war on Russia, France, and Belgium in August of nineteen fourteen, 0:18:31.920 --> 0:18:34.800 Powell had quickly moved to escape Paris, and he took 0:18:34.840 --> 0:18:38.840 this newly discovered talent with him. After all of this 0:18:39.160 --> 0:18:44.520 incredibly thrilling exposition to explain to reporters just who exactly 0:18:44.600 --> 0:18:47.719 they were about to meet this velvet curtain was opened, 0:18:47.760 --> 0:18:52.240 and there sat the enthralling Theda Bara, making her debut 0:18:52.359 --> 0:18:55.920 to the world. She was seated on a chaise lounge 0:18:55.960 --> 0:18:59.280 that was covered in tiger skins, and her incredibly pale 0:18:59.320 --> 0:19:01.720 skin and jet black hair made her look like she 0:19:01.840 --> 0:19:05.399 came from another country or culture, but also a little 0:19:05.400 --> 0:19:09.080 bit otherworldly in a more mystical sense, right in line 0:19:09.160 --> 0:19:12.240 with this vampiric character she was playing. In a fool 0:19:12.320 --> 0:19:15.600 there was. Although this was a presser, there was no 0:19:15.720 --> 0:19:18.480 Q and a session. Theda Bara gave a series of 0:19:18.520 --> 0:19:21.760 statements for reporters to quote, and these statements were very, 0:19:21.880 --> 0:19:26.080 very well worded, more than one might anticipate from an 0:19:26.160 --> 0:19:29.879 actor who had only just moved to the United States 0:19:29.880 --> 0:19:33.800 and supposedly didn't grow up speaking English. That did not 0:19:34.040 --> 0:19:37.919 seem to trouble the attendees, though Theda said things like, quote, 0:19:38.320 --> 0:19:41.480 I hope I have succeeded in depicting the complex emotions 0:19:41.480 --> 0:19:44.920 of this woman as vividly as they have appealed to me. 0:19:45.680 --> 0:19:46.200 Ah. 0:19:46.320 --> 0:19:49.080 But there was this whole double angle being played by 0:19:49.160 --> 0:19:52.840 Sellig and Goldfrap in all of this. Once Theda had 0:19:52.880 --> 0:19:56.080 given all of these statements, the press conference ended and 0:19:56.119 --> 0:20:00.720 the room was cleared. However, one carefully selected reporter was 0:20:00.800 --> 0:20:04.000 allowed to stay like just under the guise of like, 0:20:04.040 --> 0:20:06.960 they didn't rush her out, and that was Luella Parsons, who, 0:20:06.960 --> 0:20:09.359 of course would go on to become a very famous 0:20:09.400 --> 0:20:13.120 Hollywood gossip columnist. But that day, when she was still 0:20:13.119 --> 0:20:15.800 a CUB reporter, they kind of picked her because she 0:20:15.920 --> 0:20:19.560 was green, and she got to witness Theda Bara whipping 0:20:19.600 --> 0:20:22.240 off all of the heavy velvets and furs and veils 0:20:22.240 --> 0:20:24.120 that she had been wearing as part of this act 0:20:24.440 --> 0:20:26.920 and running to a window to throw it open, and 0:20:27.000 --> 0:20:29.720 dropping the accent she had been using throughout the presser 0:20:29.800 --> 0:20:30.919 as she groaned. 0:20:30.840 --> 0:20:31.720 Give me air. 0:20:34.480 --> 0:20:36.879 This is a genius move on the part of Box's 0:20:36.920 --> 0:20:40.240 pr team. Seleig and Goldfrap knew that a lot of 0:20:40.240 --> 0:20:42.879 the old school reporters in the room would never buy 0:20:42.960 --> 0:20:47.640 this whole yarn they had spun regarding Bara's backstory. Some 0:20:47.840 --> 0:20:52.200 reporters even recognized her as Theodosia to cop it from 0:20:52.280 --> 0:20:56.480 her days in the theater. But simultaneously ensuring that world 0:20:56.520 --> 0:20:58.959 would get out that this was all an act, they 0:20:59.080 --> 0:21:03.399 kept Theda's name in the papers. Some papers ran straight 0:21:03.480 --> 0:21:06.960 stories that relayed the outlandish details they'd been told that 0:21:07.080 --> 0:21:10.080 day as though they were fact, while others mocked the 0:21:10.080 --> 0:21:14.119 papers that did that, and yet others wrote pieces pondering 0:21:14.160 --> 0:21:17.320 what the truth really was. So she became a celebrity 0:21:17.359 --> 0:21:21.560 before anyone even saw her film. So smart, So manipulative, 0:21:21.600 --> 0:21:25.959 but so smart. As an aside, this type of revising 0:21:26.080 --> 0:21:29.240 and rewriting of a person's life to create essentially a 0:21:29.280 --> 0:21:32.520 new character that they played as their public persona was 0:21:32.560 --> 0:21:36.159 actually pretty common. It was a very successful way to 0:21:36.280 --> 0:21:39.800 drum up public interest in stars and consequently to drive 0:21:39.880 --> 0:21:43.720 box office numbers up. But it was also done obviously 0:21:43.800 --> 0:21:47.800 with zero consideration or awareness of things like cultural appropriation. 0:21:48.040 --> 0:21:50.879 We mentioned earlier that this was really a play on 0:21:51.000 --> 0:21:54.320 like this penchant for exoticism that people had, where they 0:21:54.400 --> 0:21:58.160 really were not thinking about cultures as anything but kind 0:21:58.160 --> 0:22:00.720 of things they could pick and choose from as of interest. 0:22:01.240 --> 0:22:04.400 And just as Theda Bara was allegedly a blend of 0:22:04.720 --> 0:22:08.760 French and Arab characteristics as plucked not from reality but 0:22:08.840 --> 0:22:12.600 from the imaginations of studio executives, a lot of other 0:22:12.680 --> 0:22:17.479 actors had that same transformation. For example, Josephine M. Workman, 0:22:17.600 --> 0:22:21.200 a young woman from California, was re christened as Princess 0:22:21.240 --> 0:22:26.280 Mona Darkfeather by Bison Motion Pictures. While Workman's paternal grandmother 0:22:26.560 --> 0:22:29.840 was Taus Pueblo, it does not appear that any real 0:22:29.880 --> 0:22:34.000 cultural connection was ever integrated into that fictional persona of 0:22:34.119 --> 0:22:38.000 Dark Feather, Although Workman became the go to choice when 0:22:38.040 --> 0:22:40.760 a film needed to fill Native American roles for women. 0:22:41.520 --> 0:22:44.080 This is just one example, but there are so many 0:22:44.160 --> 0:22:48.000 similar stories in early film history. So while Theda Bara 0:22:48.200 --> 0:22:50.840 was one of the biggest stars to have such a transformation, 0:22:51.240 --> 0:22:54.400 she was really not an outlier in the least. The 0:22:54.400 --> 0:22:59.680 title card for Bara's debut film reads, William Fox presents 0:22:59.720 --> 0:23:03.919 a fo There was a psychological drama by Porter Emerson Brown. 0:23:04.640 --> 0:23:07.520 And then the next card features a poem that reads, 0:23:08.240 --> 0:23:11.480 a fool there was, and he made his prayer even 0:23:11.520 --> 0:23:14.040 as you and I to a rag and a bone 0:23:14.080 --> 0:23:16.760 and a hank of hair. We called her the woman 0:23:16.800 --> 0:23:19.520 who did not care, but the fool. He called her 0:23:19.960 --> 0:23:23.880 his lady fair, even as you and I. So though 0:23:23.880 --> 0:23:26.560