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THE EDUCATION OF MABEL

Marilyn Slater

Back in 1973, a schoolmate of Mabel Normand's was interviewed by Elaine Boies of the Staten Island Advance published October 8, 1973. The lady is not named but is only referred to as an octogenarian. She is quoted however as remembering Mabel as “a lovely girl,” with a “happy-go-lucky” personality. “We always used to say, ‘Mabel Normand’s a screwball,’ she laughed.

The school the girls attended was Public School #17 in New Brighton on Staten Island, New York. Mabel was the most famous comedienne from Staten Island and the first. There were her fantastic Sennett productions Molly O’ (1921), Suzanna (1922) and The Extra Girl (1923) and her own production Mickey (1918), these were all films, which feature Mabel, and there were also comedies where she was paired with greats, like Charlie Chaplin and Roscoe Arbuckle. There is also the long list of comedy shorts she made, her work with Sam Goldwyn and Hal Roach.

Mabel was quite protective of her personal life and is not known to discuss much about her educational background.

David Merrick, the producer, introduced her to the theater-going public in a musical by Michael Stewart and Jerry Herman, which opened on Broadway in 1973. It has become part of many regional theaters and the albums of both the original and London casts are still very popular. The Broadway show was directed by the wonderful Gower Champion; Bernadette Peters sang the part of Mabel. The première of Mack & Mabel was in Los Angeles and I was there.

Mabel is reported to have been born in a whole range of places from Boston, Providence, Staten Island, Atlanta, Québec to even a whimsical tale by Adele Rogers St. Johns that “we found her under a rosebush.”

The rosebush may have been one growing in front of a Tysen St. house, in New Brighton, Staten Island on November 10, 1893.

The Claude Normand family moved to Sands St., in Stapleton, with the ‘baby’ Mabel, where she spent most of her childhood.

As with her birth, her educational background is also rather dim, but most likely as her former schoolmate stated it was at Public School #17. There were statements from others that Mabel attended Westerleigh Collegiate Institute. Mabel said in an interview that she went to school near Martha’s Vineyard and yes, there is also the story of the Boston Convent. Again, Adele Rogers St. John out does them all with the story that Mabel never went to school.

She was a champion swimmer; a known ‘tomboy’, Mabel’s innocent, demure beauty transported her into modeling at the age of 13, which while still in her teens lead to work with the genius D. W. Griffith. He became her film teacher and Mabel went on to become a world-renowned moviemaker, but frankly she is best known as a comedy actress. It was while working with Griffith that Mabel met a young actor named Mack Sennett with whom she collaborated with, in the heady early days of filmmaking. They worked together at Keystone and fall in love. It was a bittersweet relationship of which Mack Sennett described in King of Comedy. He writes that; “Mabel was frisky, skittery as a waterbug, and oh, my Lord, how pretty! She turned any place she was into an uproar. . .”

NOTES

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Notes:

1. Boies, Elaine; 1973, October 8; “Former schoolmates recall Island star of silent films” Staten Island Advance

2. Alvarez, Guido; photos of the homes of Mabel Normand

3. Looking-for-Mabel Collection; postcard of Public School #17 in New Brighton on Staten Island, New York

4. IMDb, Mabel Normand films

5. Mack & Mabel, October 6, 1973; opened at the Majestic Theater, New York City. Based on an idea by Leonard Spigelgass, with Robert Preston and Bernadette Peters.

6. Motion Picture Magazine, October 1918, Who's Who in Starland; “Mabel Normand ¾ Born in Boston, Mass. Dark brown eyes, fluffy black hair, weighs 112 lbs. Artist's model for C. Coles Phillips, Henry Hutt, Penhrhyn Stanlaws.”

7. Mack Sennett, searched birth and baptism records in Providence, Rhode Island convinced Mabel Normand was born in Providence.

8. Gaddis, Pearl; Motion Picture, December 1916; The Dream That Came True:… “And now for some facts about the girl who has worked so courageously to make her dream come true. She was born in Atlanta, Georgia, and educated there. When she was about sixteen, her parents moved to New York, where she first began her way in an art as an artist's model.”

9. New York Times, February 24, 1930; MABEL NORMAND, FILM STAR, DEAD Miss Normand was born on Nov. 10, 1897, at Quebec, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Claude C. Normand.

10. Federal Census records: 1900, 1910, 1920. Mabel Normand born November 10, 1893, New Brighton, Staten Island

11. Rogers St. Johns, Adele, Honey Comb,

“struggles as an orphan, slaving in the hell-holes of the garment factories of New York” … “we found her under a rosebush.”

12. Westerleigh Collegiate Institute was founded in 1895. It was the first school on Staten Island to provide a complete kindergarten-college education. The neighborhood, previously called National Prohibition Park.

13. Los Angeles Examiner, February 17, 1924 Mabel Normand's Own Life Story! -- Chapter 1 by Mabel Normand as told to Chandler Sprague Filmland's Greatest Comedienne Writes of Her Striking Career … “Up to the time I left school there was nothing eventful or particularly interesting in my life. My mother lived on Staten Island and I attended school, the last few years, at North Westport, Mass., near Martha's Vineyard. Once a month I went home, in charge of a stewardess on the Fall River Line, but I stayed at school, during the summer, studying hard and trying to skip a class and get ahead faster. I was tremendously ambitious in those days. We had very little money and even my occasional trips home were a great expense.”

14. Motion Picture News; August 9, 1913, "She is an accomplished horsewoman and a champion swimmer and high diver and before entering picture work was recognized as one of the best women swimmers in the world. She is athletic to a degree and fond of outdoor sports of all kinds, in many of which she excels her male competitors.

15. Barlett, Randolph; Photoplay, August 1918; Would You Ever Suspect It? That has been her history -- being ready. Not so many years ago, as the calendar counts time, she was living in Staten Island, just down the bay from New York. She wanted to earn her own living, and it was not long before she found a place as a model for artists. Charles Dana Gibson, James Montgomery Flagg, and other noted illustrators.

16. Handy, Truman B.; Movie Weekly, July 1, 1922;Double Crossed By A Friend Shatters Mabel Normand's Life

“In those very early days she struggled and worked as a member of Griffith's first stock company.”

. . . “Finally she met Mack Sennett, who, himself, was starting in to mould his career and his fortune.

He was attracted to her. She was so fresh, so unspoiled! Her heart was as big as all out-doors, and, too, she had the real ability that he was looking for.”

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