Film actor, producer, screenwriter, director, and composer, born in London, UK. The son of music-hall entertainers, his mother had a nervous breakdown and his father died when he was five, forcing Charlie to become a street urchin, along with his half-brother, Sydney, dancing for pennies in the street. After a time in an orphanage, he joined a troupe of child dancers and later had small roles on the London stage. At age 17 he joined a troupe of players touring the USA, where in 1912 he joined the Keystone company to appear in his first silent film, Making a Living (1914). He made 35 films in one year at Keystone, many of which he also wrote and directed, meanwhile developing his character of The Little Tramp. Despite the appearance of spontaneity and improvization in his films, he worked out every last detail to perfection. In 1915 he joined Essanay, making his first masterpiece, The Tramp that year, and was a co-founder of United Artists (1919). The Kid (1921) made him an international star, and he went on to make his major works, City Lights (1928), Modern Times (1936), The Great Dictator (1940), and Limelight (1952), after which his popularity waned.
Over the years he was criticized for his many romantic affairs, often with younger women. He never applied for US citizenship and, in 1952, on a ship to England, he was informed that he might not be permitted back into the States because of his alleged leftist views, so he settled in Switzerland with his wife Oona, daughter of Eugene O'Neill, with whom he had eight children. He did not return to the USA until 1972, when he accepted a Special Academy Award. Regarded as one of the few individuals to be a true genius of motion pictures, he was knighted in 1975.
| Charlie Chaplin | |
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Chaplin in his costume as "The Tramp" |
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| Birth name | Charles Spencer Chaplin, Jr. |
| Born |
April 16, 1889 Walworth, England |
| Died |
December 25, 1977 Vevey, Switzerland |
| Notable roles | The Tramp |
Sir Charles Spencer Chaplin, Jr. KBE, (April 16, 1889 – December 25, 1977), better known as Charlie Chaplin, was an English comedy actor, becoming one of the most famous performers in the early to mid Hollywood cinema era, and also a notable director.
Chaplin was one of the most creative and influential personalities in the silent film era: he acted in, directed, scripted, produced, and eventually even scored his own films. Chaplin's high-profile public and private life encompassed highs and lows of both adulation and controversy.
In 1999, the American Film Institute named Chaplin among the Greatest Male Stars of All Time, ranking at No.
Childhood
Charlie Chaplin was born on the 16th April 1889 in East Street, Walworth, London. His father, an alcoholic, who had little contact with his family, died when Charlie was twelve, leaving him and his older half-brother, Sydney Chaplin, in the sole care of his mother. Hannah Chaplin suffered from schizophrenia, and was eventually admitted to the Cane Hill Asylum at Coulsdon. Chaplin had to be left in the workhouse at Lambeth, London, moving after several weeks to the Central London District School for paupers in Hanwell. The young Chaplin brothers forged a close relationship to survive.
Unknown to Chaplin and Sydney until years later, they had a half-brother through their mother, Wheeler Dryden, who was raised abroad by his father. He was later reconciled with the family, and worked for Chaplin at his Hollywood studio.
Chaplin's mother died in 1928 in Hollywood, seven years after being brought to the U.S. by her sons. This was followed by Casey's 'Court Circus' variety show, and, the following year, he became a clown in Fred Karno's 'Fun Factory' slapstick comedy company, where Chaplin became the star of the troupe. Chaplin and Laurel wound up sharing a room in a boarding house. Stan Laurel returned to England but Chaplin remained in the United States. In late 1913, Chaplin's act with the Karno Troupe was seen by film producer Mack Sennett, who hired him for his studio, the Keystone Film Company. Chaplin's first film appearance was in "Making a Living" a one-reel comedy released on February 2, 1914.
Pioneering film auteur
Chaplin's early film career (1914-1917) began at Keystone Studios, where he developed his Tramp character and very quickly learned the art and craft of filmmaking (Legend has it that the Tramp character was developed by Charlie after a dream the night before. These were an immediate, runaway success with the public, and even today Chaplin's standout screen presence in these films is apparent. In 1915 he began a year's contract with Essanay film studios, and further developed his film skills, adding new levels of depth and pathos to the Keystone-style slapstick. He was given near complete artistic control, and produced twelve films over an eighteen month period that rank among the most influential comedy films in cinema. Chaplin later said the Mutual period was the happiest of his career.
At the conclusion of the Mutual contract in 1918, Chaplin built his own Hollywood studio and production company, and assumed an unparalleled degree of artistic and financial control over his productions. and his great silent feature-length films, among them: The Kid (1921), A Woman of Paris (1923), The Gold Rush (1925), and The Circus (1928).
After the arrival of sound films, he made what is considered to be his greatest film, City Lights (1931), as well as Modern Times (1936) before he committed to sound.
His dialogue films made in Hollywood were The Great Dictator (1940), Monsieur Verdoux (1947), and Limelight (1952). Modern Times was the first film where Chaplin's voice is heard (in the nonsense song at the end).
United Artists
In 1919 he co-founded the United Artists film distribution company with Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks and D. This move, along with complete control of his film production through his studio, assured Chaplin's independence as a filmaker.
Although "talkies" became the dominant mode of moviemaking soon after they were introduced in 1927, Chaplin resisted making such a film all through the 1930s. It is a tribute to Chaplin's versatility that he also has one film credit for choreography for the 1952 film Limelight, and another as a singer for the title music of the 1928's The Circus. The best-known of several songs he composed are "Smile", composed for the film "Modern Times" and given lyrics to help promote a 1950s revival of the film, famously covered by Nat King Cole. "This Is My Song" from Chaplin's last film, "A Countess From Hong Kong," was a number one hit in several different languages in the 1960s (most notably the version by Petula Clark), and Chaplin's theme from Limelight was a hit in the 50s under the title "Eternally." Chaplin's score to Limelight was nominated for an Academy Award in 1972 due to a decades-long delay in the film premiering in Los Angeles making it eligible.
The Great Dictator
His first dialogue picture, The Great Dictator (1940) was an act of defiance against Adolf Hitler and Nazism, filmed and released in the United States one year before it abandoned its policy of isolationism to enter World War II. Chaplin played both the role of a Nazi dictator clearly modeled on Hitler (with a certain physical likeness), and also that of a Jewish barber cruelly persecuted by the Nazis.
Politics
Chaplin's political sympathies always lay with the left.
Apart from the controversial 1942 speeches, Chaplin declined to patriotically support the war effort as he had done for the First World War (although his two sons saw service in the Army in Europe), which led to public anger. As a result, Chaplin's final American film, Limelight, was less political and more autobiographical in nature. His following European-made film, A King in New York (1957), satirised the political persecution and paranoia that had forced him to leave the US five years earlier (one of the few films of the 1950s to do so). After this film, Chaplin lost interest in making overt political statements, later saying that comedians and clowns should be "above politics".
McCarthyism
Although Chaplin had his major successes in the United States and was a resident from 1914 to 1952, he always retained his British nationality. During the era of McCarthyism, Chaplin was accused of "un-American activities" as a suspected communist sympathiser and J. FBI pressure on Chaplin grew after his 1942 campaign for a second European front in the war, and reached a critical level in the late 1940s, when Congressional figures threatened to call him as a witness in hearings. This was never done, probably from the fear of Chaplin's ability to lampoon the investigators.
In 1952, Chaplin left the US for what was intended as a brief trip home to England; Chaplin then decided to stay in Europe, and made his home in Vevey, Switzerland. However, by this time the animosities towards the now elderly and apolitical Chaplin had faded, and his visit was a triumphant success.
Academy Awards
Chaplin won two honorary Oscars. Chaplin had originally been nominated for both Best Actor and Best Comedy Directing for his movie The Circus, but his name was withdrawn and the Academy decided to give him a special award "for versatility and genius in acting, writing, directing and producing The Circus" instead. The other film to receive a special award that year was The Jazz Singer.
Chaplin's second honorary award came 44 years later in 1972, and was for "the incalculable effect he has had in making motion pictures the art form of this century". Upon receiving the award, Chaplin received the longest standing ovation in Academy Award history, lasting a full five minutes from the studio audience.
Chaplin was also nominated without success for Best Picture, Best Actor, and Best Original Screenplay for The Great Dictator, and again for Best Original Screenplay for Monsieur Verdoux (1947). During his active years as a filmmaker, Chaplin expressed disdain for the Academy Awards; wrote that Chaplin invoked the ire of the Academy in the 1930s by jokingly using his 1929 Oscar as a doorstop.
It is sometimes overlooked that Chaplin also won a competitive Academy Award. Because of Chaplin's political difficulties, the film did not play a one-week theatrical engagement in Los Angeles when it was first produced.
Final works
Chaplin's two final films were made in London: A King in New York (1957) in which he starred, and (as writer and director) A Countess from Hong Kong (1967), starring Sophia Loren and Marlon Brando, in which Chaplin made his final on-screen appearance in a brief cameo role as a seasick steward.
In his autobiographical book My Life in Pictures, published in 1974, Chaplin indicated that he had written a screenplay for his youngest daughter, Victoria. According to Chaplin, a script was completed and pre-production rehearsals had already begun on the film (the book includes a photograph of Victoria in costume) but were halted when Victoria got married. "I mean to make it some day," Chaplin wrote;
One of the last known works Chaplin completed was in 1976 when he composed a new score for his unsuccessful 1923 film A Woman of Paris.
Notable relationships
Chaplin's relationships with various women were an important part of his life and career, in both positive and negative ways.
Edna Purviance
Chaplin and his first major leading lady, Edna Purviance, were involved in a close romantic relationship during the production of his Essanay and Mutual films in 1916–1917. The romance seems to have ended by 1918, and Chaplin's marriage to Mildred Harris in late 1918 ended any possibility of reconciliation. Purviance would continue as leading lady in Chaplin's films until 1923, and would remain on Chaplin's payroll until her death in 1958. She and Chaplin spoke warmly of one another for the rest of their lives.
Mildred Harris
On October 23, 1918, the 29-year-old Chaplin married the 16-year-old The Wonderful Wizard of Oz actress Mildred Harris. They had one child, Norman Spencer Chaplin (also known as "The Little Mouse"), who died in infancy; During the divorce, Chaplin claimed Harris had had a lesbian affair with noted actress of the time Alla Nazimova, well known for seducing young actresses. Harris in turn claimed Chaplin was a sexual addict.
Pola Negri
Chaplin was involved in a very public relationship and engagement to the actress Pola Negri in 1922–23. Chaplin's public involvement with Negri was unique in his public life.
Lita Grey
At 35, he became involved with 16-year-old Lita Grey during preparations for The Gold Rush. They had two sons, the actors Charles Chaplin Jr. (1925–1968) and Sydney Earle Chaplin (1926–). Their extraordinarily bitter divorce in 1928 had Chaplin paying Grey a then-record-breaking $825,000 settlement, on top of almost a million dollars in legal costs. The Chaplin biographer Joyce Milton asserted in Tramp: The Life of Charlie Chaplin that the Grey-Chaplin marriage was the inspiration for Vladimir Nabokov's 1950's novel Lolita.
Paulette Goddard
Chaplin and actress Paulette Goddard were involved in a romantic and professional relationship between 1932 and 1940, with Goddard living with Chaplin in his Beverly Hills home for most of this time. Chaplin "discovered" Goddard and gave her starring roles in Modern Times and The Great Dictator. After the relationship ended in 1940, Chaplin and Goddard made public statements that they had been secretly married in 1936. But these claims were likely a mutual effort to prevent any lasting damage to Goddard's career, because Chaplin privately confirmed they were never officially married. She also lived her later life in Switzerland, like Chaplin.
Joan Berry
Chaplin had a brief affair with Joan Berry in 1942, whom he was considering for a starring role in a proposed film, but the relationship ended when she began harassing him and displaying signs of severe mental illness (similar to those of his mother). Chaplin's brief involvement with Berry proved to be a nightmare for him. Although blood tests proved Chaplin was not the father of Berry's child, the tests were then inadmissible as evidence in court, and he was ordered to support the child. Federal prosecutors also brought Mann Act charges against Chaplin related to Berry in 1944, of which he was acquitted. Chaplin's public image in America was permanently damaged by these sensational trials.
Oona O'Neill
During Chaplin's legal trouble over the Berry affair, he met Oona O'Neill, daughter of Eugene O'Neill, and married her on June 16, 1943. O'Neill and Chaplin each seemed to provide elements missing in the others' lives: she longed for the love of a father figure, and Chaplin craved her loyalty and support as his public popularity declined. They had three sons: Christopher, Eugene and Michael Chaplin and five daughters: Geraldine, Josephine, Jane, Victoria and Annette-Emilie Chaplin. Oona survived Chaplin by fourteen years, but her final years were unhappy, with grief over Chaplin's death eventually leading to alcoholism.
Death
Chaplin died on Christmas Day, 1977, in Vevey, Switzerland, following a stroke, aged 88, and was interred in Corsier-Sur-Vevey Cemetery in Corsier-Sur-Vevey, Vaud.
Other controversies
At the outbreak of World War I, Chaplin was widely criticized in the British press for not joining the Army. However, Chaplin also raised substantial funds for the war effort during War bond drives, and by making, at his own expense, The Bond, a comedic propaganda film used in 1918. This lingering controversy reportedly prevented Chaplin's knighthood in the early 1930s.
For Chaplin's entire career, some level of controversy existed over claims of Jewish ancestry. Nazi propaganda in the 1930s prominently portrayed Chaplin as Jewish (named Karl Tonstein) relying on articles published in the US press before, and FBI investigations of Chaplin in the late 1940s also focused on Chaplin's racial origins. There is no evidence of Jewish ancestry for Chaplin himself. Chaplin's half-brother, Sydney, was three-fourths-Jewish , but he was never a practising Jew. For his entire public life, Chaplin fiercely refused to challenge or refute such claims, saying that to do so would always "play directly into the hands of anti-Semites". In the biographical film, Chaplin, there is a fictional confrontation with a Nazi in which Chaplin responded to his query if he was a Jew with, "I'm not so honored."
Chaplin has also figured in the mysterious events surrounding the death of producer Thomas Ince aboard the yacht of William Randolph Hearst in 1924, one of Hollywood's greatest mysteries.
Chaplin's lifelong attraction to younger women remains another enduring source of controversy. Chaplin clearly relished the role of discovering and closely guiding young female stars;
Legacy
There is a statue of Chaplin in front of the alimentarium in Vevey to commemorate the last part of his life, and a replica also stands in Leicester Square in London. Amongst his many honours, Chaplin has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame (Chaplin's star was not dedicated until the 1970s, due to controversies over his politics in the 1950s and 1960s). Chaplin has a waxwork in Madame Tussauds. In 1992 a film was made about his life entitled Chaplin, directed by Oscar-winner Richard Attenborough, and starring Robert Downey Jr., Dan Aykroyd, and Geraldine Chaplin (Charlie's daughter, portraying Charlie's mother, her own grandmother). Downey was nominated for an Oscar for Best Actor in 1993 for his portrayal of Chaplin. In 2001, British comedian Eddie Izzard played Chaplin in the film, The Cat's Meow, which speculated about the still-unsolved death of producer Thomas Ince aboard William Randolph Hearst's yacht, of which Chaplin was a passenger of at the time. Chaplin's Tramp character was portrayed by Steve Fairnie in a famous 1980s advertising campaign for the IBM PC personal computer and later IBM PCjr. It is named after the comedy bullfighter Carmelo Tusquellas, nicknamed Charlot because his attire and show reminded that of Chaplin (also named Charlot in Spanish markets).Comparison with other silent comics
Since the 1960s, Chaplin's films have been unendingly compared to those of Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd (the other two great silent film comedians alongside Charlie Chaplin), especially among the loyal fans of each comic.
The three had very different styles: Chaplin had a strong affinity for sentimentality and pathos (which was popular in the 1920s), Lloyd was renowned for his everyman persona and classic 1920s optimism, and Keaton adhered to onscreen stoicism with a cynical tone more suited to modern audiences. Chaplin was a strict cinematic traditionalist who focused almost exclusively on performance, whereas Keaton was considered a brilliant and adventurous film innovator. On a historical level, Chaplin was behind the pioneering generation of film comedians, and both the younger Keaton and Harold Lloyd built upon his groundwork (in fact, Lloyd's early characters "Willie Work" and "Lonesome Luke" were obvious Chaplin ripoffs, something that Lloyd acknowledged and tried hard to move away from - eventually succeeding). Chaplin's period of film experimentation ended after the Mutual period (1916-1917), just before Keaton entered films.
Commercially, Charlie Chaplin made some of the highest-grossing films in the silent era; However, Chaplin's films combined made about $10.5 million while Harold Lloyd's grossed $15.7 million (Lloyd was far more prolific, releasing twelve feature films in the 1920s while Chaplin released just three). Buster Keaton's films were not nearly as commercially successful as Chaplin's or Lloyd's even at the height of his popularity, and only received belated critical acclaim in the late 1950s and 1960s. Keaton stated that Chaplin was the greatest comedian that ever lived, and the greatest comedy director. Chaplin also greatly admired Keaton: he welcomed him to United Artists in 1925, advised him against his disastrous move to MGM in 1928, and for his last American film, Limelight, wrote a part specifically for Keaton as his first on-screen comedy partner since 1915. Charlie Chaplin gets hit by Cupid (file info) This clip has Chaplin falling in love with a beautiful woman, with some help from Cupid. See media help.
Trivia
A bronze statue to Chaplin was erected in the small seaside town of Waterville, County Kerry, Ireland where the star spent many holidays in later life. A young Chaplin is a character in Shanghai Knights; the movie presented the fictional idea that Chaplin originally came to America by stowing away with Jackie Chan and Owen Wilson's characters. Elemental, querido Chaplin, by Rafael Marín (2005, ISBN 844807542X), is presented as a unpublished manuscript in which Chaplin tells how, as a London poor child, he helped Sherlock Holmes in an adventure against Fu Manchu. As Chaplin became popular throughout America, "Charlie Chaplin look-alike" contests became popular. It is said that Chaplin once entered in such a contest and came in third. Chaplin befriended Luis Buñuel in the early 30s. The Spanish filmmaker had been brought to shoot parallel versions of Hollywood films and found it easier to join Chaplin's parties than other more exclusive ones. Chaplin had long been popular in surrealist and dadaist circles. Although baptised in the Church of England, Chaplin was an agnostic for most of his life. In his later years Chaplin was a fan of Benny Hill (a big Chaplin fan himself), a compliment that touched Benny deeply when he visited Chaplin's home on invitation from Chaplin's family in 1991 and discovered that Charlie had a vast collection of Benny Hill videos. During a visit to Chaplin's home with the Great Britain Davis Cup lawn tennis team in 1921, multi-talented sportsman Maxwell Woosnam — an Olympic and Wimbledon tennis champion and one-time captain of the England national football team — defeated Chaplin at table tennis while playing with a butter knife instead of a bat. In an effort to cheer Chaplin up after this loss, Woosnam threw the actor into his own swimming pool, after which Woosnam and his team-mates were asked to leave. A Canadian cartoon show called Kevin Spencer mocked Charlie Chaplin's apparent love of young women when an old character, who would have been alive and a young woman during Chaplin's career, claims to somebody questioning whether she has done anything interesting in her life that she 'once had sex with Charlie Chaplin'. Chaplin, who grew up in dire poverty, managed his wealth very cautiously. He is dressed in a similar manner with and is possibly a homage to Charlie Chaplin.Filmography
Dates given are those of first release
Keystone Studios
(* denotes not written and directed by Chaplin)
1914
Miscellaneous:
Mutual Film Corporation
1916
1947
78. The Chaplin Revue (Sep 1) (First National shorts A Dog’s Life, Shoulder Arms and The Pilgrim edited together by Chaplin to form a single feature-length film). A Countess from Hong Kong (Jan 5)
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