Captain Billy's Whiz Bang, April 1922 · page 6 of 67
Captain Billy's Whiz Bang #32 — page 6: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This is editorial commentary on the William Desmond Taylor murder case—a real 1922 Hollywood scandal where the prominent film director was killed in Los Angeles. The magazine defends the film industry against public backlash. The piece criticizes sensationalism: Taylor, described as talented and ethical, was murdered, yet the public immediately scrutinized his personal life (he used a stage name) rather than focusing on finding his killer. The author calls this "buncombe" and "imbecilic." The satire targets Frank Mayo, an actor quoted as denouncing Hollywood as "pernicious"—the magazine mocks this as hypocritical self-flagellation by someone within the industry itself. The author argues the anti-Hollywood campaign exploiting Taylor's death is unfair mud-slinging driven by sensationalism rather than justice or reasoned criticism.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
4 Captain Billy's Whiz Bang HOWEVER, what are we coming to, is that the noisy movie people have their prototypes everywhere in society and its numerous substrata, and we for one are not going to make any scavenger's holiday out of the William Desmond Taylor murder mess in Los Angeles. Taylor appears to have been an artist of high calibre—hard-working, earnest, capable and a gentleman. But he permitted himself to be murdered—and he was a movie director. Consequently the public immediately put Taylor on trial. They dragged his name through the mud, swishing, swashing. Having put Taylor on trial, it was found that he had taken a stage name—a common thing in the movie and the fight game. But when a man gets murdered he ought to be more careful. Man of mystery, “Dual life.” Perhaps yes and perhaps no. But a lot of buncombe, any way you look at is—Imbecilic, puerile. That's what we think of the campaign of calumny against the motion picture colony growing out of the Taylor murder. * * * THE other day we read a statement from Frank Mayo, a movie actor, who burst out with this denunciation: “The Holly-wood film colony is a pernicious influence.