My Autobiography

by Charles Chaplin

  In my excitement to play with the famous William Gillette, I had forgotten to ask about terms. At the end of the week Mr Postance came apologetically with my pay envelope. ‘I’m really ashamed to give you this,’ he said, ‘but at the Frohman office they said I was to pay you the same as you were getting with us before: two pounds ten.’ I was agreeably surprised.

  At rehearsals of Holmes, I met Marie Doro again – more beautiful than ever! – and in spite of my resolutions not to be overwhelmed by her, I began to sink further into the hopeless mire of silent love. I hated this weakness and was furious with myself for lack of character. It was an ambivalent affair. I both hated and loved her. What’s more, she was charming and gracious to boot.

  In Holmes she played Alice Faulkner, but in the play we never met. I would wait, however, timing the moment when I could pass her on the stairs and gulp ‘Good evening’, and she would answer cheerfully ‘Good evening’. And that was all that ever passed between us.

  Holmes was an immediate success. During the engagement Queen Alexandra saw the play; sitting with her in the Royal Box were the King of Greece and Prince Christian. The Prince was evidently explaining the play to the King and during the most tense and silent moment, when Holmes and I were alone on the stage, a booming voice with an accent resounded throughout the theatre: ‘Don’t tell me! Don’t tell me!’

  Dion Boucicault had his offices in the Duke of York’s Theatre, and in passing he would give me an approving little tap on the head; as did Hall Caine, who frequently came back stage to see Gillette. On one occasion I also received a smile from Lord Kitchener.

  During the run of Sherlock Holmes, Sir Henry Irving died and I attended the funeral at Westminster Abbey. Being a West End actor, I was given a special pass and I felt very proud of the fact. At the funeral, I sat between the solemn Lewis Waller, then the romantic matinée idol of London, and ‘Dr’ Walford Bodie of bloodless surgery fame, whom I later burlesqued in a vaudeville skit. Waller looked handsomely profiled for the occasion, sitting stiffly, looking neither right nor left. But ‘Dr’ Bodie, in order to get a better view as they lowered Sir Henry into the crypt, kept stepping on the chest of a supine duke, much to the indignation and contempt of Mr Waller. I gave up trying to see anything and sat down, resigned to viewing the backsides of those in front of me.

  Two weeks before the ending of Sherlock Holmes, Mr Boucicault gave me a letter of introduction to the illustrious Mr and Mrs Kendal, with the prospects of getting a part in their new play. They were terminating a successful run at the St James’s Theatre. The appointment was for ten a.m., to meet the lady in the foyer of the theatre. She was twenty minutes late. Eventually, a silhouette appeared off the street: it was Mrs Kendal, a stalwart imperious lady, who greeted me with: ‘Oh, so you’re the boy! We are shortly to begin a tour of the provinces in a new play, and I’d like to hear you read for the part. But at the moment we are very busy. So will you be here tomorrow morning at the same time?’

  ‘I’m sorry, madam,’ I replied coldly, ‘but I cannot accept anything out of town.’ And with that I raised my hat, walked out of the foyer, hailed a passing cab – and was out of work for ten months.

  The night Sherlock Holmes ended its run at the Duke of York’s Theatre and Marie Doro was to return to America, I went off alone and got desperately drunk. Two or three years later in Philadelphia, I saw her again. She dedicated the opening of a new theatre in which I was playing in Karno’s comedy company. She was still as beautiful as ever. I stood in the wings watching her in my comedy make-up while she made a speech, but I was too shy to make myself known to her.

  At the closing of Holmes in London the company in the provinces also ended, so both Sydney and I were out of work. But Sydney lost no time in getting another job. As a result of seeing an advertisement in the Era, a theatrical paper, he joined Charlie Manon’s troupe of knockabout comedians. In those days there were several of these troupes touring the halls: Charlie Baldwin’s Bank Clerks, Joe Boganny’s Lunatic Bakers, and the Boicette troupe, all of them pantomimists. And although they played slapstick comedy, it was performed to beautiful music à la ballet and was most popular. The outstanding company was Fred Karno’s, who had a large repertoire of comedies. Each one was called ‘Birds’. There were Jail Birds, Early Birds, Mumming Birds, etc. From these three sketches Karno built a theatrical enterprise of more than thirty companies, whose repertoire included Christmas pantomimes and elaborate musical comedies, from which he developed such fine artists and comedians as Fred Kitchen, George Graves, Harry Weldon, Billie Reeves, Charlie Bell and many others.

  It was while Sydney was working with the Manon troupe that Fred Karno saw him and signed him up at a salary of four pounds a week. Being four years younger than Sydney, I was neither fish nor fowl for any form of theatrical work, but I had saved a little money from the London engagement and while Sydney was working in the provinces I stayed in London and played around pool-rooms.

  six

  I HAD arrived at that difficult and unattractive age of adolescence, conforming to the teenage emotional pattern. I was a worshipper of the foolhardy and the melodramatic, a dreamer and a moper, raging at life and loving it, a mind in a chrysalis yet erupting with sudden bursts of maturity. In this labyrinth of distorting mirrors I dallied, my ambition going in spurts. The word ‘art’ never entered my head or my vocabulary. The theatre meant a livelihood and nothing more.

  Through this haze and confusion I lived alone. Whores, sluts and an occasional drinking bout weaved in and out of this period, but neither wine, women nor song held my interest for long. I really wanted romance and adventure.

  I can well understand the psychological attitude of the teddy boy with his Edwardian dress; like all of us he wants attention, romance and drama in his life. Why should he not indulge in moments of exhibitionism and horseplay, as does the public-school boy with his gadding and ragging? Is it not natural that when he sees the so-called better classes asserting their foppery he wants to assert his own?

  He knows that the machine obeys his will as it does the will of any class; that it requires no special mentality to shift a gear or press a button. In this insensate age is he not as formidable as any Lancelot, aristocrat or scholar, his finger as powerful in destroying a city as any Napoleonic army? Is not the teddy boy a phoenix rising from the ashes of a delinquent ruling class, his attitude perhaps motivated by a subconscious feeling: that man is only a half-tame animal who has for generations governed others by deceit, cruelty and violence? But, as Bernard Shaw said: ‘I am digressing as a man with a grievance always does.’

  I eventually obtained work with a vaudeville sketch. Casey’s Circus, doing a burlesque on Dick Turpin, the highwayman, and ‘Dr’ Walford Bodie. With ‘Dr’ Bodie I had a modicum of success, for it was more than just low comedy; it was a characterization of a professorial, scholarly man, and I conceived the happy idea of making up to look exactly like him I was the star of the company, and earned three pounds a week. It included a troupe of kids playing at grown-ups in an alley scene; it was an awful show, I thought, but it gave me a chance to develop as a comedian.

  When Casey’s Circus played in London, six of us boarded in the Kennington Road with Mrs Fields, an old widowed lady of sixty-five, who had three daughters: Frederica, Thelma and Phoebe. Frederica was married to a Russian cabinet-maker, a gentle but an extremely ugly man, with a broad Tartar face, blond hair, blond moustache and a cast in his eye. The six of us ate in the kitchen, and we got to know the family very well. Sydney when working in London also lived there.

  When eventually I left Casey’s Circus, I returned to Kennington Road and continued to board with the Fields. The old lady was kindly, patient and hard-working and her sole income came from renting rooms. Frederica, the married daughter, was supported by her husband. Thelma and Phoebe helped with the housework. Phoebe was fifteen and beautiful. Her features were long and aquiline, and she had a strong appeal for me both physically and sentimentally; the latter I re
sisted because I was not quite seventeen and had only the worst of intentions about girls. But she was saintly and nothing ever came of it. She grew fond of me, however, and we became very good friends.

  The Fields were an intensely emotional family and would occasionally break out into passionate quarrelling with each other. The basis of contention was usually whose turn it was to do the housework. Thelma, who was about twenty, was the lady of the family and the lazy one, and always claimed that it was Frederica’s or Phoebe’s turn. This would develop from an argument into a brawl, in which buried grievances and family skeletons were hewed up and cast about for all to view, Mrs Fields revealing the fact that since Thelma had run off and lived with a young Liverpool lawyer she thought she was a lady and that she was too good to do housework, climaxing her tirade by saying: ‘Well, if you’re such a lady, clear out and go back and live with your Liverpool lawyer – only he won’t have you.’ And for final emphasis Mrs Field would pick up a teacup and smash it on the floor. During this Thelma would sit at the table, ladylike and unperturbed. Then calmly she would take a cup and do likewise, lightly dropping it on the floor, saying: ‘I too, can lose my temper,’ dropping another cup, then another, then another and another until the floor was strewn with broken crockery. ‘I, too, can make a scene.’ And the poor mother and the sisters would look on helplessly. ‘Look at her! Look what she’s doing!’ moaned the mother. ‘Here! Here’s something else you can smash,’ handing Thelma the sugarbowl, and Thelma would take it and calmly drop it.

  On these occasions Phoebe was the arbitrator. She was fair and just and had the respect of the family, and she would usually end the argument by offering to do the work herself, which Thelma would not allow her to do.

  I had been out of work for almost three months and Sydney had been supporting me, paying Mrs Fields fourteen shillings a week for my board and lodgings. He was now a leading comedian with Fred Karno, and had often spoken to Karno about his talented young brother, but Karno turned a deaf ear, because he thought I was too young.

  At the time Jewish comedians were all the rage in London, so I thought I would hide my youth under whiskers. Sydney gave me two pounds, which I invested in musical arrangements for songs and funny dialogue taken from an American joke-book, Madison’s Budget. For weeks I practised, performing in front of the Fields family. They were attentive and encouraging but nothing more.

  I had obtained a trial week without pay at the Forester’s Music Hall, which was a small theatre situated off the Mile End Road in the centre of the Jewish quarter. I had played there previously with Casey’s Circus and the management thought I was good enough to be given a chance. My future hopes and dreams depended on that trial week. After the Foresters’ I would play all the important circuits in England. Who knows? Within a year I might rise to be one of vaudeville’s biggest headliners. I had promised the whole Fields family that I would get them tickets towards the end of the week, when I was thoroughly at home with my act.

  ‘I suppose you won’t want to live with us after your success,’ said Phoebe.

  ‘Of course I will,’ I said graciously.

  Twelve O’clock Monday morning was band rehearsal for songs and cues etc., which I carried out professionally. But I had not given sufficient thought to my make-up. I was undecided how I should look. For hours before the night show I was in the dressing-room experimenting, but no matter how much crêpe hair I used I could not hide my youth. Although I was innocent of it, my comedy was most anti-Semitic, and my jokes were not only old ones but very poor, like my Jewish accent. Moreover, I was not funny.

  After the first couple of jokes the audience started throwing coins and orange-peel and stamping their feet and booing. At first I was not conscious of what was going on. Then the horror of it filtered into my mind. I began to hurry and talk faster as the jeers, the raspberries, and the throwing of coins and orange-peel increased. When I came off the stage, I did not wait to hear the verdict from the management; I went straight to the dressing-room, took off my make-up, left the theatre and never returned, not even to collect my music books.

  It was late when I returned home to Kennington Road and the Field family had all gone to bed, and I was thankful they had. In the morning at breakfast Mrs Fields was anxious to know how the show went. I bluffed indifference and said: ‘All right, but it needs a few alterations.’ She said that Phoebe had gone to see me, but had told them nothing, as she was too tired and wanted to get to bed. When I saw Phoebe later she did not mention it, neither did I; nor did Mrs Fields or any of the family ever mention it again, or show any surprise at my not continuing the week.

  Thank God Sydney was in the provinces, so I had not the painful ordeal of telling him what had happened – but he must have guessed, or the Fields might have told him, because he never did inquire about it. I did my best to erase that night’s horror from my mind, but it left an indelible mark on my confidence. That ghastly experience taught me to see myself in a truer light; I realized I was not a vaudeville comedian, I had not that intimate, come-hither faculty with an audience; and I consoled myself with being a character comedian. However, I was to have one or two more disappointments before landing on my professional feet.

  At seventeen I played a juvenile lead in a sketch called The Merry Major, a cheap, depressing affair lasting only a week. The leading lady, my wife, was a woman of fifty. Each night she reeled on to the stage smelling of gin, and I, the enthusiastic loving husband, would have to take her in my arms and kiss her. That experience weaned me away from any ambition to be a leading man.

  Then I tried authorship. I wrote a comedy sketch called Twelve Just Men, a slapstick affair about a jury arguing a case of breach of promise. One of the jury was a deaf-mute, another a drunk and another a quack doctor. I sold the idea to Charcoate, a vaudeville hypnotist who would hypnotize a stooge and make him drive through the town in a landau, blindfold, while he sat in the back throwing magnetic impulses at him. He gave me three pounds for my script, providing I directed it. We engaged a cast and rehearsed over the Horns public house clubrooms in the Kennington Road. One disgruntled old actor said that the sketch was not only illiterate but silly.

  The third day, in the middle of rehearsals, I received a note from Charcoate to say he had decided not to produce it. Not being the valiant type, I put the note in my pocket and went on rehearsing. I had not the courage to tell the cast. Instead, at lunch-time, I took them home to our rooms and told them my brother wished to talk to them. I took Sydney into the bedroom and showed him the note. After reading it he said: ‘Well, didn’t you tell them?’

  ‘No,’ I whispered.

  ‘Well, tell them.’

  ‘I can’t,’ I said. ‘I just can’t, after their having rehearsed three days for nothing.’

  ‘But that’s not your fault,’ said Sydney. ‘Go and tell them,’ he shouted.

  I lost courage and began to weep. ‘What can I say?’

  ‘Don’t be a fool!’ He got up and went into the next room and showed them Charcoate’s letter, explaining what had happened, then he took us all to the corner pub for a sandwich and a drink.

  Actors are unpredictable. The old chap who had grumbled so much was the most philosophical, and laughed when Sydney told him of the awful state I was in. ‘It’s not your fault, sonny,’ he said, patting me on the back. ‘It’s that bloody old scoundrel, Charcoate.’

  *

  After my failure at the Foresters’, everything I attempted met with disaster. However, a most formidable element in optimism is youth, for it instinctively feels that adversity is pro tem and that a continual run of ill luck is just as implausible as the straight and narrow path of righteousness. Both eventually must deviate.

  My luck changed. One day Sydney told me that Mr Karno wanted to see me. It appears he was dissatisfied with one of the comedians playing opposite Mr Harry Weldon in The Football Match, one of Karno’s most successful sketches. Weldon was a very popular comedian who remained popular up to the time of h
is death in the thirties.

  Mr Karno was a thick-set, bronzed little man, with keen sparkling eyes that were always appraising. He had started as an acrobat on the horizontal bars, then got together three knockabout comedians. This quartette was the nucleus of his comedy pantomime sketches. He himself was an excellent comedian and originated many comedy roles. He continued playing even when he had five other companies on the road.

  One of the original members tells the story of his retirement. One night in Manchester, after a performance, the troupe complained that Karno’s timing was off and that he had ruined the laughs. Karno, who had then accumulated £50,000 from his five shows, said: ‘Well, boys, if that’s the way you feel, I’ll quit!’ then, taking off his wig, he dropped it on the dressing-table and grinned. ‘You can accept that as my resignation.’

  Mr Karno’s home was in Coldharbour Lane, Camberwell; annexed to it was a warehouse in which he stored the scenery for his twenty productions. He also maintained his offices there. When I arrived he received me kindly. ‘Sydney’s been telling me how good you are,’ he said. ‘Do you think you could play opposite Harry Weldon in The Football Match?’

  Harry Weldon was specially engaged at a high salary, getting thirty-four pounds a week.

  ‘All I need is the opportunity,’ I said confidently.

  He smiled. ‘Seventeen’s very young, and you look even younger.’

  I shrugged off-handedly. ‘That’s a question of make-up.’

  Karno laughed. That shrug, he told Sydney later, got me the job.

  ‘Well, well, we’ll see what you can do,’ he said.

  It was to be a trial engagement of two weeks at three pounds ten a week, and if I proved satisfactory I would get a year’s contract.