The first motion picture ever filmed entirely in the district of Hollywood was 'In Old California,' directed by the legendary D.W. Griffith for the Biograph Company. At the time, Hollywood was just a small village, but Griffith was lured there from the East Coast by the promise of bright, reliable California sunlight, which allowed for better filming conditions than the overcast New York weather. The film was a 17-minute silent melodrama set during the Spanish colonial era of California. Its success proved that the region was an ideal location for the nascent film industry. Within just a few years, dozens of production companies followed Griffith’s lead, fleeing Thomas Edison’s strict motion picture patents in New Jersey to establish what would become the 'Dream Factory' of the West Coast.