The Slim Princess (1915 film)

The Slim Princess is a 1915 American silent comedy film directed by E. H. Calvert and starring Francis X. Bushman, Ruth Stonehouse and Wallace Beery.[1] (This is believed to have been Beery's first full-length feature film.) The movie was written by Edward T. Lowe, Jr. from a story by George Ade and play by Henry Blossom, and was subsequently remade into a 1920 film starring Mabel Normand. The farcical plot involves a princess of a fictional country, loosely based upon Turkey, in which obese women are prized and the normal-sized protagonist is widely regarded as being too slender.[2]

The Slim Princess
Still with the princess looking over the American magazine
Directed byE. H. Calvert
Based onThe Slim Princess
by Henry Blossom
StarringFrancis X. Bushman
Ruth Stonehouse
Wallace Beery
CinematographyJackson Rose
Production
company
Distributed byV-L-S-E
Release date
  • May 24, 1915 (1915-05-24)
Running time
4 reels
CountryUnited States
LanguageSilent (English intertitles)

Plot

As described in a film magazine,[3] Alexander Pike, longing for new fields to conquer and willing to give a federal grand jury some time to forget him, takes a trip to Morovenia, where the ruling governor is desperate because Kalora, his oldest daughter, refuses to get fat enough to conform to the Turkish ideal of beauty and so be safely married off. The law forbids her younger and fatter sister to marry first. Popova, the princess's tutor, has a secret grudge against the governor and encourages the Slim Princess privately to devour pickles and so preserve her slim outlines. Pike drops in for an informal call on the Slim Princess one afternoon by way of the back wall of the garden. The Princess is delighted to find that slimness is an added charm in America. He proves it to her by a magazine. He is discovered by the guards and, after a short fight, flees. The Slim Princess is sent to America to be fed on breakfast food guaranteed to put fat on any bones. She enjoys America so much and, after a renewal of her acquaintance with Alexander Pike, she becomes still slimmer, essaying to conform to the lines of the American girls. Her father discovers this through the reports of the Turkish legation, and she and Popova are recalled in disgrace and the tutor sent to prison. Pike follows them back to Morovenia and asks the governor for the hand of his daughter in marriage. Then comes swift action, in which the fat and slim princesses become considerably mixed during the negotiations between the American and the governor, who cannot understand why any man could want a thin wife. The Slim Princess and her lover are finally sorted out, and Popova released from prison.

Cast

Preservation

With no prints of The Slim Princess located in any film archives,[4] it is a lost film.

References
  1. Progressive Silent Film List: The Slim Princess at silentera.com
  2. The AFI Catalog of Feature Films: The Slim Princess Retrieved September 16, 2014
  3. "The Slim Princess". Film Fun. New York: Leslie-Judge Company (316). July 1915. Public Domain This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
  4. The Library of Congress American Silent Feature Film Survival Catalog: The Slim Princess Retrieved September 16, 2014
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