Silent era screenwriter Frederica Sagor Maas, who penned a handful of Jazz Age comedies and dramas including the 1927 Louise Brooks film, Rolled Stockings, died on January 5th at age 111.
The former La Mesa, California resident and "supercentarian" was one of the last surviving personalities from the silent film era, and perhaps the very last individual associated with one of Brooks’ silent films. Maas was also considered the second oldest person in California.
As a woman, Maas was often assigned work on flapper comedies and light dramas. Her first big success, The Plastic Age (1925), was a smash hit for Clara Bow, the “It girl.” Maas' screenwriting and story efforts – sometimes credited, sometimes not – include other Bow films like Dance Madness (1926), Hula (1927), and Red Hair (1928), two films featuring friend Norma Shearer, His Secretary (1925) and The Waning Sex (1926), the Garbo movie Flesh and the Devil (1926), and the now lost Brooks film Rolled Stockings (1927).
Rolled Stockings is a romantic drama set among carousing college students. It was one of a number of similarly-themed films aimed toward the youth market. To add a bit of verisimilitude, Rolled Stockings was filmed largely on and around the campus at the University of California, Berkeley.
The Richard Rosson-directed film was made for Paramount, and features the Paramount "junior stars." Besides Brooks, its cast includes then up-and-comers Richard Arlen, James Hall, Nancy Phillips, and El Brendel. Rolled Stockings, adapted from an original story idea by Frederica Sagor, proved popular in the summer of 1927 – and not only in the United States. It also played across Latin America and Europe.
In its review, the New York Morning Telegraph wrote, “Freddy Sagor has written quite a nice little story . . . . ,” while Robert E. Sherwood, writing in Life, called Rolled Stockings“ . . . a surprisingly nice comedy . . . the characters are of importance, and they are nicely represented by the adroit Louise Brooks.”
Even the critic for the Ann Arbor Times News, a college town newspaper,stated “The three stars, Louise Brooks, James Hall and Richard Arlen are so thoroughly likeable and the story so different from the usual line of college bunk, that Rolled Stockings proves to be a delightful bit of cinema entertainment.”
In 1999, at the urging of film historian Kevin Brownlow, Maas published her autobiography, The Shocking Miss Pilgrim: A Writer in Early Hollywood (University Press of Kentucky). Maas was 99 at the time. In the book, she recalled her life both in and out of Hollywood - as well as her remembrances of Rolled Stockings and impressions of Brooks.
In 1995, Thomas Gladysz founded the Louise Brooks Society, an internet-based archive and international fan club devoted to the silent film star. Gladysz has contributed to books, organized exhibits, appeared on television and radio, and introduced the actress's films around the world. In 1999, he interviewed and hosted two events with Frederica Sagor Mass.
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