1915 in film

Events

February 8 : D.W Griffith's The Birth of a Nation premieres at Clune's Auditorium Los Angeles and breaks both box office and film length records (running at a total length of over three hours).

June 18 : The Motion Picture Directors Association (MPDA) is formed by twenty-six film directors in Los Angeles, California.

September 11: A nitrate fire at Famous Players in New York destroys several completed but unreleased silent films which are later remade. Films lost include Mary Pickford's Esmerelda and The Foundling and John Barrymore's The Red Widow.

November 18 : Release of Inspiration, the first mainstream movie in which a leading actress (Audrey Munson) appears nude.

The Allan Dwan directed film David Harum is released. The film is the first in long line of a successful romantic onscreen pairings of actors May Allison and Harold Lockwood.

The Duplex Corporation creates a Split Duplex, an early widescreen film format where the film image is rotated 90 degrees and occupies half of a conventional frame.

Notable films released in 1915

All following films are American, except where stated.

Assunta Spina, starring Francesca Bertini - (Italy)

The Birth of a Nation, directed by D. W. Griffith, starring Lillian Gish

Carmen, directed by Cecil B. DeMille, starring Geraldine Farrar

Carmen, directed by Raoul Walsh, starring Theda Bara

The Champion, starring Charles Chaplin and Edna Purviance

The Cheat, directed by Cecil B. DeMille, starring Fannie Ward and Sessue Hayakawa

The Crazy Clock Maker

Double Trouble, starring Douglas Fairbanks

Enoch Arden, starring Lillian Gish

Fatty's Spooning Days, starring Fatty Arbuckle, Mabel Normand, and The Keystone Cops

Filibus - (Italy)

A Fool There Was, starring Theda Bara

Four Feathers

The Golden Chance, directed by Cecil B. DeMille, starring Cleo Ridgely and Wallace Reid

The Golem (Der Golem), directed by and starring Paul Wegener - (Germany)

The Immigrant

Inspiration

The Italian

The Lamb, starring Douglas Fairbanks

Madame Butterfly, directed by Sidney Olcott, starring Mary Pickford

The Man Who Stayed at Home - (GB)

Martyrs of the Alamo

The Raven

Regeneration, directed by Raoul Walsh, starring Rockliffe Fellowes and Anna Q. Nilsson

The Senator, directed by Joseph A. Golden

The Soul of Broadway

The Tramp, directed by and starring Charles Chaplin

Le traquenard, starring Irène Bordoni - (France)

The Two Orphans, starring Theda Bara

Work, directed by & starring Charles Chaplin

Short film series

Broncho Billy Anderson (1910–1916)

Harold Lloyd (1913–1921)

Charlie Chaplin (1914–1923)

Births

January 9

Anita Louise, actress (died 1970)

Fernando Lamas, actor (died 1982)

January 11 - Veda Ann Borg, actress (died 1973)

January 26 - William Hopper, actor; son of Hedda Hopper (died 1970)

January 29 - Bill Peet, Disney author and illustrator (died 2002)

January 30 - Dorothy Dell, actress (died 1934)

February 7 - Eddie Bracken, actor (died 2002)

February 12 - Lorne Greene, actor (died 1987)

February 21 - Ann Sheridan, actress (died 1967)

February 23 - Jon Hall, actor (died 1979)

February 28 - Zero Mostel, actor (died 1977)

March 2 - Lona Andre, actress (died 1992)

March 17 - Henry Bumstead, art director (died 2006)

March 19 - Patricia Morison, actress

April 10 - Harry Morgan, American actor (died 2011)

April 21 - Anthony Quinn, actor (died 2001)

May 5 - Alice Faye, actress, (died 1998)

May 6 - Orson Welles, actor, director (died 1985)

May 8 - John Archer, American actor (died 1999)

May 19 - Renée Asherson, actress, (died 2014)

June 12 - Priscilla Lane, singer, actress (died 1995)

August 2 - Gary Merrill, actor (died 1990)

August 15 - Signe Hasso, (died 2002)

August 29 - Ingrid Bergman, actress (died 1982)

September 5 - Jack Buetel, actor (died 1989)

September 10 - Edmond O'Brien, actor (died 1985)

September 14 - Douglas Kennedy, actor (died 1973)

October 29 - Evi Rauer, Estonian actress (died 2004)

December 7 - Eli Wallach, actor (died 2014)

December 12 - Frank Sinatra, singer, actor (died 1998)

December 13 - Curd Jürgens, actor (died 1982)

December 14 - Dan Dailey, actor (died 1978)

Deaths

January 10 - Marshall P. Wilder, 55, American diminutive stage and screen actor

April 26 – John Bunny, 51, American silent film comedian, A Strand of Blond Hair(short), Bunny's Little Brother(short), Bunny Backslides(short)

June 5 - John C. Rice, 58, stage and film actor, The Kiss

June 16 - Elmer Booth, 32, American silent screen actor, brother of film editor Margaret Booth, The Musketeers of Pig Alley, The Narrow Road, An Unseen Enemy

October 31 - Blanche Walsh, 42, American stage actress appeared in Zukor's 3 reel feature "Resurrection" 1912

Film debuts

Mary Boland - The Edge of the Abyss

Donald Brian - The Voice in the Fog

Marie Cahill - Judy Forgot

Laura Hope Crews - The Fighting Hope

Elliott Dexter - Helene of the North

Marie Doro - The Morals of Marcus

Douglas Fairbanks - The Lamb

Geraldine Farrar - Carmen

W. C. Fields - Pool Sharks (short)

Pauline Frederick - The Eternal City

Charlotte Greenwood - Jane

Edna Purviance - A Night Out (short) (uncredited)

Valeska Suratt - The Soul of Broadway

Erich Von Stroheim - actor, assistant director, The Birth of a Nation (uncredited); costume designer, wardrobe assistant, Ghosts

Charlotte Walker - Kindling

Fannie Ward - The Marriage of Kitty