Page 67 - All About History - Issue 33-15

ThefallofCharlieChaplin

Chaplin in a publicity shot
for Modern Times, in which
he plays a factory worker

court case that was brought against Chaplin by
a mentally fragile young actress named Joan
Barry with whom Chaplin had had a relationship.
A certain mob mentality fuelled the interest in
the case, the American Legion supporting the
paternity claim. Chaplin was duly declared the
father of Barry’s baby and was ordered to pay child
support until the child became 21. In a review of
Simon Louvish’s relatively recent biography of
Chaplin, entitled Chaplin: The Tramp’s Odyssey
(a title suggesting a journey home after conflict),
Simon Callow noted that: “The ever-increasing
gap between the Little Fellow and his creator was
lost on neither Chaplin nor the commentators: the
Tramp, impotent; Chaplin…, hugely potent, both as
artist and as male…”
Chaplin’s personal life, then, offered up a
number of opportunities to address broader social
issues. Indeed, the ‘fantasy’ of the film star has
often been a way for the culture to address very
real issues that play on its mind.
In one of his most famous
roles, Chaplin eschewed The
Tramp to satirise Hitler

The Great Dictator Monsieur Verdoux Limelight 1952 King In New York 1957 A Countess From
1940 1947 Calvero King Shahdov Hong Kong 1967
Adenoid Hynkel and The Monsieur Henri Verdoux An old steward
Barber
67