Twelfth Night

Vitagraph’s charming 1910 interpretation features some notably lively performances.

American company Vitagraph Studios’ charming interpretation suffers the tendency of many of their productions in trying to include too much of the play, but it nevertheless has much to commend it. Notably strong individual scenes include Malvolio’s reading of the letter and the location work is commendable.

It also showcases three good performances – Florence Turner’s perky Viola, an unidentified actress (possibly Maris Sais) clearly having fun as Maria, and Charles Kent effortlessly epitomising Malvolio’s pomposity. The surviving version presented here is slightly incomplete, containing 735ft of footage out of the original’s 970.