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Charlie Chaplin … The man who showed the whole world that there is no need for words and yet it is possible to accomplish many things without them. When some of his quotes dropped in my mailbox on his birthday about a month ago, I thought to write about him. I had always wondered about and wanted to learn more about Charlie Chaplin whose name had awakened a smile within me whenever I heard it. So I decided to move a bit further than the sight of his funny films on TV in my childhood.

Charlie Chaplin (Charles Spencer Chaplin), an English comic actor, film maker and composer, was born in London, England on April 16, 1889. He is said to be the greatest silent comedian of all times. He became a worldwide icon with ‘The Tramp’ character he created: the man with a derby hat, toothbrush mustache, walking stick, baggy trousers, tight coat, oversize boots and a funny walk.

Charlie Chaplin had a difficult and a poor childhood. His father was absent and his mother struggled financially. Due to the illness of his mother who was committed to a mental asylum and the early death of his father from alcohol abuse when he was 12, he and his half-brother Sydney spent their childhood in and out of workhouses and charity homes. However, having inherited natural talents from their parents who were both musical hall performers, they took to the stage to earn their living. (charliechaplin.com).

Charlie Chaplin had begun performing at an early age. When he was 19, he was signed to Fred Carno Company and joined their United States tour.  In December 1913, he signed on with Keystone Studios where he appeared in and directed 35 films, starring as the Tramp in almost all of them. After Keystone, he moved to Essanay, Mutual and First National Corporations. In 1919, Chaplin co-founded the distribution company ‘United Artists‘ thus had complete control over his films.

He wrote, directed, produced, edited, starred in, and composed the music for most of his films. Many of his films contain social and political themes, as well as autobiographical elements. At his film in ‘The Immigrant’ (1917), he reflected his own experiences of immigrating to the United States, finding humor in difficult aspects of coming to a new land. In his book ‘My Life in Pictures’, he wrote: “The Immigrant touched me more than any other film I made.”. (charliechaplin.com).

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After his early short films like ‘Police’, ‘The Fireman‘, ‘The Pawnshop‘, and ‘The Immigrant‘, Charlie Chaplin earned world-wide fame for his films like ‘The Kid‘, ‘The Gold Rush‘, ‘City Lights‘, ‘Modern Times‘ and ‘The Great Dictator‘ which are counted as masterpieces in world cinema history. Chaplin could play a variety of instruments like piano, violin and cello. He composed about 500 melodies, including the songs “Smile” and “This Is My Song“. He also wrote autobiographical books like  “My Trip Abroad”, “A Comedian Sees the World”, “My Autobiography” and “My Life in Pictures“. 

Charlie Chaplin’s life was full of scandals. During World War I, his loyalty to England was questioned although he had never applied for American citizenship and he was attacked in the British media for not fighting in the war. In 1940s, Chaplin’s popularity declined. Before his final marriage, a paternity suit was filed against him which received a wide coverage in the media and affected his public image. His film ‘The Great Dictator’ which satirized Adolf Hitler had created a discontent. He was accused of having communist ties and sympathies. An FBI investigation was opened and Chaplin was forced to leave the United States. He and his wife Oona decided to settle in Switzerland in 1952. (wikipedia.org and imdb.com).

Chaplin’s four of the films were listed in the American Film Institute’s 100 Funniest Movies and he was invited to USA in the later years to receive the Academy Awards he was entitled to. He also received Legion of Honor from the French government in 1971 and was awarded a knighthood by Queen Elizabeth II in 1975. In 1972, Chaplin received a ‘Lifetime Achievement Award’ from the ‘Lincoln Center Film Society’, which has since been presented annually to filmmakers as ‘The Chaplin Award‘.

Charlie Chaplin was married four times and had a total of 11 children. Following the actresses Mildred Harris, Lita Grey and Paulette Goddard, his final marriage was to Oona O’Neill, daughter of playwright Eugene O’Neill in 1943 with whom he had 8 children.

You can find the biography of Charlie Chaplin (‘Chaplin: His Life and Art‘) written by David Robinson -a film critic who also wrote for The Times and Financial Times- here in Amazon.
You can check the following links for the autobiographical books of Charlie Chaplin (written by Chaplin) titled ”My Autobiography”, ”My Life In Pictures”, ”A Comedian Sees The World”, and ”My Trip Abroad”.

For Charlie Chaplin film collections , you can check here.

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Above is a scene from the film ‘Idle Class’ (1921). Even a single square from the film makes me smile. There was a constant chase in many of Chaplin’s films. Charlie Chaplin had said:

”All I need to make a comedy is a park, a policeman and a pretty girl.”

Chaplin’s Masterpieces and His World Trip

Charlie Chaplin’s first full-length film that exceeded an hour was ‘The Kid’ that was released in 1921 in which he combined comedy and drama. Chaplin’s losing a child from his first marriage with Mildred Harris and his own childhood experiences are thought to have influenced the film (wikipedia.org). The story relates how an unmarried mother abandons a baby, which is found and unwillingly adopted by the Tramp. The Tramp opposes the efforts of social workers to take the boy into public care, and finally he is reunited with his mother, now a successful opera singer. The film had been a great success and by 1924 had been screened in over 50 countries.

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In 1923, Chaplin produced his first romantic drama film ‘A Woman of Paris’. Chaplin had made a comment about the shooting of this film as: “As I have noticed …, men and women try to hide their emotions rather than to try and express them. And that is the method I have pursued … to become as realistic as possible”. The film received high praises from the critics but the audience did not like the film where Chaplin appeared only a few seconds on screen and the film did bad business. (charliechaplin.com)

Chaplin’s next remarkable film after ‘The Kid’ was ‘The Gold Rush’ released in 1925 where The Tramp is a gold prospector and goes to the Klondike in search of gold and faces difficulties of cold, starvation and solitude. Chaplin was inspired by the ‘Klondike Gold Rush‘ in history which refers to a migration of prospectors to the Klondike region in north-western Canada between 1896 and 1899 after gold was discovered there by local miners. The scene of the film where Chaplin eating his boot laces as spaghetti has become world famous. (Wikipedia and Chaplin web site)

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The film ‘Circus’-where The Tramp is a clown- won Charles Chaplin his first Academy Award (it was still not yet called the ‘Oscar’) in 1929. However, it is said that it was the film Chaplin wanted to forget about for it coincided with his sensational divorce from his second wife Lita Grey, the teenage American actress who had starred in some of his early films. (www.charliechaplin.com)

In 1930s, Chaplin initially refused to move to sound films which he saw a threat to the universal understanding of his silent films and began to work on a new silent film. The film ‘City Lights’ was about the Tramp’s love for a blind flower girl who thinks he is a rich man and his sacrifices to find money for her cure. The film received high praises from the critics especially for its closing scene when the blind girl sees the reality about the Tramp once her sight is restored. The premieres of the film was very glorious for its time and made a lot of impact. Albert Einstein attended the premiere in Los Angeles and Bernard Shaw set beside Chaplin at the premiere in London. ‘City Lights’ became Chaplin’s personal favourite of his films. (Wikipedia and Chaplin web site)

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In 1931 and 1932, Charlie Chaplin left Hollywood to embark on an 18-month world tour. He travelled to Western European countries including France, Austria and Switzerland and finally he visited Japan where he survived an assassination attempt. In Europe, he had been disturbed to see the rise of nationalism and the effects of automation and unemployment. On his return to America, he wrote a serial about his travels in an American monthly magazine. (Wikipedia and Chaplin web site).

Following America’s Great Depression, he feared that capitalism and machinery in the workplace would increase unemployment. He made a comedy of this era and produced the film ‘Modern Times’ released in 1936 in which The Tramp was seen for the last time on screen. In the film, The Tramp is a Factory worker struggling to live in modern industrial society. As in ‘City Lights’, only music and sound effects were used in the film yet in one scene Chaplin’s own voice was heard directly. I watched the scene where Chaplin had to sing a nonsense song which is really very funny.

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Charlie Chaplin finally had to follow the age and made his first sound film, ‘The Great Dictator’ in 1940 which satirized Hitler. It became the most commercially successful film of Chaplin. Chaplin played both a Jewish barber as variation of his Tramp character and Adenoid Hynkel, his version of Adolf Hitler. Chaplin’s speech against war and dictatorship at the end of the film is remarkable. The film, which was banned in Germany, received five Academy Award nominations. (imdb).

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You can check the following links in Amazon for the Chaplin films that include his masterpieces – The Chaplin Collection Volume One (including Modern Times, The Great Dictator, The Gold Rush, Limelight) and
The Chaplin Collection Volume Two (including City Lights, The Circus, The Kid, A King in New York, A Woman of Paris, Monsieur Verdoux).

A Career Shaped By Coincidences

In my research, I have found out that Charlie Chaplin’s career was shaped by some interesting coincidences. It seems that he owes his work in Keystone Studios which is a milestone in his career in USA to a telegram.

On May 12, 1913, Alfred Reeves, manager of the Fred Karno theatrical company touring in America, received a telegram in Philadelphia which read:
“IS THERE A MAN NAMED CHAFFIN IN YOUR COMPANY OR SOMETHING LIKE THAT STOP IF SO WILL HE COMMUNICATE WITH KESSEL AND BAUMANN 24 LONGACRE BUILDING BROADWAY.”
Reeves showed the telegram to Charlie Chaplin. When Chaplin discovered that the tenants of the Longacre Building were mostly attorneys, he thought that his great-aunt, Elizabeth Wiggins, had died and left him an inheritance. He immediately went to New York City. He was disappointed to discover that the telegram had been sent by the owners of the New York Motion Picture Company (Adam Kessel Jr. and Charles O. Baumann), who wanted to sign him as a comedian with the Keystone Film Company. (www.charliechaplin.com).

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The birth of the ‘Tramp’ character which is also known as ‘The Little Tramp’, was also by coincidence. Mack Sennett, the popular comedy director and production chief of “The Keystone Film Company”, had told Chaplin, “Put on a comedy makeup. Anything will do.” Chaplin recalled in his autobiography:
”I had no idea what makeup to put on. … .However, on the way to the wardrobe I thought I would dress in baggy pants, big shoes, a cane, and a derby hat. I wanted everything to be a contradiction: the pants baggy, the coat tight, the hat small and the shoes large. I was undecided whether to look old or young, but remembering Sennett had expected me to be a much older man, I added a small moustache, which, I reasoned, would add age without hiding my expression. I had no idea of the character. But the moment I was dressed, the clothes and the make-up made me feel the person he was. I began to know him, and by the time I walked on to the stage he was fully born.” (charliechaplin.com).

His Home in The United States

Chaplin’s residence in Beverly Hills on Summit Drive in the Pickfair neighborhood, designed by himself, was known as a “Breakaway House”. Chaplin used to entertain his guests and screen his films in the great hall of the house. His tennis court was actively used where Greta Garbo was also a frequent player. He was said to be an inspiring host; welcoming and entertaining many celebrities in his home. (imdb.com).

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Chaplin’s Last Years, His Latest Films and Latest Home in Vevey

Charlie Chaplin’s later films were ‘Monsieur Verdoux’ (1947), ‘Limelight’ (1952), ‘A King in New York’ (1957) and ‘A Countess from Hong Kong’ (1967) in which of them he abandoned The Tramp character. The films were shot after Chaplin’s popularity started to decline due to his political views. They were not so successful as his previous films.

‘Monsieur Verdoux’ was a black comedy -shot during the events of a French serial killer of the time- about a French bank clerk, Verdoux (Chaplin), who loses his job and begins marrying and murdering wealthy widows to support his family. The film is also said to be a criticism of capitalism as a means of mass killing through wars and weapons. The film was not successful and lost money to Chaplin.

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‘Limelight’ was an autobiographical film about a forgotten comedian and a young ballerina in Edwardian London. Although the film was not political, it was boycotted in the United States due to a rising hostility towards Chaplin then, yet later was cited as one of Chaplin’s best personal works. The film’s world premiere was in London where Chaplin learned that his re-entry permit to US was revoked. Even though the matters were settled afterwards, Chaplin did not attempt to return to US and settled in Switzerland.

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Chaplin shot the film ‘A King in New York’ in England, in which he casted himself as an exiled king who seeks asylum in the United States having faced accusations of communism. The film was not shown in America until 1973. The film ‘A Countess from Hong Kong’, which was Chaplin’s last film, was a romantic comedy set on ocean liner in which Marlon Brando had starred in as an American ambassador and Sophie Loren as a stowaway found in his cabin. Chaplin concentrated in directing the film and appeared very shortly in the film as a steward. The film received negative reviews following its premiere in 1967.

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Chaplin remained in good physical and mental shape for most of his life, playing tennis regularly until his 70s and working constantly. However, after his last film, ‘A Countess from Hong Kong’, his health began to deteriorate. He died in December 25, 1977 at home due to a stroke in his sleep.

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Four years after Chaplin’s death, Ukrainian astronomer Lyudmila Karachkina named an asteroid as ‘3623 Chaplin‘. It resides in the asteroid “belt” between Mars and Jupiter. (imdb).

Since 2011, the annual Charlie Chaplin Comedy Film Festival is held in Waterville, a small town in Ireland where Chaplin spent several summers with his family in 1960s.

You can check the following links in Amazon for the latest films of Charlie Chaplin titled ‘Monsieur Verdoux‘, ‘Limelight‘, and ‘A Countess from Hong Kong‘. I also liked this special edition (the films ‘A King in New York’ and ‘A Woman in Paris’).

Vevey and Montreux

Chaplin’s final home, ‘Manoir de Ban‘, was a manor house overlooking Lake Geneva in Corsier-sur-Vevey, Switzerland- a wine growing village on the Swiss Riviera. The estate of the house lies in the countryside between the Lavaux vineyards (a UNESCO World Heritage Site), Lake Geneva and the peaks of the Swiss Alps. Chaplin lived at this house with his family for 25 years until his death in 1977. The house became a museum afterwards called ‘Chaplin’s World’ and opened to public on 17 April 2016. (chaplinsworld.com).

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Vevey is between Montreux and Lausanne all of which are in the canton of Vaud in Switzerland. I have visited these towns when I went to Switzerland in April 2017. I did not know about Chaplin Museum then but we stopped by Vevey shortly to see the town where Chaplin lived. Vevey is a pretty town but I mostly liked Montreux -a small town on the shore of Lake Geneva- which I strongly suggest that you visit. The town is very pleasant and of high standard. We enjoyed walking in the boulevard and sitting at the banks near the lake and tasting delicious desserts at the historical patisserie ‘Confiserie Zurcher‘ established in 1879 in Montreux.

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We have also visited Chillon Castle (Château de Chillon), an island castle located on Lake Geneva, 3 km from Montreux. The views around the castle – which is said to be the most visited historical monument of Switzerland- were magnificent.

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In my research, I also found out that ”Montreux Jazz Festival” is held annually in early July in Montreux which is is the second largest annual jazz festival in the world after Canada’s ”Montreal International Jazz Festival”. It would be a good time to visit Montreux.

Back to Chaplin – Epilogue

The films of Charlie Chaplin, who is considered as one of the most influential figures of the early twentieth century, are still regarded as classics and among the greatest ever made. The famous filmmaker Federico Fellini called Chaplin ”a sort of Adam from who we are all descended”. Charlie Chaplin was included in the Time magazine’s list of ”100 Most Important People of The Twentieth Century” in 1999 for the “laughter he brought to millions”. (Wikipedia) 

Bringing laughter to millions … Charlie Chaplin was making an important but a difficult job as a comedian in times of World War I, World War II and The Great Depression. Although he had a difficult childhood and came out of poverty, he managed to find humour in everything and reflected even the bitter sides of life in form of a comedy. Deeply concerned with the economic and social problems of his time, I think that none of his films were in vain. He set out simply to make money but he succeeded much more than that and managed to create a huge network of fans all over the world who still share the joy in his films even after more than 130 years after his death. Having lived until the age of 88, I guess he owed his long life to finding a funny side of every tragedy and hardship. We can also see this aspect of him in some of his quotes that I liked. Chaplin had said:

“Life is a beautiful, magnificent thing, even to a jellyfish.“

“Life can be wonderful if you’re not afraid of it. All it needs is courage, imagination … and a little dough.“

“Nothing is permanent in this wicked world, not even our troubles.”

“You’ll never find rainbows if you’re looking down.“

”A Day Without a Laughter is A Day Wasted.’‘

“Laughter is the tonic, the relief, the surcease from pain.”

As stated in Chaplin’s song ”Smile”… The song, which was sung and recorded by many famous performers like Judy Garland, Nat King Cole, Michael Jackson and Barbara Streisand, became a classic. The music of the song was composed by Chaplin. The lyrics are said to be unofficially written by Chaplin inspired by a scene from his film ‘Modern Times’ where he points to the corners of his mouth to the actress indicating that she should smile.(Chaplin web site).

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Recently, Lady Gaga sang the Song ‘Smile’ and played it at the piano at his home for the concert “One World: Together at Home” organized for Corona days by ‘Global Citizen’ movement to support frontline healthcare workers and the World Health Organisation. I listened to it and I liked her performance very much. The song is very emotional, optimistic and encouraging especially for these corona days. The Concert was splendid and unmatched in the sense that many respected celebrities made probably their most sincere and natural performances from their homes for a united cause.

I will finish this post with the lyrics of Chaplin’s song ‘Smile’. Let us smile – no matter what – as Chaplin did throughout his life.

Smile

Music by Charles Chaplin, Lyrics by John Turner and Geoffrey Parsons

Smile, though your heart is aching
Smile, even though it’s breaking
When there are clouds in the sky
you’ll get by
If you smile through your fear and sorrow
Smile and maybe tomorrow
You’ll see the sun come shining through
for you

Light up your face with gladness
Hide every trace of sadness
Although a tear may be ever so near
That’s the time you must keep on trying
Smile what’s the use of crying
You’ll find that life is still worthwhile
If you’ll just
Smile

Notes: You can check here in Amazon for Charlie Chaplin soundtracks and film music anthologies.
For Charlie Chaplin film collections , you can check here. For the Chaplin collection of his masterpieces check The Chaplin Collection Volume One and The Chaplin Collection Volume Two. For Chaplin’s later films check ‘A Countess from Hong Kong‘ and this special edition that I liked.
For Charlie Chaplin Short Comedy Classics – The Complete Restored Essanay & Mutual Collection- check here.

Alternatively, you can check Criterion here for Charlie Chaplin films in DVD or Blu-ray format.

You can find my related links for Charlie Chaplin books – the biographies and autobiographies- at the beginnings of this post.
You can also check Charlie Chaplin unisex watch.

Legal Note:
Charlie Chaplin™ © Bubbles Inc. S.A. All Rights Reserved
Photographs from  Chaplin films made from 1918 onwards, excluding A Countess from Hong Kong,  and from the Chaplin archives,  © Roy Export S.A.S or ©  Roy Export Co Ltd. All Rights Reserved.