Charlie Chaplin

	Charlie Chaplin
	...his life
Childhood	Charles Spencer Chaplin was born on Tuesday, 16th April, 1889 in Walworth, London. Both his parents were successful music hall artists, particularly his father, Charles Snr, and initially the family was reasonably prosperous. However, when Chaplin was three years old his father left home, leaving his mother Hannah to bring up the young Charlie and his older brother, Sydney. The family were plunged into poverty, as Hannah battled unsuccessfully against mental illness. His mother proved to be a major influence on the young Charlie, however. When he was five years old, Charlie made his first on-stage performance, ironically as his mother's career began to slide away. She was to be admitted to various lunatic asylums leaving her sons to the care of the workhouse. In 1898, when Charlie was 9 years old, he made his first professional appearance, with William Jackson's 'Eight Lancashire Lads', at the Theatre Royal, Manchester. Further personal troubles followed, however. His mother was re-admitted to the asylum and his father died, aged 37, an alcoholic, his career in ruins. Charlie's brother Sydney began work as a steward on various cruise liners, and Charlie was left to fend for himself, after telling the authorities he was living with an aunt.
Early Career	Both Charlie and his brother were to follow their parents into show business. With 'The Eight Lancashire Lads', Charlie toured the UK for two years, appearing in all the major cities. 'The Eight Lancashire Lads' were a troupe of clog dancers, and Charlie spent six weeks learning the skill, before finally taking to the stage in December 1898, in a pantomime production of 'Babes in the Wood'. The tours were to introduce Charlie to the British music hall, the troupe often sharing the bill with the top stars of the day. Finally, in 1901 Charlie left the 'Lancashire Lads', determined to make his way as a 'legitimate' actor. By 1903, Charlie was appearing in a nationwide production of Sherlock Holmes, extensively touring both major and provincial venues throughout the UK for four years. It was at this time that his talent was begining to be recognised in the business. And in 1908 he was to get his first big break when he joined the Fred Karno Company. Karno was one of the biggest names in show business at the time, running several touring companies in the UK, Europe and America. It was with Karno that Charlie would develop his skills for comedy and mimicry which would later make him famous throughout the world. At the age of 19, Charlie fell in love with chorus girl, Hetty Kelly. To anyone else it would have been an infatuation, but to Charlie's sensitive, artistic nature it was true love. Hetty was only fifteen. The affair lasted less than a week, perhaps destroyed by Charlie's over-the-top affection, or perhaps because of interference by Hetty's mother. The pain of the break-up was to stay with Charlie for much of his life. After appearing with the Fred Karno Company in the UK for two years, Charlie was sent on a tour of America in 1910. On this trip he would be understudied by a young man from Lancashire, called Stanley Jefferson. Like Charlie, Jefferson would also become a movie legend, after changing his name to Stan Laurel. The American tour continued throughout 1911 and 1912, Charlie playing the part of a drunk in the highly successful sketch, A Night in an English Music Hall. Charlie was now one of the leading comedians in the company, devising sketches and routines for use in the shows. After playing several weeks in New York, the company went on the road, the tour finally ending in May 1912 in Salt Lake City. On returning home, Charlie was to find his mother still in the asylum, and Sydney married to actress, Minnie Constance. Karno decided to keep the American company together and sent them out on the road in the UK. However, Charlie longed to return to the States. Along with Stanley Jefferson, and tour manager Alf Reeves and his wife, Amy, he joined another of Karno's companies for a second American tour. It was to be a fateful decision, one which would ultimately change the course of entertainment history.
In the Movies	The second American tour held little of the fascination of his first trip. The sight-seeing had lost its novelty, and Chaplin grew tired of the "cheap vaudeville circuits", which he later described as "bleak and depressing". The company played three, sometimes four times a day, seven days a week, for five months. In the spring of 1913, tour manager, Alf Reeves, received a telegram asking that Chaplin call at the New York office of Kessel and Bauman. Charlie had no idea who Kessel and Bauman were, but on arrival found that they were owners of the Keystone Film Company, and wished to offer Charlie a job in the movies. Charlie cared little for the Keystone films, but felt it would offer some good publicity before returning to "real" work the following year. After rejecting their first offer, Chaplin eventualy signed a revised contract on 25th September. Chaplin saw out the remainder of his obligations with the Karno Company and arrived in Los Angeles in early December, 1913. The Keystone studio was run by the legendary Mack Sennett. After being initially over-awed, Charlie spent the first few weeks hanging around the studio, taking in the Keystone working methods. Finally, in January 1914, Sennett gave Chaplin his first role, as a newspaper reporter in Making a Living. The following day Chaplin was hanging around on set, when Sennett, lost for ideas for gags, asked him to "Put on some comedy makeup. Anything will do". This particualr anything, turned out to be some baggy trousers, a bowler hat and cane, and a pair of over-sized shoes. A stange looking tramp walked onto the set of Mabel's Strange Predicament and one of the most famous icons of all time was created. Before this movie hit the cinemas, Chaplin's "second" film had already been shot and released, Kid Auto Races at Venice. Now the films came quick and fast. Keystone comedies were generally shot, cut together and released within four days. There was little time to stop for breath. You finished one, then went on to the next. Chaplin appeared in six films in little over two months. But he was unhappy with the direction of these movies. On the stage, Chaplin had taken a leading role in script development and in devising comic sketches. In the movies, he found his suggestions were thrown out by directors for whom he had little respect. Things came to a head when Sennett assigned Chaplin to work for Mabel Normand, a girl several years younger than him, with none of his stage experience. Mabel Normand was not only the director of the movie, but was Sennett's girlfriend, and when a major bust-up occcured during the making of Mabel at the Wheel, everyone, including Chaplin himself, assumed that his career with Keystone was over. Normand had brushed aside all Charlies ideas, until finally he could put up with it no longer and refused to continue. Charlie later described the incident in terms which would become a recurrent theme throughout his life. He had nothing personaly against Miss Normand he said, "but this was my work". At this crucial juncture, Charlie's career was saved by a wire from New York, ordering Sennett to produce more Chaplin films. The public it seemed, could not get enough of this little man who dressed as a tramp.
	To be continued...