Overlooking the Mack Sennett studios as they appeared in 1916
Photo & Art Gallery




Mabel Normand and Mack Sennett in their production offices, c. 1918

Permit for studio construction


frame from "Molly O" (Mabel Normand, center)

Sennett offered Normand her own film company and studio - the Mabel Normand Feature Film Company. One of the first projects of the new film company was "Mickey" (1918), starring Normand in the title role as a girl from the wilds of California who is sent to live with her high-society relatives in the East. The film effectively combined comedy with melodrama, and showed audiences another side of Normand's talent as an actress. But the pressure of running her own film company and studio, in addition to starring in the films, proved to be too much for Normand. She left Sennett and went to work for the Goldwyn Pictures Corporation for a few years, but returned to Sennett to star in "Molly O'" (1921).

back to history page