Georges Méliès

The name Georges Méliès (born this day in 1861) is no doubt on everyone’s lips very much these days thanks to the recent release of Scorcese’s Hugo. (Very savvy to have released it at Thanksgiving). I just read the book it’s based on, Brian Selznick’s The Invention of Hugo Cabret, enjoyed it much, and am looking forward to seeing the film over the holidays).

Interested in drawing and puppetry as a boy, Méliès worked as a supervisor in the family boot factory until his father retired in 1888, sold his shares in the company and used the proceeds to buy the Theatre Robert-Houdin. He studied magic, and revitalized his theatre (which was then running out of steam) by devising new spectacles of his own. In 1895, he chanced to be present at the first ever screening of films by the Lumiere Brothers. He immediately acquired his own film equipment and began devising short little vignettes to screen at his theatre, magic tricks that were not possible to do anywhere but on the silver screen. In so doing, he invented many special effects we now take for granted: the stop trick (or substitution), multiple exposure, hand-tinting (color film had not been invented), time-lapses and dissolves. He built his own studio for the purpose in 1896. The films were all only minutes long, and took place on a stage (with very few changes of set-up or angle). In addition to his technical breakthroughs, he is to be credited for the influence of his gorgeous, fantastical, and imaginative visuals, much in a league with the visions of his contemporaries L. Frank Baum, Winsor McCay, Fred Thompson, and of course Jules Verne, who inspired some of his work.

World War I devastated him financially, and tastes changed drastically thereafter. Penniless, he went to work selling toys in a Paris train station, although some 11th hour recognition by his compeers did finally arrive before his death in 1938.

Here’s one of his most famous films, 1902′s “A Trip to the Moon”

To find out more about  the history of vaudeville, consult No Applause, Just Throw Money: The Book That Made Vaudeville Famous, available at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and wherever nutty books are sold.