GLORIA SWANSON IN CHARACTER | SADIE THOMPSON (1928) Oversized photo

[Los Angeles]:  United Artists, [1928]. Vintage original 11 x 14″ (28 x 35 cm.) black-and-white single weight glossy silver gelatin photo. A crease near bottom left corner, attached information blurb on verso. Fine.

Gloria Swanson was at the top of her game in her last silent films produced during the late-1920s. With the funds of lover Joseph P. Kennedy (credited as a Gloria Swanson production), she played some of the finest roles on film.

Based on W. Somerset Maugham’s Rain (which opened on Broadway in 1922), the role of Sadie Thompson — the prostitute who buys into religious faith only to be faced with the hypocrisy it can foster — was originated by Jeanne Eagels, who was in Hollywood at the time turning one of her great plays into a film, The Letter. Swanson would be nominated for the very first Academy Award as Best Actress. This film was lost for years but one surviving print was found in Mary Pickford’s archive, the last reel disintegrated (it has now been reconstructed using photos).