Charles Ray was a silent film

Silent film

A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound, especially with no spoken dialogue. In silent films for entertainment the dialogue is transmitted through muted gestures, pantomime and title cards...

 star. Extremely popular in a series of films casting him in juvenile roles, primarily rural young men, Ray's career faded as he lost his youthful looks- he also had a reputation of being demanding and having an outsized ego. In 1926, he played the lead in Paris

Paris (1926 film)

Paris is a silent film, written and directed by Edmund Goulding, and released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. The film starred Charles Ray, Douglas Gilmore, and Joan Crawford. Ray stars as a young American millionaire named Jerry who is vacationing in Paris and visits an Apache den, the Birdcage Cafe,...

opposite a young Joan Crawford

Joan Crawford

Joan Crawford , born Lucille Fay LeSueur, was an American actress in film, television and theatre....

.

However, an attempt to switch careers and play sophisticated men-of-the-world was not a success. An elaborate and expensive self-produced version of The Courtship of Miles Standish

The Courtship of Miles Standish (1923 film)

The Courtship of Miles Standish was an ambitious and costly historical silent film produced by and starring Charles Ray.The film was based on the famous Henry Wadsworth Longfellow poem The Courtship of Miles Standish. This movie famously bankrupted Ray costing him his life savings garnered from...

(1923), a film now considered a lost film

Lost film

A lost film is a feature film or short film that is no longer known to exist in studio archives, private collections or public archives such as the Library of Congress, where at least one copy of all American films are deposited and catalogued for copyright reasons...

, was also not a success. Ray finished his career in small parts, dying from an infected tooth at the age of 52.

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