Charlie Chaplin

Sir Charles Spencer "Charlie" Chaplin, KBE (16 April 1889 – 25 December 1977) was an English comic actor and film director of the silent film era.[2] He became one of the best-known film stars in the world before the end of the First World War. Chaplin used mime, slapstick and other visual comedy routines, and continued well into the era of the talkies, though his films decreased in frequency from the end of the 1920s. His most famous role was that of The Tramp, which he first played in the Keystone comedy Kid Auto Races at Venice in 1914.[3] From the April 1914 one-reeler Twenty Minutes of Love onwards he was writing and directing most of his films, by 1916 he was also producing, and from 1918 composing the music. With Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks and D. W. Griffith, he co-founded United Artists in 1919.[4]
Chaplin was one of the most creative and influential personalities of the silent-film era. He was influenced by his predecessor, the French silent movie comedian Max Linder, to whom he dedicated one of his films.[5] His working life in entertainment spanned over 75 years, from the Victorian stage and the Music Hall in the United Kingdom as a child performer, until close to his death at the age of 88. His high-profile public and private life encompassed both adulation and controversy. Chaplin's identification with the left ultimately forced him to resettle in Europe during the McCarthy era in the early 1950s.
In 1999, the American Film Institute ranked Chaplin the 10th greatest male screen legend of all time.[6] In 2008, Martin Sieff, in a review of the book Chaplin: A Life, wrote: "Chaplin was not just 'big', he was gigantic. In 1915, he burst onto a war-torn world bringing it the gift of comedy, laughter and relief while it was tearing itself apart through World War I. Over the next 25 years, through the Great Depression and the rise of Adolf Hitler, he stayed on the job. ... It is doubtful any individual has ever given more entertainment, pleasure and relief to so many human beings when they needed it the most".[7] George Bernard Shaw called Chaplin "the only genius to come out of the movie industry".[8]

Biography
Early life in London (1889–1909)
Charles Spencer Chaplin was born on 16 April 1889, in East Street, Walworth, London, England.[9] His parents were both entertainers in the music hall tradition; his father, Charles Spencer Chaplin Sr, was a vocalist and an actor and his mother, Hannah Chaplin, a singer and an actress who went by the stage name Lilly Harley.[10] They separated before Charlie was three. He learned singing from his parents. The 1891 census shows that his mother lived with Charlie and his older half-brother Sydney on Barlow Street, Walworth.
As a small child, Chaplin also lived with his mother in various addresses in and around Kennington Road in Lambeth, including 3 Pownall Terrace, Chester Street and 39 Methley Street. His paternal grandmother's mother was from the Smith family of Romanichals,[11] a fact of which he was extremely proud,[12] though he described it in his autobiography as "the skeleton in our family cupboard".[13] Chaplin's father, Charles Chaplin Sr., was an alcoholic and had little contact with his son, though Chaplin and his half-brother briefly lived with their father and his mistress, Louise, at 287 Kennington Road.[14][15] The half-brothers lived there while their mentally ill mother lived at Cane Hill Asylum at Coulsdon. Chaplin's father's mistress sent the boy to Archbishop Temples Boys School. His father died of cirrhosis when Charlie was twelve in 1901.[16] As of the 1901 Census, Chaplin resided at 94 Ferndale Road, Lambeth, as part of a troupe of young male dancers, The Eight Lancashire Lads,[17] managed by a William Jackson.[18]
A larynx condition ended the singing career of Chaplin's mother.[19] After Chaplin's mother was again admitted to the Cane Hill Asylum, her son was left in the workhouse at Lambeth in south London, moving after several weeks to the Central London District School for paupers in Hanwell.
In 1903 Chaplin secured the role of Billy the pageboy in Sherlock Holmes, written by William Gillette and starring English actor H. A. Saintsbury. Saintsbury took Chaplin under his wing and taught him to marshal his talents. In 1905 Gillette came to England with Marie Doro to debut his new play, Clarice, but the play did not go over well. When Gillette staged his one-act curtain-raiser, The Painful Predicament of Sherlock Holmes as a joke on the British press, Chaplin was brought in from the provinces to play Billy. When Sherlock Holmes was substituted for Clarice, Chaplin remained as Billy until the production ended on December 2. During the run, Gillette coached Chaplin in his restrained acting style. It was during this engagement that the teenage Chaplin fell hopelessly in love with Doro, but his love went unrequited and Doro returned to America with Gillette when the production closed.[20]
They met again in Hollywood eleven years later. She had forgotten his name but, when introduced to her, Chaplin told her of being silently in love with her and how she had broken his young heart. Over dinner, he laid it on thick about his unrequited love. Nothing came of it until two years later, when they were both in New York and she invited him to dinner and a drive. Instead, Chaplin noted, they simply “dined quietly in Marie’s apartment alone.” However, as Kenneth Lynn pointed out, “Chaplin would not have been Chaplin if he had simply dined quietly with Marie.”[21]

Mr. Bean's car

Mr. Bean's car, a British Leyland Mini 1000, developed a character of sorts over the series and was central to several antics, such as Mr. Bean getting dressed in it, driving while sitting in an armchair strapped to the roof or attempting to avoid a parking garage toll by driving out through the entrance.
At first, an orange 1969 BMC Mini MK II (registration RNT 996H) was Mr. Bean's vehicle, but this was destroyed in an off-screen crash at the end of the first episode. From then on, the car was a 1985 model (registration SLW 287R), "Applejack" green with a matt black bonnet. It made its first appearance in "The Curse of Mr. Bean".
The Mini also had a number of innovative security measures, for example Bean uses a bolt-latch and padlock, rather than the lock fitted to the car, and removes the steering wheel instead of the key. These formed a running joke in several episodes, at one point deterring a car thief. The car, confused with another demonstration car of exactly the same model and colours (but no padlock) (registration ACW 497V), was crushed by a tank in "Back to School, Mr. Bean", but returned in later episodes, perhaps having actually been the identical demonstration car from that point on.
Mr. Bean has a long-running, yet unexplained feud with the unseen driver of a light blue Reliant Regal Supervan III (registration GRA 26K), which will usually get turned over, crashed out of its parking space and so forth. This conflict originated in the first episode, when the Reliant's driver held the Mini up on the way to a mathematics exam, and subsequently became a running joke throughout the series.
Both the Mini and the Reliant re-appeared as characters in the animated Mr. Bean cartoons, and in the film Mr. Bean's Holiday, yet another Mini appears – a lighter yellow/green than the original with a black sunroof, registration YGL 572T. Also seen is a left hand drive version of his Mini, owned by the character Sabine which has a French registration. A sequence involving the Mini driving through Harrod's was shot for the 1997 film, but ultimately was not included in the final cut.[15]
After filming ended, the present Mini used in filming was sold to Kariker Kars to be hired for various events. It was then temporarily displayed as a major attraction at the Rover groups museum. In 1997, it was purchased by the Cars of the Stars Motor Museum where it is still on display today.[16]
One of the original Mr. Bean Minis is on display at the Cars of the Star Motor Museum in Keswick, northern England. Both the Mini and the Reliant re-appeared as characters in the animated Mr. Bean cartoons. In the film Mr. Bean's Holiday yet another Mini appears – a lighter yellow/green than the original, registration YGL 572T. Also seen is a French version of his Mini, owned by the character Sabine which wears a Paris registration and is left hand drive. In the animated series, his Mini's registration plate number is STE 952R.

Mr. Bean

Mr. Bean is a British comedy television series of 14 half-hour episodes starring Rowan Atkinson as the title character. Different episodes were written by Atkinson, Robin Driscoll, Richard Curtis and one by Ben Elton. The first episode was broadcast on ITV on 1 January 1990,[2] with the final episode, "Hair by Mr. Bean of London", on 15 November 1995. Based on a character developed by Atkinson at university, the series followed the exploits of Mr. Bean, described by Atkinson as "a child in a grown man's body",[3] in solving various problems presented by everyday tasks and often causing disruption in the process. During its five-year run the series gained large UK audience figures, including 18.74 million for the 1992 episode "The Trouble With Mr. Bean".[4] The series has been the recipient of a number of international awards, including Rose d'Or. The show has been sold in 200 territories worldwide, and has inspired two feature films and an animated cartoon spin-off.[5]The title character, played by Rowan Atkinson, is a slow-witted and selfish yet likeable buffoon who brings various unusual schemes and contrivances to everyday tasks. He lives alone in his small flat in Highbury, North London, and is almost always seen in his trademark tweed jacket and a skinny red tie. He also usually wears a digital calculator watch (which he does not like to lose). Mr. Bean rarely speaks, and when he does, it is generally only a few mumbled words which are in a comically low-pitched voice. His first name (he names himself "Bean" to others) and profession, if any, are never mentioned. In the first film adaptation, "Mr." appears on his passport in the "first name" field, and he is shown employed as a guard at London's National Gallery.[12] In Mr. Bean's Holiday, however, his name is listed on his passport as "Rowan".[13]
Mr. Bean often seems unaware of basic aspects of the way the world works, and the programme usually features his attempts at what would normally be considered simple tasks, such as going swimming, using a television set, redecorating or going to church. The humour largely comes from his original (and often absurd) solutions to problems and his total disregard for others when solving them, his pettiness, and occasional malevolence.
At the beginning of episode two onwards, Mr. Bean falls from the sky in a beam of light, accompanied by a choir singing Ecce homo qui est faba ("Behold the man who is a bean"). These opening sequences were initially in black and white in episodes 2 and 3, and were intended by the producers to show his status as an "ordinary man cast into the spotlight". However, later episodes showed Mr. Bean dropping from the night sky in a deserted London street, against the backdrop of St. Paul's Cathedral suggesting Bean is an alien. At the end of episodes 3 and 6 he is also shown being sucked right back up into the sky in the respective background scenes (black scene in episode 3 and street scene in episode 6). Atkinson himself has acknowledged that Bean "has a slightly alien aspect to him";[14] in the animated series, he was actually shown to be an extraterrestrial.