1431450
Douglas Fairbanks, Sr.
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Vintage Sergis Alberts portrait of the Swashbuckler, the King of Hollywood
Douglas Fairbanks, Sr., born Douglas Elton Thomas Ullman, 1883–1939. American silent film actor. 7½" x 9" black-and-white portrait photograph signed Sincerely / Douglas Fairbanks on the back.
This is a vintage portrait of Fairbanks by Hollywood star photographer Sergis Alberts (1884–1941), whose stamp appears at the lower left. Alberts, the son of the official photographer to Czar Nicholas II of Russia, photographed such prominent people as actress Jean Parker, actor Nikita Balieff, artist Alice Barney, and newspaper cartoonist George McManus. His son, Maxwell Sergis Alberts, also became a photographer to the stars, shooting such luminaries as Greta Garbo, Elizabeth Taylor, Howard Hughes, and Eleanor Roosevelt.
Fairbanks and his wife, actress Mary Pickford, were "Hollywood Royalty." By 1918, the energetic, athletic Fairbanks had made 29 films and was Hollywood's most popular actor—the "King of Hollywood"—and the third highest-paid, behind Pickford and Charles Chaplin. But his best years were yet to come. In 1920, he married Pickford and launched a series of swashbuckling adventure-costume films that made him a superstar: The Mark of Zorro (1920), The Three Musketeers (1921), Douglas Fairbanks in Robin Hood (1922), The Thief of Bagdad (1924), The Black Pirate (1926), and The Gaucho (1927).
Fairbanks, Pickford, Chaplin, and D. W. Griffith formed United Artists in 1919, giving them control over both their films and the money that they earned. Fairbanks became the first president of the Motion Picture Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1927 and presented the first Academy Awards. The same year, Fairbanks and Pickford were the first to mold their hand- and footprints in the concrete at Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood.
Fairbanks has signed this photo on the back with a huge 8½" black fountain pen signature. The photograph has been slightly irregularly trimmed. There are scattered handling bends, a foxing spot and minor pencil notations on the back, and archivally repaired tears at the bottom and right edges and at the top right corner. None of these affects Fairbanks's magnificent inscription and signature. Overall the photo is in good to very good condition.
This is a nice memento from the golden age of silent films.
Unframed.
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