Guest Post: Chaplin, Keaton and us

 Hello all. Sorry, this isn't Ayse. And no, it's not some elaborate blog coup, but instead a guest post from Kieran. Many of you will know that I'm Ayse's partner, and as silent film has become rather significant in our lives together, we thought it would be a good topic for a soppy Valentine's Day post. For one day only I've been let loose. You poor people. 

Kieran's mugshot, and the first signs of Ayse's influence - I didn't even like football (soccer) before we met

The idea for this post was to show a different perspective. So as a disclaimer, I've always loved London - but unlike Ayse, I'm not a Londoner.  I'm from a smallish market town smack bang in the middle of the country, known as Newark-on-Trent (former inhabitants have since trotted off around the world and named much more famous places after it). In terms of humour and culture, we generally have more in common with our northern cousins than our southern neighbours.

Many people seem to have a definitive moment where they fell in love with silent film, or they grew up with them like Ayse. I did neither. In fact, I have a definite memory of disliking silent comedy as a kid. I used to do a lot of youth theatre when I was a precocious wee bairn and one year we put on a show based on the theme of “silent comedy.” I don't remember much about the show at all (we were that good), but I do remember having to watch some clips of silent comedy on a fuzzy VHS – and I thought it was awful (I don't remember there being any Chaplin though, folks...). 

One of my favourite comedy routines of all time. No pun intended. Honest.

So, what changed? Fast forward some 10 years, and I started looking for silent comedy clips online. I don't know why to be honest. One of the first that I stumbled across was The Kid – and I thought it was superb. But, it was actually Buster Keaton that I really fell in love with at the time. I liked the fact that he clearly wrote films – you could only do much of what he did with the advent of cameras, whereas the films of many others could (and were) just been done on the stage. I liked the engineering-style fluidity of his movement and the momentum of his films – many sequences feel like a cinematic version of the game Mousetrap. And I loved the “stone face” - because it isn't, all that nuance and communication through his eyes was superb. He also appealed to me as an amateur film-maker, as he struggled with similar issues as I did when trying to achieve certain effects.

I've always maintained you don't have to pick one or the other. Even at that time I preferred plenty of Chaplin films to Keaton ones, and felt no conflict for doing so – Easy Street and the Gold Rush are still two of my favourite films of all time, and I think the Pawn Shop clock sequence has to be one of my favourite comedy routines ever. There is definitely no need to compare them or put them against each other.

Well, I suppose you could pit them against each other - see their Celebrity Deathmatch bout here....

So, I have long been a fan of Chaplin, but then I met Ayse. Surprisingly, we didn't meet through our mutual love of film, but a mutual love of history I suppose. We are both members of the living history (re-enactment without the battles) group, the Great War Society and met at one of these events. Ayse was portraying a member of the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry, and I was a grubby, be-bearded French soldier - as you can imagine, it was love at first sight.

But we decided that we should probably meet whilst I didn't look like I'd been dragged through a hedge backwards. So, we set our first proper date as a day out in London. I always carry at least one book with me at all times, or used to until my back started becoming increasingly crooked from the years of being a one-man-mobile-library (that and members of the public didn't like me asking them to be quiet all the time...). Back to the point, the book I had with me on that day was the Keaton biography Tempest in a Flat Hat that I'd picked up in New Zealand. (It's a great introductory book, highly recommend it).

A superb introductory biography to Keaton, and the start of all this...

Ayse saw this and we got talking about silent films and Chaplin. As she recounted on one of the original Charlie's London articles on Silent London, she said she used to be a Chaplin fan growing up, to which my reply was "you never stop being a fan." She says that it was me that got her back into Chaplin again, but it's equally true that Ayse rekindled my love of silent film. At this point she hadn't seen any silent film on the big screen, with an audience or with live accompaniment, so for a Christmas present in early 2011 we went to see the Gold Rush at the Royal Festival hall in London, with Carl Davis conducting the London Philharmonia.

Carl Davis conducts the score to the Gold Rush (courtesy of the Southbank Centre / Richard Cannon)

 It was outstanding, and that year I got taken on various tours around Charlie's London with Ayse and her mum, and hear her personal stories about Chaplin and growing up watching him. I won't recount them here, read the other posts on the blog if you haven't already. It was great to see the streets that had shaped Charlie growing up and seeing the personal connection Ayse had, and her passion was infectious (as I'm sure you all know). I found myself falling more in love with Chaplin. Whilst I was up in York as a mature student, we would visit each other as often as possible, and we would always end up watching a bit of Chaplin or Keaton.

Almost a year later, we found ourselves at Bristol Silents' Slapstick Festival. It was my second time here but Ayse's first, and we made a great group of friends, and found ourselves travelling to shows and festivals around the country. These were always places I had meant to go, like the British Silent Film Festival . With Ayse, I finally got to go and had someone to share the great experience with.

Ayse and Kieran at the British Silent Film Festival in Cambridge, with a mini Charlie.

We were also lucky enough to get to Italy twice in 2012, the first time to Bologna and Il Cinema Ritrovato, (see Ayse's great write-up of her time in the Chaplin archives here) and the second to a festival that had always been on the "to do list" - Le Giornate del Cinema Muto in Pordenone. Both were different, but equally great experiences. And I'd probably have never gone to either of them if it hadn't been for Ayse, her enthusiasm is so infectious.

2012 also saw the start of Charlie's London, first on Silent London, then later here and on Facebook. What a community they have become, full of lots of wonderful, knowledgeable and friendly people - dedicated to sharing a love of Charlie and his films and preserving his memory. Another way that Charlie and Buster have brought us enjoyment not just through their films, but also the friends they've made us over the past couple of years. 2013 so far has seen us back at the Slapstick Festival - this time as volunteers, with a write up of our time there here.

Although I say there's no need to compare, I did start as a fan of Keaton first and foremost - I just didn't think of him as better than Chaplin. But if you spend any time with Ayse, and this applies to anyone (even my housemates with no interest in silent films have said it), you will end up falling in love with Chaplin - or at the very least wanting to find out more about him. I appreciate the depth of Charlie's films and their emotional elements. He is a real story-teller, and I don't think anyone weaves comedy and drama together as well as he does. The real auteur, he brought his visions to life - directing, scoring and starring in his works. He created a character that is peculiarly British, the gentleman tramp, but had more universal appeal than any other. And what I like most is his social voice - like many greats he raised issues about society and world events that many turned a blind eye too. Not only did he raise the issues, but he laughed at them too, the quickest way to solve great issues is to turn them into objects of ridicule. He was more than just a film star or a comedian.

Charlie and Buster working together for Limelight

The film that perhaps epitomises our love for Charlie and Buster is Limelight. A great film in its own right, and one that we often find ourselves watching, we finally get to see the two greats on-screen together and leaving us wishing there was more. A sentiment shared by Chaplin and Keaton themselves it seems, as they ended up working on the scene longer than intended.

As Chaplin and Keaton have become so important in our lives, and led us to do so many things and meet so many people we wouldn't have otherwise, when we finally tie the knot Ayse and I have decided to have the song Eternally from Limelight played at our wedding.

Thanks for reading folks.

Kieran.

Welcome back Charlie's Londoners

Hi all,

I am so sorry for the long delay in writing another post for you. I have been super busy lately with various Charlie and research engagements but now I am free to concentrate on a blog post....well, sort of!

For those of you who do not know, Charlie's London was in the audience for the annual Bristol Silents event that is Slapstick 2013. It was an absolute blast! Lots of fun, films and slapstick moments galore with some very close friends and supporters of Charlie's London. In fact there was very little Chaplin at this festival, ok there was next to no Chaplin at this festival apart from one moment.........

Now all you nice people out here who follow Charlie's London on Facebook will know we have this silly moment on Monday's called Fan Girl Monday. How did it start? Well funnily enough it was Christmas eve, everyone was rushing around and doing the normal pre-Christmas mad moment things when I received a message from a Charlie's London follower who said "Tomorrow is going to be a sad day for a Chaplin fan, should we do something today to make it a bit fun". At first I did not know what to do so I decided to look through the page for signs. Then it hit me! Everyone now and then we descend into Chaplinmania! It is like Beatlemania except with less noise (being the silent era, of course!) and no instruments. It always amuses me when I see comments like "Oh wow! I did not know Charlie was so handsome", so with that in mind the decision was made quite easily. Fan Girl Monday was born......

The Fan Girl Monday cover picture!

For any of you unfamiliar with the rules, here goes! Tuesday through to Sunday Charlie's London does what it says on the tin, it posts about Charlie in London or anything related to that. But on Monday everyone can go nuts. We have had Charlie in his bathing suit, Charlie by his swimming pool looking seductive, at the City Lights premiere with Albert Einstein, the infamous Cello picture, the list goes on. Well thanks to the last night of the festival Fan Girl Monday has its next contender because for 30 seconds about 20 minutes into Marion Davies' 1928 film Show People I sat there mesmerised by sight of a certain Mr Chaplin.......

I was really excited by the showing of this film for obvious reasons, yet there were also other elements I was looking for, mostly from the audience. Firstly how many people would recognise Charlie before the title was shown and what would their reaction be? Secondly I was sat with 8 followers of Charlie's London, 5 I knew and 3 I had met for the first time that weekend.  We of course all knew what was coming, My poor partner Kieran (far left in the photo below) knew more than most and just flashed me a knowing smile which I caught out of the corner of my eye just before the musicians struck up for the opening titles.

Charlie's Londoners waiting to go in to see Show People.

The whole festival and a review of it will be featured in Silent London very shortly, so keep your eyes peeled. For now I must say goodbye, but stay tuned because this week I will be talking about an amazing play that I recently visited to do with Charlie's early life in London......

See you soon everyone!

Ayse x

An enchanted Charlie Christmas and a Happy Hollywood New Year

I hope you had a fantastic Christmas and enjoyed the festivities of the holidays. I most certainly did, surrounded by my family and friends. Good food, good drink and at times (when I was allowed the remote control) good TV too. Christmas pudding steaming on the hob and Casablanca in the background, it was my kind of afternoon. That is till my brother, the chef of the family, insisted on watching a mad-cap cook. He likes as he cooks giant edible monstrosities out of wacky ingredients and then expects you to do the same...

Thank goodness for my godson. Now anyone who follows the various pages of Charlie's London will know that I speak about Jayden a lot. He is nearly four and the son of my cousin, who in truth is more like my sister. He is my latest Chaplin convert and loves to watch his films with me. He calls him "that naughty Charlie Chaplin" and for Christmas we bought him the Chaplin and Co. DVD which he watched absolutely transfixed. For anyone who does not know this DVD I highly recommend it if you have children, or young adults you want to get into Charlie but may feel silent films at a first glance are too heavy going. It's a French animation produced by the Association Chaplin and Bubbles Inc. in conjunction with Roy Export SAS. It's similar to the Pixar style of animation and for me captures the mannerisms and essence of the little tramp quite well. Jayden watches them so intently and is so familiar with Chaplin films in general that now he can even watch them and make the connection between the children's adaptation and the original shorts they are meant to represent.

Watching him watch any Chaplin brought me to a subject that I know many Chaplin blogger, Tweeter, Facebooker and Tumblrer (is that a word...) has thought long and hard about over the festive period.

Jayden and his DVD

Of course, if you are a Chaplin fan, Christmas is often a strange time of year. Christmas Day, 1977 saw the end of an era with the passing of not only a comedy genius but arguably one of the fathers of contemporary cinema. Writing as much as I do about Charlie made me realise that somehow, on the day when everyone would be relaxing and celebrating, I would have to mark it with something of a sombre nature. So how was I to do it?

Talking one afternoon to one of my close blogging / Facebook friends, Anne  threw up an interesting situation and for me. I am one of the youngest bloggers on the subject that I know.  In a time when so many other great internet contributors have written very touching posts because they remember Charlie's passing, I cannot. I was born 5 years after he died and don't have those memories to draw from. I also try to keep my blog focused on London as much as I can - and of course, he didn't die here.

It was then suggested to me that I should write a post on the Christmas' he had in London such as his sad moment in Hanwell, or waking hungry on Christmas morning because there was not even an ounce of food in the house. For those that don't know, as the story goes Charlie stood in line with the other boys at the Hanwell Workhouse for his present of an orange. Oranges were a rare treat and he was excited to have one. However as he stood there, excited and happy he was told by the warden that because he had soiled himself the night before he wasn't allowed one - a memory that haunted him for the rest of his days.

Charlie in The Gold Rush 1925

I toyed with the idea but then I realised that this probably would not read very well, especially when this time of the year is meant to be a happy one. I reflected again on the fact that I was not alive when he was, as much as this has always saddened me it finally flashed the lightbulb above my head which led me to this post.

Charlie for me has never been dead or alive, he has always been a beautiful enigma wrapped up in a world of make believe and pure resilient genius. I did not have to mourn his passing because for me he never had one. I watch Jayden and his love of Charlie's films and I think of my own childhood, sat in very much the same position with my grandmother watching them in the same way. Laughing at the same parts, crying at others. Charlie has always been in my life and will continue to be whether he physically lives or doesn't.

Hindsight in life is such a great gift. I can appreciate the things he was trying to convey to the world without having to read the scandal and the rubbish that many people reported about him to sell newspapers. His art will continue to speak forever and while we hear the infectious laugh of the children who enjoy him now as much as people did in 1915, I think as Chaplin fans we can all sleep easy, knowing that future generations will make sure he lives forever!

Charlie's films are screened all around the world still, nearly
a century after some of them were made.