Awards

Charlie Chaplin's salary history suggests how rapidly he became world famous, and the skill of his brother, Sydney, at being his business manager.

1914: Keystone, worked for $150 a week
1914-1915: Essanay Studios, of Chicago, Illinois, $1250 a week, plus $10,000 signing bonus
1916-1917: Mutual, $10,000 a week, plus $150,000 signing bonus
1917: First National, $1 million deal — the first actor ever to earn that sum.
In 1919 he founded the United Artists studio with Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks and D. W. Griffith.

Although "talkies" (movies with sound) became the dominant mode of moviemaking soon after they were introduced in 1927, Chaplin resisted making a talkie all through the 1930s. It is a tribute to Chaplin's versatility that he also has one film credit for choreography for the 1952 film Limelight, and one credit as a singer for the title music of the 1928 film The Circus. The best-known of several songs he composed is "Smile", famously covered by Nat King Cole, among others.

His first sound picture, The Great Dictator (1940) was an act of defiance against Adolf Hitler and fascism, filmed and released in the United States one year before it abandoned its policy of isolationism to enter World War II. Chaplin played a fascist dictator clearly modeled on Hitler (also with a certain physical likeness), as well as a Jewish barber cruelly persecuted by the Nazis. Hitler, who was a great fan of movies, is known to have seen the film twice (records were kept of movies ordered for his personal theater). After the war and the uncovering of the Holocaust, Chaplin stated that he would not have been able to make such jokes about the Nazi regime had he known about the actual extent of the pogrom.

Chaplin's political sympathies always lay with the left. Several of his movies, notably Modern Times (1936), depict the dismal situation of workers and the poor.

Although Chaplin had his major successes in the United States, he retained his British nationality. During the era of McCarthyism, Chaplin was accused of "un-American activities" as a suspected communist; and J. Edgar Hoover, who had instructed the FBI to keep extensive files on him, tried to end his United States residency.

Charlie Chaplin and Jackie Coogan in "The Kid" (1921)In 1952, Chaplin left the US for a trip to England; Hoover learned of it and negotiated with the INS to revoke his re-entry permit. Chaplin then decided to stay in Europe, and made his home in Vevey, Switzerland. He briefly returned to the United States in April 1972 to receive an Honorary Oscar.

Chaplin won the honorary Oscar twice. When the first Oscars were awarded on May 16, 1929, the voting audit procedures that now exist had not yet been invented, and the categories were still very fluid. When it became apparent that Chaplin, who had been nominated for Best Actor and Best Comedy Direction, had failed to win either award for his movie The Circus, the Academy decided to give him a special award "for versatility and genius in acting, writing, directing and producing The Circus". The other film to receive a special award that year was The Jazz Singer.

Chaplin's second honorary award came 44 years later in 1972, and was for "the incalculable effect he has had in making motion pictures the art form of this century". He came out of his exile and collected his award less than a month before the death of J. Edgar Hoover. Chaplin was also nominated without success for Best Picture, Best Actor, and Best Original Screenplay for The Great Dictator, and again for Best Original Screenplay for Monsieur Verdoux (1947).

In 1973, he received an Oscar for the Best Music in an Original Dramatic Score for the 1952 film Limelight, which co-starred Claire Bloom. The film also features a cameo with Buster Keaton, which was the first and last time the two great comedians ever appeared together. Because of Chaplin's difficulties with McCarthyism, the film did not open in Los Angeles when it was first produced. This criterion for nomination was not fulfilled until 1972.

His final films were A King in New York (1957) and A Countess from Hong Kong (1967), starring Sophia Loren and Marlon Brando.

In a 2005 poll to find The Comedian's Comedian, he was voted amongst the top 20 greatest comedy acts ever by fellow comedians and comedy insiders.

Source : Chanchal Creative Art

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