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Taylorology Issue 72
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* T A Y L O R O L O G Y *
* A Continuing Exploration of the Life and Death of William Desmond Taylor *
* *
* Issue 72 -- December 1998 Editor: Bruce Long bruce@asu.edu *
* TAYLOROLOGY may be freely distributed *
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CONTENTS OF THIS ISSUE:
Flashes of Charlie Chaplin, Part II
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What is TAYLOROLOGY?
TAYLOROLOGY is a newsletter focusing on the life and death of William Desmond
Taylor, a top Paramount film director in early Hollywood who was shot to
death on February 1, 1922. His unsolved murder was one of Hollywood's major
scandals. This newsletter will deal with: (a) The facts of Taylor's life;
(b) The facts and rumors of Taylor's murder; (c) The impact of the Taylor
murder on Hollywood and the nation; (d) Taylor's associates and the Hollywood
silent film industry in which Taylor worked. Primary emphasis will be given
toward reprinting, referencing and analyzing source material, and sifting it
for accuracy.
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[Other Chaplin items can be found in TAYLOROLOGY 36, 37, 46, and 51]
Flashes of Charlie Chaplin, Part II
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
September 11, 1921
Frank Vreeland
NEW YORK HERALD
Charlie Chaplin, Philosopher, Has Serious Side
Charlie Chaplin an egotist--Charlie Chaplin an iconoclast! It hardly
seems possible. Yet out of his own mouth the king of the screen comedians
convicts himself.
"Yes, I'm an egotist," says Chaplin, no matter how hard you protest.
"I'm an iconoclast. I love to tear things apart. I don't like them as they
are."
And it would seem, from the talk he gave the other day at the Ritz-
Carlton while stopping in New York on his way abroad--his first trip to
Europe in eleven years--that he was as he pictured himself. But it would
require the pen of a George Meredith to describe such an egotist.
Make no mistake about the quality of self-concentration in him. He is
neither overbearing, vainglorious nor snobbish. Those who spoke with him on
his visit here found him one of the most affable and engaging of men. There
is none of the aloofness in him to be found in screen performers with less
than half his success. Nor is he cold and ruthless. When he is in the mood
for it--and he acknowledges he is a creature of moods--he can be gay and
hospitable even to casual acquaintances.
It is simply that he is confident in himself, that he has arrived at his
viewpoint deliberately as a result of his career. He might be called an
egotist by conviction. For all things are measured according to his
personality. Fundamentally, every one is an egotist, more or less, in that
vein, but Chaplin is franker about it than most.
"Ah, yes," he declares, with a twinkle in his eye, "I think a very great
deal of myself. Everything is perfect or imperfect, according to myself.
I am the perfect standard."
And he waves his hand with boyish yet ironic smile, having settled that.
His self-absorption can be understood on this basis, that, now that he
is independent, he resents anything which smacks of intrusion from the
outside world that would seem likely to control or curb him. There is a hint
of a smoldering rebel in him that would have broken out but for his success.
Chaplin says positively that he is not soft hearted. Admirers of his
tender wistfulness in "The Kid" will scarcely credit it. Yet when anything
rouses him a glitter comes into his eyes, almost a fixed, hard stare, that is
scarcely the expression of an arrant sentimentalist. Then again, when he
speaks of Barrie, a shadowy, dreamy look drifts across his eyes--for his is a
Barrie fan. But of that more later.
Personality is the most fascinating thing in the world--that study of
the common qualities and the unique that link up and separate the great and
the small. Chaplin says that nothing in life enchants him quite so much as
personality--the human stuff. He himself is one of the most fascinating
among mortals. He hasn't the simple, bubbling, direct appeal of his close
friend Douglas Fairbanks. He is more subtle.
Some one has said that the great of the earth aren't really complex,
they only seem so. Yet Chaplin is one of the most complex among men, a fact
which leads to some apparent contradictions. One moment he will declare that
he is wrapped up primarily in his own concerns; the next he will assert that
nothing is of real moment and all life is ephemeral. But that, at bottom, is
the expression of a mind quietly secure in itself and disdainful of the
world.
All this came out in a talk in his suite at the hotel the other day in
which he illuminated for virtually the first time the serious side of his
nature, and all but psychoanalyzed himself. As he talked readily and
pungently, he drank copious draughts of hot water with a pinch of salt, for
he has suffered from indigestion and neuritis of late. He curled about the
earthenware pots holding this stimulating beverage on the table exactly like
a kitten around a saucer of milk, and drank it with his left hand--though he
gestured mainly with his right.
Those hands of his hardly seem in the flesh to have the delicacy and
dexterity they possess on the films, until he moves them in a deft gesture,
and then the instinctive grace shows. As he talks he clasps them around his
knee, or digs them in his trousers or vest pockets, or thumbs them under his
armpits, and on the rare occasions when he is at a loss for a word, he waves
the right hand slowly in a circle to one side. His favorite motion would
seem to be to consist of brushing the curly locks back from his forehead, or
rumpling the gray hair in back. For already, though he is only 32, the snows
of time are creeping through his dark hair.
Meanwhile, his legs are behaving in an interesting and eccentric
fashion, quite as though they belonged to some one else. They will be
sprawled straight in front of him, or curled around the rungs of his chair
like a school boy, and sometimes one of them will be quite casually sat upon.
They are never in the same place for two minutes.
The feet were encased on this occasion in leather bedroom slippers, and
this, with the neat pin striped suit he wore, gave him not the least air of
being dressed to receive company. He lounged back in his chair quite
unaffectedly, and there was no suggestion despite the royal, golden
decorations of the suite, that there was a king holding his morning levee.
From the summit of his thirty-two years and his five feet four inches he
was asked to look back upon his life and say whether he was satisfied with
it.
"I never really thought of that before," he said slowly, rubbing his
head. "Of course," he went on with his quick smile, "it's hardly time for me
to say at 32 whether I'm satisfied with my life. But I think I am. I think
if I had it to live over again I'd do it as I have--only more so. I'd do it
with less moderation.
"But I'm not satisfied with the world as I find it. There are many
things in it I'd like to change. Do I mean political and economic
conditions? Well, yes, I suppose I do.
"But I'm not soft hearted about them. When I see such misery as that on
the East Side it arouses my emotions, but it doesn't make me sentimental.
My interest is caught--such things stimulate me. I know that if I found my
lot cast there I shouldn't wait very long before I worked myself out of it.
"What is the purpose of existence? I don't know. I accept it as it is.
After all, what is the value of putting such queries to one's self? It's
enough that we're here, that all that has gone before has led up to
ourselves. What does it matter what comes tomorrow? So far as we're
concerned, we're the crown of the ages. Each one can consider himself the
perfect fruit toward which evolution has been working. We're in this world
to live--that's enough."
Despite this interest in himself, the comedian who has passed the
recreation hours for thousands in hilarious enjoyment finds it very difficult
to amuse himself in his leisure hours.
"I'm really very lazy," he explained with a frank smile. "My working
hours are from 9 to 5, and I really don't do anything at all in my spare
time. I don't like to make engagements to meet people or to go to dinners.
The thought of getting ready for such appointments bothers me.
"And yet, when I've finished work I often say, 'I'd like to see so-and-
so now.'
"'Oh,' they tell me, 'you had an engagement to see him a couple of hours
ago, but you broke it off.'
"I don't drive my car about much. In fact about the only thing I like
to do is just ramble around. I swim a bit, but I'm not a sportsman. Yes, I
know there was a picture of me in a magazine dressed in polo costume and
standing beside a horse, but that was all a joke. I went down to Coronado to
rest up a bit, and there was a friend there who had a complete outfit. He
suggested that I put it on just for a joke, and then the picture was taken.
"I don't go to concerts and that sort of thing. I used to play my
violin a great deal up to a couple of years ago, but since then I've hardly
touched it. I seem to have lost interest in such things. Yes, I've composed
my own music, I'm ashamed to confess. Were they bright, gay tunes? Not at
all--very sentimental ballads. Almost weepy. Some time ago I used to think
it would be fine to be the leader of an orchestra. The grace as he waved his
baton attracted me, the sense of command. I felt that way when I conducted
the Hippodrome orchestra. But somehow I don't seem to care so much about it
any more.
"Usually, I'm hard put to it till I set to work and amuse myself.
I hate to think of the effort it would require to go out and meet people, to
go to the theatre. You see, I am lazy. I hate to think of the next picture
I'm going to do right after I've completed one. I don't like to choose the
idea for the story. I put it off till the last moment.
"I put off the day I start to work--and I'm going to defer it as much as
possible in the future. I like to remain in a state of pleasant uncertainty
until I feel in the right mood to start. I must feel a kind of glow, a sort
of white heat or inspiration. Of course, it's impossible to maintain the
quality of inspiration all through a picture. You can't really act except in
a few scenes. After a time on each picture it becomes mechanical and you
find yourself going a bit stale. Toward the end you feel as though you would
have to flog yourself to finish it.
"So I like to save my acting spirit as much as possible. Some actors
insist on acting even when they're rehearsing. I want every bit rehearsed
thoroughly, all the technical details worked out very carefully. I say,
'Now, so-and-so crosses the bridge at this point; now I go over to the table;
now I lift up this cup.' Then, when all those bits of business have been
gone through thoroughly, I say, 'Now we'll act it.'
"But I don't want perfection of detail in the acting. I'd hate a
picture that was perfect--it would seem machine made. I want the human
touch, so that you love the picture for its imperfections."
It may be guessed from all this that Chaplin is something of an epicure
of emotions, a connoisseur of feelings. He is--that attitude pervades his
whole thought. He is inclined to be a sort of professional spectator,
looking on and sampling life exquisitely, plumbing every sensation, even
despair, for the sake of the adventure in it. Though he was born in France
there must be Russian blood somewhere in his ancestry, for he relishes being
introspective.
"The other night," he said, "I went to the 'Follies.' Fanny Brice is a
wonder as a comedian when she says, 'I'm feelin' terrible, t'ank God'; that's
a gem. But the rest of the production didn't move me. Even the pretty girls
didn't stir me, and usually when I see them on the stage it puts me in quite
a romantic flutter. I say to myself, 'You might meet one of them and marry
her. There, that girl on the end--maybe she'll be your wife. Who knows?'
"Every time I sit down in front at a musical comedy I'm a potential
husband. It excites me tremendously, and I like it. But at the 'Follies' I
was struck with an impression of straining for effect. I was oppressed, as I
often am, with a sense of the futility of human effort. That ovation given
to Mary and Douglas the other night at the theatre was immense--but at bottom
it amounted to nothing! When you come right down to it nothing in the world
really means anything.
"When I go to the theatre, so often I say to myself, 'Look at all this
noise and bustle going on inside here, while outside real things are
happening! Isn't it terrible? Look at that man there, striving so hard to
please. He thinks he is important. Isn't human nature fruitless and
depressing?'
"My mouth is drawn further and further down. I grow dismal and
despairing. I realize what a perfectly good time I've having with my
emotions. Then I'm happy."
And the comedian laughed.
"Of course," he went on, "the reaction from such moods is pronounced,
and I become quite gay. But I am always impressed with the fact that you can
call nothing in life truly great. The best picture that was ever made, when
it's shown, well, that's that"--he waved his hand--"and it's over. It's
served its purpose, and passed on. Nothing in life is lasting or important.
If God were to come along and pick up the Statue of Liberty the world would
really go right on as though nothing had happened."
The telephone rang, and Chaplin turned toward it eagerly, and listened
expectantly as his press agent answered it.
"That phone," he said, "has been buzzing constantly since I came here.
I never knew I really had so many friends. And in spite of all the calls,
each time it rings I'm just as curious as ever. Yet, no call is ever so
momentous as I expect.
"I'm just as curious about reading fan letters. I get anywhere from 100
to 200 a day. They fascinate me. I hold one in my hand, and say, 'Who knows
what wonderful message this may contain?' And the wonderful message is,
generally, a letter requesting an autographed picture, that runs like this:
"'Dear Mr. Chaplin: I've seen you so often on the screen, and I like you
so much. Won't you please be good enough to send me your photo, so I can put
it among my gallery of screen celebrities, whom I greatly admire?'
"Flattering!
"I send out about 4,000 pictures a year. The pictures cost four cents,
the postage and mailing another four cents, besides the time of the
stenographer to answer the requests--this is on the authority of my press
agent. If I once stopped to look through the heaps of mail I get, I'd never
do any work. And the letters, once I do look at them, never mean anything.
Few intelligent persons write fan letters. And those who do don't make me
feel in the least indispensable. I feel the world would get along just as
well if I should drop out of it.
"You see, I recognize that really too much emphasis is placed on the
personality of a play, without distinguishing his personality on the screen
from his character off it. He is much different out of a picture from what
he is in it. Yet it's that personality they see on the screen, which is
really a sort of impersonal quality, that the fans want to know. Of course,
if you seek to know an actor just as a regular friend--well, that's
different.
"But I must admit that I like such interest. When I came here a year
ago I thought I'd be unobtrusive. I didn't let any one know I was here.
I registered at the hotel under another name. Yet every one seemed to know
it presently. This time when I cam East I thought at first I'd do it
quietly, without any press agent flourish. I even considered I might go
abroad incognito. I said to myself: 'Nobody will know you're around--it
won't really make any difference to them anyhow.' Then I told myself:
'Nonsense! Of course it will! As if you could go incognito!'
"Besides," and he smiled candidly, "I enjoy it. (I like being patted on
the back). So now I'm having a very good time. I'm really taking an
emotional holiday. I found I was going stale. Nothing seemed to interest me
vitally any more. When I think about my latest picture, I'd say to myself,
'What if it shouldn't be a success?' And I'd answer myself, 'What does it
matter, anyhow?' Then I'd start to worry about my apathy, and having really
begun to worry once more, I was happy. I enjoy worrying about my work--it
keeps me interested.
"But this time it wasn't enough. Nothing really roused me but food--
I love food. I'd finished 'The Idle Class,' and I had a number of scenes
completed for my next picture. Then one day, as I was in my dressing room,
starting to make up I looked at myself in the glass suddenly, and said, 'See
here, you're 32, and you haven't been abroad in years. You're not taking any
fun out of life. You're going stale.'
"Yes, perhaps it was the sight of the gray hairs that did it. Maybe I'd
been working on too many pictures in the last year. I'd had a touch of the
'flu,' and that seemed to leave me depressed. At any rate, I decided at
11 o'clock on a Tuesday morning to go to Europe, and at 11 o'clock the next
morning I was leaving Los Angeles. The rest of the company had been all
ready to go on with the picture, but they're disbanded now. I don't care
when the picture is finished. I'm going to have a good time.
"I shall go to England, where I hope to meet H. G. Wells, Bernard Shaw--
all the big men of that country. What places shall I visit in London? Oh,
just 'spots.' I'll take a kind of Dickensian prowl. But particularly I want
to see the Kennington road. That's where I lived as a boy. I don't remember
what it looks like, but I know I want to see it.
"Then I shall go to Berlin. I'm most interested to observe what they've
been doing there since the war, especially in motion picture producing. Also
I'm going to Madrid--I want to see a real bullfight. No, I don't contemplate
playing a bullfighter, though Frank Harris's story, 'Montez the Matador,'
would be splendid to put on the screen.
"This trip, as I said, will be principally for the purpose of
recuperating my emotions. You see, I want to express myself freely. Most of
my life I've been so suppressed. When I was struggling along as an actor I
was so afraid of what people would think about me. I'd harbor secret
thoughts, but I'd be afraid to let them out. Whenever I met a man who
dared to express unconventional ideas--ideas I thought were held only by
myself--I thought he was a superman.
"That's one thing I do appreciate about success. It enables me to do
what I please. I can say to myself: 'Let's go to Egypt today.' And I can
go. I can think what I please.
"That's largely the reason why I don't care much about reading. I don't
want to be fettered by other persons' thoughts. When I was about 19 I set
out to read at a great rate. But since then my interest has languished.
I scarcely read a magazine. Novels don't interest me. I like history a bit.
I also rather enjoy modern biographies--stories that get me close to human
personalities. The biography of Oscar Wilde fascinates me. But I dislike
any suggestion of the mechanical or the non-human in literature. Science?
I hate it.
"I find myself constantly skipping the plot in a book. You see, I don't
want any sense of originality spoiled. I don't want to be bothered by a
suspicion, after I've nursed an idea, that I feel would simply paralyze the
world, that maybe some one, some where, had written the same thing and I'd
read it--and forgotten it.
"Yes, I have what I trust is a really big idea for a picture I want to
play in. I've carried it around in my mind for a couple of years, the way we
all do, and I hope to use it in the near future. It's about a clown. It
will show the hardships of his life. It will present him behind the scenes
as it's never been done before--truthfully. It won't have any of the
sentimental romance you see so often in such plays. It will show how his
work is simply bread and cheese to him--merely his means of earning a living,
nothing more. And it will reveal his utter contempt for his audiences.
"It's like 'Deburau'? I never saw that play and I don't know its
history. Of course, this picture will have its comedy, but it will be the
most serious thing I've ever attempted. For my custard pie days are over.
Yes, possibly I shall do 'Beau Brummell' some day."
But though he has renounced the custard pie and all its works he doesn't
show the bitterness toward that paramount element in his past career that
most converts do toward their early dissipations. When it was suggested that
he might be knighted on his trip to England Chaplin, who discounted any
rumors to that effect, chuckled as he pictured his coat of arms, with a
custard pie rampant.
Always, he said, he had wanted to get away from them, from the first.
As far back as his earliest days in the movies he had striven to put some
real characterization into his parts, and not depend solely on a bakery for
his technique. The story of his debut into pictures had a new sidelight shed
on it by the comedian.
"I was playing at Philadelphia when a strange telegram came to the
theatre. It was addressed to some weird name--Champagne, or something like
that. At any rate it began with 'Ch,' so I figured it must be for me. It
said I was to meet some one on important business in the Longacre Building in
New York City. I asked my friends what kind of persons occupied the Longacre
Building. They said, 'Lawyers,' which got me excited.
"There had been some kind of aunt in my family--a couple of generations
removed--who was expected to die some day and leave us all a big fortune. Of
course, she was probably mythical--you know how there are stories like that
in every family. But I'd heard about her so often, and when I learned that
lawyers occupied the Longacre Building I went there expecting that at last my
ship had come in. But it turned out to be nothing more than an introduction
to the movies.
"When I first began to act before the movies I was terribly nervous.
It wasn't so much the fact that I was appearing in a strange studio, before
cold eyed stage hands. But the Keystone people who hired me had seen me in
'A Night in a Music Hall,' and I was heralded as a frightfully funny man.
I had a reputation to live up to, and I felt desperately put to it to make
good. And all the other comedians stood around the studio with
superciliously twisted mouths and an air of 'Show me.'
"That was all the harder because, never having been in a movie studio
before, I thought it would be the easiest thing to act before a camera.
I figured it would be nothing but walking through my part. Well, I was
quickly disillusioned. I had to study the business. I had to get over
feeling self-conscious before the camera. The way to do that is to
concentrate on your part so hard you lose yourself in it. If you don't you
might just as well quit acting in the movies.
"Moreover, I had the advantage of a good stage training. Every screen
actor would be helped immeasurably by that. I'd acted under an excellent
stage director--Quentin McPherson, director for Charles Frohman, for whom, by
the way, I appeared in 'Sherlock Holmes.' No, I'll never go back to the
speaking stage again. I'm not a very good speaking player, and, besides, an
audience means nothing to me. They are just a mass of figures. I like to go
off somewhere in seclusion, work out a picture and then suddenly spring it on
people and say: "Here, look at it--that's me."
"That stage experience gave me quite a lead from the beginning over
other movie actors. Very few of them in those days understood the technique
of movie acting. They'd walk too fast, or cross over in front of one another
with the utmost nonchalance. Besides I was surprised to discover that few of
them, even those most concerned in the production of pictures, took it
seriously. It was just a cheap sideline with them, a means of making a
livelihood. From the first I took it very seriously. I had been deeply
impressed, as I still am, with the powerful appeal of the motion picture,
with its great circulation, its--what's the word (he snapped his fingers)--
its great scope."
Perhaps Chaplin underrates his desire to read, for he is fond of Frank
Harris's works, and reads Guido Bruno--both of whom are often an effort for
the man in the street. But his reluctance to read, he indicated, is due not
only to distrust of having his cinema ideas colored, but also because he
doesn't want his writing affected. For Chaplin disclosed that he has
secretly been indulging in writing--that he has even been concocting poetry
all these years, with scarcely any one suspecting it.
"Yes, I've scribbled a great deal," he said. "Poetry and such things.
I've never written any short stories nor essays. Most of my writings have
been unfinished. I start off at a great rate, and then lose interest. You
know how you put a thing aside, promising yourself you'll complete it some
day, when you feel more inclined. That's how I've written.
"I've projected several full length plays, though I've never done
anything with them. But I have taken to playwriting more seriously of late.
And--I've completed a one act play."
He launched into a description of it, detailing how it was a satire on a
certain type of piety, in which a child lay dying while a thunderstorm raged
outside and an old crone mumbled pious phrases inside and a man went crazy.
A bright little gruesome bit it seemed, though Chaplin added, with a grin,
that "It had funny passages in it." The unique point about it was that two
mysterious men who sat down in front on the stage during the action turned
out in the end to be the author and the manager, who insisted that "this play
will never get produced unless it has a happy ending," with which the author
agreed.
"Probably that author is more fortunate than I am, for I shall most
likely never get it printed or produced. I don't expect to present it at my
own expense, either. But maybe some day I shall read it to my friends, who
may be able to stand anything."
That interest in religion displayed in this playlet is one of the
underlying traits of the comedian. He considers that many religions in the
world's history have been little but "repressions and propaganda."
"I have no 'spooks.'" he said. "There are none either in my mind or
outside. I don't believe in spiritualism, and, frankly, I don't believe in a
hereafter. Life is interesting enough as we have it here--let's make the
most of it now."
He drank some hot water as he said that--perhaps so much talking had
made him thirsty. Moreover, that drink seemed designed not only for his
indigestion but to keep him from taking on weight. For, he admitted, "I'm
afraid lately I've been taking on avoirdupois, and if I keep on"--he waved
his hand with a mock flourish--"I shall lose my ethereal figure."
The comedian was not always as sturdy as he now is. When he was a lad
in England, he said, he was quite frail. What helped him early in life was
long distance running. It does not appear to be generally known that Chaplin
at one time was a Marathon plugger.
"You see, I have quite a good lung development. And then, my legs were
quite well developed from dancing with the 'Eight Lancashire Lads' on the
stage. I used to belong to the Kennington Harriers, and thought nothing of
running fifteen miles. In fact, I considered going into the Marathon in the
London Olympics, but became ill about that time.
"I can still run ten miles without minding it. You never lose that
stamina and lung power. People are surprised today to know that with my
slight figure I can run long distances. Not so long ago I was at the beach
with Samuel Goldwyn, and he got up off the sand and began doing some
exercises.
"'You ought to take exercise, he said. 'Do this every day.' So I said,
'I think I'll run up and down between those two piers about twenty times.
Want to try it with me?' He stared at me astonished, for the distance on the
sand between the piers was about half a mile. But he and several other film
people ran up and down with me a couple of times--then they dropped out. By
that time a crowd had gathered around and as I kept going they started up a
band. I ran up and down about ten times without any trouble."
The one thing that seems to sweep him away in artistic endeavor is
dancing. He has the most enthusiastic admiration for Pavlowa.
"When I see her floating above me so gracefully, when I look at her
face, I see the tragedy of life. I see the hard struggle in her career.
Something seems to catch hold of me here." He placed a hand on his brow.
"I get all choked up. The rhythm of it carries me away."
Of course in film production he is much interested in David W. Griffith.
He was much drawn to "The Birth of a Nation, " "Intolerance"--especially the
Babylonian episode--and "Broken Blossoms."
"Griffith is a real personality, and he manages to convey it on the
screen. He makes all his offerings distinct and individual. I always go to
see a new Griffith picture. It may be terrible--I may disagree with his
ideas--but they're always interesting. His pictures are different."
Then Chaplin wrinkled up his upper lip and his eyes in a startling real
burlesque of the diabolical mask of the violin player in "Dream Street," and
got up off his chair to wriggle in a travesty of the kind of "evil" to which
the violinist's playing was supposed to incite the slum dwellers. But
Chaplin confessed that it is not often he feels inspired to give such comic
travesties.
"You see," he explained with a rather wistful smile. "I'm not really a
comedian. Except on rare occasions I never feel inclined to try to be funny
and carry on in company. Friends never say of me, 'Oh, he's a very amusing
man to be with.' Frank Tinney is just as funny off the stage as he is on.
I'm not--I wish I were. Mostly I like to be with people with whom I scarcely
have to speak a word. All I want to do occasionally is say, 'Um--aa--h'm!'
I like people who understand when I do this"--and he pointed deftly to
something, jerking his thumb as though he meant the subject to be picked up.
"People whose sole conversation is to yawn and say, 'When do we eat?'
"Not that I think people talk too much. Very rarely do we really get
under the skin of a personality in a conversation. The savages communicate
with each other much more definitely and clearly. If they like you they
stroke your hair, and so on. We cover up ourselves in words."
And then this strange compound of contradictions, who likes Barrie and
considers "Mary Rose," for all the fact that it is a bad stage production,
one of the most spiritual and delicate masterpieces he has ever seen,
acknowledged that he "likes vulgarity, for it is of the masses--of the earth,
earthy--and I love that."
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
[Special thanks to David Pierce for supplying the following article.]
January 18, 1922
Thomas Burke
THE OUTLOOK
The Tragic Comedian
A "Close-Up" of Charles Chaplin
A frail figure, small footed, and with hands as exquisite as those of
Madame la Marquise. A mass of brindled-gray hair above a face of high color
and nervous features. In conversation the pale hands flash and flutter and
the eyes twinkle; the body sways and swings, and the head darts birdlike back
and forth, in time with the soft chanting voice. His personality is as
volatile as his lithe and resilient figure. He has something of Hans
Andersen, of Ariel, touched with rumors of far-off fairyland tears. But
something more than pathos is here. Almost, I would say, he is a tragic
figure. Through the universal appeal of the cinematograph he has achieved
universal fame in larger measure than any man of recent years, and he knows
the weariness and emptiness that accompany excess. He is the playfellow of
the world, and he is the loneliest, saddest man I ever knew.
When I first heard that Charles Chaplin wished to meet me, I was only
mildly responsive. I can never assume much interest in the folk of the film
and the stage; their hectic motions, their voluble, insubstantial talk, and
their abrupt transitions are too exhausting. But I was assured that Charles
Chaplin was "different," and finally a rendezvous was made at a flat in
Bloomsbury. He is different. I was immediately surprised and charmed.
A certain transient glamour hung about this young man to whose doings the
front pages of the big newspapers were given and for whom people of all
classes were doing vigil; but, discounting that, much remained; and the shy,
quiet figure that stepped from the shadow of the window was no mere film
star, but a character that made an instant appeal. I received an impression
of something very warm and bright and vivid. There was radiance, but it was
the radiance of fluttering firelight rather than steady sunlight. At first I
think it was the pathos of his situation that made him so endearing, for he
was even then being pursued by the crowd, and had taken this opportunity to
get away for a quiet walk through narrow streets. But the charm remained,
and remains still. It is a part of himself that flows through every movement
and every gesture. He inspires immediately, not admiration or respect, but
affection; and one gives it impulsively.
At eleven o'clock that night I took him alone for a six-hour ramble
through certain districts of East London, whose dim streets made an apt
setting for his dark-flamed personality. I walked him through byways of
Hoxton, Spitalfields, Stepney, Ratcliff, Shadwell, Wapping, Isle of Dogs; and
as we walked he opened his heart, and I understood. I, too, had spent hard,
inhospitable hours of youth in these streets, and knew his feeling about
them, and could, in a minor measure, appreciate what he felt in such high
degree at coming back to them with his vast treasure of guerdons and fame.
The disordered, gypsy-like beauty of this part of London moved him to ecstasy
after so many years of the bright, angular, gemlike cities of Western
America, and he talked freely and well about it.
At two o'clock in the morning we rested on the curb of an alley-way in
St. George's, and he talked of his bitter youth and his loneliness and his
struggles, and his ultimate bewildering triumph. Always, from the day he
left London, he had at the back of his mind, vague and formless and foolish,
the dream of a triumphal Dick Whittington return to the city whose stones
were once so cold to him; for the most philosophic temper, the most aloof
from the small human passions, is not wholly free from that attitude of "a
time will come when you SHALL hear me." Like all men who are born in exile,
outside the gracious inclosures of life, he does not forget those early
years; and even now that he has made that return it does not quite satisfy.
It is worth having--that rich, hot moment when the scoffers are dumb and
recognition is accorded, the moment of attainment; but a tinge of bitterness
must always accompany it. Chaplin knows, as all who have risen know, that
the very people who were clamoring and beseeching him to their tables and
receptions would not before have given him a considered glance, much less a
friendly hand or a level greeting. They wanted to see, not him, but the
symbol of success--reclame, le dernier cri--and he knew it.
He owes little enough to England. To him it was only a stony-hearted
step-mother--not even the land of his birth. Here, as he told me, he was up
against that social barrier that so impedes advancement and achievement--
a barrier that only the very great or the very cunning can cross. America
freely gave him what he could never have wrested from England--recognition
and decent society. He spoke in chilly tones of his life in England as a
touring vaudeville artist. Such a life is a succession of squalor and mean
things. The company was his social circle, and he lived and moved only in
that circle. Although he had not then any achievements to his credit, he had
the potentialities. Although he was then a youth with little learning, an
undeveloped personality, and few graces, he had an instinctive feeling for
fine things. Although he had no key by which he might escape, no title to a
place among the fresh, easy, cultivated minds where he desired to be, he knew
that he did not belong in the rude station of life in which he was placed.
Had he remained in this country, he would have remained in that station. He
would never have got out. But in America the questions are, "What do you
know?" and "What can you do?" not, "Where do you come from" and "Who are your
people?" "Are you public school?"
Today England is ready to give him all that it formerly denied him. All
doors are open to him, and he is beckoned here and there by social leaders.
But he does not want them. Well might he quote to them the terms of a famous
letter: "The notice which you have been pleased to take of my labors, had it
been early had been kind; but it has been delayed till I am indifferent and
cannot enjoy it...till I am known and do not want it." But twice during our
ramble--once in Mile End Road and once in Hoxton--he was recognized, and the
midnight crowd gathered and surrounded him. There it was the real thing--not
the vulgar desire of the hostess to feed the latest lion, but a spontaneous
burst of hearty affection, a welcome to an old friend. He has played himself
into the hearts of the simple people, and they love him. The film "Charlie"
is a figure that appeals to them, for it is a type of thwarted ambitions, of
futile strivings and forlorn makeshifts for better things. As I watched the
frail, elegant figure struggling against this monstrous burst of enthusiasm,
in which voices hot with emotion, voices of men and women, cried boisterous
messages of good will to "our Charlie," I was foolishly moved. No Prime
Minister could have so fired a crowd. No Prince of the house of Windsor
could have commanded that wave of sheer delight. He might have had the crowd
and the noise, but not the rich surge of affection. A prince is only a
spectacle, a symbol of nationhood, but this was a known friend, one of
themselves, and they treated him so. It was no mere instinct of the mob.
They did not gather to stare at him. Each member of that crowd wanted
privately to touch him, to enfold him, to thank him for cheering them up.
And they could do so without reservations, for they could not have helped him
in his early years--they were without the power. I do not attempt to explain
why this one man, of all other "comics" of stage and film, had so touched the
hearts of the people as to arouse this frenzy of adulation. It is beyond me.
I could only stand and envy the man who had done it.
Yet he found little delight in it. Rather, he was bewildered. I think
his success staggers or frightens him. Where another might be spoiled he is
dazed. The "Charlie," the figure of fun that he created in a casual moment,
has grown upon him like a Frankenstein monster. It and its world-wide
popularity have become a burden to him. That it has not wholly crushed him,
ejected his true self and taken possession of him, is proof of a strong
character. Your ordinary actor is always an actor "on" and "off;" but as I
walked and talked with Chaplin I found myself trying vainly to connect him,
by some gesture or attitude, with the world-famous "Charlie." There was no
trace of it. When, a little later, I saw one of his films, I again tried to
see through the makeup the Chaplin I had met, and again I failed. The
pathetic, fragile clown of the films is purely a studio creation, having
little in common with its creator, for Chaplin is not a funny man. He is a
great actor of comic parts. Every second of his pictures is ACTED, and when
he is not acting he casts off "Charlie," drops the mask of the world's fool,
and his queer, glamorous personality is released again.
He described to me the first sudden conception of his figure of fun--the
poor ludicrous fool, of forlorn attitudes, who would be a gentleman, and
never can; who would do fine and beautiful things, and always does them in
the wrong way and earns kicks in place of acceptance and approval. At every
turn the world beats him, and because he cannot fight it he puts his thumb to
his nose. He rescues fair damsels, and finds that they are not fair.
He departs on great enterprises that crumble to rubbish at his first touch.
He builds castles in the air, and they fall and crush him. He picks up
diamonds, and they turn to broken glass. At the world's disdain he shrugs
his shoulders and answers its scorn with rude jests and extravagant antics.
He is sometimes an ignoble Don Quixote, sometimes a gallant Pistol, and in
other aspects a sort of battered Pierrot. All other figures of fun in
literature and drama have associates or foils. "Charlie," in all his
escapades, is alone. He is the outcast, the exile, sometimes getting a foot
within the gates, but ultimately being driven out, hopping lamely, with ill-
timed nonchalance, on the damaged foot. He throws a custard pie in the
world's face as a gesture of protest. He kicks policemen lest himself be
kicked. There is no exuberance in the kick; it is no outburst of vitality.
It is deliberate and considered. Behind every farcical gesture is a deadly
intent. Never do the eyes, in his most strenuous battles with authority,
lose their deep-sunken haunting grief. Always he is the unsatisfied, venting
his despair in a heart-broken levity of grips and capers. Chaplin realized
that there is nothing more universally funny than the solemn clown, and in
"Charlie" he accidentally made a world-fool; though, I think, certain
memories of early youth went to its making.
But I am more interested in the man than his work. When, at four
o'clock in the morning, he came home with me to Highgate and sat round the
fire, I felt still more warmly his charm and still more sharply his essential
discontent. I do not mean that he is miserable--he is indeed one of the
merriest of companions; but he is burdened with a deep-rooted disquiet.
He is the shadow-friend of millions throughout the world, and he is lonely.
He is tired, too, and worn, this young man whose name and face are known in
every habitable part of the world. It is not a temporary fatigue, as of a
man who is overworking or running at too high a pitch. His weariness, I
think, lies deeper. It is of the spirit. To the quick melancholy of the
Latins--for he is Anglo-French, and was born at Fontainebleau--is added that
unrest which men miscall the artistic temperament. But even without these he
could not, I think, command happiness. He is still an exile, seeking for
something that the world cannot give him. It has given him much--great
abilities, fame, fortune, applause; yet it has given him, for his needs,
little. The irony that pursues genius has not let him escape. He is hungry
for affection and friendship, and he cannot hold them. With the very charm
that draws would-be friends towards him goes a perverse trick of repulsing
them. He desires friendship, yet has not the capacity for it. "I am
egocentric," he confessed. To children everywhere his name brings gurgles of
delight; and he does not like children. He has added one more to the great
gallery of comic figures--Falstaff, Pickwick, don Quixote, Uncle Toby,
Micawber, Touchstone, Tartarin, Punchinello--and he hates "Charlie."
He sat by the fire, curled up in a corner of a deep armchair like a
tired child, eating shortbread and drinking wine and talking, talking,
talking, flashing from theme to theme with the disconcerting leaps of the
cinematograph. He talked of the state of Europe, of relativity, of Benedetto
Croce, of the possibility of a British Labor Government, of the fluidity of
American social life, and he returned again and again to the subject of
England. "It stifles me," he said. "I'm afraid of it--it's all so set and
solid and ARRANGED. Groups and classes. If I stayed here, I know I should
go back to what I was. They told me that the war had changed England--had
washed out boundaries and dividing lines. It hasn't. It's left you even
more class-conscious. The country's still a mass of little regiments, each
moving to its own rules. You've still the county people, the Varsity sets,
the military caste--the governing classes and the working classes. Even your
sports are still divided. For one set there are hunting, racing, yachting,
polo, shooting, golf, tennis; and for the other, cricket, football, and
betting. In America life is freer and you can make your own life and find a
place among the people who interest you."
And Chaplin has surrounded himself with quiet, pleasant people. Not his
those monstrous antics of the young men and women whose light heads have been
shaken by wealth and mob worship. He is not one of the cafe-hotel-evening-
party crowd. When the "shop" is shut, he gets well away from it and from the
gum-chewing crowd to whom life is a piece of film and its prizes great
possessions. You must see him as an unpretentious man, spending his evenings
at home with a few friends and books and music. He is deeply read in
philosophy, social history, and economics. His wants are simple, and,
although he has a vast income, he lives on a portion of it and shares
everything with his brother, Syd Chaplin. During the day he works, and works
furiously, as a man works when seeking distraction or respite from his
troubled inner self. What he will do next I do not know. He seems to be a
man without aim or hope. What it is he wants, what he is seeking, to insure
a little heart's ease, I do not know. I don't think he knows himself. This
young man worked for an end, and in a few years he achieved it, and now the
world now stretches emptily before him, "and the eyelids are a little weary."
I have tried to present some picture of this strange, elusive, gracious,
self-contradictory character; but it is a mere random sketch in flat outline,
and gives nothing of the opulent, glittering, clustering light and shade of
the original. You cannot pin him to paper. Even were he obscure, a mere
nobody, without the imposed coloring of "Charlie" and world popularity, he
would be a notable subject, for he has that wonderful, impalpable gift of
attraction which is the greater part of Mr. Lloyd George's power. You feel
his presence in a room, and are conscious of something wanting when he
departs. He has the dazzling rich-hued quality of Alvan in "The Tragic
Comedians." You feel that he is just the fantastic, flamboyant figure that
leads revolutions. And when you connect him with "Charlie" the puzzle grows,
and you give it up. The ambition that served and guided him for ten years is
satisfied; but he is still unsatisfied. The world has discovered him, but he
has not yet found himself. But he has discovered the weariness of repeated
emotion, and he is a man who lives on and by his emotions. That is why I
call him a tragic figure--a tragic comedian.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
[The "Three-Minute Hot Weather Interview" was a regular feature of this
newspaper, in which celebrities were to attempt to answer 15 questions within
three minutes.]
August 31, 1921
Marguerite Mooers Marshall
NEW YORK EVENING WORLD
Charlie Chaplin Proclaims He Is In the Matrimonial Market Again
In Three-Minute Hot Weather Interview
Charlie Chaplin, the playboy of the movies, Charlie of the funny feet,
the trained mustache, the incredible headgear, handles a three-minute
interview with all the care he does NOT bestow on custard pies and cops.
Charlie is ever so polite about it, but nevertheless he acts as if he thought
The Evening World's hot weather test in mental speed were a bomb of some sort
that might go off in his hands.
When I saw the brown-eyed, debonair, soft-voiced little comedian in the
theatre lobby just after the rehearsal of the next release of his friend Mary
Pickford and just before the showing of the newest picture of his friend
Douglas Fairbanks, he leaned against the wall for support, wiggled his
fingers nervously and took his full three minutes to answer the fifteen
questions I had prepared.
FIRST MINUTE.
Gains on Schedule, but Parries Most Thrusts.
It was exactly 17 minutes past 1 when I asked:
Q. No. 1--What is it that makes you so funny?
Charlie Chaplin (grinning bashfully, so that he showed most of his very
white and even teeth, and looking off into space, somewhere over my left
shoulder)--I don't know--ask the kids.
Q. No. 2--Ought movie salaries to go down?
Charlie Chaplin (straightening his drooping shoulders, an indignant
inflection in the soft voice)--Certainly not!
Q. No. 3--Is the Bolshevik Government going to last in Russia?
Charlie Chaplin--I do not know.
Q. No. 4--Why don't you want to marry again?
Charlie Chaplin (who was recently quoted as saying that he didn't, but
who seems to have changed his mind--girls, here's your chance!)--Who says
that I don't? Quoting me to that effect was a mistake. I certainly do want
to marry again, very much!
Q. No. 5--What sort of woman do you like best?
Charlie Chaplin (again grinning embarrassedly and tying his fingers into
bow knots)--Now, that's hard to answer; I really couldn't say; I couldn't
even tell whether she's blond or brunette; I couldn't answer that.
Q. No. 6--Are you in favor of an Irish republic?
Charlie Chaplin (determinedly playing safe)--I prefer to be discreet and
not commit myself.
The first minute was gone and we were one answer ahead of the average
called for by the time schedule.
SECOND MINUTE.
Slows Down His Answers, but Holds to Schedule.
Q. No. 7--Should women smoke cigarettes?
Charlie Chaplin (hesitating, lips moving nervously, then smiling
diplomatically)--That depends on the woman.
Q. No. 8--Do you believe in national censorship of the movies?
Charlie Chaplin (repeating the question to gain time and thinking hard)
--Do I believe in national censorship? Yes--if it's intelligent.
Q. No. 9--What do you do with all your money?
Charlie Chaplin (the hundred candle-power grin again turned on)--Pay my
taxes--and spend some now and then.
Q. No. 10--What should the Government do to help the unemployed?
Charlie Chaplin (who takes a decidedly serious, non-facetious interest
to labor and social problems)--They should do a great deal--so much that I
couldn't begin to cover the subject even if I took the whole time you allow
for the interview.
The second minute was up and we had lost our one-answer lead owing to
the comedian's habit of stopping to think before he spoke.
THIRD MINUTE.
Finishes Exactly on Time and Seems Glad It's Over.
Q. No. 11--What is the easiest way to make people laugh?
Charlie Chaplin (with modest hesitation, although you'd think him
qualified to answer this one)--Make them happy, I guess--but somebody else
could answer that question a good deal better than I.
Q. No. 12--If you were not a movie star, what would you like to be?
Charlie Chaplin (with a quiet chuckle)--Night watchman.
Q. No. 13--How many custard pies have you ruined since the beginning of
your career--a million?
Charlie Chaplin--Oh, not as many as that. Say a thousand!
Q. No. 14--What is your candid opinion of the Volstead act?
Charlie Chaplin (the laugh in his eyes, as well as on his lips, and
looking me straight in the face for almost the first time during the
interview)--Of the Volstead act? You must excuse me--I don't use such
language!
Q. No. 15--When are you going to play Hamlet?
Charlie Chaplin (although this role is said to be his dearest ambition)
--I'd rather read it. What I really want in my future work is to do as I
please--to follow my own whim!
The interview and the three minutes were over. Charlie seemed glad the
bomb had not exploded!
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
September 4, 1921
NEW YORK TRIBUNE
Charlie Chaplin seemed to be the big attraction on the White Star pier
yesterday when the Olympic sailed for Southampton...
He posed for the "stills" and the motion picture machines until the
operators were satisfied and when it was done he drew his hand across his
dripping brow and appeared to be garnering the drops that fell into his
upturned hat which he held under his chin. Then with a spoon fashioned from
his imagination he pretended to stir the contents of the hat and sprinkle the
bystanders.
It has been said that Chaplin will go in for the romantic thrillers, the
sort of films that Bill Hart produces.
No. There was not a word of truth in it. Charlie did want to get a
certain Bill Hart story, but he had no thought of forsaking the funny film.
It was explained that Chaplin was impressed with "The Border Wireless," which
Howard E. Morton wrote for Hart, and had informed the author that he would
like to have had it for himself. Mr. Morton asked Chaplin if he contemplated
quitting comedy. Charlie then explained that he would have enacted the
romantic part portrayed by Hart in his own way, and that the more serious the
tale the more ludicrous he would have made it.
"The great trouble with writers," said Chaplin, "is that they offer what
they think is funny stuff. I want serious stories which I can make
ridiculous. I can think of funny things to do with a serious plot. Comedy
suggestions injected into manuscripts I get rarely are the ideas I want."
Charlie said he would pass a month in England...
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
[In 1919, Elsie Codd came from England to Los Angeles; she was hired by
Chaplin to write publicity for the British press.]
October 11, 1919
Elsie Codd
PICTURES AND PICTUREGOER
Some First Impressions of Charlie Chaplin
I.
Los Angeles!
The long journey was at last accomplished, and I stood, feeling very
small, strange and lonely amidst a seething mass of chaotic "arrivals" and
"departures," wondering whether my telegram had really arrived and whom they
would send to meet me.
Then gradually the crowd resolved itself to one figure, a little slight
man in a neat grey suit, who apparently expected someone on the "Limited,"
and who looked as though he were wondering whether that someone had got
mislaid en route.
At the moment when I decided that I was neither dreaming nor suffering
from an optical illusion, the little man focused his attention on a grey hat
and a blue coat and skirt, and visibly recalled these garments as important
data in an otherwise rather vague scheme of identification.
My next impression of Charlie Chaplin was a smile, an English voice, and
the warm clasp of an outstretched hand.
II.
Slowly the big car glided along a bewildering maze of long streets with
strange tall buildings, thronged with busy traffic and a cosmopolitan crowd,
then gradually the city was left behind and we passed down a wide, smooth
boulevard, bordered with palms and pepper trees.
On the way he would point out some landmark of special interest--the
ruins of the old Griffith Babylon on the Sunset Boulevard, the Sennett
Studio, where he made his own first pictures--but I think these remarks were
purely incidental, concessions to his role of cicerone showing a little
British "rubberneck" the usual sights for the first time. I remember he
talked incessantly--little about pictures, a great deal about England and the
people "back home."
Yes, some day he hoped to see the Old Country again. But when he went
he wanted some definite purpose to take him there. Perhaps to produce a
play. No, not for the screen--for the stage. It was the dream of his life
to write that play, and he had carried the idea bout with him for the last
two years. Yes, he acknowledged, almost shyly, it was to be a serious play,
centered in a deep psychological problem.
"But I don't suppose it will ever materialise," he said, breaking off
the subject with a laugh. "I can't write, you know."
At last the car slowed down on a quiet avenue and drew up before a
quaint row of low timbered-fronted houses, a little bit of Shakespeare's
England sleeping beneath the cloudless blue of the Californian sky.
"And this," said Charlie, "is the Studio."
He was obviously gratified at my delight. In one part we found a
village within a village, the "set" which was built for "Sunnyside," and of
which the church is still standing today, because Charlie likes its quiet
pastoral touch and hates to pull it down.
We finished the tour with an inspection of the huge open stage, on which
a "set" for the new picture was already in course of construction, then
adjourned to Charlie's private office. There he showed me his books and
pictures and talked of the things that interest him most--men and women, art
and letters, drifting from that point into speculations of a philosophical
nature.
Charlie is a deep thinker and a brilliant talker. A chance remark will
set him off, seeking his way through a maze of speculations, his mind working
so surely and rapidly, that you need all your powers of concentration to keep
pace with him. His intelligence is marvelously quick and active, and he
expresses himself in a vivid boyish way which somehow inspires you with his
own enthusiasms. I have never seen a man more intensely ALIVE. He is such a
slight little fellow himself, that he gives you the impression of one whose
physique is consumed by the very strength of its own vitality.
The other day he owned that he wished he were "a tall, fine chap," and
guessed his own small build explained his intense admiration of champions of
the ring and other big fellows.
III.
A little tousle-headed figure in a preposterous suit of clothes,
surrounded by a crowd of some fifty "extras," cameramen, technical directors,
continuity writers and property-men.
Charlie Chaplin at work.
I believe the thought the uppermost in my mind when I reached home at
the close of that long, hot, strenuous day was that I would have liked just
at that particular moment to have met the man who asserts that Chaplin
doesn't earn that million-dollar salary.
And another thing I learnt was that genius is not only the infinite
capacity for taking pains, but also that enthusiasm which makes loyal and
willing workers, that patience and humanness which alone inspires that spirit
which makes a work of genius live.
IV.
It was late in the morning when he arrived moody, restless and distrait.
Hadn't slept all night worrying over some snag in this old story. He also
decided he wouldn't use the scenes he had made yesterday. They were no good,
anyhow. Nobody to be admitted to his office; newspaper men, interviewers and
automobile agents to be shot at sight.
With this ultimatum Charles Chaplin retires to the sanctuary to thrash
out his problems alone.
V.
I will conclude these impressions with the recollections of an evening
at Chaplin's house. He and his wife had entertained a few friends, and after
dinner we adjourned to the music-room, with its quiet, intimate atmosphere of
shaded lights.
In one corner stood a magnificent concert grant. Charlie loves music.
It seems to be the natural outlet for his restless, eager spirit, and
whenever I have seen him in that room, sooner or later he invariably responds
to the lure of the instrument.
On this particular evening he sat there for nearly an hour, playing
snatches from "Butterfly," "Carmen" and the "Valse Triste," improvising sad,
wistful little melodies of his own, and trying some new records on the
pianola.
"And this is my favourite," he said, having after a long search at last
discovered one he particularly wanted to try.
I glanced at the title. It was the celebrated theme with variations
from one of Haydn's string quartettes, the melody to which we English have
learnt to sing the hymn, "Praise the Lord, ye heavens adore Him."
"I remember I used to think it the most beautiful thing on earth when I
sang it as a little boy at Sunday school," Charlie said. "But now it seems
wonderful things to me. I seem to see a whole Russian army on a great wide
plain, thousands and thousands of them as far as the eye can reach. They are
all kneeling in prayer, and the priest passes slowly down their ranks and
blesses them with the sacred ikon in his hands."
And as I watched him lose himself and all sense of his surroundings in
the beauty of that music, I realised that this was a Charlie Chaplin the
world has yet to know.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
*
August 7, 1920
Elsie Codd
PICTURES AND PICTUREGOER
Sidelights on The Stars:
Charlie Chaplin
He arrives. And simultaneously a miniature hurricane breezes into the
peaceful little English village drowsing in the sunshine, as though that
small human dynamo had suddenly electrified the entire surrounding atmosphere
with his presence.
The arrival is immediately heralded by the bodyguard, vigilantes and
watchers at the gate, and the customary view-hallo is raised; "Rollie! Jack!
He's here!"
Occasionally Mr. Chaplin will relieve the watchers of the formality,
suddenly materialise on the premises and announce himself with the triumphant
whoop: "He's here!" Which always means that he's feeling "good," and heralds
for us all the dawn of a perfect day.
Thereupon Rollie and Jack, the trusty cameramen, instantaneously
precipitate themselves from some hidden lair and sprint to the projecting
room, it being an unwritten law that any person rash enough to attempt an
entrance into said projecting room after the doors are closed is liable to be
shot at dawn.
After ripping open his shirt collar and flinging his latest specimen of
flamboyant neckwear on the nearest chair, Charles Spencer will then pass
judgment on the scenes that were shot on the previous day. A running flow of
Chaplinesque comment will accompany the running off of the film; in fact, a
quarter of an hour per diem in the projecting room with Charlie would be an
education for any high-class film critic.
(N.B. and before I forget it: In the projecting room there stands a
sinister instrument strangely misnamed a harmonium, and at this juncture I
might add that if the light is too bad for us to "shoot," it is Mr. Chaplin's
habit to have it out on that harmonium. On such occasions--a wet and dismal
afternoon by preference--he will improvise for hours in minor keys, till you
want to lift up your voice and weep. Probably, what with the wet afternoon
and the wheezy harmonium and the minor keys, he will go home with a couple of
nice new "gags" neatly pigeonholed in that remarkable mind of his, and feel
that he has spent a thoroughly jolly afternoon.)
But, supposing the day is bright and sunny. No sooner has the film been
run off than Charlie is out in the open again. Perhaps there is a new "set"
to be inspected, which mysterious ritual is performed by giving an
impersonation of a camera lens and squinting through your fingers from
various angles of the stage.
Or possibly Mr. Chaplin is going to shoot that day a new faction of his
story. Then the various actors and their make-ups pilgrimage to the Santuary
in order to submit themselves for inspection and approval. Thereupon
Mr. Chaplin will run through his mail, retire to his dressing-room, which is
partitioned off by a curtain from the rest of his office, doff the well-cut
garments he affects as a private citizen, and in due course emerge in his
famous reincarnation of a tailor's nightmare.
Possibly over the business of making-up he will discuss some tangled
know in his "story" with the elect who form his advisory committee. On one
occasion I remember him rushing out of his dressing-room in the preliminary
stages of making-up, with a towel round his chin, another twisted like a
Grecian fillet round his head, to impart the sensational news that he had
just solved a problem in the story that had been worrying him for weeks. The
twist was as original as it was perfectly logical and natural, and yet it was
the last thing that would probably every have occurred to a trained scenario
writer.
"I just made my mind a blank," he exulted in his vivid, boyish way, "and
the idea came in a flash. Can't think why it had never occurred to me
before. It only just shows you that the danger we movie folk have to guard
against is to allow our minds perpetually to run in the same groove and only
think in the terms of the movies."
Charlie at work is still the same marvel to me that he was the very
first day I saw him in action, only, if possible, even more so. He will be
at it six hours on end, without showing a sign of fatigue, his small body
perpetually active, his mind working with the precision and lightning
rapidity of a steel spring. Some times he will knock off for half-an-hour
and go off to lunch on a cup of coffee and his favourite strawberry
shortcake, but as likely as not he will send off the others and remain on the
lot, too interested in his job to risk any chance of disturbing his
concentration.
I remember one day we were discussing our ideas of pleasure and
happiness, and how Charlie thrilled at the thought of a long walk through the
English countryside and a farmhouse meal with fresh bread, dairy butter, new-
laid eggs and tea in an earthware pot.
"The only things that gave me any real pleasure," he said, "are just the
simple things. I'm happiest when I'm working, and the biggest pleasure I get
out of life is to suddenly get a real inspiration and land a comedy gag."
Sometimes, of course, inspiration clogs. I have known some hot
afternoon when Charlie declares he is nearly asleep, and the rest of us are
feeling very much the same. Then, by sheer force of will, he will go through
a variety of strenuous gymnastics with a tremendous show of energy and "pep."
Sometimes, however, it is a case of pure physical and mental exhaustion, the
result of several days of almost superhuman effort. Then he abandons all
pretence of work and knocks off for a bit, gets out his violin and plays us a
tune, gives us a little exhibition of fancy dancing or one of his famous
imitations of a grand opera tenor.
When the light is good, work may go on uninterruptedly till past five,
when possibly Mr. Chaplin will remorsefully remember that at four he had an
appointment with his dentist or a special emissary of the Grand Lama. Even
then, after he has discarded his screen regalia, he may remain at the studio
long after the others have left, working out the next scenes of his story or
seeking fresh inspirations over the sweet music of his old violin. On other
occasions he will wind up a busy day with a show or a dinner.
And so, as Mr. Pepys would say, to bed.
"I've had a wretched night," we will possibly hear on the following
morning, "hardly slept a wink. But I've had a great idea. Now we'll retake
some of those scenes we did yesterday."
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
October 1921
Elsie Codd
PICTUREGOER
[from an interview with Jackie Coogan]
It was one afternoon, between scenes, during the filming of "The Kid,"
that I cornered Jackie Coogan on the set for the purpose of a press
interview...
It was at this moment that Charlie Chaplin strolled up from another
part of the set, and took a seat beside us on the edge of the pavement.
"I'm making an attempt," I explained, "to fathom the psychology of a
youthful screen star. So far, I find him somewhat detached on the subject of
moving pictures. As a man of influence and standing, he will probably listen
to you. Please help me out."
"You flatter me," Charlie said with a smile, whilst Jackie promptly
profited by the occasion to return to his mud-pies. "All the same, I very
much doubt whether my influence and standing, as you are pleased to call
them, have any bearing on the case in hand. You know," he continued,
lowering his voice so that Jackie could not hear, "what I like about that kid
is his absolute sincerity. He's one of the few with whom I come into contact
who are completely indifferent to my position in this unreal sort of world of
ours. He likes me, not because I'm Charlie Chaplin, but because he thinks
I'm not a bad sort of scout, though, no doubt, he entertains an even higher
opinion of the property-boy and the janitor, because they have so much more
time to play with him. But seriously, you know," he said, hitching up his
knees in his favourite attitude of repose, "that boy's a genius. He's not
only got imagination, but vision. No long, tiresome rehearsals for him!
I might labour in vain if I were simply to tell him to 'register' surprise,
joy or sorrow in the usual way; but give him an intelligent grasp of the
situation in hand, and put it to him what he would do under similar
circumstances, and he will instantly key himself to the corresponding
emotions. The great thing to be remembered, if the privilege falls to your
lot to develop a latent genius, is to allow it the freedom to find itself and
work out its destiny along its own lines. That is why, as far as possible, I
leave Jackie to give his own rendering of a part, and just content myself
with giving him such hints as will make that rendering more perfect from a
technical point of view. Such things as camera values, positions and cues
have to be learnt, but he is a child interpreting a child's part, and having
a natural genius for self-expression, can be trusted to follow his own sense
of logical fitness in any situation that presents itself. The task I have
set myself to perform is to develop in him a realisation of what personality
means in any form of Art, and to make him, above all things, true to himself.
Come here, you little miffler," he said, turning to his protege, who was
still reveling in the bliss of old clothes and unlimited supplies of earth
and water; "tell us what you need most to be a really great actor."
"Personality," (No doubt of Master Jackie's conviction on this point,
for the promptness and decision of the answer simply didn't allow a loophole
for the slightest argument.)
"And what does Personality mean?"
"Being just yourself and nobody else."
"And how do you know a good actor when you see one?"
"Oh, that's easy. He acts so natchral, that--that--well, you can't
even see that he's acting at all."
Not bad for a five-year old, is it? Though I doubt whether I'd ever
have got so deep into the matter if it hadn't been for Charlie's assistance.
For no sooner was Charlie's back turned than Jackie made a confession.
"I'm not so sure that I wouldn't like to be a camera-man," he said with
a quaint, pensive expression.
"I like to hear those cameras whirr, and turning the handle's great
fun. You watch me."...
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
August 20, 1916
Grace Kingsley
LOS ANGELES TIMES
Witty, Wistful, Serious is the Real Charlie Chaplin
To interview a man whose idea of repartee might consist in throwing a
pie--who might, as a proof of his wit, offer to hurl you over a cliff--how
exciting!
However, there weren't any pies around the Charlie Chaplin stage the
other day. There was only a billiard-room "set" used by the comedian in his
latest picture, "The Count," with its comedy furniture lying around in
dejected attitudes, as if comedy were indeed a sad business.
Which, take it from Charlie Chaplin it is--the saddest business in the
world.
Charlie arrayed himself in a natty summer suit, with a day off from
work, was practicing golf strokes out on the grass plot in front of his
studio with Billie the mascot goat of the studio, as principal hazard and
sometimes caddy.
Away from the Cooper-Hewitts it's a very human, natural, lovable Charlie
that greets you. A Charlie with flashes of drollery, and moments of
wistfulness, too, such as you see in the pictures. A Charlie of unexpected
vanities, and of equally big humilities concerning himself and his
achievements. A shrewd Charlie, who is saving his money toward the time when
he may do big things. And a Charlie, above all, who takes life and himself
seriously, and wants you to take them seriously, too.
Maybe it's the background of the poorhouse that makes him serious. You
know, when he was a little boy Chaplin, his brother and mother were thrust
into an English workhouse. If it hadn't been for the poorhouse, and
certainly if it hadn't been for a certain large curly dog, maybe there never
would have been anybody in the world earning $670,000 a year and the world
would have been out a lot of laughs besides. It was the big curly dog of
Chaplin's workhouse period that pulled Charlie out of the river one day when
the embryo comedian was in bathing, and had got beyond his depth.
Chaplin's present ambition--that for which he is waving? Nothing less
than appearing in high comedy on the speaking stage--comedy as high as Pinero
or Shaw or Wilde.
One believes that he will achieve it, too, even though you smile at the
idea that, in the very midst of a funny fall, Charlie may be delivering a
Shaw epigram, or that he may be murmuring a Wilde bon mot all the while he is
kicking the fat man!
"When I arrive in the morning I'm usually gloomy," said Charlie, as he
led us out on the big state, "especially when I haven't any idea of what I'm
going to do in a scene, as is often the case. Tears bedew my eyes as I put
on my make-up, and I weep sadly as I step out on the stage. And as for these
gray hairs:--indicating those about his temple over his right ear--I got them
all the other day trying to be funny in a ballroom scene. I think any
comedian who started out to be funny in a ballroom would have his career
blighted at the outset."
Chaplin has his comedy "locations" down fine. It's easy to be funny in
a billiard-room or a bakery, he says; a bathroom is inherently humorous; one
chuckles even at thought of a taxidermist's shop; a taxicab, facetiously
nicknamed "the robber's delight," is potentially funny, but ballroom and a
horse and buggy are synonymous for sighs.
"How did I acquire my walk?" Well, sore feet are always funny to me--
I mean, of course, other people's. Mostly, somehow, they are owned by people
with no sense of humor, or maybe a person's sense of humor is in abeyance
when he has sore feet. Anyway, it was a funny little old public-house keeper
in London, who habitually had sore feet and groaned over them, from whom I
learned that walk."
"How about the athletic work you do, that we hear so much about?"
"No, ma'am. Don't you believe that. Why should a man exert himself
needlessly that way? Don't I go to work every morning with my dinner pail,
like a stevedore? Why should I swing dumbells when I have to throw people
around so as to break things with them every day? Why should I wrestle, even
when I have to kick people for a living? And as for hanging to swinging
bars, I call a chandelier my second name. I love walking. I walk in crowds,
downtown, and think out my plots. People are so sad and so funny, so
pathetic and so absurd. I like to frequent parks and cafeterias and other
places where crowds go."
Charlie Chaplin calls his funny clothes his "salary." And as for his
first comedy boots, they were a pair of old ones belonging to Ford Sterling.
So that Chaplin both literally and figuratively stepped into Sterling's
shoes."
"No, I don't own a car. I rent one when I need it. When I was over at
the Keystone I bought a car. The first day I ran it it went on a gasoline
jib. First it playfully climbed a telephone pole, then it bit me when I
tired to fix the speedometer, and lastly, when I got out and tried to pry the
darn thing loose from a house it had run into, it jammed me up against a wall
and wouldn't let me go.
"Concerning my imitators--yes, I have had some funny experiences with
them. I met a man the other day, fresh from some place where they don't have
any Charlie Chaplin imitators, apparently. He had just seen me an hour
before, he said, out in front of one of the theaters.
"'Why do you do it?' he asked. 'I think you lose prestige that way--
cheapen yourself!'
"'Oh, I don't know,' I told him, 'I hardly know myself why I do it. It
just helps keep me busy--that's all--helps pass the time away!'"
Back in New York, on Charlie's recent trip, he was standing in a crowd
watching an imitation of himself, when a small boy came up and tried to push
him out of the way.
"What's the matter?" demanded Chaplin.
"Oh, git outa me way," said the urchin. "I wanta see Charlie Chaplin.
Whada you care about seein' him? Youse guys always gets in a kid's way.!"
At another time Charlie had been doing a scene in an alley, and the rest
of the company had gone on, while Chaplin stopped to watch a bunch of
newsboys shooting craps. Along came a policeman.
"Move on!" he commanded.
"I'm Charlie Chaplin, and I've been working here!" exclaimed the
comedian.
"You Charlie Chaplin!" laughed the policeman. "Huh, I guess I know
Charlie Chaplin when I see him. You're just one of his bum imitators. Get
out!"
Charlie is given to spells of moody melancholy. One night he was
particularly low-spirited, and when he chanced to meet the joyous Tom
Meighan, the latter proposed a slumming party to chase away the glooms. They
went down to the old "Mug" saloon on Winston Street.
"The proprietor was suspicious of us from the beginning," said Chaplin.
"Maybe our clothes were too good. He asked all sorts of questions. 'Do you
work on the docks at San Pedro?' 'No, not at San Pedro,' I assured him.
After we had spent upwards of 30 cents buying him drinks, he openly voiced
the opinion we weren't there for any good. Finally our evidence of
overwhelming wealth--we had spent six bits by that time--caused him to decide
that such reckless spenders must be from Alaska. After a while, though, he
began to look at me closely. A look of amazement stole over his face. 'You
ain't--it can't be Charlie Chaplin!' he cried. 'Pshaw,' I answered, 'of
course not. I'm a traveling man.' 'I'll bet you are Charlie Chaplin!' he
insisted. But when I coyly admitted I was indeed that very person--
"'Aw, no you ain't,' he veered around. 'No man that made $670,000 a
year would come to a dump like this!' And no amount of persuasion or proof
could convince him."
Chaplin has been much taken up by society of late. He admits he rather
likes dancing and the role of cozycorner fusser.
"But I think," he said slowly and a little sadly, "I think perhaps those
people could be very cruel, if--" Did that "if" mean, if one lost one's
vogue, his money, his power? Shrewd Charlie.
"Anyhow, my work's the thing. Yes, I admit that sometimes I use other
people's ideas." Chaplin grinned. "But, oh, the irony of fate! Once last
year I made a picture filled with no less than ten masterpieces of other
people's creation--and the exhibitors sent it back. Said it was rotten!"
Chaplin has a secretary to answer his letters, of which he receives
sometimes as many as 100 a day. And his letters are graded and filed! What
do you think of that? If you write him an A No. 1 love letter, for instance,
or one that's extremely interesting, or one so badly composed that it's
funny, that letter goes into a certain pigeonhole and to be kept and taken
out and read over again by Charlie at some future day. But if you write only
the common or garden variety of love letter, or any other ordinary sort, it
is filed in the regular letter file, and after a while is destroyed. He gets
letters from everywhere in the world, and is an especial favorite in China
and Japan.
Following is a postcard which he received the other day from an admirer
in Tokio: "Dear Mr. Chapline: Dear Sir: Your kind favour with a pretty
photo of you was duly to hand for which I was enormously delighted.
Expecting that your work in the M. F. Company will please us more than I saw
before, Yours truly, -----."
Oftentimes he goes to the theater to listen to comments of his
audiences.
"And when I hear some of the criticisms, I walk off quickly," he says.
For, strange as it may seem, as sensitive to criticism as a child is
this famous comedian, who has created a guffaw that is heard around the
world, a ripple of laughter that ceaselessly encircles the globe.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
[The following interview with Edna Purviance really belongs with her
interviews in TAYLOROLOGY 66. But Chaplin does make a cameo appearance.]
May 6, 1916
Fred Goodwins
PICTURES AND PICTUREGOER
The Little Lady of Laughter
I want you to imagine, if you will, what a breath of fresh air it was to
find when I prepared this interview that I was compelled to speak the truth
from sheer want of a means to improve it! Like the "Ernest" of Oscar Wilde's
comedy, it's the first time I ever found myself placed in such a position.
I suppose Edna has her faults; if she has she is fearfully bashful about
them, for in all my intimate friendship with her I have never so far
succeeded in bringing one to light.
She was with Charlie the first time I met her--in the lobby of the hotel
where they were dining--and while that ubiquitous young gentleman was trying
to handle three visitors at once she drew me aside and gave me an amusing
insight into the various subterfuges he has to practise in order to dispose
of the "pests," as distinguished from the legitimate callers.
"He hates to do it, you know," she assured me, "but if you only knew the
hundreds of inconsequential things people want to see him about sometimes,
you wouldn't think hardly of him--or of me--for turning them down."
"Of you?" I queried.
"Yes, you see, he feels so badly about having to do it that he has to
get poor me to answer phone messages and act as a right-hand diplomat!"
That's the phrase: "Right-hand diplomat." There you have the whole of
Edna's relation to the great little star, for when she is not playing her
part before the camera she is managing bits of business for him and
sometimes, when occasion demands it, managing him.
When I grew to know Edna more thoroughly I was better able to realise
just why she is one of the best-loved girls in the whole of this vast
industry. The boys of the studio always spoke of her in glowing terms,
particularly the many English boys, I noticed, the reason of which soon
became apparent. Edna, for a patriotic American girl, is the most English-
spirited creature that ever happened. She is, in fact, just that good-
natured, hardy, tomboyish type so dear to us Englishmen. Yet, withal, she
has the right amount of reserve that goes to make up the ideal girl.
"You want to interview me?" she exclaimed, when I told her I wanted to
do so for PICTURES. (I had taken her into a candy-store for a little tea--
Charlie having Anglicised her into that habit, which is not a national one in
America.)
"Why not?" I said, amused at the wideness of her blue eyes.
"Oh, don't 'kid' me," she chided, and it took me several minutes and the
unearthing of a note-book to convince her that the great B. P. wouldn't be
averse to hearing from her something about herself. My point was gained.
"Well, first of all I suppose you want me to tell you that I was
born--"
"Just like 'David Copperfield,' eh?" I agreed. "That was the first
chapter of your life?"
"Of course it was," she said. "Don't be irrelevant."
I subsided, and continued to jot.
"Do you write shorthand?" she exclaimed, looking at my book. "So do I--
Pitman's; what's YOUR system?"
"'Pitman-Goodwins',' I suppose you'd say--nobody can read it but
myself!"
She evinced a desire to use her pastry-knife murderously, and I
hurriedly returned to my notes.
"Well, I was born in 1894, in the State of Nevada--so I'm thoroughly
Western, you see. A lot of people have asked me how I came by my peculiar
name and this will be a good opportunity to tell them. The name itself is
French, of course, and must have come down through several generations--
because nobody ever saw a purely French woman with hair as fair as mine, did
they?" She pulled out a strand of very blonde hair--almost white it is, and
as fine as spider silk. "I expect I get it from the English side of my
family, which is my mother's. But about my name--Charlie says I ought to
change it; because nobody can pronounce it; but I hate assumed names, and as
mine is so distinctive I want to keep it. Tell people to pronounce it like I
do--Pur-vi-ance, with the accent on the second syllable.
"When I left high school I became secretary to a firm in San Francisco,
and it was there that I acquired the speed at typewriting that I used in that
Picture we were in together"--she meant "The Bank"--"but the humdrum life of
an office didn't seem to satiate my inborn spirit of freedom--love of
adventure I suppose you'd call it--so one day I turned up my position and
became a lady of leisure once more.
"Time kind of hung on my hands, and one day I thought it would be fun to
go out to Niles"--the Essanay head studio near San Francisco--"and see them
taking pictures, so I called up a girl chum of mine and we went.
"When we got there, they were very kind to us and let us wander around
the plant, and then I noticed what a crowd of girls was there. I asked one
of the gentlemen what they were all doing, and he said: 'Why, Mr. Chaplin has
got five hundred of them to choose his new leading lady from; these are some
of the applicants.' While we were watching, a little man with dark curly
hair, who had been walking among the girls, looked over at me, and pointing
in my direction called out: 'That's the type I want!' I was scared at first,
and when the young man who was with him came over to me, I asked him who the
little man was. 'Why, that's Charles Chaplin, our comedy star,' he answered;
'he wants to see you about the position.' 'Position?' I said. 'Yes, Miss,'
he answered; 'he wants you for his leading lady--just to try-out, you know.'
"So that's how I met Charlie. I was not one of the applicants, but the
idea of acting in pictures with the comedian I had laughed at so often
appealed to me as a huge joke, and I decided that I'd try everything once--
like the Kaiser," she added artlessly.
"Never mind the Kaiser," I suggested; "I'm getting interested. And was
it a huge joke?"
"It was not; before I began to be a picture artist, I had thought myself
gifted with a little more than ordinary intelligence. After the first day in
front of the camera, I came to the conclusion that I was the biggest 'boob'
on earth.
"Charlie was very patient with me, though, and after my first picture,
in which I think I was terrible--'A Night Out,' you know--I began to get used
to the work, and although I have had occasional relapses, as Charlie calls
them, I am at least 'camera-wise' by now."
"And a very clever little woman," I added, with privileged gallantry.
"No, I wouldn't like to believe that. But someday I want to do
something REALLY good; I want to EARN the people's regard, don't you know.
I don't want them to like me just because I'm lucky enough to be Charlie's
leading lady, but because I've done something myself that has appealed to
them."
"You've done that already, Edna," I ventured. "Look at the letters you
get from all over the world."
"Yes, that's true; but I want to go on and on and on. I think I've
found a business in which I can achieve something, and I want to rise to the
top of it. I remember your saying that Charlie is the soul of ambition."
I nodded. "Do you believe me when I say that if ambition could get a person
on, I'd be the most successful woman in the world?"
"Why, yes," I agreed, a bit at sea over the sober channel our interview
was taking. "You'll do it, too."
She raised her eyes eagerly.
"Do you REALLY think that?" she begged. "I'm a pessimist, you know--I
never believe anything will happen until it has.
"Gee! It's half-after-four, and I promised to see Charlie at the next
corner but one."
We passed on to the door.
"Great Scot! it's pouring," I ejaculated, looking through the glass.
"You can't go out in this! Let me go and fetch Charlie down here."
Her permission received, I started out, but good luck saved me a wet
trip, for at that moment a huge touring-car halted by me and the comedian
thrust out his head in greeting.
"Hold on!" I cried. "Your precious burden's in here." A moment later
the little lady of laughter was snugly ensconced among a lot of rugs, and
they were both waving their adieus.
In that car were two of the best-known personalities in the world--two
"souls of ambition;" one all but fully realised, the other only a question of
time.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
July 1930
Jim Tully
NEW MOVIE MAGAZINE
The Unknown Charlie Chaplin
I first met Charles Chaplin at a dinner given by Ralph Block. My first
book had been published. Chaplin had read some of the reviews. When we
parted that night he asked me to call on him and was kind enough to tell me
that he liked me.
Several days later I telephoned the studio. Chaplin sent his limousine
for me. He was very kind during that first private interview. I was ill at
ease. We parted, I think, with a feeling of reserve on both sides. I was
not natural that day. Nor was I ever quite natural in all the months that I
was to be associated with the comedian. I have always regretted this fact.
Paul Bern is ever on the alert to be kind, as hundreds in Hollywood
besides myself can testify. He secured me a position with Chaplin. My
salary was small, but it was a fair wage, considering what little work I had
to do. It was agreed upon between the comedian and myself that he was to
sign certain articles which I was to write from time to time. His name had
value in the magazine world. After signing two articles he refused to sign
more. Feeling the inadequacy of my position, and hoping daily against hope,
I remained on the job.
Konrad Bercovici, the writer of gypsy romances, once wrote an article on
Charles Chaplin for HARPER'S MAGAZINE. In it he did me the honor to call me
Chaplin's secretary. He described my entering the room and laying a paper on
the great jester's desk. No attention was paid to me.
Mr. Bercovici was sadly mistaken. My principal duty with Charles
Chaplin was to receive my weekly check. I was merely one of the sad jesters
in the court of the King of Laughter.
The time arrived to select a leading lady for "The Gold Rush." Dozens
of screen tests were made of ambitious young ladies. I often accompanied
Chaplin's higher salaried yes-men to the projection room, where we watched
as the faces of these inane beauties flashed upon the screen.
An ordinary-looking Mexican girl arrived one morning. She had played
some years previously in "The Kid." Chaplin was not yet at the studio. The
girl was about to depart, when lo--the little jester met up with his destiny.
A screen test was made of the girl. Several of us agreed privately that it
was the worst yet made. The girl did not photograph.
Chaplin watched her features on the screen the next day. In silence we
watched him.
He rose from his chair.
"That's the girl," he exclaimed. A fearful silence filled the room.
I walked to my office and allowed the yes-men to argue the great
question. Something--perhaps a mood--as he had, and rightly, no respect for
my judgment, compelled Chaplin to join me a few minutes later. He entered
the room as tragic as Hamlet, hands held behind his back, a frown on his
face, as though his next decision would rattle the stars from the sky.
"What do you think of her, Jim?" he asked.
Having been hungry, and knowing that he would choose the girl he
preferred anyway, I parried with, "I don't know, Charlie. She may be all
right."
The rug on my office floor was vivid red. Chaplin began to pace up and
down, up and down, hands still behind his back. His good-looking face bore
the same fearful frown. Now and then I would glance at him and then let my
eyes rest once more on the scarlet carpet.
Suddenly the door opened. The Mexican girl entered. She was cheaply
dressed, but her eyes flashed, her teeth were even, her body was so round and
supple that one soon forgot the ugly black dress which clothed it.
Chaplin smiled benignly, as gracious and charming a smile as I have ever
seen.
She stood before him and asked, "Well, what is it, Charlie? Am I
hired?"
The comedian looked at her and then down at his spats, which, actor-
like, he always wore.
I watched their expressions. The keen, fine face of the actor, mobile
and finely molded, was a face that would be noticed in any gathering. The
girl watched him, round-eyed, round-faced, full of life. I saw in her then
everything which Chaplin did not see--a young woman who seemed to me devoid
of spiritual qualities.
Chaplin answered at last, "You're engaged."
The girl leaped into the air with joy. Together they walked out of my
office--to a troubled destiny for the man and a fortunate one for the girl.
She afterward had the fine fortune to marry the comedian and garner for
herself many hundreds of thousands of dollars.
If his marriage was a farce, his divorce was tragic. As Lita Grey
Chaplin she brought him as much misery as it is possible for a
misunderstanding young lady to bring to genius.
She worked in "The Gold Rush" at a salary of seventy-five dollars a
week. Mr. Chaplin has no more sympathy with large salaries than any trust.
During her stay at the studio, the officials from the Board of Education
often called. She could scarcely be forced to study. Her grades were low
and she had no interest in books. And to this girl was given by the Fates in
marriage Mr. Charles Spencer Chaplin, the most complex of human beings.
Just why he remembered Miss Grey from her childhood days and insisted
upon making her his leading lady might be worthy the attention of a master of
irony like Chaplin himself. He has undoubtedly been away from it long enough
to smile--until he remembers the fortune it cost him. And then, if he weeps,
he is but human.
It is my opinion that Chaplin does not like intelligent men as
companions.
Elmer Elsworth, one of the most whimsically humorous and highly
intelligent men I have known, worked with him for many months. Chaplin once
remarked to me that Elsworth was "a real highbrow." Given his choice between
such a man and Henry, the heavy restaurant proprietor in Hollywood, the
comedian chose the latter. They have been close associates for many years.
Chaplin frequents his restaurant and spends hours in chatting with other
ephermal film immortals.
Chaplin often ridicules sentimentality in others. The publishers of
Thomas Burke's "The Wind and the Rain" sent him a copy of that book. It is,
so far as I know, one of the most maudlin and sentimental books written an
any language. Burke is a product of the same London environment that
produced Chaplin. Success has made both men dramatize self-pity. Chaplin
read the book with tears in his voice. The true nature of the volume
entirely escaped him. Secluded in a bungalow at the far end of the studio,
oblivious to everything else, he read and discussed the book at great length.
When I asked to borrow the precious volume, he willingly loaned it to
me, saying, "Take good care of it, Jim. It's my Bible."
The book had touched the misery of his own childhood. After seeing the
East End of London, I can understand why. For there poverty is groveling,
supine--so listless and beaten that it dares not hope.
I said to him, "Charlie, it would be a nice thing to cable Burke and
also send his American publishers a boost for the book."
He was immediately enthusiastic over the idea. I phrased cablegram and
telegram, which he approved.
Burke had asked him for an autographed photograph. I found one and took
it to him. He frowned.
"It's not good enough," he said.
In London, four years later, I asked Burke if he had ever received the
photograph.
"Not yet," he answered.
Chaplin has often been called "a maker of directors." During my term
with him he had as his lieutenants Charles Reisner, now a successful
director; Edward Sutherland, Henry, the ponderous restaurant keeper, and
Harry d'Arrast. Monta Bell, the famous Paramount director, had but recently
left him to begin his brilliant career. Bell was in many respects the
shrewdest and most able man associate with Chaplin. He watched his
opportunity and sold himself to Warner Brothers to direct "Broadway After
Dark." It was an immediate success and Bell's future was assured. I tried
at many different times to get Chaplin to comment on the film. He would not.
It had seeped through Hollywood that Bell had been partly responsible
for "A Woman of Paris." Chaplin heard the news and made no comment.
One of the most surprising qualities about him is his kindness and
tolerance toward those who have been none too kindly to him. His attitude
toward life is far from gentle, however. People interest him a great deal,
though he has no love for them in the mass.
In all the months I was with him he expressed no love for the beauty of
nature. I called his attention to a gorgeous sunset. He looked with
narrowed eyes and said no word. He once, in a whimsical mood, spoke of the
fog of London and wished that he might die in it. He told how it draped the
buildings and hid their ghastly ugliness.
Once, long after I had gone, three men sat a table with him. Being
citizens of Hollywood, two of them evidently thought the shortest road to his
heart was in disparaging me. Chaplin listened for some time, saying nothing.
At last he said, "He can write," and the subject was changed.
His mind is ever in a furore. As restless as a storm, it is always
charged with wonder. The vagaries of the human brain interest him a great
deal. The Leopold-Loeb case kept him enthralled. He often expressed pity
for the Chicago anarchists done to death as the outcome of the Haymarket
riot.
One brave fellow in the early morning hour before his execution sang so
that the entire prison could hear:
"Maxwelton braes are bonnie,
Where early fa's the dew--
It was there that Annie Laurie
Gae me her promise true."
Chaplin often talked of this incident. Whenever he did, his voice was
soft.
When not working, which was half the time, it was his custom to
telephone from his Beverly Hills mansion each day and request that certain of
his employees be sent to him. If the order came late in the evening, we
considered it from "the little genius," our pet name for him.
One Saturday afternoon I was called for, and upon arriving was told that
I was to accompany him to dinner that night. He had suddenly grown tired of
two other men and had suddenly desired my company. I saw that he was in a
dark mood and, sensing tedious hours ahead, I looked about for a means of
protection.
Leaving the mansion to go on an errand in Hollywood, I had the good
fortune to meet Lita Grey at the studio. Knowing that if she should
"accidentally" drift into the Montmartre, where I guessed we would go for
dinner, that he would probably invite her to dinner and send me home, I asked
her to come to the restaurant. She agreed to make it appear accidental. The
plan nearly worked.
At eight o'clock that night Chaplin took me to the Montmartre. As we
walked nonchalantly toward his accustomed table, he stopped suddenly. For
there sat the two men of whom he was tired.
Chaplin turned about, saying "No more privacy than a shoe clerk," and
walked with me out of the restaurant. We went to another cafe. It also was
crowded.
His Japanese chauffeur followed us in the car.
Chaplin decided to go to the Ambassador Hotel.
Once there, we remained at the same table for over five hours. I was
completely talked out.
Chaplin watched the dancers gliding about.
At last a Spanish girl began to flirt with him. My heart beat fast.
If she would only come to his table, he might excuse me. I praised the
girl's beauty now and then, while the comedian's eyes followed her. Finally,
in desperation, I said, "Why don't you chat with her, Charlie? She's very
lovely."
And the little genius answered, "I'm not in the mood, Jim. It's
lovelier just to watch her."
He took me home early in the morning.
Lita Grey arrived at the Montmartre on time. She found the two men at
the table. We had come--and gone.
He is the greatest inarticulate ironist on earth. The petty platitudes
of lesser men do not conceal from his keen eyes the great truth that life is
a bitter business and that mankind does a goose step to the grave. He has
the first-rate man's sense of futility.
My ingratitude to Chaplin has long been a byword in Hollywood. It has
been said that I arrived here a tramp and was befriended by film people,
subsequently biting the hands that fed me. This is not true. The two men
who made the early days easier for me in Hollywood were Paul Bern and Rupert
Hughes. Both are still close to me. My second book was dedicated to Rupert
Hughes, my last to Paul Bern.
Until this moment I have never troubled to answer any man's charges.
My old grandfather used to say, "Kape your head up, Jimmy. Ye've the blood
of a wind-rovin' Dane." And so through all the melee of words I have always
smiled, and thrown another brick. If it missed, I threw another one.
"Payple respect ye more whin they're a little afraid," my grandfather
used to say. He was a ditch-digging man of the world, doomed to canker out
his life in the saloons of a miserable Ohio town. There was always in his
big and turbulent and troubled old head a slight feeling of contempt for
everything and everybody. He early inculcated in me that feeling, and begged
me to try like the devil to compel life to make way for me. I obeyed the
magnificent, mud-bespattered old brigand, and I put him in a book just as he
was and sent him to the far corners of the world. If I whimpered in
explaining myself now, he'd kick a board out of his coffin.
Charles Chaplin and I quarreled over a matter which the intervening
years have taught me was my fault. I was entirely to blame. But growth is
not given to Irish mortals in a day.
Long after we had separated, I was invited to the home of Frank Dazey,
with whom I was writing a play.
When I arrived, Mrs. Dazey said to me, "Jim, I know you'll be a good
fellow, as Charlie Chaplin is coming. Marion Davies telephoned and asked if
she could bring him. I knew you would understand."
Always self-conscious in company, I wondered how I would act.
The newspapers at the time were full of news concerning our quarrel.
Chaplin arrived soon afterward. He was charming as sin. Never in all
his life had he been more considerate with me. In the presence of all the
guests, he put his arm about me. A sublime actor, one can never be sure when
he is in or out of a role. Cynical of most things, I still believe that he
was sincere that night. If not, he was charming, which is just as well.
Later in the evening a charade was played. Charlie picked me for his
side. In choosing a word, he said, "Let's pick one of four syllables." And
then with pantomime and a look of deep concern, he said, "Lord, I don't know
any."
The game over, many of the guests chatted in the living room. Wondering
if he had changed I began to talk upon a pathological subject. Soon he drew
his chair near mine and we talked for a long time. As of old his powerful
mind wondered at subjects probably never to be understood.
Since meeting him at the Dazey home I have seen him but once.
At the time of his greatest trouble, I met him walking in the gathering
dusk down Sunset Boulevard.
His cap was pulled low over his eyes. His shoulders were drooped.
His hands were shoved deep in his pockets. His chin was buried on his chest.
There was no one within a block of us. My first impulse was to say,
"Hello, Charlie," and put my arm about him.
I was positive that he would have welcomed me. And yet I hesitated, for
some unaccountable reason.
Soon his lonely figure melted into the night. Somehow at the time he
reminded me of Victor Hugo's line on Napoleon after the battle of Waterloo.
That Man of Destiny was found wandering aimlessly in a field, in Hugo's
words, "the mighty somnambulist of a vanished dream."
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Back issues of Taylorology are available on the Web at any of the following:
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Full text searches of back issues can be done at http://www.etext.org/Zines/
For more information about Taylor, see
WILLIAM DESMOND TAYLOR: A DOSSIER (Scarecrow Press, 1991)
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