Crane Wilbur - Film Noir Foundation

In only his third movie, 26-year-old John Garfield starred in Blackwell’s Island (Warner Bros.,1939), from a story and screenplay by Crane Wilbur
already had both a taste for the macabre and an interest in the inner
workings and methodology of criminal organizations.
While the 20-something Wilbur acted on Broadway and in stock,
he also continued to hone his writing craft. A 1909 review of Wilbur’s
musical-comedy-drama Fritz the Wandering Musician said the four-act
play by the “rising young playwright,” was “…clean, clever and bright,
and holds the interest of the audience from the rise of the curtain until
its final fall on the last act.” However, it was as an actor, not a writer,
that the handsome Crane Wilbur made his motion picture debut in the
summer of 1911, with the American Pathé company of New Jersey. Wilbur
soon proved a capable leading man, although he claimed to never
be that impressed with his own acting skills. At Pathé, Wilbur teamed
up with actress Pearl White for a number of short films prior to their
breakthrough with The Perils of Pauline, which put Wilbur briefly into
the realm of top mid-teens leading men. For his part as hero in a series of
death-defying escapes (and hands-on work with live rattlesnakes, lions
and rats), Wilbur made about $125 per week—a decent salary for 1914,
if not on Chaplin or Pickford levels.
In 1915, the Lubin company of Philadelphia lured Crane Wilbur
away from Pathé to make the serial The Road of Strife. Later that
same year, Wilbur headed west to California to work at David Horsley’s
Centaur studios, where in 1916 he began making feature-length
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productions—which he soon began writing and directing, as well.
However, still less than sanguine about his own acting skills—and
about motion pictures in general—Wilbur relocated to Oakland,
California, in 1918, to operate his own theater and set up a film
studio. During this period he experienced more personal pain. His
22-year-old second wife, Arleene Archibald, died in 1916, and three
years later his infant son (by third wife Florence Dunbar) suffocated
in his sleep. Fleeing the devastation, Crane Wilbur abandoned filmmaking
in 1920 and relocated to New York, to again work as a stage
actor and playwright.
The Mysteries Begin
Wilbur’s first Broadway offering as a playwright, 1920’s The
Ouija Board, was a murder mystery set against the backdrop of
bunko spiritual mediums. Though only a modest success, it paved
the way for a 1922 Wilbur-penned follow-up called The Monster,
which featured a mix of humor, mystery, and horror. Set in an insane
asylum, The Monster ran for over 100 performances, and was optioned
by producer-director Roland West for a 1925 movie version
starring Lon Chaney.
Through the rest of the ’20s, Wilbur continued on Broadway, balancing
acting with the production of his plays, such as the comedy