[about getting the role of Holofernes in
Giuditta di Betulla (1914)] I hadn't expected to play Holofernes
because I wasn't the type physically. I stayed away from the studio,
but [director
D.W. Griffith] sent for me. I said, "I can't
play the part; I'm too much of a shrimp". But he had tried out a lot of
actors, and finally decided that I could do the part to suit him better
than anybody else could. So he found a way, just as he always did. He
put me on a pedestal and put brass armor on me. I looked like a giant.
I stayed up there either on my throne or on a couch all the time. I had
two broadswords, and I threw those broadswords around like a giant. The
only other time you saw me I was riding in a chariot across the
battlefield and, of course, that made me look tall. No, Griffith never
said to me, "You're too small!"
