"Ithaqa" Comic Book Update #82: A Little Bit About The Whartons + Spooky Churches

So time to fulfill my promise and talk about the Wharton Studios, and the brothers themselves! One of the reasons why film plays such an important role in this story, is because during the late 1910's and the early 1920's, Ithaca was the unofficial film capital of America!

Who knew right!? In 1912 Theodore Wharton filmed a Cornell football game, and was so intrigued by the natural beauty of the city of Ithaca that he asked his brother Leopold to come check it out. 3 years later they had founded Wharton studios.

Beyond providing the film makers with impressive vistas, the city itself was exceptionally cooperative with the burgeoning film makers:

"Leo needed a trolley to fly off Stewart Avenue Bridge; the city sold him one. Ted needed furniture, homes, or a surfeit of skunks for any given scene; the locals eagerly complied. A call for extras would be immediately answered by townies and students alike. Many of their production team were moonlighting while employed at Cornell or Ithaca College."

This excitement at the prospect of working in the film was so charming that I actually worked it into the narrative. Mookie is masquerading as a respected colleague of the Whartons, and is helped by the local library purely based on Catherine's love of the silver screen.

The Whartons gave all kinds of NYC stars a good reason to ride the train upstate and star in films. The locals were delighted, and the newspapers spent a lot of time gossiping about who was dating who, and was spotted on set. One famous actress of the time who has made it into my comic is Irene Castle:

She specialized in dance and loved the city so much that she married a local.

The brothers started to have big problems in 1918 when they went all in on a war film called The Eagles Eye, and it flopped.

WW1 was almost over, and audiences had started to get sick of war films. All this time they had been developing a relationship with William Randolph Hearst, a newspaper and media tycoon who even became a senator.

If you've ever heard of the film "Citizen Kane" it is a thinly veiled biography/attack on William Hearst by the visionary director Orson Welles. For example the very famous "Rosebuds" mystery in the film was meant to shame Hearst, who reportedly referred to his mistresses nipples as "rosebuds".

Hearst was so powerful that he prevented "Citizen Kane" from opening in most theaters, and then he ruined Orson Welles's career, even though he was one of the most brilliant film makers who ever lived.

Back to the Whartons. They tried eventually to get out from under Hearst's thumb and finance their films with other people. He did not like that and managed to block some of their projects from seeing any kind of release. They sued him, and he held them up in legal red tape for years until 1919, when they were awarded a very small amount of money.

In 1919-1920 the creditors come and tear the studio apart. They sell everything off and both brothers move out to California. Ted gets a job at MGM, and collectively the two brothers had worked on 700 films by the time they died.

Hope that little history was worth the wait! Now you've got some good background info for the comic. After all, it takes place in 1920...so you know that the Wharton's are in a bit of financial trouble...perhaps enough to start bootlegging to stay afloat?

Theresa Chiechi's (The Artist @la-fumettista) website is here: http://www.theresachiechi.com/

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