ABSTRACT
Mary Pickford spoke of the importance of educating and uplifting audiences and preserving film and its history and shaping its legacy. Screenwriter and Pickford intimate Frances Marion was able to sustain her screenwriting career even as other female screenwriters lost ground. She authored several important Pickford profiles for Photo play, including September 1928's "Why Mary Pickford Bobbed Her Hair." She had a complex and intense relationship with her mother: they were mother and daughter, coheads of the household, industry pioneers, and business partners. She had already accomplished the remarkable feat of maintaining her superstar status for more than a decade and a half. She was structured, disciplined, and worked efficiently and doggedly, a perfectionist who did as many take as required. Kiki, she went to work as a salaried, if well-compensated, employee for her United Artists partner Joseph Schenck. For her next project, Pickford returned to Forever Yours, the production she had shuttered in 1930.
