Film · British & Irish

Charlie Chaplin

1889–1977 · British

Silent comedy — the Tramp, and the last holdout against sound

Chaplin rose from Victorian London music hall to become the most recognised human being on earth, inventing in the Tramp a figure of bowler hat, cane and splayed walk that worked in every country because it needed no language. He wrote, directed, produced, scored and starred in his own films, co-founded United Artists to keep control of them, and went on making essentially silent features for a decade after sound arrived. Accusations of communist sympathy drove him out of the United States in 1952, and he did not return until 1972, to collect an honorary Oscar.

How to spot them

▸Bowler hat, toothbrush moustache, cane, oversized shoes, splay-footed waddle — the Tramp
▸Pathos smuggled inside slapstick: the gag sets up a moment of real feeling
▸He composed his own scores; 'Smile' and the 'Terry's Theme' from Limelight are his
▸Long-take, full-figure comedy — the camera stands back so you can see the whole body work
▸Often paired with the huge Mack Swain or the bullying Eric Campbell; the boy Jackie Coogan

Key films

A tramp adopts an abandoned baby and fights the orphanage men on a tenement roof to keep him (1921)

The Kid — Jackie Coogan as the boy; his first full-length feature.

Starving in a Klondike cabin, a prospector boils and eats his own boot, and later makes two bread rolls dance on forks (1925)

The Gold Rush — the film he said he most wanted to be remembered for.

A blind flower seller mistakes a vagrant for a millionaire; at the end she touches his hand and knows him (1931)

City Lights — released silent, with his own score, four years after sound arrived.

A factory hand is swallowed by the gears of a production line, and sings a song in gibberish Italianate nonsense (1936)

Modern Times — the Tramp's last appearance, and the first time audiences heard the star's voice.

A dictator in a mock-German state dances with an inflatable globe, and a Jewish barber is mistaken for him (1940)

The Great Dictator — his first true talkie, ending in a direct-to-camera speech for humanity.

A courtly Parisian bank clerk murders wealthy widows for their money and calls it a business (1947)

Monsieur Verdoux — a commercial disaster in America that damaged his standing there.

A washed-up music-hall clown saves a suicidal ballerina; the two great silent comedians share a stage at last (1952)

Limelight — the only time he appeared on screen with Buster Keaton.

Key ideas

Comedy is a long shot of life, tragedy a close-up — his own formulation of why he kept the camera back
Total authorship: writer, director, producer, star, composer and, through United Artists, his own distributor
The dignity of the poor treated as a subject, not a joke, in the middle of a gag sequence

Quick-fire facts

•Born in Walworth, south London, on 16 April 1889; his mother was committed to an asylum and he spent time in a workhouse
•He joined Fred Karno's music-hall troupe and toured America with it, where Keystone signed him in 1913
•In 1919 he co-founded United Artists with Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks and D. W. Griffith
•He received an honorary Academy Award at the very first ceremony in 1929
•His only competitive Oscar came in 1973, for the score of Limelight, which had been barred from Los Angeles screens for twenty years
•Re-entry to the United States was withdrawn in 1952 while he sailed to Britain; he settled in Corsier-sur-Vevey, Switzerland
•He returned to America in 1972 for an honorary Oscar and received a twelve-minute standing ovation, the longest in the ceremony's history
•He was knighted in 1975, two years before his death on Christmas Day 1977
•In 1978 his coffin was stolen from its Swiss grave and held for ransom; it was recovered eleven weeks later
•He was married four times; his fourth wife, Oona, was the daughter of the playwright Eugene O'Neill

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Sources

The Chaplin Office — Chaplin's Life
Festival de Cannes — Charlie Chaplin at the Festival de Cannes