Family Interviews

One of the most enjoyable and challenging resources for the book has been the family, or at least those members of it that have so selflessly agreed to have me grill them with my inane questions. Family members I have been lucky enough to interview over the past few years include Michael and Christopher Chaplin, both of whom I interviewed during the Cinema Ritrovato Festival in 2007, Pauline Mason who is Charlie's cousin Aubrey Chaplin's youngest daughter and Betty Tetrick's half-sister, in December of 2007 and then Geraldine, just recently at her home in Miami Beach. Each of these interviews gave me a unique perspective on Sydney, that I wouldn't have been able to get from any book, letter, or archival document.

Michael's interview was interesting, because although he started it by saying he really remembered very little, as the questions continued, it was clear he was remembering more and more--like Sydney's fondness (and ritual with) cigars and he and Gypsy's habit of visiting the pawnshops each morning around the casinos--their method of adding to a large collection of gaudy jewelry very cheaply.

Christopher, who would have been three when Sydney died, talked to me about family folklore regarding his uncle. I especially appreciated this perspective, because it helped me to see how much of this folklore had made it verbatim into the scanty literature already in existence about Syd--say in David Robinson's wonderful bio or Charlie's own autobiography. One question I can't get anyone to confirm to me is why everyone thought that Syd was Jewish. There seems to be absolutely no confirmation of this anywhere, and in fact, Syd himself liked to tell jokes about the race. Christopher told me that the folklore included a belief that Sydney's second wife was also Jewish. Amazing how these rumors are proliferated!

Pauline Mason, who was in her early 80s when I interviewed her, looked positively wonderful. She had big beautiful photos of both Charlie and Betty throughout her house and really only wanted to talk to me about those two folks. I know from his correspondence that Sydney and Minnie did quite a lot for Betty and Pauline herself had several wonderful photos of Syd, perhaps passed along from her father Aubrey, but she could remember very little about him, or his second wife Gypsy, with whom she visited quite often after Sydney's death. I mean, she remembered the great honor of being invited to stay with Gypsy at the famous Beau Rivage hotel where Gypsy lived and all of that, but remembered very little of Gypsy's stories. She did remember Josephine's wedding, however, in incredible detail--obviously one of the few Chaplin family events she was invited to attend. Anyway, I enjoyed meeting Pauline and her daughter that cold December day outside London, I enjoyed our lunch at the local pub, and an afternoon of conversation, but I gleaned very little about my subject for all my trouble.

Finally, I have recently had the honor of interviewing Geraldine about her uncle. I took along two full pages of questions and, in the end, came home with an entirely different collection of information than I expected. She couldn't answer the questions about all the scandals that I had. Unbelievably, that information just doesn't seem to have made its way through the generations, and I think Sydney would be very happy about that. She provided me, however, with some very vivid and detailed stories of Sydney's visits during her childhood, complete with a couple of verbatim jokes of his. Gypsy she remembered clearly as well. And it is these sorts of stories that will help me to fill out the final chapters of the book, making the elderly characters "Sydney and Gypsy Chaplin" fully fleshed out and realistic ones.

I can't thank these folks enough for allowing me to usurp their time and memories in hopes of enhancing this project with the results. And, I can't thank Kate Guyonvarch enough for making most of these contacts possible.

Minnie Chaplin's Film Career

While I'm in the midst of the long first chapter on Syd's childhood, education and career with Karno, I thought I would take a bit of a break and present some information on Minnie Chaplin's film career. It is known that Syd and Minnie performed together with Karno, especially in the show called "Skating," written by Syd, but there is also a photo of the cast of "The Hydro" in which she appears, suggesting that she may have also been a part of that cast as well. Surely, as a part of the Karno troupe of comedians, Minnie received at least a fraction of the tutelage the Chaplin brothers received in every sort of stage business. Even if she hadn't been Sydney Chaplin's wife, she would have been the sort of skilled comedy actress Keystone would have found very useful.

What's surprising, perhaps, is that she was not utilized by Keystone more. But, as it was, Minnie appeared in only five Keystones, all while Sydney was on contract. Her first was a location film, Gussle Rivals Jonah, in which she plays a sort of prudish young woman who is completely disgusted by the sleeping gentleman slouching over onto her. In fact, she plays a similar character in many of the films. She also appears in Gussle's Backward Way, Gussle Tied to Trouble, and Lover's Lost Control. In this last film, she is given a several-minute sequence on her own. Having rebuffed Gussle's flirtations, Minnie's prudish young woman receives his revenge, when he spins a long petticoat to her backside and she, in agitation, must try to figure out how to rid herself of it. Then her final Keystone appearance was a brief second-long glimpse of her in the beginning of A Submarine Pirate--an appearance brought to my attention by Brent Walker.

Then, of course, Minnie appears in the cabaret scene in A Dog's Life, in which plays one of the anonymous dancers. One wonders what Minnie thought of life as an actress, and whether or not she missed it.

Winter Break

Check out my new research assistant!

Since I'm about to head back to school tomorrow, I thought I would write briefly about the progress I made over the break. It's always amazing to me that six weeks can go so quickly. Despite all of my procrastinating and two weeks in Seattle, I managed to finish two chapters. What I'm calling chapters at this point are really only circumscribed time periods of Syd's life that I can get my mind around. So, some are like 20 pages and some 50+ pages. I envision that the demarkations of the chapters that comprise the finished biography will be quite different from what I'm calling "chapters" right now.

Anyway, I first finished a chapter covering 1932-1937. This is the period following Syd's participation in Charlie's world tour and his becoming comfortable with life in Nice, France following that tour. Much has been made of the fact that Syd never owned property, that he preferred to live in hotels, but that's simply not entirely true--as seems to be the case with much that I'm discovering. Right now I'm having a war with some idiot on wikipedia, who insists on including the nipple-biting incident in Syd's wikipedia entry. But the truth is just not that simple. Matthew Sweet, who wrote the article that appeared in the UK on this issue based his contentions on the hearsay evidence of a ninety-something Betty Tetrick. And that's all. As Syd's biographer, I really wish the story was that simple, but it isn't. It seems good old Monty Banks was involved in a way that none of us may ever be able to figure out, but that's not the only gray area. Anyway, back to my original assertion. It turns out that, in fact, the Chaplins owned a flat in Nice for many years--probably up until Syd's death or shortly before. Of course, it was in Minnie's name initially, which could be the source of confusion, but the address was Palais Rosa-Bonheur and one of the great letters I accessed in Milan, Italy last April gave a lot of information about it and when it was acquired. This has really been my biggest challenge in writing this book: old questions are answered, just as new questions arise. This chapter tries to cover the period up to Minnie's terrible death from breast cancer in 1936, and luckily, the Milan correspondence helped to fill in most of this period.

The next chapter and one I'm still tidying up is the Keystone Chapter. This one is 50 pages and still going strong. Not only am I pleased to say that all Syd's Keystones exist (except for most of Fatty's Wine Party), but a lot of information about this period I was able to get from Motion Picture News, Moving Picture World and a great database of small-town newspapers called NewspaperArchive. As I mentioned before, one of the greatest discoveries for this chapter was Minnie Chaplin's film career. She seemed to be included only in the location films: Gussle's Backward Way, Gussle Tied to Trouble, and Gussle Rivals Jonah. Actually, it's amazing to me how many books have been written on the Keystone studios in general. Two new ones have come out just in the past few months and then, of course, we're all waiting for Brent Walker's book with baited breath. Thankfully, Brent already shared most of his Syd information with me for the book (another gracious colleague), but I think I may try to get up to Madison, Wisconsin to the Aitken Bros. Collection spring break, just to make sure I haven't missed anything.

My next chapter will be about Syd's childhood and I'm more than ready to begin writing it. I think I've come up with some interesting tidbits for that period of time that everyone will be interested in. Happy New Year everyone!

New York and Beyond

My last research trip occurred the week before Halloween and, thanks to gracious friends and colleagues, allowed me to visit New York City and the Public Library Billy Rose Theatre Collection, to kind of top off my informational gathering efforts. First, a big thank you goes to Michael Cartellone and his lovely wife Nancy Meyer for hosting me in their home for the duration of the trip. They were wonderful and very supportive hosts and I really appreciate their efforts on my behalf. Michael not only hosted me, but accompanied me on my little research trips into Manhattan proper. I can't even get the boyfriend to do that! Thanks, Michael!

Besides the great overview of Manhattan I received from Michael nearly every day, Steve Massa had gone well out of his way to make my trip a profitable one for the book. When I arrived at the Billy Rose Collection on my second day in town, Steve handed me a two-page list of goodies I should gander at there, which he had personally compiled for me. Everyone there at the library was gracious and helpful (well, except for one guy in the Special Collections room, who basically told us to "shut up") and I even managed to meet a librarian who's parents still live here in Zanesville. What is it about Zanesville anyway? No matter where I go, I seem to run into references to it. In Seattle, I found pottery in the SAM collection from one of the Zanesville potteries. On Catalina Island, there was a whole monument practically to Zanesville's own--Zane Grey, who had a house there, I guess. Everyone seems to have heard of it or knows someone from here. I'm thinking it may just be a very blessed place from which to write a book. At least I hope so.

Anyway, Michael and I spent two days in the New York Public Library, the first in Bryant Park and the second at Lincoln Center with Steve. He looked at things Houdini, and I delved into the Syd stuff like there was no tomorrow. At Bryant Park, I managed to download all the remaining LA Times Syd articles that I had not collected from the LA Public Library and that was indeed a treasure trove of stuff. At Lincoln Center there were lots of great press books, programs, clippings and other goodies that helped to answer old questions. One in particular was contained in an article that suggested Charlie had pushed for Syd to be chosen to play the title role in Charley's Aunt. This aspect of the brothers' lives really interests me. I think most of us have some idea of the role that Syd played in Charlie's career, but as I am slowly coming to find out, Charlie seems to have played a very important role in Syd's as well--at least his career as an actor. Of course there is the whole Keystone thing, which is well known, but there also seems to be evidence of Charlie playing some role in Syd's million-dollar contract with Famous Players Lasky and now Christie. All this makes their relationship all the more complicated and interesting.

Friday night was the climax of the short trip, however, as Steve and his wife, Michael, myself, Ben Model, Rob Arkus and Jeni Rymer all met at a great Asian restaurant called Amber for a friendly get together. I can't thank Steve enough for arranging this. It was a great, great evening. Since this trip, my long and busy quarter at school has ended and I have now settled myself in here at home to begin writing. This will be the toughest challenge. I fully plan to complete three chapters and start a fourth before the quarter starts up again January 5th. I will keep everyone posted on my progress as it occurs. Also--ever the optimist--I have gotten two presentations on my Syd research accepted at conference early next year, one on the Gussle character, and one on The Better 'Ole. Part of my strategy here is to make sure I get that part of my work done in time, you know? And, of course, I'm always seeking both feedback and interest in the project, which I hope to also receive at these venues. And, hey, I get to go to Albuquerque and New Orleans respectively.

Ciao for now.

Los Angeles

It's high time I wrote up this episode in the Syd bio adventure, n'est-ce pas? Time has gotten away from me, that's for sure. However, the Los Angeles research trip, despite a nasty sunburn and so much traffic it would make your head spin, was an incredibly worthwhile adventure. Most of it I shared with my research assistant Kendra Lisum, a former Chaplin enthusiast and graduate of the University of Nevada-Reno. In fact, we arrived together on Tuesday, July 29th and Kendra lent me her researching services then for ten days. Of course, being her first time in LA, I felt compelled to show her the sites and provide for her enough entertainment so that she would feel the experience was a worthwhile one for herself as well.

Our first day of researching was spent at the Margaret Herrick Library in Beverly Hills. That first day, we had to learn the ropes of researching at the library, because there are so many little rules and regulations to remember that it sometimes got in the way of our main purpose. This first day, we had an appointment with two different special collections departments--documents and photos. We were to look at parts of the Harry Crocker collection, the Mack Sennett collection, and the Mary Pickford collection. This pretty much took the entire day and so, since we hadn't even accessed the core collection (which is available without an appointment), I knew we would have to spend at least another day or two there. I think the most important items this collection had were photos from films--and there were many. Unfortunately, although I made copies for future reference, I just know that whatever publisher I go with will not allow me more than a handful of photos, so perhaps a Syd photo book is in my future as well. Someone will want to see these beauties besides me--surely. I've included a couple here for your entertainment.

Margaret Herrick also had a great collection of literature--old periodicals and such--and I spent two more days with Kendra and then two days after her departure trying to collect as many mentions of Syd in things like Motion Picture News and The Triangle as I could. Needless to say, I didn't quite get done. But there is more than this one reason for me to go back to LA early next year to fill in a few gaps.

In between a visit to Charlie's studio on one day and to Venice Beach on another, we hit the Warner Brothers archive at USC. According to the two archivists on duty, the reading room we enjoyed was brand new. We even got to sign our names on the door, so I hope ole Syd appreciates the fact that his name in conjunction with ours now graces the door of the WB archive! Unfortunately, what they had to offer us was disappointing. Supposedly, they had legal documents from all of Syd's Warners films, but some were more well-represented than others and none of the files included a copy of Syd's contract, which I especially wanted. The folder for The Better 'Ole was the largest, and even included a list of all actors BUT Syd and their wages, but that was a close as we got. However, probably the best thing we got to see that day came over by way of Ned Comstock at the USC Film archive, and that was the complete script for The Rendezvous, a lost Syd film. Surprisingly, all of the archives we visited graciously offered to make copies of documents (for a price, of course). I was not expecting this, but it sure saved us a lot of time and energy in terms of typing everything into our tired computers.

We also visited the Los Angeles County Natural History Museum. This is always a difficult place to get an appointment, for some reason, but perserverence paid off this time. They didn't have much on Syd (they have a huge collection on Charlie, though, if anyone's interested, including lots of props and costumes from the early films), but what they did have was useful--which were the incorporation documents from some of Syd's many side businesses. I learned here that he actually had two incorporations for the airline, for instance.

Of course, any such trip must include a little boat ride over to Catalina Island. I was hoping to find out from the folks that had the Wrigley estate papers about Syd's historic agreement with Wrigley involving landing his aircraft on the island--the first such agreement. No one could help me there. But, the curator of the Catalina Island Museum was very gracious and helpful and provided us with her entire collection of cuttings on the Syd Chaplin Aircraft Corporation as it came to be written about in the Catalina press. This was very helpful information as well.

Finally, and this occurred after Kendra's departure, was my visit to the LA Public Library. My intention here was to spend a good deal of time working with the LA Times archive database gathering Syd articles. This turned out to be time very well spent. Here I learned about Syd's expertise with the golf club--one I'm sure Charlie ridiculed him about--and the fact that he owned a race horse at one time, among many other things. I have to say, even though I know how unreliable the news media can be, spending so much time with newspaper archives has provided an incredible amount of information that I wouldn't have had otherwise. Of course, it has also given me quite a few more puzzling questions to answer in the bargain!

So, in arriving home with my booty and spending a good deal of time organizing it all, in hopes of making it useful, I feel certain that I now have more than enough information to write the entire biography. I know I will have to fill a few gaps here and there later on, but now my most important task is to write the thing. With that in mind, I have suspended research travel (with the exception of one quick trip to New York next week to view the NY Public Library collection) probably until springtime. With six weeks off at Christmas this year, then, my task will be to complete enough chapters with enough polish to start sending it off to publishers by January. And that's a tall order.

Thanks to my cadre of reviewers, however, I can now say that I have two chapters fully written and edited. A third is well on the way. So, as slow as this process has been, I don't think these deadlines are that unrealistic. We'll see.

Oh, yes, I have yet to write about Minnie's film career. That will be next time.

The Library of Congress and Slapsticon 2008

Last weekend began my summer research schedule for the book. I arranged to spend the day before Slapsticon 2008 at the Library of Congress viewing Syd films. I think I had four or five films reserved for that day, but I had to arrive as early as possible, because my appointment began at 8:30. Little did I know then that I could have arrived anytime during that day and still viewed the films, so perhaps it would have been better to get some sleep first and then try to drive the 6 1/2 hours to Arlington. I will know better next time. Anyhow, I drove it, beginning from Zanesville at approximately 12:30AM and I was in pretty good shape until about 3:30. That's when I began to get REALLY SLEEPY. But, by 4:30, the sun was thinking about coming up and I got a reprieve. I was groggy the rest of the way, but alert and somehow, by the grace of god, managed to miss all the morning traffic around D.C. So, from the hotel in Arlington, I took the Metro down to the library, got my visitor's card (the worst picture ever made, I can tell you) and began viewing films. This is my second experience sitting in a film archive in front of a Steenbeck machine and threading rare films into it myself. I can't really believe they give me this privilege, but so far, happily, I haven't let them down. So, Wednesday, I viewed Giddy, Gay and Ticklish (Keystone, 1915), Hushing the Scandal (Keystone, 1915), a small, small fragment of Fatty's Wine Party (Keystone, 1914), and what was supposed to be 3 reels of the 7-reel The Perfect Flapper (First National, 1924), but which ended up being only 1 reel (the third). So, I spent about four hours viewing approximately one hour of film--but then that's research!

At one of the viewing carrels next to me was a pile of folks from Slapsticon, notably Steve Massa, who had invited me to join them after my work was done to view some of the 20-some-odd rare films they had scheduled to view for the day. I'm afraid I had to decline that offer, sadly, because by the time I was finished, I was having leg cramps--i.e., it was time to find a bed and crash.

Slapsticon was a delight (http://www.slapsticon.org). This was my second time, but my first was a very long one-day journey in which I drove down, watched three Syd films and then drove home. That was two years ago. I wonder if I have some sort of skewed idea that one must push one's body to the limit in order to feel like one is doing proper research? Anyway, I saw Steve give an intro to Syd's work up on stage that year, but pretty much met no one. This year, I was determined to meet folks and see what kind of conversations I could get going on Syd. And, I did that. I had a wonderful visit to Slapsticon. I met up with old colleagues like Hooman Mehran, Uli Ruedel from the George Eastman House, Rob Arkus and Steve Massa, of course, but I also met some really famous silent comedy folks like Richard Roberts, Rob Farr, and Brent Walker--among many others. Brent, being that he's writing a book on Mack Sennett's Fun Factory, which should be coming out from McFarland soon, had quite a lot to talk about and I appreciated all the information he gave me. He's the one who discovered Syd's first released film to be Keystone's Among the Mourners (1914), which I got to see at the festival on Friday. Thanks again for that, Brent! He also had some tantalizing bits of info, which others echoed as well, about another possible Syd scandal. Now there's a surprise!

So, on Friday, before the screening of Among the Mourners, I had another visit to the LOC, because it takes about a week for them to get films for you and I had come up with another title late in the game. When I got there (it was totally empty of researchers on Friday, by the way), I discovered someone else had reserved reels of The Perfect Flapper and they were being housed on the shelves above my reserved film, which was Syd's last Keystone before A Submarine Pirate, entitled No One to Guide Him (1915). So, I asked to view those two reels as well, giving me a total of 4 reels to view that morning. Among the Mourners was scheduled for 2:00PM, so I had to hurry and work with all this stuff, having only arrived at the LOC at near 11:00AM, thanks to slowpokes Uli and his buddy Chris Seguin (and they say women are high maintenance--sheesh!). Too bad, too, because the National Portrait Gallery had two great visiting exhibitions that featured Charlie items--a Steichen Photography exhibit and one of old advertising posters. I got to see neither.

The Perfect Flapper reels (#1 & 2) were pretty good, especially the scene in which Syd does a parody on several odd scenes from Shakespeare. There are no title cards attached to these scenes, so I wonder how many folks could figure out what scenes he was doing--"A horse, a horse, my kingdom for a horse!" from Richard III, "Alas, poor Yorick!" from Hamlet, in which he kisses a bald man's head in lieu of a skull, and "Juliet, Juliet, wherefore art thou, Juliet?" which is a little play on similar lines from Romeo and Juliet, of course. No One to Guide Him, a two-reeler, however, had virtually nothing going for it. It was my least favorite film of the weekend. Maybe even Syd was realizing at that time that Gussle was about to fizzle out.

Back at the Rosslyn Spectrum, Among the Mourners was actually pretty good. To crib from Brent Walker's program notes: "The plot is a variation on one Sennett used frequently at Biograph and Keystone--the untrustworthy 'friend' (Conklin), who convinces his 'pal' (Opperman) to pretend to be dead, so as to test his wife's (Davenport's) faithfulness. Of course, Chester has every intention on moving in on the wife when hubby's in the pine box--but what no one anticipates is the arrival of an obnoxious, seltzer-bottle wielding drunk (Syd Chaplin), who disrupts the proceedings while demonstrating the profound acrobatic talents that would remain a staple of his comedy after he moved to his own starring unit as the character 'Gussle.'" In fact, this inebriate is the primordial Gussle, and a nod to Syd's Karno character Archibald as well. The monocle, the wide moustache, the center-parted, slicked down (but unwieldy) hair, and the sheer unconcern with propriety and decorum--those elements all made it into the Gussle character. Certainly, this film was a much better debut than what was Syd's first produced (but not first released) film, His Prehistoric Past, where he plays a cop, waking Charlie from a nap in the last few seconds of the final scene.

Anyway, by Saturday, I was ready to take my pile of notes and scurry home, which is exactly what I did. But the festival started something, and I found myself reviewing other Syd films I have copies of at the house. And, this activity lead to a great discovery, which I shall write about before I leave for my big LA research trip in a couple of days. Out in LA awaits my new research assistant and old friend Kendra Lisum, the AMPAS archive, the Warners archive and much, much more.

Finishing up with my Research Assistants

My undergraduate research assistants, Tyler and Crys, finish their last days of work with me this coming week. In their honor, I want to reflect back on the term and recount the successes and failures of utilizing them for this project. Well, there really were no failures, just a few things that weren't as useful as I had planned.

Both students had never done any kind of research assisting before. In fact, if you think about it, this is mostly an opportunity that comes to graduate students and is rarely one an undergrad experiences anywhere. Out at Zanesville, though, I only have undergrads, and since I consider myself an undergraduate professor anyway, I've always wanted to be able to provide some of these interesting opportunities to my own students, if possible. For these two, I was able to get a couple of hours of credit each for their efforts and they paid me back with good attendance and what seemed to be a genuine interest in the task at hand.

Over the course of the quarter, I have asked Crys and Tyler to take turns performing the following tasks: interview transcription, manuscript transcription, Newspaper and periodical database research (online and on microfilm), and film viewing with written commentary. In addition, I tacked on at the end an opportunity for each student to research a small contextual topic that I could then make use of in the book. After I provided a long list of such topics, Crys chose Vitaphone and James FitzPatrick's Traveltalks and Tyler chose Marshall Neilan and the onset of sound production at British International Pictures (which largely concerns Hitchcock's Blackmail). So, two topics each. I think, though, as involved as both topics are, that they're only really going to get to cover one each. Each one is important to understanding something about Syd's life story--especially the last one, which I hope will clear up a lot of questions I still have about Syd's BIP controversy of 1929.

My setup for entertaining research assistants is not the best. I have a small office and no place for a student to get particularly cozy each session and make his or her own. So, each student must feel he/she is under complete and humiliating scrutiny every time he/she comes in to work, although neither one has complained about it (maybe this is just the way I would feel given their situation). I have to say, though, that this proximity has helped me and the project quite a bit. Having set them to work on something right there in front of my desk for five hours a week helps to keep me engaged in the process and also motivated. And, with ten hours total thus spent--sort of forcibly--the project then becomes more a daily part of my life. In fact, I've been working with the assistants four days each week, keeping the whole thing uppermost in my mind, whether I want it to be there or not. What to do, though, now that this ideal situation is ending? How do I keep things on this level of productivity?

Anyway, although I haven't asked my assistants for their required response essays on this experience as yet, I would probably surmise that the film observation/commentary and then the little research projects were the two most interesting aspects. Transcribing in any form is just laborious, and I had to go back over the products carefully myself anyway. But at least most of it is now done! I also found that transcribing handwriting is a real gift--because one of my students just couldn't do it at all!

So, while I won't have time in the fall (I'm teaching 4 classes!) to sign up more assistants to help me, I will at least have one this summer when I go to LA for several weeks. I have that to look forward to. But first is the Library of Congress and Slapsticon. At the LOC, I will be watching several of Syd's films I have not yet seen, including Fatty's Wine Party, Hushing the Scandal, Giddy, Gay and Ticklish, and The Perfect Flapper. That happens the day before Slapsticon begins. At Slapsticon, then, I will get to see Among the Mourners, a film that up until Richard Roberts discovered it, was not known to be a Syd Chaplin film at all and now turns out to be his first ever film. So much for relaxing this summer!