Elmer Clifton

Who was Elmer Clifton?

Elmer Clifton was an American writer, director, and actor from the early silent days. A collaborator of D.W. Griffith, he appeared in The Birth of a Nation and Intolerance before giving up acting in 1917 to concentrate on work behind the camera, with Griffith and Joseph Henabery were his mentors. His first feature-length solo effort as a director was The Flame of Youth with Jack Mulhall.

Clifton honed his talents during the late 1910s, directing vehicles for Mulhall and Herbert Rawlinson at Universal and then for Dorothy Gish for Famous Players-Lasky. Two of his projects with Gish, Nobody Home and Nugget Nell, featured performances from pre-stardom Rudolph Valentino. Most of this early output has been lost. He was the first filmmaker to discover the talents of Clara Bow, whom he cast in Down to the Sea in Ships, released on March 4, 1923. The independently produced film was well-reviewed for its visual authenticity.

During the 1920s, Clifton directed films for several different studios. During the filming of The Warrens of Virginia for Fox Film Corporation, lead actress Martha Mansfield suffered a fatal accident from burns when her costume caught fire. Clifton directed The Wreck of the Hesperus for Cecil B. deMille's production company, and filmed on location in the Grand Canyon for The Bride of the Colorado. He also directed some Technicolor short films, including Manchu Love with an all-Asian cast.