“Forgotten Hollywood”- Charlie Chaplin Novel Available!
Manny P. here…
An unknown novel by Charlie Chaplin — the only fictional book the comic ever wrote — is public for the first time. Footlights, unveiled in London, was written by Chaplin in 1948, and later adapted into his film Limelight. The motion picture is the only time he and Buster Keaton appeared on screen together. The novella (written when he was almost sixty) emerged from a dark periods in Chaplin’s life. An avowed pacifist, Charles was called before the House Un-American Activities Committee. His reputation was further damaged by a lawsuit from an actress who claimed he had fathered her child.
The book was published in English by Cineteca di Bologna, the Italian film restoration institute which has been working with biographer David Robinson on reconstructing drafts found in the Chaplin archives. He broke out of the deprivation of his childhood to discover his unique gifts as an entertainer. As an adolescent, Charlie began working in music halls in Soho, before eventually becoming an actor with a theatre troupe. According to Robinson, the relationship between a drunken clown and desperate ballerina in Footlights was likely inspired by Chaplin’s 1916 meeting with legendary Russian dancer Vaslav Nijinsky.
The Cinetaca describes Chaplin’s vivid, idiosyncratic writing style moves freely from colloquial to moments of rich imagery. And, the literary work is illustrated with previously unpublished documents and photographs from the Chaplin archives, as well as pictures of the theatrical world of his youth, and images from the author’s private collection. The publication is the first time the Chaplin family has allowed previously unpublished material to appear in print.
To celebrate Chaplin first screen appearance as the Little Tramp on February 7th, 1914, Cineteca will re-distribute his 1925 classic The Gold Rush in cinemas across Italy this month.
Until next time> “never forget”
This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 5th, 2014 at 12:00 am and is filed under Blog by Manny Pacheco. You can follow any comments to this post through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.
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