A sensation early on

By 1918 Carmel Myers, best remembered as the vamp Iras of “Ben-Hur” (1925), was already an above-the-title star at Universal, which that year cast the 18-year-old Myers in two charming comedies, “A Society Sensation” and “All Night.” Carmel saw such potential in her new leading man she urged Carl Laemmle to sign him to a long-term contract before another studio could snatch up Rudolph Valentino, a smolderingly handsome Italian-born onetime landscape gardener (and tea dancer and possible gigolo). Laemmle didn’t listen, and Metro was shortly to make history with its classic antiwar epic “The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse” (1921), from which Valentino would emerge a screen legend. “A Society Sensation” will screen Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. at the Lasky-DeMille Barn, 2100 N. Highland Ave., prior to Emily Leider’s discussion of her new book, “Dark Lover: The Life and Death of Rudolph Valentino.” (323) 874-4005.

-- Kevin Thomas