The Half-Way Girl

The Half-Way Girl
Lobby poster
Directed by	John Francis Dillon
Screenplay by	Joseph F. Poland Earl Snell
Story by	E. Lloyd Sheldon
Produced by	Earl Hudson
Starring	Doris Kenyon Lloyd Hughes
Cinematography	George J. Folsey
Edited by	Marion Fairfax
Production company	First National
Distributed by	First National
Release date	August 16, 1925 (1925-08-16)
Running time	80 minutes
Country	United States
Language	Silent (English intertitles)

The Half-Way Girl is a 1925 American silent drama film directed by John Francis Dillon that was filmed around the Jersey Shore.^[1]

Plot[]

Doris Kenyon plays Poppy La Rue, an actress who winds up stranded in Singapore when her theatrical troupe goes bust. She winds up in the red-light district where she works as a "hostess" (generally a silent film era euphemism for prostitute), where she meets Philip Douglas, a down-at-the-heels Brit (Lloyd Hughes).

While drunk, he kills a man in self-defense, and Poppy helps him to escape. Jardine (Sam Hardy), a plantation owner, is determined to have Poppy, and when she wants to escape from the Oriental underworld, he offers to help, provided she accompanies him to Penang. They board a ship. Douglas is also on board and when a fire breaks out in the hold, he rescues Poppy from Jardine's advances. They manage to get in a lifeboat just before the ship explodes, and are picked up by a passing vessel. Douglas' father (Hobart Bosworth) wants the couple to separate, but finally he accepts Poppy as his daughter-in-law.

Cast and crew[]

• Directed by: John Francis Dillon
• Cinematography by: George J. Folsey (as George Folsey)
• Film Editing by: Marion Fairfax
• Art Direction by: Milton Menasco

Writing credits[]

• E. Lloyd Sheldon story
• Joseph F. Poland (credited as Joseph Poland)
• Earle Snell (credited as Earl Snell)

Cast (in credits order)[]

• Doris Kenyon as Poppy La Rue
• Lloyd Hughes as Phil Douglas
• Hobart Bosworth as John Guthrie
• Tully Marshall as The Crab
• Sam Hardy as Jardine
• Charles Wellesley as Gibson
• Martha O'Dwyer as Miss Brown (credited as Martha Madison)
• Sally Crute as Effie

Production[]

The spectacular fire aboard an ocean liner was shot in color, and to make it even more exciting, a leopard also breaks free on the ship. The Corvallis, a 270-foot wooden-hulled cargo ship that was surplus from World War I, was purchased from the United States Government by First National Pictures for a fraction of her original cost.^[2] First National Pictures bought her for the sole purpose of blowing her up in The Half-Way Girl. In June 1925, under the supervision of the United States Coast Guard, the Corvallis, now renamed for the film as the Mandalay, was towed 45 nautical miles (83 km; 52 mi) offshore, loaded with dynamite, and blown up while the cameras rolled. After the explosion, the stern remained afloat and had to be sunk by the United States Coast Guard. It was claimed that blowing up an actual ship saved $25,000 over the cost of creating the scene using miniatures.^[2]

Preservation status[]

This is a lost film with no archive holdings.^[3][4]

References[]

External links[]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to The Half-Way Girl.

• The Half-Way Girl at IMDb
• Synopsis at AllMovie
• Still of Doris Kenyon and other women in the cast toasting Kenyon, at gettyimages.com