Robert G. Vignola

Robert G. Vignola
Born Rocco Giuseppe Vignola
(1882-08-05)August 5, 1882
Trivigno, Basilicata, Italy
Died October 25, 1953(1953-10-25) (aged 71)
Hollywood, California, USA
Occupation Actor, Screenwriter and Film director
Years active 1906–1937

Robert G. Vignola (born Rocco Giuseppe Vignola, August 5, 1882 – October 25, 1953) was an Italian-born American actor, screenwriter and film director in American cinema. One of the silent screen's most prolific directors, he made a handful of sound films in the early years of talkies but his career essentially ended in the silent era.

Biography

Born at Trivigno, in the province of Potenza,[1] Vignola left Italy with his family at the age of 3 and was raised in upstate New York. He made his acting debut at 19 in the theatrical show "Romeo and Juliet", performing with Eleanor Robson Belmont and Kyrle Bellew.

He began his film career as an actor in 1906 with the short film The Black Hand, directed by Wallace McCutcheon and produced by Biograph Company. A year later, he became part of Kalem Studios, for which he made numerous movies. As an actor, one of Vignola's most notable film roles was as Judas Iscariot in From the Manger to the Cross (1912), directed by Sidney Olcott, one of the most successful films of the period.

As a director, he directed 87 films, some of which have been lost. Some examples are The Vampire (1913), sometimes cited as the first "vamp" movie,[2] and Seventeen (1916), where Rudolph Valentino did an uncredited cameo.

Other films include the big-budget epic When Knighthood Was in Flower (1922), starring Marion Davies; Déclassée (1925), with the uncredited appearance of the then unknown Clark Gable; Broken Dreams (1933), which received a nomination for Best Foreign Film at the Venice Film Festival, and The Scarlet Letter (1934), the last film of Colleen Moore.

He had a long association directing the early movies of Pauline Frederick such as Audrey (1916) and Double Crossed (1917), both lost films.

Vignola died in Hollywood, California in 1953 and was buried in St. Agnes Cemetery, Menands, New York.[3]

Partial filmography

From left to right: William Randolph Hearst, Vignola and Arthur Brisbane in New York, during the filming of Vignola's The World and His Wife (1920)

Actor

Director

Scene from Under Cover (1916)

References

  1. ↑ Alfred Krautz, Hille Krautz, Joris Krautz, Encyclopedia of film directors in the United States of America and Europe, Volume 2, Saur, 1997, p.221
  2. ↑ John T. Soister, American Silent Horror, Science Fiction and Fantasy Feature Films, 1913-1929, McFarland, 2012, p.41
  3. ↑ Robert G. Vignola; allmovie.com
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