“Robin Hood (1922) carried the same scenario credits, except that this time Fairbanks appeared under his pseudonym of Elton Thomas (his two middle names). This was the first film designed by Wilfred Buckland, who came from Belasco’s theatre, working with Langley and Robert Fairbanks, whose engineering skills were often the valuable foundation for the physical marvels which Fairbanks performed with such apparent ease after meticulous preparation. (Tables on which he had to leap, for instance, were cut down precisely to the point where no effort would be visible in the accomplishment). Fairbanks in fact revealed that he was himself keenly aware of the danger that his character could be dwarfed by the wrong setting. The castle in Robin Hood, 90 feet high and with an interior so large that it could only be lit by sunlight, is thought still to be the largest set ever built in Hollywood. It was contructed during Fairbanks’ absence in New York, and on his return he told Dwan (according to Dwan’s account, quoted by Kevin Brownlow in The Parade’s Gone By), ‘I can’t compete with that. My work is intimate. People know me as an intimate actor. I can’t work in a great vast thing like that. What would I do in there?’. Dwan showed him, by demonstrating the slide Robert Fairbanks had devised for the scene where Robin Hood, cornered on a blacony 40 feet above ground, leaps over the edge and appears to slide to safety down the fold of an enormous drape”.

(David Robinson, The Hero, cit.)