Charlie Chaplin Wallpapers

Charlie Chaplin Actor Wallpapers, Biography, Filmography, Photos
Sir Charles Spencer Chaplin, Jr. KBE, (April 16, 1889 � December 25, 1977), better known as Charlie Chaplin, was an English comedy actor, becoming the most famous performer in the early to mid Hollywood cinema era, and also a notable director. He is considered amongst the finest mimes and clowns caught on film and his influence on performers in both fields is great.

Chaplin was one of the most creative and influential personalities in the silent film era: he acted in, directed, scripted, produced, and eventually even scored his own films. His working life in entertainment spanned over 70 years, from the British Victorian stage and music hall in England as a child performer, almost until his death at the age of 88. He led one of the most remarkable and colorful lives of the 20th century, from a Dickens-like London childhood to the pinnacle of world fame in the film industry and as a cultural icon.

His principal character was "The Tramp": a vagrant with the refined manners and dignity of a gentleman who wears a tight coat, oversized trousers and shoes, a bowler hat, a bamboo cane, and his signature toothbrush moustache. Chaplin's high-profile public and private life encompassed highs and lows of both adulation and controversy.

Childhood

Chaplin's parents were both entertainers in the Music Hall tradition. His father, an alcoholic, died when Charlie was twelve, leaving him and his older half-brother, Sydney Chaplin, in the sole care of his mother, Hannah. Hannah Chaplin suffered from severe mental illness, and was eventually admitted to the Cane Hill Asylum at Coulsdon (near Croydon). Chaplin had to be left in the workhouse at Lambeth, London, moving after several weeks to the Central London District School for paupers in Hanwell, London. The young Chaplin brothers forged a close relationship to survive. They gravitated to the Music Hall while still very young, and both proved to have considerable natural stage talent.

Unknown to Chaplin and Sydney until years later, they had a half-brother through their mother, Wheeler Dryden, who was raised abroad by his father. He was later reconciled with the family, and worked for Chaplin at his Hollywood studio.

Chaplin's mother died in 1928 in Hollywood, seven years after being brought to the U.S. by her sons.
Chaplin's early film career (1914-1917) began at Keystone Studios, where he developed his Tramp character and very quickly learned the art and craft of filmmaking. By the end of his year at Keystone, he was directing and editing his own short films. These were an immediate, runaway success with the public, and even today Chaplin's standout screen presence in these films is apparent. In 1915 he began a year's contract with Essanay film studios, and further developed his film skills, adding new levels of depth and pathos to the Keystone-style slapstick. In 1916, he signed a lucrative deal with the Mutual Film Corporation to produce a dozen two-reel comedies. He was given near complete artistic control, and produced twelve films over an eighteen month period that rank among the most influential comedy films in cinema. Chaplin later said the Mutual period was the happiest of his career.

At the conclusion of the Mutual contract in 1918, Chaplin built his own Hollywood studio and production company, and assumed an unparalleled degree of artistic and financial control over his productions. Using this independence, over the next 35 years he created a remarkable, timeless body of work that remains entertaining and influential. These include the comedy shorts: A Dog's Life (1918), and Pay Day (1922); longer films, such as: Shoulder Arms (1918) and The Pilgrim (1923); and his great silent feature-length films, among them: The Kid (1921), A Woman of Paris (1923), The Gold Rush (1925), and The Circus (1928).

After the arrival of sound films, he made what is considered to be his greatest film, City Lights (1931), as well as Modern Times (1936) before he committed to sound. These were essentially silent films scored with his own music and sound effects. City Lights contained arguably his most perfect balance of comedy and sentimentality. Of the final scene, critic James Agee wrote in Life magazine in 1949 that it was the "greatest single piece of acting ever committed to celluloid".

His dialogue films made in Hollywood were The Great Dictator (1940), Monsieur Verdoux (1947), and Limelight (1952).
n 1919 he co-founded the United Artists film distribution company with Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks and D. W. Griffith, all of whom were seeking to escape the growing power consolidation of film distributors and financiers in the developing Hollywood studio system. This move, along with complete control of his film production through his studio, assured Chaplin's independence as a filmaker. He served on the board of UA until the early 1950s.

Although "talkies" became the dominant mode of moviemaking soon after they were introduced in 1927, Chaplin resisted making such a film all through the 1930s. It is a tribute to Chaplin's versatility that he also has one film credit for choreography for the 1952 film Limelight, and another as a singer for the title music of the 1928's The Circus. The best-known of several songs he composed are "Smile", composed for the film "Modern Times" and given lyrics to help promote a 1950s revival of the film, famously covered by Nat King Cole. "This Is My Song" from Chaplin's last film, "A Countess From Hong Kong," was a number one hit in several different languages in the 1960s, and Chaplin's theme from Limelight was a hit in the 50s under the title "Eternally."
On March 9, 1975, he was knighted as a Knight Commander of the British Empire (KBE) by Queen Elizabeth II. The honour was first proposed in 1931, and again in 1956, when it was vetoed by the then Conservative government for fears of damage to relations with the United States at the height of the Cold War and planned invasion of Suez of that year.

FILMOGRAPHY
* 01. Making a Living (Feb 2) *
* 02. Kid Auto Races at Venice (Feb 7) *
* 03. Mabel's Strange Predicament (Feb 9) *
* 04. Between Showers (Feb 28) *
* 05. A Film Johnnie (Mar 2) *
* 06. Tango Tangles (Mar 9) *
* 07. His Favourite Pastime (Mar 16) *
* 08. Cruel, Cruel Love (Mar 26) *
* 09. The Star Boarder (Apr 4) *
* 10. Mabel At The Wheel (Apr 18) *
* 11. Twenty Minutes Of Love (Apr 20)
* 12. Caught in a Cabaret (Apr 27) *
* 13. Caught in the Rain (May 4)
* 14. A Busy Day (May 7)
* 15. The Fatal Mallet (Jun 1) *
* 16. Her Friend The Bandit (Jun 4) (Chaplin's only lost film)
* 17. The Knockout (Jun 11) *
* 18. Mabel's Busy Day (Jun 13) *
* 19. Mabel's Married Life (Jun 20)
* 20. Laughing Gas (Jul 9)
* 21. The Property Man (Aug 1)
* 22. The Face on the Bar-Room Floor (Aug 10)
* 23. Recreation (Aug 13)
* 24. The Masquerader (Aug 27)
* 25. His New Profession (Aug 31)
* 26. The Rounders (Sep 7)
* 27. The New Janitor (Sep 14)
* 28. Those Love Pangs (Oct 10)
* 29. Dough and Dynamite (Oct 26)
* 30. Gentlemen of Nerve (Oct 29)
* 31. His Musical Career (Nov 7)
* 32. His Trysting Place (Nov 9)
* 33. Tillie's Punctured Romance (Nov 14) *
* 34. Getting Acquainted (Dec 5)
* 35. His Prehistoric Past (Dec 7)

Essanay
1915

* 36. His New Job (Feb 1)
* 37. A Night Out (Feb 15)
* 38. The Champion (Mar 11)
* 39. In The Park (Mar 18)
* 40. A Jitney Elopement (Apr 1)
* 41. The Tramp (Apr 11)
* 42. By The Sea (Apr 29)
* His Regeneration (May 7) (cameo: a customer)
* 43. Work (Jun 21)
* 44. A Woman (Jul 12)
* 45. The Bank (Aug 9)
* 46. Shanghaied (Oct 4)
* 47. A Night in the Show (Nov 20)
* 48. Burlesque on Carmen (Dec 18)

1916

* 49. Police (May 27)

1918

* 50. Triple Trouble (put together by Essanay from unfinished Chaplin films two years after he had left the company)

Miscellaneous:

* The Nut (Mar 6, 1921) (cameo: chaplin impersonator)
* Souls For Sale (Mar 27, 1923) (cameo: himself, celebrity director)
* A Woman of the Sea (1926) (produced by Chaplin)
* Show People (Nov 11, 1928) (cameo: himself)

Mutual Film Corporation
1916

* 51. The Floorwalker (May 15)
* 52. The Fireman (Jun 12)
* 53. The Vagabond (Jul 10)
* 54. One A.M. (Aug 7)
* 55. The Count (Sep 4)
* 56. The Pawnshop (Oct 2)
* 57. Behind the Screen (Nov 13)
* 58. The Rink (Dec 4)

1917

* 59. Easy Street (Jan 22)
* 60. The Cure (Apr 16)
* 61. The Immigrant (Jun 17)
* 62. The Adventurer (Oct 22)

First National
1918

* 63. A Dog's Life (Apr 14)
* 64. The Bond (Sep 29)
* 65. Shoulder Arms (Oct 20)

1919

* 66. Sunnyside (Jun 15)
* 67. A Day's Pleasure (Dec 15)
* The Professor (uncompleted)

1920

* 68. The Kid (Feb 6)
* 69. The Idle Class (Sep 25)

1922

* 70. Pay Day (Apr 2)

1923

* 71. The Pilgrim (Feb 26)

United Artists
1923

* 72. A Woman of Paris (Sep 26) (cameo)

1925

* 73. The Gold Rush (Jun 26)

1928

* 74. The Circus (Jan 6)

1931

* 75. City Lights (Feb 6)

1936

* 76. Modern Times (Feb 5)

1940

* 77. The Great Dictator (Oct 15)

1947

* 78. Monsieur Verdoux (Apr 11)

1952

* 79. Limelight (Oct 16)

Later Productions
1957

* 80. A King in New York (Sep 12)

1959

* 81. The Chaplin Revue (Sep 1) (First National shorts A Dog�s Life, Shoulder Arms and The Pilgrim edited together by Chaplin to form a single feature-length film.

1967

* 82. A Countess from Hong Kong (Jan 5)

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