Volume II: Filmography

BRETHREN OF THE SACRED FISH

Production stills: (L) with William Russell courtesy of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. (F-571-2) and

(R) James Cruze in the background with the dark hat, looking on courtesy of the American Museum of the Moving Image/Lawrence Williams Collection (M-23-X)

July 20, 1913 (Sunday)

Length: 1 reel (1,000 feet)

Character: "A comedy of secret signs and signals"

Cast: William Russell, Riley Chamberlin, Bill Noel, and most of the male members of the Thanhouser stock players (as club members)

ADVERTISEMENT, The New York Dramatic Mirror, July 16, 1913:

"A druggist is in love with a girl who is annoyed by a butcher whom she wants thrashed. In fact, she tells the druggist she will only marry him if he will pummel the butcher, who is a great deal bigger and broader than the druggist. But the latter remembers that the butcher has a fondness for joining secret societies, and induces him to enter one in which the druggist is grand master. The butcher immediately 'gets his' and the love of the girl."

SYNOPSIS, The Moving Picture World, July 26, 1913:

"The butcher was a very large and muscular man. He was the town's champion boxer, and those who dared to contest his title always got the worst of it. The druggist was not athletic and he was timid. He loved a girl who read romantic novels, and who idolized the dashing heroes of books, who triumphed despite all obstacles. The druggist was not at all dashing. The girl knew it and despised him. The girl was passing the butcher's shop when she slipped and fell. The butcher rudely laughed, and the girl, her mind bent on vengeance, sought out the druggist and hissed, 'slay the dragon and I am thine.' She referred to the butcher, and the druggist knew it. A hero of slender physique can thrash a 200 pound villain in a novel, but in real life-! The girl insisted that all was over between them unless the butcher was punished, so it had to be done. The vulnerable spot in this Achilles of the meat shop was that he belonged to all the secret societies in town, and prided himself that he could exchange salutations with the brethren of all organizations. The druggist, who had more brains than muscle, recalled this fact, and resolved to profit by it. In a day or two it was announced that a new secret society, 'The Brethren of the Sacred Fish,' had been organized, and the butcher tried to join it. The druggist, who was the grand master, apparently did not care to take any more members, finally consented to accept the anxious butcher.

"The meat dealer had a very strenuous initiation in the lodge room and then was taken in front of the drug store 'to learn humility at the hands of a worthy grand master.' The girl was present and breathlessly watched her champion pummel the unresisting butcher. She did not know it was an 'initiation,' and gladly consented to marry the druggist at once. It was not until the happy pair where safely on their honeymoon that the butcher learned that the new honor was an empty one, for 'The Brethren of the Sacred Fish' was dissolved."

REVIEW, The Morning Telegraph, July 27, 1913:

"Good judgment was used in the selection of the scenario for this picture, which presents one of the funniest of the season. What the Brethren of the Sacred Fish, a temporary fraternity organized for a joke, did not do to the novice in the way of initiation requisites is not worth speaking about."

REVIEW, The Moving Picture World, July 26, 1913:

"A very pleasing little comedy, in which the butcher is a 'joiner' and is initiated into the new lodge in a very funny manner. A lot of good, clean amusement in this and plenty of action."

REVIEW, The New York Dramatic Mirror, July 30, 1913: This review is reprinted in the narrative section of the present work.

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