On the cusp of revolutionizing Shakespearean acting in America with B’way openings of RICHARD III in 1920 and HAMLET in’21*, John Barrymore also got serious about film. (Not something you could count on other than during his miraculous run of 1932 - 1934,) The reason was likely his love of grotesquerie, a passion handsomely serviced by this more or less faithful adaptation of the Robert Louis Stevenson novella. Directed by John S. Robertson in stiff, poetic ‘prestige’ style as a series of romantic or ghastly tableaux vivants which can now make a proper effect thanks to an early 2000s restoration. (Try the KINO edition.) The story is much as you recall: brainy doctor tries to isolate man’s good side from his bad with a potent potion, then can’t find the OFF switch. With a decent cast and standout perfs from BAD companion Louis Wolheim (in real life a ‘working man’ with a concave face Barrymore discovered and got into acting), and from BAD wench Nita Naldi. Successfully pitiable. But who are we kidding? You’re here to watch Barrymore, still a youthful 38, transition au naturale, without camera tricks or makeup from handsome/saintly Jekyll into hideous villain Hyde.* Makeup and camera dissolves will be used later, but the initial change remains both wild and impressive. The later ones also have their charms; especially in a print where you don’t need to squint to see it happen.
READ ALL ABOUT IT: *See Michael A. Morrison’s JOHN BARRYMORE: SHAKESPEAREAN ACTOR for details on Barrymore’s Bard influence. Or simply watch Laurence Olivier’s HAMLET/’48, loaded with Barrymore touches as well as something like Barrymore’s highly Freudian ‘cut’ of the text. Right down to what soliloquies were dropped. (Olivier saw the Barrymore production in London 25 years before as an impressionable 16-yr-old.)
ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: *Barrymore repeated his one-shot transformation trick (now shown going in both directions) with better/closer framing in DON JUAN/’26.
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