Acting Career
Dark Cloud began working for American Mutoscope and Biograph in New York in 1910, making his first screen appearances in the era of "eastern Westerns" under the direction of D. W. Griffith and with cinematography by Billy Bitzer. Unlike the later Westerns, featuring dramatic conflicts and indolent Natives, these early films showed Native Americans with respect: in serene, nearly still-life profile against a wide landscape, as though in calm reflection on their lives before the treaties were broken. The Song of the Wildwood Flute, with Mary Pickford and Mack Sennett, was filmed near Fishkill, New York. Dark Cloud's first movie, The Broken Doll was made in 1910 in Coytesville, near Fort Lee, New Jersey, where Griffith also filmed Call of the Wild.
Dark Cloud appeared in many Westerns and other films during the 1910s. He moved with Griffith's company to the West Coast in 1912, eventually appearing in at least 34 silent movies in a brief film career of only 8 years, cut short by the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918. He was sometimes billed as Chief Dark Cloud or as William Dark Cloud. After Remington's death, Dark Cloud collaborated on making a 1917 Francis Ford movie, based on John Ermine of Yellowstone, in which "John Darkcloud" appeared as Fire Bear.
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