Motion picture actors and actresses; Motion pictures
His emotionality is never more apparent than when he is at work. Often
he becomes exhausted in his efforts to inspire one of his company with
the desired emotion. “Heavens!” he will cry, “It’s enough to break your
heart--such stupidity!” When he sees the rushes, anger and despair are
apt to break from their leashes and run away with the projection-room.
Often, however, these emotions are directed quite as much toward his
own part in the performance as toward that of others. Charlie has, in
fact, that capacity for being dissatisfied with his own work which is a
part of every great artist.
The world at large does not seem to know much about Charlie’s brother
Sydney. Yet he is a very real brother and Charlie has a very real
affection for him. He himself is an excellent comedian with only
one disadvantage--he is the near relative of a great comedian. This
relationship, I may add, could never be detected from a casual glance
at the two, for Syd Chaplin is rather tall and rather blond and his
features are much more sharply cut than are those of his brother.
Syd, by the way, possesses a very ready wit. Once when dining with Mary
and Doug he listened to the latter’s statement that the costumes for
“Robin Hood” had cost a hundred and sixty-two thousand dollars.
“Hmph!” commented Syd, “I should call that ‘Robbin’ Doug.’”
It was after completing his $670,000 contract with the Mutual
Film Company that Charlie made with the First National Company a
million-dollar deal calling for eight two-reel pictures. This did not
sound difficult. The comedian expected to complete the order in a year.
Instead, he has only just recently finished the last of the National
Film pictures.
_Chapter Fourteen_
JACKIE COOGAN AND “THE KID”
The few superfluities which appeal to Charlie Chaplin must have some
association of romance. For example, he is very fond of mangoes, and
every evening that a certain Los Angeles café has this delicacy the
manager calls up Chaplin’s house. When Charlie sits down in front of a
glass of this exotic fruit he is positively radiant.
“Lovely musty odor!” he will comment. To him the delicacy calls up
visions of long-robed, wide-sleeved Eastern men, of caravans winding
threadlike across the desert, and of incense rising in fretted temples
from the feet of golden gods. Every bit of him goes out to meet this
glamourous suggestion just exactly as every bit of him goes out to meet
the broad, rollicking humor of the derby pulled off by the string.
Domesticity does not fit into my conception of his character. He is
too individual, too much oppressed by threat of routine, to sustain
any such close relationship. One can as easily imagine De Musset
or Verlaine mowing the front lawn of his suburban home as Chaplin
responding contentedly to like conditions.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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