The End of the Tour (1917) User Reviews

Authentic pictures of joys and sorrows

[deickemeyer · 6 February 2015]

Many of the scenes in "The End of the Tour," a five-reel screen story of stage life produced by the Columbia Pictures Corporation, are authentic pictures of the joys and sorrows, mostly sorrows, experienced by the members of the small time theatrical companies. Earle Mitchell, the author of the story, and George Baker, the director of the production, have evidently secured their information at first hand. As a consequence nearly all the "stage business" is true to life, and will amuse that large portion of the general public that looks upon the actor as a being apart, and has an insatiable curiosity concerning him and his private affairs. The usual vicissitudes of a traveling company in hard luck are shown in "The End of the Tour," and a romantic story is woven about the leading man of the organization. He gives his last dollar to help the women of the troupe out of town when the company strands, and stays behind with the property man. The two assist the local fire company to put on a benefit performance, in which the daughter of the leading man of the town takes part. Her father objects strongly, and discovers that the actor whom he does not want to associate with his daughter is his own son. The studies of stage and rural types are the best feature of the picture, and have been entrusted to a competent cast. Lionel Barrymore plays the leading man of the Chicago Ideals Theater Company with excellent judgment and makes him human and likable. Walter Hiers, Richard Thornton, Maud Hill, Kate Blancke, Mary Taylor and Hugh Jeffery are the other members of the troupe, and Frank Currier, Ethel Dayton, Charles Eldridge, J. Herbert Frank and William Harvey represent the people of the town. The production has been given careful attention. – The Moving Picture World, February 17, 1917

The 39 Year Old Lionel Barrymore

[Single-Black-Male · 26 February 2003]

By this stage in Lionel Barrymore's career, I am getting bored by his films. It may be because it is silent, and as someone who was born in the talking picture era, this does not do anything for me. Perhaps if he acted with Noble Johnson he might have appealed to a wider audience.