THE IMMIGRANT, released 100 years ago today

The release date for The Immigrant is often given as June 17th, 1917 but trade publications & newspapers from the era say the 18th. Michael Hayde's recent book on the Mutuals, Chaplin's Vintage Year, also says the 18th, so that's the date I'm going with.

This was Chaplin's second to last film for the Mutual Film Corporation. The day before its release, he signed his first million-dollar contract with First National.

The rocking of the boat for the opening scenes was achieved by attaching a pendulum to the tripod head of the camera.

There is a very similar scene between Bugs Bunny and Christopher Columbus in the 1951 cartoon Hare We Go.
  Chaplin built the dining hall set on rockers so it would tilt back and forth.
These boat rocking tricks had previously been used in Shanghaied (1915)

Charlie sees Edna for the first time when she enters the dining room.

The gun-through-the-leg gag was recycled from The New Janitor (1914).

The immigrants see the Statue Of Liberty for the first time.

The part of the waiter was originally played by Henry Bergman but Chaplin didn't feel he was menacing enough so he replaced him with Eric Campbell and his diabolic eyebrows. 

The story goes that Chaplin did so many takes of Edna eating beans that she became ill.
According to Grace Kingsley, Edna told him: "It’s no use Charlie. I simply can’t swallow another one.'
‘Great Scott!’ retorted Charlie, ‘how am I going to get my gagging over, then?’
‘I give it up,’ replied Edna. ‘If you’d been gagging as much as I have for the past five hours you wouldn’t want to gag any more!’" (L.A. Times, May 20th, 1917)

Chaplin wrote in My Life In Pictures (1974):
"The Immigrant touched me more than any film I've made. I thought the ending had quite a poetic feeling"

THE COUNT, released 100 years ago today

The Count was a struggle for Chaplin from the beginning. He built a set, as he often did, "with not an idea in my head."¹ This lack of inspiration caused him a great deal of anxiety: "When I arrive in the morning I'm usually gloomy, especially when I haven't any idea what I'm going to do in a scene...," he told journalist Grace Kingsley in August 1916, "tears bedew my eyes as I put on my makeup, and I weep sadly as I step out on the stage."²

His first plea for help went out to his brother, Sydney, who was in New York at the time. How much Charlie counted on him for brainstorming gags and scenario possibilities is evident in their correspondence when Syd was away.

Wiring him at the Hotel Bonta in New York City, July 31, while he would have been filming The Count, Charlie pleaded: "Have you any suggestions for scenes? Have dining room and ballroom. I am playing a count but an imposter to win an heiress but cannot get story straight. Wire me some gags if possible. Playing in Chaplin make-up in fancy dress ball." Charlie's problems with this story continued, however, causing him to film the mostly one-man-show One A.M. in the meantime. By August, the situation was so dire that Charlie's butler and Man Friday, Tom Harrington, wired Sydney again:

"Charlie is very depressed condition for past two weeks. Doesn't seem able to get mind around to his story. He wishes nearly every other day that you were here...Think it very important for his future success for you to drop everything in New York and come here immediately at least three or four weeks. Charlie hasn't been sick but whenever he gets into difficult situation, which doesn't work out satisfactorily, he always wishes Syd were here."

Five days later Charlie wired his brother himself: "The last two pictures have given me great worry and I need you here to help me. Drop everything and arrange to be in Los Angeles by August 12 to help me in directing next picture. Wire answer immediately."³

Why was Sydney tormenting his brother this way?  It seems Sydney felt "used" by Mutual and that they weren't paying him what he thought he was worth. A settlement seems to have been reached because Sydney eventually returned to California.⁴

The Count's ballroom scene appears to have caused Chaplin the most stress. He told Grace Kingsley:

"And as for these gray hairs"--indicating those about his temple over his right ear--"I got them all the other day trying to be funny in a ballroom scene. I think any comedian who started out to be funny in a ballroom would have his career blighted at the outset." ⁵

Illustration by Gale for Grace Kingsley article, Los Angeles Sunday Times, Aug. 20th, 1916 

Charlie wasn't the only one driven crazy by this scene. Chester Courtney, an old music hall acquaintance who had been given a job at the studio, recalled:

If anyone were to play "And They Call It Dixieland" in my hearing I should run, screaming! It nearly lost me my sanity, thanks to Charlie. He kept a studio band playing it for weeks learning to dance with Edna Purviance."⁶

Despite all the problems, The Count was well-received among critics and fans, who had been disappointed with his last film One AM.  The public felt that Chaplin had made a come back of sorts.

The inimitable comedian returns to the type of motion picture farce in which he gained his fame and is seen in his familiar baggy trousers, cutaway coat at least two sizes too small, his dinky derby, diminutive moustache and slender cane, not forgetting the celebrated brogans.⁷

_________________________________________________________________________________

¹ Charles Chaplin,  My Autobiography, The Bodley Head, 1964
²Grace Kingsley, "Beneath The Mask: Witty, Wistful, Serious Is The Real Charlie Chaplin," Los Angeles Sunday Times, August 20th, 1916
³ Lisa K. Stein, Syd Chaplin: A Biography, McFarland, 2011
⁴ibid
⁵ Grace Kingsley, "Beneath The Mask: Witty, Wistful, Serious Is The Real Charlie Chaplin," Los Angeles Sunday Times, August 20th, 1916
⁶Chester Courtney, "The Real Charles Chaplin," Film Weekly, Feb. 1931
⁷Moving Picture World, September 2nd, 1916

Chaplin with members of his stock company on the set of his first Mutual film, THE FLOORWALKER, c. April 1916

L-R: Henry P. Caulfield (Manager of the Lone Star Studio), Leo White, Edna Purviance, Chaplin,
Charlotte Mineau, Eric Campbell, Lloyd Bacon and Vincent Bryan (scenario editor/writer).

Same group, different pose
Front Row: Caulfield, White, Edna, CC, Mineau, Bacon. Back row: Bryan, Campbell

EASY STREET

Chaplin's ninth film for Mutual was released February 5th, 1917. The release of the film was delayed for two weeks due to rain, as well as an accident in which Chaplin received several stitches. More about this below.

Plot: Reformed Charlie becomes a policeman and his beat is Easy Street, the toughest street in town.

The film opens with Charlie asleep on the ground outside of the Hope Mission.

According to the Washington Times (Feb. 11, 1917), during the filming of this scene the baby, attracted to Chaplin's mustache, suddenly reached up and tore it off his lip ("and also part of said lip.") In order to go on with filming, Chaplin had to return to his dressing room to apply a replacement. Meanwhile, "the baby held tightly to its new possession and even went to the extent of insisting in a way all its own to taking it home. Here its mother finally secured it and she realized it was a souvenir well worth keeping. That evening she recounted the experience to her husband and showed him the prize." To make a long story short, the "prize" ended up being auctioned off at a charity bazaar for $110.

Charlie is enamored with Edna, the mission's organist.

"Chaplin at first proposed to take the part of the missionary in order that his affair with the beautiful Edna might have a better chance to fructify, but decided that it would be undignified for a clergyman to descend from the pulpit and beat up the irascible [Eric] Campbell." (Reel Life, 1917)

Crew member Dave Allen recalled that "when Charlie wanted anything, he'd yell for it, and the person nearest it would grab it and give it to him. When Charlie started yelling 'Truncheon! Truncheon!' I thought he was calling 'Luncheon' and sent the extras off to eat--it seems in London the cops call a nightstick a truncheon." When Chaplin heard of the mistake, he burst into laughter. (Harry Crocker manuscript via Charlie Chaplin Archives, Taschen 2015)

Filming was delayed when Chaplin injured himself while filming this scene with Eric Campbell: "I pulled a lamp post over on myself,” he explained. “It was necessary to take several stitches and I lost a good deal of blood--I didn’t know I had so much blood. We kept the scene, too. It makes one of those serious little touches, you know.” (The Day Book, Feb. 9, 1917)

Regarding this scene, Chaplin told Sergei Eisenstein in 1930: "You remember the scene in Easy Street where I scatter food from a box to poor children as if they were chickens? You see, I did this because I despise them. I don't like children." (Eisenstein, Notes Of A Film Director, 1959) 

Charlie accidently sits on a hypodermic needle which gives him the superhuman strength to beat up the Easy Street bullies. 

...and save the day.

THE RINK, released December 4th, 1916

The Rink was Chaplin's 8th film for Mutual & the first to display his rollerskating prowess, skills he had doubtlessly developed in the c.1909 Fred Karno sketch, Skating, which was co-written by Syd Chaplin (both brothers performed the sketch for different Karno touring companies). He employed another skating routine twenty years later in Modern Times, which revives some of the restaurant gags in The Rink as well.

Not surprisingly, others in the cast, who may not have been as comfortable on skates as Chaplin, were black and blue during rehearsals:

Charles Spencer Chaplin and Mutual players have begun the filming of a rollerskating rink story. The script provides that each one of the troop shall become proficient in the art of retaining their equilibrium, and the stage at the studio has been the scene of many tumbles that will not appear on the screen. Eric Campbell, the six-foot-two heavyweight, is reported to have ruined one section of the flooring, and other members are nursing bruises which in some instances require meals served from the mantelpiece. General Manager H. P. Caulfield is putting in all his time preventing the artists from completely destroying the plant. (Motion Picture News, December 9th, 1916)

To give an idea of The Rink's popularity with audiences, here is a clipping from a 1917 issue of Motography. It's hard to tell if the owner of the theater was being serious:

A few favorite scenes:

This was Henry Bergman's first appearance in drag in a Chaplin film. 

BEHIND THE SCREEN, released this week in 1916

Goliath, the stage hand, and his assistant, David.

Charlie manages to carry a dozen chairs and a piano at once.

"Stage hands lunch hour." Charlie uses bellows to shield himself from Albert Austin's smelly onions.

Charlie discovers the new stage hand is really a girl (Edna).

He promises to keep her secret.

When Eric sees Charlie kissing the new stage hand, he makes fun
of him by doing an effeminate dance. These blatant references to homosexuality were very
risqué at the time. 

"The comedy department rehearses a new idea"--a pie fight.

After a fight with Charlie, Eric falls into the trap door that has been rigged with explosives
by the striking stage hands. 

Charlie and Edna congratulate each other on their escape. 

Roscoe Arbuckle visits the Lone Star Studio, 1916

Judging from the costumes, Chaplin was filming Behind The Screen. Henry Bergman is between Chaplin and Arbuckle. Eric Campbell is at left. Everyone appears to be checking out Arbuckle's fancy car.

Photo from Chaplin's Schatten by Fritz Hirzel (1982), credited to MOMA, NYC.
 Courtesy of Dominique Dugros.

Obituary for Eric Campbell who died on December 20th, 1917

Moving Picture World, January 5th, 1918

His daughter's name was actually Una. Perhaps "Laura Austin" was a stage name.

THE FIREMAN, released June 12, 1916

"I was passing a firehouse one day, for example, and heard a fire alarm ring in. I watched the men sliding down the pole, climbing onto the engine, and rushing off to the fire. At once a train of comic possibilities occurred to me. I saw myself sleeping in bed, oblivious to the clanging of the fire bell. This point would have a universal appeal, because everyone likes to sleep. I saw myself sliding down the pole, playing tricks with the fire horses, rescuing the heroine, falling off the fire engine as it turned a corner, and many other points along the same lines. I stored these points away in my mind and some time later, when I made The Fireman, I used every one of them. Yet if I had not watched the firehouse that day the possibilities in the character of a fireman might never have occurred to me." (Charles Chaplin, "What People Laugh At," American, November 1918)

Certain scenes in The Fireman were filmed at an actual Los Angeles fire house. The two burning houses shown in the film were studio-created facades, not real condemned houses which Mutual claimed in its publicity at the time. However it's remarkable to watch Chaplin climb the three-story set in one take.