Charles Chaplin
Charles Spencer «Charlie» Chaplin (London, April 16, 1889-Corsier-sur-Vevey, December 25, 1977) was an actor, comedian, composer, producer, screenwriter, director, British writer and editor. He became very popular in silent cinema thanks to the many films he made with his character Charlot. He is considered a symbol of humor and silent cinema. Towards the end of World War I, he was one of the most recognized men in the world cinematography.
His parents were also related to show business like him, especially the music-hall genre. Chaplin made his debut at the age of five, when he replaced his mother in a performance. In 1912, he had already performed with the Fred Karno theater company, with whom he toured various countries.
His character Charlot made his debut in 1914, in the film Earning his Bread, and during that year he made thirty-five short films, including All for an Umbrella, Charlot at the dance and Charlot and the fire. However, Chaplin's most notable films were The Gold Rush (1925), City Lights (1931), Modern Times (1936) and The Great Dictator (1940). His techniques at the time of filming included slapstick , mime, pantomime and other visual comedy routines. From the mid-1910s, he directed most of his films, in 1916 he also took over the production, and from 1918 he composed the music for his productions. In 1919, in collaboration with Douglas Fairbanks, David Wark Griffith, and Mary Pickford, he founded United Artists.
Throughout his life, Chaplin received multiple awards and nominations. He received Honorary Oscars in 1928 and 1972, was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1948, was knighted OBE in 1975, and had a star named after him on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. in 1970. In 1952, after a series of political problems that involved him with communism and anti-American activities, he had to go into exile in Switzerland, where he spent the rest of his life. Although the number of productions he made by that time had decreased, he filmed A King in New York and A Countess from Hong Kong , his last works. He passed away on Christmas Day 1977.
Chaplin was married four times — to Mildred Harris, Lita Grey, Paulette Goddard and Oona O'Neill — and was credited with dating eight other actresses of his day. Three of his children, Josephine, Sydney and Geraldine, also dedicated themselves to show business.
Biography
Early Years
Charles Spencer Chaplin was born on 16 April 1889, presumably on East Street in Walworth, London. However, a letter discovered in 2011 alleged that he was born in a wagon in Black Patch Park, a gypsy encampment in Smethwick, near Birmingham. His parents were music-hall artists. His father, Charles Spencer Chaplin Sr., was an actor and singer; While his mother, Hannah Chaplin, was known in the show under the pseudonym Lily Harley, the two separated before Charles was three years old. An 1891 census showed that Harley lived in Barlow Street with her two children—Charles had a half-brother, Sydney John Hawkes (1885-1965).
As a child, Chaplin lived alternately at various addresses, notably around Kennington Road in Lambeth, including 3 Pownall Terrace, Chester Street and 39 Methley Street. His paternal grandmother's mother came from a family of gypsy blacksmiths, a fact of which Chaplin was very proud and which he defined in his autobiography as "the foundation of the family fabric."
Charles Chaplin Sr. was an alcoholic and cared little for his children, although they briefly lived with him and his mistress, Louise, at 287 Kennington Road, due to their mother having been committed to the nursing home. Cane Hill in Coulsdon because of his serious psychiatric problems.
His father died in 1901 of cirrhosis when he was 37 and his son Charles, twelve. He was buried in an unmarked mass grave. According to a 1901 census, Chaplin resided at 94 Ferndale Road, Lambeth, as a member of a group of young dancers, "The Eight Lancashire Boys", directed by William Jackson.
A disease of the larynx ended the career of Chaplin's mother. Due to one of her hospitalizations as a result of her mental problems —she suffered from nervous depression— and malnutrition, her children were admitted for several weeks in Lambeth Asylum in South London and then Hanwell School for Orphans and Poor Children from June 1896 to January 1898.
In 1903, Chaplin played Billy in the play Sherlock Holmes, written by William Gillette and starring British actor Harry Arthur Saintsbury. With this group, he gave shows in different music-halls in London and in the rest of England. When Sherlock Holmes was replaced by Clarice, Chaplin remained in the role of Billy until production wrapped on December 2. During the performances, Gillette guided Chaplin in his sober manner.
Chaplin worked in various professions—gofer boy, glassblower, street vendor—until he was hired by the Frohman company to perform some minor roles until the middle of the decade on tours of England and in the capital. Meanwhile, his mother was hospitalized again because of a new nervous breakdown. Upon completion of his contract with Frohman, he performed successfully in coffeehouses, circuses, and music-hall shows.
Early years in the United States
Chaplin's entry into Fred Karno's mime company in 1907 was a fundamental event in his artistic training. He debuted with a comic role in the play The Football Match His first tour of the United States with the Karno troupe occurred between 1910 and 1912; by 1909, he had performed in the main variety theaters of Paris. By the end of 1912, they had already toured Canada, New York, Chicago, Fall River, Philadelphia, etc. Arthur Stanley Jefferson, later known as Stan Laurel, also participated in the company. He and Chaplin shared a room in a pension. By late 1913, Chaplin's performances had been seen by Mack Sennett, Mabel Normand, Minta Durfee, and Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle. Sennett, who had discovered him in a New York theater in a drunken role, hired him for his Keystone Studios as Ford Sterling's replacement at a rate of $150 quarterly and $175 the remaining nine. adapt to the demands of an action movie. Having finished filming Earning a Bread, Sennett felt he had made a costly mistake. Many historians agree that Normand was the one who convinced him to give it another chance. Chaplin quickly became a hit and was Keystone's most popular star.
Normand directed Chaplin on a few occasions and also wrote the scripts for some of his early films. Chaplin did not like being directed by a woman, and on many occasions they had disagreements. However, they became friends, despite the fact that soon after Chaplin left Keystone.
The Wanderer
The character of the tramp, also known as Charlot in Spain and Latin America, was introduced during the silent era in a Keystone comedy titled Suffocating Races (released February 7, 1914). However, Chaplin had designed the character's outfit for a film produced a few days earlier, but released shortly after the other, on February 9, 1914, entitled Mabel's Strange Dilemmas. Chaplin recalled in his autobiography:
I had no idea what makeup to wear. I didn't like my character as a reporter. Carlitos journalist]. However, on the way to the wardrobe, I thought of wearing pumpkins, big shoes, a cane and a mushroom hat. He wanted everything to be contradictory: the loose pants, the narrow jacket, the small hat and the wide shoes. I was undecided between looking young or older, but remembering that Sennett wanted me to look like a much older person, I added a small mustache that, I thought, would add more age without hiding my expression. I had no idea of the character, but as soon as I was ready, the makeup and the clothes made me feel the character, I started to know it and when I got to the stage I was born completely.
Charlot is a vagabond with refined manners, clothing, and the dignity of a gentleman. Chester Conklin contributed the little tailcoat and Ford Sterling the shoes. The only thing that belonged to Chaplin was the cane cane, as the bowler hat also belonged to Roscoe Arbuckle.
Chaplin, with his character, quickly became the most successful star in Sennet's company. The vagabond was known as Charlot in France, Italy, Spain, Andorra, Portugal, Greece, Romania and Turkey, as Carlitos in Brazil and Argentina and Der Vagabund in Germany. Chaplin went on to play the tramp in a dozen shorts and later in various feature films. However, he still made a cameo appearance as a "Keystone Kop"—incompetent policemen who intervened in a series of 1920s comedy films—in A Thief Catcher, filmed between the 5th and 26th. January 1914. The film was believed missing and therefore Chaplin's performance in it was unknown, until a print was discovered in 2010 during an antiques sale in Michigan.
The popular character of the tramp became deeply identified with the silent film era. When sound productions became widespread in the 1930s, Chaplin refused to embody his character talking about him. In fact, in City Lights (1931), there is no dialogue. Chaplin abandoned his character in the film Modern Times (released on February 5, 1936), which ends with the tramp walking down an endless road towards the horizon, hand in hand with Paulette Goddard. The film was virtually silent, although in one scene Chaplin could be heard singing for a few minutes (however, in an unintelligible language). Despite this ending, Chaplin returned to project, for the last time, the figure of the tramp in his first totally sound film, The Great Dictator (1940), this time in the role of a Jewish barber who suffers persecution from fascist totalitarianism.
Chaplin's formula at the time of filming consisted of exaggerated gestures and other methods of physical comedy. Usually, the homeless man responds to his enemies with kicks or bricks, that is, he uses great aggressiveness, for which critics warned that his pranks bordered on vulgarity, despite the fact that viewers liked the character. In 1915, Chaplin—known in major European and American cities—signed a new contract with Essanay for one year, with a salary of $1,250 per week. With this company, he made 14 films in which he further developed his cinematographic skills., in productions considered more ambitious. Frequently, they shared the bill with Chaplin, actors such as Edna Purviance who embodied, in general, naive girls, or the villains Leo Blanco and Bud Jamison who were too tall to offset Chaplin's short stature.
Chaplin's popularity continued to rise towards the end of World War I. In his films, he made reference to the problems and injustices of the society of his time; among them, the difficulties, constant struggles and humiliation of the helpless immigrants and labor problems.
With the Mutual Film Corporation
In 1917, the Mutual Film Corporation paid Chaplin $670,000 to produce a dozen two-reel comedies on exceptional terms. Twelve films were produced over a period of 18 months, for which he received US$150,000. Among these films are Charlot the Peddler, Charlot Moneylender, Charlot fireman, Charlot on Calle de la Paz and Charlot at the store. During the filming of the latter, the United States entered the First World War. Edna Purviance continued to be the female lead, but Chaplin also included Eric Campbell, Henry Bergman and Albert Austin. Chaplin considered his period with the Mutual Film Corporation "the happiest of his career".
Chaplin took over directing his films from 1918. However, a year earlier, when his contract with Mutual had expired, he refused to continue working with them and signed a new contract with First National to produce eight films of two reels for $1,075,000. By 1923, Chaplin already had his own studios in Hollywood and thus allowed him to work at a more relaxed pace and focus more on the quality of his productions. For First National, he made Life of a dog and Shoulder arms in 1918.
United Artists Foundation
In 1919, the group consisting of Chaplin, Mary Pickford, Mac Adoo, D. W. Griffith and Douglas Fairbanks, founded the United Artists (UA) film distribution company, in an attempt to escape the growing power of other distributors and financiers. This company, along with full control of his film production through his studio, ensured Chaplin's independence as a filmmaker. He served on the AU board until the 1950s, when he sold 75% of his shares to a group led by Arthur Krim.
Chaplin's films were beginning to be feature films, save for a brief cameo in A Woman from Paris (1923). which was followed by the comedies The Gold Rush (1925) and The Circus (1928). The Gold Rush is considered the seventh best film of the century xx, out of a hundred selected and is succeeded by Modern Times (1936). His only dramatic work was Public Opinion, released in October 1923.
After the advent of talkies, Chaplin continued to focus on silent films, including sound effects and music with melodies based on or composed by popular songs. The Circus (1928), City Lights (1931) and Modern Times (1936) were essentially silent. City Lights was praised for its mix of comedy and sentimentality. After its premiere, Chaplin traveled for 15 months to London, Berlin, Paris, Vienna and Brussels.
Modern Times was the first film in which Chaplin's voice was heard, but many consider her to be mute anyway. Preparations for this film began at the end of 1932 and filming began in October 1934, with Paulette Goddard as the protagonist. In it, Chaplin allegories the machinery of the industrial age, the worker-robot, mass production and the difference in social classes. Two scenes from the film are still remembered today: one, when the homeless man is trapped inside the gears of a machine and when, at the end, he walks along an endless highway towards the horizon holding hands with Paulette Goddard. Modern Times meant the last appearance of the classic vagabond —despite the fact that his figure would be enunciated again in The Great Dictator (1940) in the form of a Jewish barber— and was considered the fifth best film of the 20th century.
The best-known song he composed, "Smile," for Modern Times, was later 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 languages in the late 1960s—notably Petula Clark's version and another discovered in 1990 by Judith Durham of The Seekers recorded in 1967—. The song by Candilejas was a hit in the 1950s under the title "Eternally". Chaplin also wrote scores for his silent films, when they were re-released with sound, especially The Boy, with Jackie Coogan in its first version, which was released again in 1971.
The great dictator
Chaplin's first talking film, The Great Dictator (1940), was an act of defiance against Nazism. It was filmed and released a year before the United States entered World War II. Chaplin played the character of Adenoid Hynkel, the dictator of Tomainia, modeled after the German dictator Adolf Hitler, who was four days younger than Chaplin in real life and had a similar mustache. The film also featured comedian Jack Oakie as Benzino Napaloni, the dictator from Bacteria, a parody of Italian dictator Benito Mussolini.
Paulette Goddard also chimed in. The film was seen as an act of courage in the political environment of the time, both for its ridicule of Nazism and its depiction of Jews persecuted by the Nazi regime. The character of a Jewish barber also intervened, played by Chaplin himself, very similar to the classic tramp in his clothing, behavior and attitudes, and who also suffered persecution. At the end, the barber makes a speech denouncing the dictatorship, greed, hatred and intolerance, speaking out in favor of freedom and human fraternity:
I'm sorry, but I don't want to be an emperor, that's none of my business, I don't want to rule or conquer someone. I would like to help everyone if possible: Jews and Gentiles, Blacks and Whites. We should all want to help, so are human beings. We want to live with the happiness of the other, not with his anguish. We don't want to hate each other and despise each other. In this world there is room for all, and the earth is rich and can provide everyone. The way of life could be free and beautiful...».Fragment of The Great Dictator (1940), played by the Barberian character
The film was nominated in five categories for the Academy Awards. However, it did not win any. It was banned in Spain and premiered 36 years later, in 1976, when Francisco Franco had already died.
Political persecution
Chaplin refused to support the effort made by the army during World War II, as he had done in the previous war, when he promoted war bonds for World War I with his colleague Douglas Fairbanks. In his comedy in black humor Monsieur Verdoux, from 1947, criticized capitalism and claimed that the world encouraged mass killing through wars and weapons of mass destruction. A King in New York, one of his last productions, satirized the political persecution based on exile that he had had to carry out years before. In 1937, a campaign against the comedian accused him of having plagiarized René Clair in Modern Times in his film Freedom for us. On Chaplin, Clair said: "That is a man who dominates the history of cinema." In 1938, he was pressured not to film The Great Dictator and, on the occasion of its 1940 release, Joseph Goebbels, Adolf Hitler's propaganda minister, commented: "Chaplin is a contemptible little Jew.". In 1942, the newspapers accused him of being a communist, and the following year Joan Barry had a daughter and denounced the actor for not wanting to acknowledge her paternity. In 1944, the process initiated by Barry was resolved in favor of Chaplin.
During World War II, he campaigned for the opening of the Second Front to help the Soviet Union, which was fighting the Germans alongside the United Kingdom, the United States, and the other allies, and supported various pro-Soviet friendship groups. He also socialized with well-known communists such as Hanns Eisler and Bertolt Brecht, and attended events held by Soviet diplomats. In the political climate that prevailed in the United States in the 1940s, this behavior meant that Chaplin could be considered "dangerously progressive and amoral." Chaplin denied being a communist and claimed he was a "peacemonger", but considered government efforts to suppress that ideology it was an unacceptable infringement of civil liberties. He was indicted by the Committee on Un-American Activities for alleged "un-American" activities. J. Edgar Hoover had provided secret files on him to the FBI. On the one hand, due to his progressive ideas, publicly exhibited in all his short films and in many of his films such as Modern Times or The great dictator, caused any excuse to be found to put him in prison. In fact, in 1947 the Anti-American Activities Commission accused 79 American film figures, which is why the process began against the "Ten Hollywood" who refused to appear before the McCarthyite commission. In 1949, the Washington Court of Appeals rejected the appeals filed by the "Hollywood Ten", who were sentenced to one year in prison for 1950 and registered on the black lists. He was also accused of not complying with the Mann Act - which prohibits the transfer of individuals to other states for the purpose of prostitution - when he took his girlfriend Joan Barry from New York to Los Angeles. For participating in an act of solidarity with Russia in San Francisco and taking part in a Russian art act in New York, he was criticized and defined as communist.
His film Monsieur Verdoux (1947) was another excuse to justify this persecution, since it established a parallelism between the crimes of the protagonist and those of the great powers during wars. a violent conference took place in New York, where Chaplin was verbally attacked by more than a hundred journalists. In 1952, he went to the United Kingdom for the premiere of Lights, and Hoover, upon learning of the fact, negotiated with the Immigration and Naturalization Service to bar Chaplin from re-entry to the US.
Exile
Looking closely, life seems to be a tragedy; seen from afar, it seems like a comedy. Never forget to smile, because the day you didn't smile will be a lost day. Life is a play that does not allow essays. That's why he sings, laughs, dances, weeps and lives every moment, before the curtain comes down and the work ends without applause. You have to have faith in yourself. Even though I was in the orphanage or I would walk the streets looking for what to eat, I was considered the greatest actor in the world. Life is wonderful... if you're not afraid of it. Without knowing misery, it is impossible to value luxury. More than machinery we need humanity, and more than intelligence, kindness and courtesy. I was persecuted and banished, but my only political creed was always freedom. —Charles Chaplin |
In 1947, the Committee on Un-American Activities began lobbying the prosecution to deport Chaplin, "whose life in Hollywood contributes to destroying the moral fiber of America," as it was put. Despite the fact that he was called to testify on several occasions, he never appeared and was accused by a reactionary association for writing a letter to the painter Pablo Picasso, also a communist, in reference to the Eisler case.
A US senator said that "Chaplin's behavior bordered dangerously on treason." On September 17, 1952, the United States Attorney General gave instructions to detain the actor and part of his family when they were traveling on the RMS Queen Elizabeth to attend the premiere of Candilejas in Europe and thus, debate whether or not he should be expelled. There they denounced him for "belonging to the Communist Party, as well as serious crimes against morality and making statements that show a hostile attitude and contempt for the country thanks to whose hospitality has been received." enriched".
Finally, he acquired a mansion in Corsier-sur-Vevey, in Switzerland, where he lived from 1953 until his death. His wife, Oona, traveled to the United States to auction off her husband's assets and, on the occasion of his 64 On his birthday, Chaplin went to Geneva and handed over his return permit to the United States to the American consul, thereby demonstrating his intention of not wanting to return to that country, although he later returned to receive an award for his career in 1972.
Andrei Gromyko, USSR Minister of Foreign Affairs between 1957 and 1985, met Charlie Chaplin on two occasions, the first in the US and the second in London. In 1988 he wrote the following about his encounters with the actor:
I was standing, talking to someone, when the man who knew so well about the cinema approached me with a lovely smile: "How are you, Mr. Ambassador? I am Charlie Chaplin." (...) After greeting him, I said to him: "In my country, all film fans know you very well. And now that the Soviet people know their speeches against fascism and their support for the Soviet Union, they feel even more sympathy for you." (...) When we separated, Chaplin said, "I wish you victory." The next time I saw him was in London, at a diplomatic reception (...). He had definitely left the United States, but had not yet been established in Switzerland. (...) I asked him a delicate question: "What are you now, American or British?" He responded with a smile of dislike: "I guess I'm not really American." Then he added, suddenly again: "I am sick of being defamed, especially because I don't know why." We separated from the group and continued: "Pray for yourself. I've been insulted for getting married more than once, but if that's a crime, millions of Americans are also guilty. What happens is that I haven't been lucky in that. No one can accuse me of acting unjustly with any of the women I've been divorced from. I thought he had already been quite punished for life, but it seems that there are people who want to punish me even more." I looked almost supplicating, like looking for my understanding. He continued: “They persecute me because in my films I express opinions that they do not share. They attack my moral behavior first and then seek legal reasons: they are trying to prove that I have not paid all the taxes accrued for my profits in the United States. All this is part of an organized campaign against me, and American law is so elastic, that if the government is against one, it can already be lost, even if it is totally innocent. That's why I said goodbye to the United States." The man was honest. Suddenly, and as he spoke to himself, he said, "Why do I tell you all this?" Then he gave the answer: “First, because, although I am not a communist, I admire the honesty of his country. Secondly, because I know you will never use my words to hurt me."Andréi Gromyko, Memories (1988) pp.87-88
Composer
Chaplin composed a variety of scores and songs for his films, though he was not credited for doing that work. The song "Smile", which he composed for Modern Times, was very popular in the United Kingdom when it was performed by Nat King Cole in 1954, and by Celine Dion during the obituaries at the 83rd Academy Awards. of 2010, held the following year in the United States. His songs were even sung by prestigious singers such as Michael Jackson or the Mexican José José. In the 1960s, Petula Clark performed "This is my song", which Chaplin had written for The Countess from Hong Kong.
In 1972 he won an Oscar for "Best Original Score" for Candilejas, which he shared with Raymon Rasch and Larry Russell. His nephew, Spencer Dryden, was a Hall of Fame drummer of Rock.
Last years
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Between May and July 1956, in England, he directed the filming of A King in New York. During filming he was made a Fellow of the British Film Academy in London. For that film, he produced, scripted, acted in, and directed. In 1958, he began writing his autobiography and the Brussels Cinematheque asked 150 historians from around the world for a list of the best films in the history of cinema: Chaplin turned out to be the director with the most votes for The Gold Rush.
In 1962, he was made an Honorary Doctor of Oxford University, England. In 1964, he announced the appearance of his memoirs, and in 1965, he began directing The Countess of Hong Kong, with Sophia Loren and Marlon Brando, released in 1966.
In 1969, on the occasion of his 80th birthday, three historians of his work (Maurice Bessy, Pierre Leprohon and Marcel Martin) gave him an open letter, in which they asked him to reissue their films, thus allowing his films They were known by the new generations, a request that he would carry out in the following years. In 1972, he returned to the United States and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences paid him a tribute and awarded him the Honorary Oscar award during a celebration held at the Pavillion Dorothy Chandler at the Music Center in Los Angeles on April 16 of that year, her 83rd birthday. To a standing applause for twelve minutes, the longest applause at an Oscars celebration, she commented: "Words seem so insignificant, so useless. I can only say that... thank you for the honor of being invited here, and... oh, you are wonderful and sweet people, thank you."
Between 1969 and 1976, Chaplin used musical compositions and scores used in his films, to reissue them in others such as The Leisure Class (1971), Payday (1972), A day of pleasure (1973) or Charlot in the sun (1974). He also collaborated for The Circus (1969) and The Kid (1971). In 1974, his eighty-fifth birthday was celebrated in different parts of the world and in Buenos Aires, Modern Times was revived. In February 1975, the news of his new film spread: La rareza, which deals with the story of a South American woman endowed with wings and capable of flying.
On March 2, 1975, Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom appointed him Sir, awarding him the Order of the British Empire. Chaplin, already weakened, received the distinction in a wheelchair because he could not move very easily.In 1976, some of his little-remembered films were revived and cycles were mounted on his extensive filmography. His last work was A Woman from Paris, which came to fruition in 1976.
Death
The actor's health began to decline in the mid-1960s, when filming on A Countess from Hong Kong ended. In addition to the asthma symptoms he suffered from, he was diagnosed with senile dementia. The renowned actress Lillian Gish admitted that she was not able to recognize her when she arrived in the United States in 1972. By 1977, she was no longer able to speak or move, although she used to walk in a wheelchair accompanied by her wife through the streets of Vevey until the lake. In September 1977, he witnessed a circus show, and at the end, the clowns gave him their red noses as a tribute. It was his last public appearance. Towards the end of the year, the public media reported on Chaplin's physical weakness.
He died on Christmas 1977 at the age of 88 at his Manoir de Ban residence in Consier-sur-Vevey, Switzerland, in his sleep, at 4 a.m. (Swiss time). After an intimate ceremony, he was buried in the cemetery of the canton of Vaud. Coincidentally, his daughter recalled in several interviews that her father had never liked Christmas because it reminded him of the extreme poverty he had experienced in his childhood. On March 1, 1978, his body was stolen by a small group of Polish mechanics. with the aim of extorting his family. However, his plan failed, the thieves were caught, and his remains were recovered eleven weeks later, on May 17, near Lake Geneva. His body was again entombed, but this time under 1.8 meters of concrete to avoid further assaults. In 1981, London City Council erected a life-size statue of Chaplin in Walworth, where he spent his early life.
Private life
In 1918, he married the young actress Mildred Harris, of whom he said: “She was young and pretty. But my emotions were very mixed. Without being in love, I wanted our marriage to be a success. It was not". In 1919, the couple had their first child, Norman, who lived for only three days. Then the couple separated—divorced in 1920—and Chaplin's mother's mental health worsened again. In 1921, she came to the United States to spend the last years of her life with her son.
In 1924, he married Lita Gray in the Mexican municipality of Empalme, Sonora, because she had become pregnant when she was only 16 years old; by 1926, they had had two sons, whom he named Charles and Sydney (the latter after his brother, who died on Chaplin's 76th birthday). For her part, Lita Grey, filed for divorce and the court seized her home and her film studio, finally, in 1927, compensated her with one million dollars.
In August 1928, his mother died at the age of 63, a fact about which he commented: «He spent many years in mental hospitals. But in the last seven of hers, she saw her children triumphant over her. That made her partly recover her health ». On her marriage to the actress Paulette Goddard in 1936, he commented: "When I knew her 'thoroughly' I saw that she was a happy and funny girl. I felt desperately alone, hoping to find somewhere a nice "little ray of sunshine".
In 1941, he divorced Paulette Goddard and in 1943 he married again, this time to Oona O'Neill, daughter of playwright Eugene O'Neill. She was 18 years old and he was 55. By 1946 they had already had two children, Geraldine and Michael John. Two years earlier, his two sons—from marriage to Lita Gray—had been called up to the US Army and destined to fight in Germany. In 1948, the French Association of Film Critics approached the Swedish Nobel Foundation and proposed him as a candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize, which generated various controversies.[citation needed]
Throughout his life, he was romantically linked to many actresses of his day including Hetty Kelly, Edna Purviance, Mildred Harris, Pola Negri, Marion Davies, Lita Grey, Merna Kennedy, Georgia Hale, Louise Brooks, Paulette Goddard, Joan Barry, and finally with Oona O'Neill.
Legacy
Artistic Recognitions
Chaplin was appointed sir in 1975 at the age of 85 by Queen Elizabeth II. This honor had already been proposed in 1931 and 1956, but was vetoed by the Foreign Office, who expressed concern about Chaplin's alleged political views and his decision to marry young people as young as 16 twice. This, perhaps, would damage the reputation of the British honors system and the relationship with the United States.
Among other honours, Chaplin received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1970. A statue of the comedian was made by John Doubleday to stand in London's Leicester Square. It was introduced by sir Ralph Richardson in 1981. There is a bronze statue of Chaplin in Waterville Kerry.
Chaplin received three Academy Awards in his lifetime: one for Best Score and two honorary awards. However, during his years as a filmmaker, Chaplin did not receive any awards for his films, despite the fact that City Lights and Modern Times are considered some of the best films. xx century.[citation needed]
Oscar Awards
| Year | Category | Movie | Outcome |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1941 | Best movie | The Great Dictator | Nominee |
| Best actor | Nominee | ||
| Best original script | Nominee | ||
| Original soundtrack | Nominee | ||
| 1948 | Best original script | Monsieur Verdoux | Nominee |
| 1973 | Best original dramatic soundtrack | Candilejas | Winner |
Assessment and influence
Currently, he is considered one of the most representative entertainment figures of silent cinema and an icon of humor. Between 1917 and 1918, the actor Billy West made about twenty films imitating Chaplin's character. Four years after his death, the Ukrainian astronomer Lyudmila Karachkina, discoverer of 131 asteroids, named one of them Chaplin 3623 in honor of the actor. He has also been featured in various cartoon series and, in 1985, he was honored with his image on postage stamps in the United Kingdom. Critics said that he had reached "a level of dramatic expression that has never been surpassed."
In addition to marketing various products with Chaplin's image, IBM designed commercials in the 1980s with an impersonator of the comedian. In 1992, Richard Attenborough coordinated a film about his biography entitled Chaplin, which received a BAFTA Award. Director John Woo, for his part, directed the film Hua ji shi dai (1981), in which he parodied The Circus. In 2001, British comedian Eddie Izzard played the actor in the film The Cat's Meow, based on the still unresolved death of producer Tomas H. Ince during a football match, in which Chaplin was a guest. The prestigious Italian director Pier Paolo Pasolini was a follower of his films and in his film The Canterbury Tales, the character of Ninetto Davoli is a kind of recreation of the tramp. One of the late actor's daughters, Josephine Chaplin also worked on the film.
Mexican actor Roberto Gómez Bolaños on his show "el Chapulín Colorado" he paid tributes to Chaplin, such as in the chapter "the costume, the mask and something else" of 1974 in which he made a brief interpretation of Charlot as well as his character in the parody El Gordo y el Flaco where precisely his character of El Flaco alludes to a character very similar to Chaplin.
The newspaper Página/12, from Argentina, analyzing his work, published: «Almost without exception, Chaplin has found in the contradictions of his century the most passionate dramatic material and, without a doubt, this This fact earned him opposition from critics who did not accept this criterion of "thematic immediacy" that he has bravely made him travel along paths linked to political satire ».
The Time magazine conducted a study, supported by surveys and opinions from various publications around the world, which recognized Charlie Chaplin as one of the most important personalities of the century xx.[citation required]
In 1999, the American Film Institute defined him as "the tenth most famous actor of all time". In 2008, the writer Martin Sieff in his book Chaplin: A Life, wrote: "Chaplin was not just great, he was gigantic." George Bernard Shaw called him "The only genius of the film industry". to a large number of people who suffered the privations of war and the loss of their families.
In 2005, his hat and cane were auctioned by Bonhams auction house for $300,000 and in 2011, to commemorate the 122nd anniversary of his birth, the technology company Google released a doodle with video to commemorate it.
1. Teplice, Czech Republic.
2. Chełmża, Poland.
3. Waterville, Ireland
4. London, England, United Kingdom.
5. Hyderabad, India.
6. Alassio, Italy
7. Barcelona, Spain
8. Vevey, Switzerland.
Complete filmography
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Annex: Goya Award for best photography
Annex: XI edition of the Goya Awards