Charles Spencer Chaplin: A Profile

When you think of a tramp or comedy in either silent or talkie films, you think of Charlie Chaplin. He portrayed the homeless hobo to perfection. You could see him lining up in the soup kitchens of the Great Depression period. The whole world was going through an economic meltdown while Chaplin was busy making the term destitute an actual term of endearment. One of the easily recognisable scenes from this period is Chaplin boiling his shoes to eat them. That was a move which made people of those times identify with him and relate to him. People got encouraged to see a poor character that is broke with his pockets turned out, sitting in gutters as the rain poured down; yet being happy. They felt that they could also get through those hard times. The comedy dished out by Chaplin could never be termed either goofy or slapstick. It was portrayal of life in its dark and stark reality and in terms of great adversity. There was not a Chaplin film that was ignored by people. One of the famous quotes of Chaplin goes like this – “A man’s true character comes out when he’s drunk.” Chaplin’s early life was a troubled one. He was born in a poor section of South London. His father ws Charles Chaplin Sr. While his mother was Hannah Chaplin. He was born on 16th April 1889. His father was a singer and his mother was an actress and a dancer. She danced in British musical halls of those times. By the time Chaplin was a toddler, his parents were already estranged. At the age of seven, he was sent to Lambeth Workhouse to take care of payments of some of the family’s debts. His early experiences in life brought out the enactment of the `tramp’ in him in later life. His father passed away with cirrhosis of liver when Chaplin was nine. Later in life, Chaplin said, “To laugh truly, you should be able to take your pain and play with it.” From a young age, Charles Chaplin Jr. Always found the time to follow in the footsteps of his parents; by being a performer on the stage. At the age of nine, he was recruited to become a member of a dancing troupe. He was picking up well as a tap dancer and made his mark by practicing his routines many times during a day. His commitment and hard work helped him to earn money to live by. At thirteen years of age, he was self-sufficient. At the age of fourteen, he played his first acting part on stage as local newspaper boy in `Romance of Cockayne’. It turned out to be a big break for him. He was appreciated for his ability to play a comedy character. He was being noticed as a bright child actor. He also played Billie, the pageboy in Sherlock Holmes dramas. At seventeen, he joined the circus. It was called `Casey’s Circus’ as a dancer. He reached the New World, travelling with this circus troupe. When Chaplin visited the United States of America, Vaudeville was at the peak of its glory. Dancers and singers entertained local communities with their skills and they were in demand. Chaplin was fortunate to do his shows at the Colonial Theatre in New York City. He got good reviews for his acts. He became famous with the role of a drunkard because of its slapstick humour. He spent two years doing such shows. He went back to England in June 1912 and had to face days of depression, once again. Luckily, he did not have to wait for long as he got a chance to go back to New York City in the month of October, that same year. During this visit, he was introduced to the film business with New York City Motion Picture Company. He got a break after that with Keystone Picture Studios and worked out a contract of $150 a week. This meant that Chaplin would not have to struggle, ever again. He began playing the penniless tramp to perfection. He ventured out the next year, in December 2013, to the Western Coast and arrived in Los Angeles. He used the moustache to look a little older. He enjoyed playing that and the drunken clown. He directed a film in 1914 and it was called `Caught in the Rain’. He gets mixed up in a lover’s quarrel and did plenty of slapstick. It was a success. Keystone then depended on him to direct most of his films from then on. One of the greatest compliments Chaplin got in his life was from Walt Disney who said that it was the template of Chaplin’s tramp on which the Mickey Mouse cartoon character got inspiration from. The features of Chaplin’s tramp were everywhere. In the year 1917, Chaplin became a worldwide phenomenon. His films were being played in every country. The First World War was thinning down after the heating up in 1916. USA entered the war in April 1917. Chaplin refused to join the war effort. He hated wars. In 1918, Chaplin made an innovative film that was called `A Dog’s Life’. This ilm opens with the familiar figure of the penniless tramp entering the screen, hungry and desperate, looking for where the next meal would come from. He is followed by a dog whose name is Scraps. This dog is rescued by Chaplin from a dog fight. The dog and the tramp do everything together; they work, look for food and even look for women in tandem. Edna Purviance and his brother Sidney also make their appearance in this film. The timing of Chaplin’s comedy was brilliant in this film. It was hailed as a total work of art by the film critics. Married Life Mildred Harris became Chaplin’s first wife. She was a child star and made her debut when she was only eleven years old. She met Chaplin in 1918 and they dated each other. At first, Chaplin was not serious. When he came to know that she was pregnant with his child, he became concerned and consented to marriage. He did not want a scandal to escalate at this point in his life. The marriage was actually out of fear; not love. There was a miscarriage and the child was lost. He had an unhappy marriage which ended the following year with a settlement from Chaplin’s estate. His unhappy days led to the making of the film, `The Kid’ which turned out to be a masterpiece. It touched upon loss and sadness and the world came to know that Chaplin can even make people cry besides making them laugh. From this moment in his life, all Chaplin’s creations started touching the hearts of people and engaging their minds. When `The Kid’ was released, it became a blockbuster hit, internationally. Chaplin turned into a wealthy man on its account. Thousands of fans flocked to meet him when he stepped out on the streets of England. His next work was a romantic film called `A Woman of Paris’. He decided not to act in this film and allowed his protégé, Edna Purviance to hog the limelight by merely directing. In the field of direction, Chaplin was moving way ahead of his time. The film did not do well as the audience was not ready to see a film without Chaplin in it and a plot that requires thinking and complexity. He had to return to comedy after that. He did it in a big way by making `The Gold Rush’ in 1925. He was inspired by the Klondike Gold Rush of 1898. It cost him one million dollars to make as a result of multiple shooting locations, special effects and costly set material. He used over six hundred people to make the movie. It turned out to be an iconic epic. Chaplin portrayed a powerful role in this film. Marriage to avoid a Scandal In the nineteen twenties, Chaplin got involved with a sixteen-year old Lita Grey and got her pregnant. He was thirty-six at that time. In an act of panic, he married her. They went away to Mexico and got married in November 1924. She gave birth to Chaplin’s first child; a son named Spencer. Charlie Chaplin began to resent his wife after few months and spent most of his time in studios, away from her. In time, they had one more child together and the second son was Sydney Earl Chaplin. The audiences did not like the way Chaplin was treating his wife and it translated into box office earnings that fell. Chaplin divorced Lita Grey in August 1927 and went back to his work. A film out of these dark days was `Circus’. It got good reviews. He picked up his first Oscar in 1928. The Advent of Talkies Chaplin lost his balance as an actor with the introduction of the talkies. He was used to the silent films shooting and editing. He felt that movies were better with just background music and no sound dubbing. He was also nervous about the tramp character getting ruined if he started lending voice to his comic and wild gestures on film. He continued working on silent films and passed up on the spoken dialogue. His major film during these times was `City Lights’. In this plot, his character falls in love with a blind girl he meets at a street corner, where she sells flowers. He earns money to pay for her eye operation that would restore her vision. It took Chaplin a couple of years to complete the filming. The final edit was completed in December 1930 and the film was released in early 1931. It earned high praise from the critics and people started saying things like no one except Chaplin could have made such a film. The film had instant audience appeal. Chaplin’s fans were quite satisfied watching films without dialogues. In those days, the film earned Chaplin a huge sum of three million dollars. It was a big crowning achievement for him. After this film, Chaplin took a sabbatical for almost a year and a half from films. During this time, he came across a young actress, Paulette Goddard. He knew that she was going to be a star and he saw to it that she became one. He cast her as his co-star in `Modern Times’ in 1936. This film was a masterpiece – a satire of modern industrialised society. The film’s setting is the Great Depression. It highlights the struggle between workers who go on a strike and the factory owners; all this happens in a comic fashion. Industry is projected as a juggernaut which is ready to replace humanity. Isn’t that is what is happening today with artificial intelligence and its rise and control over human minds? Chaplin himself scored the music for this film. There is a satirical song that is made up of incoherent gibberish. Socialist Mind Not many people are aware that Chaplin had socialist leanings. He said, “To those who can hear me, I say – do not despair. The misery that is now upon us is but the passing of greed – the bitterness of men who fear the way of human progress. The hate of men will pass and dictators die and the power they took from the people will return to the people and so long as men die; liberty will never perish.” Chaplin penned `The Dictator’ and inserted this quote of his in that film. It was a mocking satire of Hitler and the Nazis. He began filming this epic film just six days after Britain issued a formal declaration of war against Germany. It was pretty controversial for Chaplin to make a film of this kind. He had also received a warning from his peers. If left to others, this film would never have seen the light of day. He had sufficient money to pull it off on a private basis. He wanted to make sure that Hitler would be laughed at. The film covered serious stuff and the ending was almost like a public service announcement. Chaplin looks right into the camera and addresses the audience as to why war is abominable and fascism had to be stopped. What was the result? Chaplin’s fame and star began to fade considerably. Taking exile from the United States of America Chaplin was outspoken with his `Great Dictator’ and `Modern Times’. He used to tell people in his inner circle, “Greed has poisoned men’s souls and it has barricaded the world with hate ... machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical; our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery, we need humanity; more than cleverness, we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost.” By the middle of nineteen forties, his film career declined and Chaplin started going through a hard time, coping with his popularity that was on a wane. J. Edgar Hoover and the Federal Bureau of Investigation began tracking every move of Chaplin but in vain; they could not find any dirt on him. In frustration, Hoover began a wicked smear campaign which was aimed at wrecking the public image of the star director. Chaplin came into the negative limelight by his open support of Russian War Relief. This kind of support was unacceptable in U.S. politics scene. It helped cast suspicion on to Chaplin’s motivation to help Russia. His detractors became worried that with his massive appeal; he would be able to reach the undesirables with his kind of socialist propaganda. FBI did their best to take Chaplin’s public persona down to reduce his influence on the world stage. Westbrook Pegler, hired by Hoover, started printing one story after another about Chaplin to make him unpopular. He was shown out as an ardent supporter of Russian communism and made out as a villain who hated American values. His divorce was portrayed as one that went against family values. By dumping his wife, he was made to look as if he was dumping America itself. To make matters worse, after few months, an alleged former lover of his came forward to file a paternity suit. Chaplin was vindicated from these vicious claims as blood tests proved that he was not the father. Public opinion did much damage to the reputation of Charles Spencer Chaplin in USA. In the name of national security, the FBI screwed up his life and image. Poor Chaplin had not even joined the communist party but was officially maligned as a traitor and communist. Chaplin did not take such kind of attacks, lying down. He turned the press conferences into circuses when he mentioned to the reporters, “Proceed with the butchery! Fire on at this old gray head!” During this phase, Chaplin managed to find happiness and love when he met an actress, Oona O’Neil. She stayed by his side till the day he died. She began worshipping him. Oona became his real friend and his comfort and saving grace. In 1951, Chaplin made `Limelight’, which, in my opinion, is his finest film. He gave the music for this film and it was magical. A brilliant score! The FBI did its best to ban this movie. This spelt his self-imposed exile from the United States of America. He would not set foot on American soil till 1972. By this time, the media’s desire in this country to malign Chaplin had grown cold and to a degree; the `little tramp’ was forgotten and forgiven. Chaplin was next seen when receiving the Special Academy Lifetime Achievement Award at the Oscars. Standing next to the host Jack Lemmon, Chaplin looked like a fragile image of his former self. Chaplin was tormented by J. Edgar Hoover and the Federal Bureau of Investigation and he could care less of the public sentiment. He was not expecting to be received in this country with open arms; yet, he got a deafening standing ovation for a long time. The audience finally acknowledged his work with a big `Thank You’. If I am not mistaken, the applause set a record for the longest standing ovation that anyone had received on that stage since the inception in 1933. Later that year, Chaplin suffered a major stroke and had to spend most of his time on a wheelchair. He found it difficult to speak even; with his voice slurring. He still managed to release an illustrated biography called `my Life in Pictures’ in 1974. He rescored an old film, `A Woman of Paris’. He also featured in a documentary called `The Gentleman Tramp’, which was aired in 1975. In that year, he received knighthood by Queen Elizabeth, on a wheelchair. Subsequently, his health started to fade and he died on Christmas Day in 1977.