The Unknown purple

   Roland West and Carlyle Moore collaborated on this three-act (plus prologue) drama produced by West at the Lyric Theatre, where it opened on 14 September 1918 for 273 performances. Richard Bennett's performance as Peter Marchmont, an inventor framed for a crime by his cheating wife and her lover, was credited with much of the production's success, as well as the use of flashbacks, a technique Elmer Rice had pioneered effectively in On Trial four years earlier. Once out of jail, Marchmont invents a machine that makes him invisible (except for a telltale purple light), allowing him to seek revenge. West directed a 1923 motion picture version starring Henry B. Walthall.