Stuff

What do you know about Charlie Chaplin?

We were talking about this at the end of last year, around Xmas time. It was interesting to hear what other people said, apart from “who?” that is:

• silent film star
• slapstick
• sentimental, maudlin
• liked very young girls
• had lots of wives and children
• was a communist
• wrote slushy tunes
• not funny, never funny

Well, some bits of this are slightly true and some bits are just opinion, probably from people who had never seen a Chaplin film as it was intended to be seen, on a big screen in a cinema with an audience.

So let’s clarify a few things. There are good books, articles and even TV series about Chaplin, so this is not anything like even a partial biography.

Chaplin was born in a very poor area of south London in 1889. His parents split not long after. He was devoted to his mother, but she had serious mental problems. There’s no doubt Charles Chaplin had a tough childhood.

After a period working in theatres as a comedy actor, he went with Fred Karno’s army to the USA and eventually began a movie career. His short films were hugely popular around the world and Chaplin was possibly the most famous and recognisable person on the planet for a time, and very highly paid. The films were massively successful.

He formed the company United Artists with Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks, and produced some of his greatest work, including “The Gold Rush”, “The Circus” and “City Lights”.

It has become popular to say Chaplin was not funny. Very many of his films had a very serious side, especially “The Kid”, where he drew on his difficult childhood. There are some wildly inventive and funny scenes, great story telling and if you ever get a chance to see some, do.

Admittedly, Chaplin liked to revisit his works over the years, re-edit them, add unnecessary commentary, none of which was an improvement. He made more political films, “Modern Times” and “The Great Dictator” which people did not like. After all, here was a movie star getting involved in world politics. He went into sound, and one theory says that he became less popular in the USA when they realised he had an English accent, a sarf Landan one even. Not even an American.

Well!!

Sound films were considered by so many to be a fad. They would last a while and then the industry would revert back to silent films with live music and effects. The studios wanted this – having to rebuild their studios to accommodate sound recording equipment was going to be expensive. Movie theatre owners did not want it either, again because of the expense.

Eventually, as we know, pre-recorded sound became a thing, forever.

It certainly had an effect on the industry. Musicians who had worked in cinemas were out of a job, or at least had to find new jobs. The soundtrack was on the film, or at least on discs synchronised with the film. The studio orchestra did all the playing that was necessary. Customers in any cinema around the world could hear the exact same musical score.

As far as actors and speech were concerned, many had to re-evaluate their futures. Some silent stars who had heavy accents either had to retire or move back to their country of origin.

Voice coaches were employed for many. Again, “Singin’ In The Rain” shows this a little. Some stars continued but ultimately failed. A key example is John Gilbert who had been a huge star iin silents but, when he moved into talkies, the gossip was he had a terrible voice. It’s not true at all, he has a fine voice, it was just an opportunity for studio bosses to plot his ruin.

And, of course, stars like Garbo who had a heavy Scandinavian accent flourished. Her accent just added to her exotic air of mystery.

And what of comedians? Harold Lloyd continued into the sound era and created many more good films. Buster Keaton tried, but it didn’t work. Laurel and Hardy had been big silent stars, and became even bigger stars in the sound era.

Charlie Chaplin resisted. Remember that Charlie Chaplin at some point was one of the most famous and recognisable people in the world (especially in his tramp, or “little fellow”) guise. In 1931, when Chaplin released his masterpiece “City Lights” as a silent film with title cards and recorded music, the fact that there was no ‘talking’ was seen as an old-fashioned, unpopular and an out-of-step move.

If you ask people what the first talkie was you will get some funny answers. “Some Like It Hot”… “The Wizard Of Oz”, “The Jazz Singer”.

The latter film, from 1927, is generally considered to be the correct answer. It isn’t really, as we will see.

Well, OK, it depends what you mean by ‘talkie’. I am expecting a film with people talking throughout, something of feature length (ie not a short) and possibly a recorded musical score, though that is not essential.

This Al Jolson film does indeed have some speech, but it’s not all the way through, and mostly there are the usual intertitle cards explaining what is happening or what characters are saying. Yes, there is a recorded musical score and there are portions where Jolson sings live and talks, but they can’t add up to more than two or maybe three minutes in the whole film. The rest is really what you would call a silent film, well, silent with synchronised sound.

Jolson’s first words are “Wait a minute, wait a minute, you ain’t heard nothin’ yet”, except Jolson had made other short films with sound and had said this before. What stunned people watching was the free and improvised nature of what he said.

You can buy this film on home media. It’s worth watching. I find it rather squirm-worthy, not just by modern standards but by any standards. I like Jolson generally, and he was a great performer, and the film was a massive hit.

But let’s be clear, Warner Brothers themselves had produced feature films with complete synchronised scores long before this, and they produced the first all talkie film, “Lights Of New York” in 1928. Short sound films had been around since 1900, though 1923 or so is the first real record of sound films publicly demonstrated.

Nevertheless, as shown in “Singin’ In The Rain”, “The Jazz Singer” marked the point at which talkies became a thing. It has been re-made since, many times.

Some directors and producers embraced it, despite the difficulties. Others resisted. As the interviewees on “Hollywood” say, the silent film was an international language. It didn’t matter what you spoke, you could understand a silent film. The whole method of story telling changed. Talking was the thing.

One person who resisted was Charlie Chaplin.