Remembrance Wall

Title: Molly O’

Date: 1921

Distributor: Mack Sennett--Mabel Normand Productions

Director: F. Richard Jones

Cast: Mabel Normand, Geroge Nichols, Anna Hernandez, Albert Hackett, Eddie Gribbon, Jack Mulhall, Lowell Sherman, Jacqueline Logan, Ben Deely, Gloria Davenport, Carl Stockdale, Eugenie Besserer

Summary: Molly O'Dair, whose mother is a washerwoman and whose father is a ditch-digger, sees the picture of Dr. John Bryant, an eligible young bachelor millionaire, in the newspaper and falls in love with him. Later she meets him at the country club where she goes to deliver washing, and attracted by her charms, he gives her a ride in his car. Bryant's fiancée, Miriam, understands, and at a masked ball, when he mistakes Molly for her, she returns his ring. Molly is thrown into a compromising situation with the doctor owing to the interference of Jim Smith, Mr. O'Dair's choice for her, and consequently she is turned into the street. Finding her in Bryant's bedroom the following morning, O'Dair is about to shoot him, but he learns that they are married. Later, Molly is abducted by a society crook in a dirigible, but she is rescued and reunited with her husband.

Notes: For nearly two decades, the only known surviving footage of Molly O' was a segment preserved by the UCLA Film and Television Archive. Several years ago, it was confirmed that Gosfilmofond of Russia held a negative made from a worn nitrate print that was missing one reel and had many of the slapstick sequences removed. These materials have been augmented with better-condition materials and some missing sections provided by the Douris Corporation and the Library of Congress by UCLA. Original titles have been re-created, and the remaining missing sequences abridged through stills and synopses from the Mack Sennett collection at the Margaret Herrick Library of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.