Cecil Spooner (January 29, 1875 – May 13, 1953) was an American stage and film actress, screenwriter, and film director.

Biography

Cecil Spooner was born on January 29, 1875, in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. Her mother, Mary Gibbs Spooner, ran a theater in Brooklyn. Spooner made her New York theater debut in 1903 in ''My Lady Peggy Goes to Town.'' She continued to appear on Broadway throughout the decade. Spooner married Charles E. Blaney, who had written several of the Broadway plays in which she appeared, in 1909. That same year, Spooner made her motion picture debut in the

Edison Studios Edison Studios was an American film production organization, owned by companies controlled by inventor and entrepreneur, Thomas Edison. The studio made close to 1,200 films, as part of the Edison Manufacturing Company (1894–1911) and then Thom ...

adaptation of

Mark Twain Samuel Langhorne Clemens (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910), known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer, humorist, entrepreneur, publisher, and lecturer. He was praised as the "greatest humorist the United States has p ...

's ''The Prince and the Pauper''. Spooner played the roles of the prince, Edward, and the pauper, Tom Canty. She was praised by a reviewer for ''

Moving Picture World The ''Moving Picture World'' was an influential early trade journal for the American film industry, from 1907 to 1927. An industry powerhouse at its height, ''Moving Picture World'' frequently reiterated its independence from the film studios. I ...

'' for her ability to convey the distinctions between the two characters. In 1914, Spooner wrote, directed, and starred in the silent film '' Nell of the Circus''. On December 9, 1914, Spooner was arrested at the

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theater that she managed for "indecency." The police and the local community had taken offense to the play Spooner had opened the night before, ''The House of Bondage'', and its treatment of "white slavery," a euphemistic term for

sex trafficking Sex trafficking is human trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation. It has been called a form of modern slavery because of the way victims are forced into sexual acts non-consensually, in a form of sexual slavery. Perpetrators of the ...

. Spooner was released into the custody of her lawyer; she revised the play twice to remove the "objectionable" content, but the show ran for only eight performances and was reviewed negatively by theater critics. Spooner appeared in several films in the early 1920s, and she returned to Broadway in the late 1920s and early 30s. Her last known acting role was in a 1950 episode of the TV show ''

The Lone Ranger The Lone Ranger is a fictional masked former Texas Ranger who fought outlaws in the American Old West with his Native American friend Tonto. The character has been called an enduring icon of American culture. He first appeared in 1933 in ...

.'' Cecil Spooner died on May 13, 1953, in

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, California.

Selected filmography

* ''

One Law for the Woman ''One Law for the Woman'' is a 1924 American silent Western film directed by Dell Henderson and starring Cullen Landis, Mildred Harris and Cecil Spooner.Munden, p. 136 Cast * Cullen Landis as Ben Martin * Mildred Harris as Polly Barnes * C ...

'' (1924) * ''

The Love Bandit ''The Love Bandit'' is a 1924 American silent film, silent Western film with a Northwoods theme directed by Dell Henderson and starring Doris Kenyon, Victor Sutherland, and Cecil Spooner. Plot As described in a film magazine review, Amy Van Cla ...

'' (1924) * '' Peaceful Neighbors'' (1922) * '' He's Bugs on Bugs'' (1922) * '' Money or My Life'' (1922) * '' The Decoy'' (1912) (A stage play written by Harry King Tuttle especially for her) * '' Nell of the Circus'' (1914) (also writer and director) * '' The Dancer and the King'' (1914) * ''

Hansel and Gretel "Hansel and Gretel" (; german: Hänsel und Gretel ) is a German fairy tale collected by the German Brothers Grimm and published in 1812 in ''Grimm's Fairy Tales'' (KHM 15). It is also known as Little Step Brother and Little Step Sister. Hansel ...

'' (1909) * ''

The Prince and the Pauper ''The Prince and the Pauper'' is a novel by American author Mark Twain. It was first published in 1881 in Canada, before its 1882 publication in the United States. The novel represents Twain's first attempt at historical fiction. Set in 1547, ...

'' (1909)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Spooner, Cecil 1875 births 1953 deaths Women film pioneers American film directors American women film directors American women screenwriters American film actresses Actresses from New York City 20th-century American women writers 20th-century American screenwriters