e of opinions in the answering: Of two men, both possessed of
a natural talent and love for music, which would be likely first to
learn to play upon the cornet correctly and with pleasing
expression--the man who had previously learned the technique of violin
playing, together with the meaning and value of musical terms, or the
one who, without any knowledge of music or of how to perform, should
suddenly determine to learn to play a given instrument?

_2. Photoplay Writing Requires a Separate Training_

Apply the same reasoning to the question of who should _become_ the
most successful photoplaywright--the trained and experienced fiction
writer, or the ordinarily intelligent and imaginative follower of some
other vocation, who is suddenly struck by the idea that he could, and
filled with the determination that he will, write a photoplay. We
accentuate the word _become_ in order to emphasize the fact that even
the professional writer _must_ learn the _technique_ of photoplay
construction before he can hope to produce a script that will not only
be accepted by a film manufacturing company for production, but will
be produced exactly as he has written it, _without the need of drastic
revision or rewriting_. This, however, is very rare today.

This last point is important. While, as we have said, it is improbable
that an experienced fiction writer would fail in the field of
photoplay writing once he had learned to put the plot together in
proper form and had mastered a knowledge of the limitations of the
moving-picture stage, it is also just as unlikely that the most famous
writer living could legitimately sell a photoplay that was essentially
faulty in construction and absolutely lacking in screen quality. If
the idea were a good one and the writer were to submit it to the
producing company under his own name, the chance is that the company
would accept it, and, after using his idea to construct the photoplay
in proper form, produce and even feature it--on account of the big
name won in the field of fiction writing. If, on the other hand, he
should submit it under a pen name it is possible that, provided the
plot, or even the fundamental idea, proved to be exceptionally good,
he might be offered a moderate sum for the plot or for the idea alone,
to be worked up and produced as the director thought best. In making
him the offer, the company would probably explain quite frankly that
the script was not suitably constructed