Eyes of Youth

   Charles Guernon and Max Marcin collaborated on this popular melodramatic comedy starring Marjorie Rambeau. Eyes of Youth opened on 22 August 1917 for a remarkable 414 performances at Maxine Elliott's Theatre (the production transferred to the 39th Street Theatre for the last month of its long run) in an A. H. Woods-shubert production. A mystic identifies four possible life paths to Gina Ashling, but must not tell her one of the four forecasts. The three choices that are told range from a career as an incompetent schoolteacher with an unhappy love life to success as an amoral prima donna or a descent into prostitution. Instead of choosing the revealed paths, Gina decides on the unknown. The impressive Broadway run of Eyes of Youth was matched by great popularity on tour. A 1919 silent motion picture version, starring Clara Kemble Young, with a young Rudolph Valentino in a supporting role, was modestly successful.