In the chapter on the limitations of the photoplay stage we have already said something about the inadvisability of calling (in your scenario) for elaborate snow-and rain-storm effects.  But of course it is another matter to plan stories with winter or with summer backgrounds.  Take into consideration that most of the Eastern companies, once the winter season is at hand, look for stories that may be done mostly in the studios, with interior settings.  If the company has a branch studio in California or in Florida—­facts which you can easily learn from the trade publications—­they will very probably take suitable stories calling for outdoor scenes.  As the winter season approaches its end you begin to offer scripts that call for exterior scenes, though, of course, there are some scenes which it would not be possible to do until summer is well advanced.

It is impossible here to lay down any exact rules for submitting to any company; you must be guided by your good judgment and your acquired knowledge of how the company to which you submit your scripts has its field-forces distributed.  But in order to make scripts acceptable for production by a company that has a field-force working, say, in the Adirondacks, it is necessary to get your stories to them in good time.  Therefore, post yourself concerning the movements of the various companies, and when you learn that a certain concern has a field-company in the West Indies, send them the best script you have or can write, suited to the locality in which they are working.  If it is accepted, you may be sure that the editor will be very glad to keep you informed as to how long they are going to stay.  In that way you will avoid sending to a company a story with a Jamaican background when the field-company has been moved to the Delaware Water Gap region.

7.  Hackneyed Themes

Here is a list of subjects no longer wanted by the editors—­unless the theme is given a decidedly new twist—­because they have become hackneyed from being done so often.  Many such lists have been printed in the various motion-picture trade-papers and the different magazines for writers.  We give the tabooed themes that have so far been listed, and others drawn from different sources.  A careful study of this list may save you from wasting your time writing a story that has already been done—­perhaps two or three times, in one form or another—­in every studio.

(1) The brother and sister, orphaned in infancy, parted by adoption and reunited in later life.  They fall in love, only to discover the blood relationship.

(2) The little child stolen by gypsies, and restored to her family in later life, generally by means of a favorite song.

(3) The discharged workman who goes to do injury to his former employer, but who performs some rescue instead and gets his job back.

(4) The poor man who attends a fashionable dinner.  He conceals in his clothing delicacies for his sick wife.  A ring or other valuable is lost.  He alone of the party refuses to be searched.  The valuable is found and his story comes out.