William C. Thompson, cinematographer in Men Behind the Monsters Forum

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William C. Thompson, cinematographer

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Jelly Roll Norton	William C. Thompson, cinematographer	Lead	[-]
Nov 15 07 1:55 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I was wondering if anyone knew of any biographical material on the cameraman, William C. Thompson. http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0860847/ He's probably best known here as Ed Wood's man behind the lens. His work aided Plan 9 more than most anything else probably did. Even in the modest Daughter of Horror, his work stood out to me. I just noticed that he shot Dwain Esper's Maniac and checking him on imdb, I saw that he was around in the early silent days and did mostly exploitation movies. I recall reading a bit about him in Nightmare of Ecstacy and Weaver's Robert Clarke bio, but I didn't see much on the 'net as far as personal background on him goes. Last Edited By: Jelly Roll Norton Nov 15 07 1:58 PM. Edited 1 time.
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Cadaverino		#1	[-]
Nov 16 07 3:46 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	William Creevy Thompson was born in Bound Brook, New Jersey on 30 March 1889, the son of Walter B. and Elizabeth Thompson. Walter was listed in the 1900 U.S. Census as a broker. Another son was born in 1898. William was working as a real estate agent in the 1910 U.S. Census, when he was 21. He was living with his mother in Montclair, New Jersey. His draft registration card from 1917 decribes him as tall and stout, with red hair and light brown eyes. His occupation was chemist and photographer. He was married and living at the Melrose Hotel in Los Angeles. He listed as his dependents his wife, mother, and disabled brother. In the 1930 U.S. Census, William and his English wife Julia, whom he married four years earlier, owned a home on Fernwood Avenue in Los Angeles. His occupation was motion picture cameraman. With them lived Julia's two sons and two daughters, three of them adults. I cannot find William in the California death index, 1940-1997, although the IMDb says he died in Los Angeles in 1963.
Jelly Roll Norton		#2	[-]
Nov 16 07 1:22 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Thanks a bunch for your efforts, Cadaverino! Did you find this on the internet searching U.S. Census files? I need to learn how to research more effectively.
Cadaverino		#3	[-]
Nov 28 07 4:29 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Sorry for my delay in answering your question. I found all the data at Ancestry.com, a subscription genealogy service.
Jelly Roll Norton		#4	[-]
Dec 4 07 4:28 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Thank you again, my friend!
jbzink		#5	[-]
Mar 16 09 5:53 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I saw your post from a couple years ago. I am the great grandson of William C. Thompson's wife, Julia Halliday Hoyt Thompson, who died in 1957. I have much of Bill's personal effects and photographs. I know of no living relations to give them to. I do appreciate your research. Jim
TomWeaver999		#6	[-]
Mar 16 09 7:25 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	<< I have much of Bill's personal effects and photographs. << If you're a West Coaster, let me recommend the cinema dept. at USC or the Academy Library, where there'll be preserved for all time or 'til the next earthquake, whichever comes first. Then again, if there are movie stars or noted behind-the-scenes folks in the photographs, there's always eBay!
jbzink		#7	[-]
Mar 24 09 9:12 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Thanks Tom. I'll separate the personal family stuff from his business stuff and contact those you recommend. I have a business card of Ed Wood Jr., a bunch of pics from "Paris After Midnight", "Racket Girls", an autograhed photo of Art Lasky, Bill's original typed resume and much more, probably photos and reels no one else has. Jim
Ted Newsom		#8	[-]
Apr 3 09 8:51 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Just cruised through the IMdb list for Mr. Thompson. Amazing. His first credit as D.P. is in the BIRTH OF A NATION era, his last, the era of network TV and drive-ins. If only someone could've sat him down and just let the tape recorder roll. They're not mainstream pictures; most I've never even heard of, much less ever seen, with the odd exploitation exceptions like MANIAC and the Wood films. Still, those things are a genuine part of film's heritage and history. Interesting also that there are so very few credits listed in the 20's. Could be just the obscurity of the sort of things he worked on keep them off the radar; could be he got into some other lilne of work, though I tend to doubt that. And his stuff for the Wood films gives them whatever professional gloss they have.
doctor kiss		#9	[-]
Apr 3 09 4:32 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Ted Newsom wrote: Interesting also that there are so very few credits listed in the 20's. Could be just the obscurity of the sort of things he worked on keep them off the radar; could be he got into some other lilne of work, though I tend to doubt that. And his stuff for the Wood films gives them whatever professional gloss they have. Thompson was making something of a name for himself at Metro until 1918, but he really does seem suddenly to 'drop below the radar' at that point; even his two known 1919 and 1920 credits are misnomers, insofar as they were both pictures shot in 1918 and released belatedly. Not all of his 1910s credits at companies other than Metro are as certain as they appear at the IMDb either, since they've been cribbed from Lauritzen and Lundquist's American Film-Index, which credits photography on several of those pictures to 'William A. Thompson, probably same as William C. Thompson.' To that end, if Jim has a typed resume, it could potentially be a useful document in helping both to correct and to fill a few gaps in WCT's filmography. Thompson's name crops up in several 1953 articles on 3D pictures, asserting that he tried to get several studios interested in a 3D camera of his invention in 1932, but the details are scant at best. When I spoke to Maila Nurmi in 2003, she maintained that Thompson's photography was what made her appearance in PLAN 9 so iconic and memorable; because he photographed her 'silent-movie style' (her words). She added that the original photographer on her TV show had been of silent-era vintage too, with comparable results. Maila-stories... therefore, probably true, but maybe just a little retouched.
jbzink		#10	[-]
Apr 4 09 9:14 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Thanks, doc. If there is a mechanism by which I can scan and upload pics, resumes and so on for those interested in Bill's career, please advise. I suppose I could upload to a url.
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Ted Newsom		#11	[-]
Apr 4 09 11:03 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Scanning, you'll have to do yourself. It's as easy as making a Xerox copy; Kinko's has them, as do some of your friends, probably. Just get some advice on how big to make the file. A really high-grade, high-resolution scan-- great for picture reproduction-- will often be a HUGE digital file and just as often too big to post in a forum. If you want to have one for your own files, keep the image at high resolution, but then make a smaller copy at lower resolution to exchanges or posting on line. An 8x10 still scanned at high resolution will tend to be the equivalent of a photo about four feet wide and two feet high. When you've got an original scan like that, bring it into a program like Photoshop or MS Paint and resize it to a workable image. For posting on-line, you should "Save As" a JPEG file, which are by their nature lower resolution and easier to handle by assorted computers & programs. There's only so much resolution you can ever get on a computer screen anyway; it'll look great. This Yuku board has a build-in upload function, so you don't need to go to an outside loaction like imageshack (which is free anyway). When you want to post an image, click on "Reply" on a previous post, or "New Topic" (Using the "Quick Reply" function will not work; the menu dosen't show up.) A horizontal menu will appear with a lot of little icons in a row. Click on the one that looks like a square "photo" of a mountain landscape with a Sun in the sky. Hit Upload and search for your scan in your own computer, select it, and bingo. Hey, if I can figure it out, anybody can!
sunsetpictures		#12	[-]
Feb 5 13 3:59 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Hi, I realize I'm a little late to the game here, but I was wondering if any of you had followed up on the state of this investigation. Has anyone learned anything more about William C. Thompson? I am interested in his early connections to Canadian cinema - specifically the Canadian Bioscope Company. He made a film with them called "Evangeline", which happened to be the first ever Canadian feature film. Please, if you're still out there, let me know if you heard anything more about this fascinating character. Thanks.
ryanbrennan		#13	[-]
Feb 5 13 8:09 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	For whatever it's worth, Wikipedia says that he had only one eye and IMDB says that he was color blind. Not only is there a paucity of credits in the 1920s, as Ted noted, but he has only one credit for 1916 and one for 1917. That must have been during his service in the military during WWI. If Wikipedia is correct, I wonder if he lost an eye in the war? Last Edited By: ryanbrennan Feb 5 13 8:12 PM. Edited 1 times.
Jelly Roll Norton		#14	[-]
Feb 5 13 10:45 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Interesting developments! I missed seeing those posts in '09. Thompson was represented in Tim Burton's Ed Wood as being color blind. Hope that jbzink returns to this thread...
sunsetpictures		#15	[-]
Feb 6 13 11:47 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Wikipedia also says that he was born in 1899, which would indicate that he shot his first films when he was around 14 years old.. I would stick to more reputable sources. How interesting to hear that he was colorblind (or vision-impaired, if he did in fact only have one eye). With that in mind, what Maila Nurmi had to say about his style is made all the more illuminatory. His aesthetic was made for and within the silent, black and white era. He composed images on the stark basis of formal composition within a frame. This was clearly a successful approach that was giving to some very compelling imagery, despite the fact that it was borne out of certain "impairments". You all seem to be very adept at stretching back into the past to uncover hidden information. Would anyone have any suggestions as to where else I could go to find out more about "Evangeline" - the film I mentioned before? It's been presumed lost, so I'm trying to find as many current connections to it as possible.
ryanbrennan		#16	[-]
Feb 7 13 12:43 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	sunsetpictures wrote: Wikipedia also says that he was born in 1899, which would indicate that he shot his first films when he was around 14 years old.. I would stick to more reputable sources. Which is why my comment is qualified with "for whatever it's worth" as both sources are prone to error.
jbzink		#17	[-]
Mar 3 13 5:41 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Hey everybody, I'm back. Sorry to have been away. This forum was linked to an old email address and it totally slipped my consciousness. Well, Sunset Pictures found me and they will be rolling in to talk to me and my relatives in California to hear stories of Bill Thompson and take a look at all my memorabilia. I'm grateful for all the people who have looked into Bill's life and career. Some of you may know a lot more than I do. I would appreciate any bits of trivia you have. I'm finally going to get a page up with scans of his still photos and any information you have found. Please write me with links to sites, books, articles and so on that are relevant. I'll make a link here so you all can see. William C. Thompson married my great grandmother, Julia Halliday Hoyt several years after her first husband died of influenza in 1920. He took in Julia's children, including my paternal grandmother Helen. I inherited all the photos and letters from my father, who was very close to Bill. It is unfortunate that my father died in January before this "Evangeline" project came to my attention and he could be interviewed. Jim Zink jbzink52@gmail.com
jbzink	Photos	#18	[-]
Mar 3 13 6:12 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I have a gallery here. Enjoy. Please do not use without permission.
ryanbrennan		#19	[-]
Mar 4 13 4:49 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Wow, that's some terrific stuff! I especially like the behind-the-scenes picture with Ed Wood & Criswell and the astounding shot with the She-Monster. Just great.
doctor kiss		#20	[-]
Mar 4 13 5:24 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Indeed, this is a really great collection of material, and the extremely candid 1958 remarks about Ed Wood are fabulous! The three-page résumé is particularly revealing, confirming which silent movie credits really belong to William C. Thompson and also explaining why he 'disappears below the radar' for the most part in the 1920s, when he moved into scientific, industrial and instructional films. It's interesting that the 3D camera he devised in the 1930s was for Bryan Foy Productions, as this helps to explain the references to it that I found in the press in 1953 --- all of which were essentially promotional pieces for the 3D feature HOUSE OF WAX... produced by Bryan Foy! Also of note (among many other things) are the two Eastmancolor USAF instructional shorts from the late 1950s, OPERATIONS DITCHING and SPACE GUIDANCE AND CONTROL; these are both titles I've encountered previously, but in the context of Ed Wood having directed them. For those who've kept track of the labyrinthine 'Cinema of Dwain Esper' thread over the past years [link if you have a few hours to work through it!], it's revealing to see William C. Thompson also dealing in prints of former Lloyd Friedgen releases discussed on that thread, such as OUTRAGES OF THE ORIENT and FORBIDDEN WOMEN. Add that to the recommendation letter from Dan Sonney commending the 'between 40 and 50' (!) movies photographed by William C. Thompson that Sonney had distributed, and his link with the whole 'roadshow attraction' marketplace is underlined even more clearly. In which regard, the photo of William C. Thompson alongside the lion puts me in mind of one of the more obscure pre-MANIAC features with which Dwain Esper was associated (and on which WCT is indeed credited as photographer), the Spanish-language LA JAULA DE LOS LEONES ('The Lion's Jaws', 1930): sunsetpictures wrote: Would anyone have any suggestions as to where else I could go to find out more about "Evangeline" - the film I mentioned before? It's been presumed lost, so I'm trying to find as many current connections to it as possible. You may already have seen this, but there's some reasonably substantial coverage of EVANGELINE in US trade journal Moving Picture World volumes 18 (Oct.-Dec. 1913) and especially 19 (Jan.-Mar. 1914), available in digital form at: http://archive.org/details/movingpicturewor18newy http://archive.org/details/movingpicturewor19newy Aside from some full-page ads [link to an example], vol. 19 also contains a review of the movie (p.662), a lengthy reel-by-reel synopsis of the feature (p.726-8) and various tidbits relating to the fact it was screened for the trade in New York during the same week that it opened in Halifax... for example (p.557): 'H.T. Oliver, vice-president and general manager of the Canadian Bioscope Company, and W. Thompson, chief photographer, have arrived in New York. Evangeline has been completed, and will be ready to be shown some time next week.' Vol. 18, meanwhile, already contains a couple of full-page ads announcing the feature to the US trade in Oct/Nov. 1913. There are also some minor ads/references to the movie in trade journals Motography and The Billboard, but nothing that adds anything to the MPW coverage. Last Edited By: doctor kiss Mar 4 13 5:27 AM. Edited 1 times.
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William C. Thompson, cinematographer

William C. Thompson, cinematographer