Queer Places:
Motion Picture & Television Fund, 23388 Mulholland Dr, Woodland Hills, CA 91364
Valhalla Memorial Park
North Hollywood, Los Angeles County, California, USA
Edwin
August Phillip von der Butz[2]
(November 10, 1883 – March 4, 1964) was an American actor, director, and
screenwriter of the silent era. A co-star, Blanche Sweet, would later bluntly
state - "He was a homo." He was friends with gay silent film star
J. Warren Kerrigan and most
likely Kerrigan's long time partner
James Vincent.
Edwin was born Edwin August Phillip von der Butz in St. Louis, Missouri on November 20, 1883 to August Butz and Sarah Mykins. He was educated at the Christian Brothers College. He began working with Biograph Studios in New York as early as 1908 and moved to Hollywood with that company in 1910. He moved over to Universal where he met Kerrigan. He starred in several films by D. W. Griffith, who was also with the company. August was in many of the master's early works: The Welcome Burglar, The Cardinal's Conspiracy, White Roses, A Blot on the 'Scutcheon, The Girl and Her Trust. August continued to work well into the 1930s as a writer and director. Early one with Griffith, he began writing scripts as well as acting, including the lovely The Mender of Nets (1912) with Mary Pickford. When he moved up to Universal, it was as writer-director. The trades praised his split-screen effects in A Stolen Identity (1913), for which he not only served as writer and director but also as actor in the two leading parts (the film is now lost). He appeared in 152 films between 1909 and 1947. He also directed 52 films between 1912 and 1919. He co-founded Eaco Films in 1914.[3]
The reclusive August had few people out to his chicken ranch at 648 South Figueroa, but Kerrigan was one of them, which a fan magazines noted without further comment, beside mentioning "the house of time and fun" it took to prepare August's signature dish, pimento haricots.
In 1916, he entered his name as a candidate for President of the United States, and spoke out against censorship in cinema. The candidate wasn't taken very seriously, and perhaps that wasn't the point. He didn't like the road that his industry was going down, and wanted to voice his opinion in the hope of change.
Although he'd play bit parts in films right up to 1947, he ended up having to play Santa Claus in Beverly Hills department store to pay the bills. Edwin passed away from cerebral metastatic disease on March 4, 1964 at the Motion Picture County Hospital in Woodland Hills, Los Angeles County, California. He was interred on March 6 in an unmarked grave at Valhalla Memorial Park in North Hollywood.
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