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Charles Chaplin Senior: Victorian Music Hall Songs


Have you ever wondered what it would be like to perform original songs from the music halls of Victorian London? front cover

The Porter House of Publishing has just released a songbook by Cecilia H. Porter featuring six long lost songs that were originally performed on the Victorian Music Hall stage more than a hundred years ago by Charles Chaplin Senior, father of the famous Little Tramp.

The book comes with a CD so that you can hear the songs, but there’s also an additional sing-along version of each song! For those who like to “tickle the ivories,” sheet music is included, as sold on the original song sheets.

Interested in experiencing those far away days with your family and friends? Visit the Porter House of Publishing website for details.

And see our page on Charles Chaplin Sr. to read more about Charlie Chaplin’s father.


Conference 2014 - Call for Papers


Call for Papers - The Birth of Chaplin’s Little Tramp: A 100th Anniversary Celebration

**JUNE 26, 27 & 28, 2014 - CINETECA DI BOLOGNA, ITALY**

**STATEMENT OF INTENT**

This 100th anniversary celebration of Charlie Chaplin’s iconic persona, the Little Tramp, or as he himself named him, the Little Fellow, will be an event geared towards the public first and film scholars and aficionados second and third. We wish to invite abstracts/proposals from speakers who can accommodate this audience effectively, i.e., potential speakers should suggest topics dealing with historical or humanities-related foci, rather than theoretical or academic. The best proposals will discuss the Little Tramp persona in some manner.

Little Tramp EXHIBIT B

The event will be held in the beautiful northern Italian city of Bologna, with one day of the celebration to coincide with the beginning of the world-renowned Il Cinema Ritrovato festival (June 28-July 5, 2014).

**PROVISIONAL KEYNOTE AND/OR FEATURED SPEAKERS (OTHERS TBA):**

  • David Robinson, Film Critic and author of Chaplin: His Life and Art
  • Kevin Brownlow, film historian and director of The Unknown Chaplin
  • Kate Guyonvarch, Director of Roy Export S.A.S. /Association Chaplin office, Paris
  • Cecilia Cenciarelli, Archivist and Head of The Chaplin Project, Cineteca di Bologna, Italy
  • Lisa Stein Haven, Associate Professor of English and author of Syd Chaplin: A Biography

The following topics are meant to generate ideas for presentations, not limit creativity or exclude participation:

  • The Little Tramp’s Music Hall origins
  • Chaplin at Keystone: The Process of Creating a Character
  • The Little Tramp’s Final Appearance: The Great Dictator, Monsieur Verdoux, or Limelight?
  • The Chaplin Imitator Phenomenon (Feel free to discuss a circumscribed time period for this topic)
  • The Little Tramp in Contemporary Film Criticism
  • Audience Reception: The Little Tramp
  • Consequences of A Woman of Paris: Chaplin’s Film Endeavor without the Tramp

All are welcome to submit proposals for consideration.

Please send a 500-word abstract, a short bio and your contact information by **June 30th, 2013** to Kate Guyonvarch (office@charliechaplin.com). Please place **Birth of the Tramp event** in your subject line.

Conference Organizers:
Kate Guyonvarch
Roy Export S.A.S.
58 rue Jean-Jacques Rousseau
75001 Paris
www.charliechaplin.com
http://www.facebook.com/CharlieChaplinOfficial

Cecilia Cenciarelli
The Chaplin Project
Cineteca di Bologna
Via Riva di Reno, 72
40122 Bologna
http://www.cinetecadibologna.it
www.charliechaplinarchive.org


From the Chaplin Archives


Further to our popular first post of photographs from the Chaplin archives, here is our second selection. Enjoy and please share this post!

i{1658-filename-big} Charlie on the set of The Kid, circa 1920. Copyright © Roy Export Company Establishment

i{1657-filename-big} Paulette Goddard and Chaplin on the set of Modern Times, circa 1935. Copyright © Roy Export Company Establishment. Scan Courtesy Cineteca di Bologna

i{1647-filename-big} Paulette Goddard and Chaplin, Beverly Hills, circa 1940. Copyright © Roy Export Company Establishment. Scan Courtesy Cineteca di Bologna

i{1648-filename-big} Filming The Great Dictator, circa 1939. In Chaplin: His Life and Art, David Robinson writes, “Reginald Gardiner suffered much more than Chaplin from the experience of being strapped upside down, and only managed his lines and air of insouciance with great effort.” Copyright © Roy Export Company Establishment. Scan Courtesy Cineteca di Bologna

i{1651-filename-big} Chaplin and Martha Raye, who jokingly called each other “Chuck” and “Maggie” while working on Monsieur Verdoux in 1946. Copyright © Roy Export Company Establishment. Scan Courtesy Cineteca di Bologna

i{1650-filename-big} On the set of City Lights, circa 1930. Copyright © Roy Export Company Establishment. Scan Courtesy Cineteca di Bologna

i{1655-filename-big} Charlie Chaplin and Helen Keller meet on the set of Sunnyside, 1919. Copyright © Roy Export Company Establishment

i{1656-filename-big} Chaplin and the famous Max Linder shake hands on the set of The Adventurer, circa 1917. From the archives of Roy Export Company Establishment. Scan Courtesy Cineteca di Bologna


Criterion releases Monsieur Verdoux


The Criterion Collection (U.S.) releases Chaplin’s Monsieur Verdoux (1947) on DVD and Blu-ray today.

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Synopsis by Charles Chaplin in My Autobiography, published 1964: Verdoux is a bluebeard, an insignificant bank clerk, who, having lost his job during the Depression, evolves a scheme of marrying old spinsters and murdering them for their money. His legitimate wife is an invalid who lives in the country with her little son, but she is ignorant of her husband’s criminal enterprise. After the murder of a victim, he goes home as would a bourgeois husband after a hard day’s work. He is a paradox of virtue and vice: a man who, as he trims his rose bushes, avoids stepping on a caterpillar, while at the end of the garden one of his victims is being consumed in an incinerator. The story contains diabolical humour, bitter satire and social criticism.

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Disc Features

  • New 2K digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray edition

  • Chaplin Today: “Monsieur Verdoux,” a 2003 documentary on the film’s production and release, featuring filmmaker Claude Chabrol and actor Norman Lloyd

  • Charlie Chaplin and the American Press, a new documentary featuring the director of the Chaplin company Roy Export, Kate Guyonvarch, and author Charles Maland

  • Illustrated audio interview with actor Marilyn Nash

  • Radio advertisements and trailers

- PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by critic Ignatiy Vishnevetsky and reprinted pieces by Chaplin and critic André Bazin


My Autobiography: New U.S. Edition


“The best autobiography ever written by an actor. An astonishing work.” —Chicago Tribune

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Chaplin’s heartfelt and hilarious autobiography tells the story of his childhood, the challenge of identifying and perfecting his talent, his subsequent film career and worldwide celebrity. In this, one of the very first celebrity memoirs, Chaplin displays all the charms, peculiarities and deeply-held beliefs that made him such an endearing and lasting character.

Re-issued as part of Melville House’s Neversink Library, My Autobiography offers dedicated Chaplin fans and casual admirers alike an astonishing glimpse into the the heart and the mind of Hollywood’s original genius maverick.

Take this unforgettable journey with the man George Bernard Shaw called “the only genius to come out of the movie industry” as he moves from his impoverished South London childhood to the heights of Hollywood wealth and fame; from the McCarthy-era investigations to his founding of United Artists to his “reverse migration” back to Europe, My Autobiography is a reading experience not to be missed.

Get your copy of My Autobiography today on Amazon.


Chaplin Figurine


i{1643-filename-big} Further to the highly popular poll on our Facebook page in November 2012, Iminime Co., Ltd in South Korea has created this innovative Charlie Chaplin figurine.

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If you would like to pre-order one now, here is their list of official distributors.

Estimated shipping: May to June 2013

US Distributors: Diamond Comic Distribution & 7-hobby

China Distributor: BBICN

Japan Distributor: Red Mercury

Singapore Distributor: The Falcon’s Hanger

Thailand Distributors: ToysStation & Playmaxx

U.K Distributors: ToyHQ & OnesixthBruce

Italy distributor: ToysHeroes

U.A.E(Dubai) Distributor: Cinemaone

South Africa Distributor: Hobby Island

Malaysia Distributor: Robotica Toys i{1641-filename-big}


A selection of Chaplin photographs


Spanning several decades, the Charlie Chaplin photography archives provide a very rich view of much of Chaplin’s life on and off his film sets. Starting this month, we will be sharing selections of photographs with you here on our website on a regular basis. Here is our first selection of images. We hope you enjoy them as much as we do!

i{1627-filename-big} Chaplin with a “snake sandwich” on the set of The Circus, circa 1926. Copyright © Roy Export Company Establishment. Scan Courtesy Cineteca di Bologna

i{1628-filename-big} On the set of The Kid, circa 1920. Copyright © Roy Export Company Establishment

i{1630-filename-big} Tea time on the set of Sunnyside, 1919. Copyright © Roy Export Company Establishment

i{1638-filename-big} Chaplin with Dorothy Rosher, who played Cupid in The Bond, 1918. Copyright © Roy Export Company Establishment

i{1640-filename-big} Chaplin with boxer Jack Dempsey at Chaplin Studios, circa 1918. Copyright © Roy Export Company Establishment. Scan Courtesy Cineteca di Bologna

i{1639-filename-big} Douglas Fairbanks and Chaplin at Chaplin studios. Copyright © Roy Export Company Establishment. Scan Courtesy Cineteca di Bologna

i{1632-filename-big} Scene from The Circus, 1928. Copyright © Roy Export S.A.S. Scan Courtesy Cineteca di Bologna

i{1631-filename-big} On the set of The Gold Rush, 1924. Copyright © Roy Export Company Establishment. Scan Courtesy Cineteca di Bologna