Top 200 British Directors
[C] Irish directors are included.
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Considered to be one of the most pivotal stars of the early days of Hollywood, Charlie Chaplin lived an interesting life both in his films and behind the camera. He is most recognized as an icon of the silent film era, often associated with his popular character, the Little Tramp; the man with the toothbrush mustache, bowler hat, bamboo cane, and a funny walk.

Charles Spencer Chaplin was born in Walworth, London, England on April 16, 1889, to Hannah Harriet Pedlingham (Hill) and Charles Chaplin, both music hall performers, who were married on June 22, 1885. After Charles Sr. separated from Hannah to perform in New York City, Hannah then tried to resurrect her stage career. Unfortunately, her singing voice had a tendency to break at unexpected moments. When this happened, the stage manager spotted young Charlie standing in the wings and led him on stage, where five-year-old Charlie began to sing a popular tune. Charlie and his half-brother, Syd Chaplin spent their lives in and out of charity homes and workhouses between their mother's bouts of insanity. Hannah was committed to Cane Hill Asylum in May 1903 and lived there until 1921, when Chaplin moved her to California.

Chaplin began his official acting career at the age of eight, touring with the Eight Lancashire Lads. At age 18, he began touring with Fred Karno's vaudeville troupe, joining them on the troupe's 1910 United States tour. He traveled west to California in December 1913 and signed on with Keystone Studios' popular comedy director Mack Sennett, who had seen Chaplin perform on stage in New York. Charlie soon wrote his brother Syd, asking him to become his manager. While at Keystone, Chaplin appeared in and directed 35 films, starring as the Little Tramp in nearly all.

In November 1914, he left Keystone and signed on at Essanay, where he made 15 films. In 1916, he signed on at Mutual and made 12 films. In June 1917, Chaplin signed up with First National Studios, after which he built Chaplin Studios. In 1919, he and Douglas Fairbanks, Mary Pickford and D.W. Griffith formed United Artists (UA).

Chaplin's life and career was full of scandal and controversy. His first big scandal was during World War I, at which time his loyalty to England, his home country, was questioned. He had never applied for American citizenship, but claimed that he was a "paying visitor" to the United States. Many British citizens called Chaplin a coward and a slacker. This and other career eccentricities sparked suspicion with FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover and the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), who believed that he was injecting Communist propaganda into his films. Chaplin's later film Der große Diktator (1940), which was his first "talkie", also created a stir. In the film, Chaplin plays a humorous caricature of Adolf Hitler. Some thought the film was poorly done and in bad taste. However, the film grossed over $5 million and earned five Academy Award Nominations.

Another scandal occurred when Chaplin briefly dated 22 year-old Joan Barry. However, Chaplin's relationship with Barry came to an end in 1942, after a series of harassing actions from her. In May 1943, Barry returned to inform Chaplin that she was pregnant and filed a paternity suit, claiming that the unborn child was his. During the 1944 trial, blood tests proved that Chaplin was not the father, but at the time, blood tests were inadmissible evidence, and he was ordered to pay $75 a week until the child turned 21.

Chaplin also was scrutinized for his support in aiding the Russian struggle against the invading Nazis during World War II, and the United States government questioned his moral and political views, suspecting him of having Communist ties. For this reason, HUAC subpoenaed him in 1947. However, HUAC finally decided that it was no longer necessary for him to appear for testimony. Conversely, when Chaplin and his family traveled to London for the premier of Rampenlicht (1952), he was denied re-entry to the United States. In reality, the government had almost no evidence to prove that he was a threat to national security. Instead, he and his wife decided to settle in Switzerland.

Chaplin was married four times and had a total of 11 children. In 1918, he married Mildred Harris and they had a son together, Norman Spencer Chaplin, who lived only three days. Chaplin and Harris divorced in 1920. He married Lita Grey in 1924, who had two sons, Charles Chaplin Jr. and Sydney Chaplin. They were divorced in 1927. In 1936, Chaplin married Paulette Goddard, and his final marriage was to Oona O'Neill (Oona Chaplin), daughter of playwright Eugene O'Neill in 1943. Oona gave birth to eight children: Geraldine Chaplin, Michael Chaplin, Josephine Chaplin, Victoria Chaplin, Eugene Chaplin, Jane Chaplin, Annette-Emilie Chaplin, and Christopher Chaplin.

In contrast to many of his boisterous characters, Chaplin was a quiet man who kept to himself a great deal. He also had an "un-millionaire" way of living. Even after he had accumulated millions, he continued to live in shabby accommodations. In 1921, Chaplin was decorated by the French government for his outstanding work as a filmmaker and was elevated to the rank of Officer of the Legion of Honor in 1952. In 1972, he was honored with an Academy Award for his "incalculable effect in making motion pictures the art form of the century". He was appointed Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the 1975 New Year's Honours List. No formal reason for the honour was listed. The citation simply reads "Charles Spencer Chaplin, Film Actor and Producer".

Chaplin's other works included musical scores that he composed for many of his films. He also authored two autobiographical books, "My Autobiography" (1964) and its companion volume, "My Life in Pictures" (1974).

Chaplin died at age 88 of natural causes on December 25, 1977 at his home in Vevey, Switzerland. His funeral was a small and private Anglican ceremony according to his wishes. In 1978, Chaplin's corpse was stolen from its grave and was not recovered for three months; he was re-buried in a vault surrounded by cement.

Six of Chaplin's films have been selected for preservation in the National Film Registry by the United States Library of Congress: The Immigrant (1917), Der Vagabund und das Kind (1921), Goldrausch (1925), Lichter der Großstadt (1931), Moderne Zeiten (1936), and Der große Diktator (1940).

Charlie Chaplin is considered one of the greatest filmmakers in the history of American cinema, whose movies were and still are popular throughout the world and have even gained notoriety as time progresses. His films show, through the Little Tramp's positive outlook on life in a world full of chaos, that the human spirit has and always will remain the same.

Irving Rapper was one of the last surviving directors from the "Golden Age of Hollywood," passing away on Dec. 20, 1999, at the age of 101, four weeks shy of his 102nd birthday. Rapper is best remembered for the films he made with Bette Davis, including the classics Reise aus der Vergangenheit (1942) and Das grüne Korn (1945). He also directed the first film adaptation of a Tennessee Williams play, Die Glasmenagerie (1950), and the Rapper-helmed Roter Staub (1956) won screenwriter Robert Rich an Oscar (Rich actually was blacklisted writer Dalton Trumbo, one of The Hollywood Ten, who did not receive his Oscar for almost 20 years). Rapper continued directing well into the 1970s.

Born in London on January 16, 1898, he emigrated to the United States and became an actor and stage director on Broadway while studying at New York University. In the mid-'30s, he journeyed westward to Hollywood, hired as an assistant director and dialog coach at Warner Bros., where he proved invaluable translating--and mediating--for non-native-English-speaking directors; by the early 1940s, he had metamorphosed into the hottest director on the Warner Bros. lot.

Hired as a "dialog director" (a position created by the film studios in the late 1920s with the advent of sound) by Warners in 1935, he practiced that craft until 1941, when he was promoted to director. While the position of dialog director no longer exists, in the first decades of the talkies dialog directors worked with the actors on their line readings and interpretation of individual scenes. The position was particularly critical when the director was a foreigner who didn't understand English very well.

Rapper initially worked with Gernan émigré William Dieterle on Louis Pasteur (1936), Das Leben des Emile Zola (1937) and Juarez (1939). While Dieterle was focused on the technical aspects of filmmaking, such as the lighting of the sets and the camera angles, Rapper concentrated on the actors' performances. He also served as a dialog director for Hungarian émigré Michael Curtiz, for whom he translated (and who, according to Rapper, spoke English more poorly the longer he was in Hollywood) and French-born Anatole Litvak. In that position, Rapper forged strong bonds with certain actors, who came to depend on him.

Bette Davis and Rapper formed a bond that included the free solicitation of advice. He counseled Davis to ask to have William Keighley, who was originally assigned to direct her in Günstling einer Königin (1939), replaced by Curtiz. Davis was to be in heavy makeup, and Rapper knew that Curtiz, a perfectionist, would be the right man to capture the visuals in the costume drama. Ironically, Rapper did not get to be the dialog director on the film, as he was assigned to a troubled picture helmed by Litvak. Without him on the set of "Elizabeth and Essex" to run interference, Davis and Curtiz--both strong-willed perfectionists---fought furiously.

Rapper resisted being assigned as a director of "B" films because he knew that once you were assigned to that unit you were stuck there and would never get a chance to graduate to "A" pictures. Rapper bided his time until he was offered a "programmer," Shining Victory (1941), by studio head Jack L. Warner. Shot without stars, the inspirational movie was a modest success and Warners assigned him to another "inspirational" picture, about a minister, Mit einem Fuß im Himmel (1941). The minister was played by Oscar-winner Fredric March, then widely considered the best American actor since John Barrymore (who had by now turned into a parody of himself). March's talent was matched only by Paul Muni and the Great Profile's brother Lionel Barrymore. March was enthusiastic about the character and has long considered it one of his favorite roles. The film's success solidified Rapper's filmmaking career, which was further bolstered by his next picture The Gay Sisters (1942), starring the great Barbara Stanwyck, who lobbied for the role.

The next picture he directed was destined to become a classic. "Now, Voyager" (1942) was "the picture that made me," Rapper said in a 1981 interview. Politics played a role in his nabbing the choice assignment with only three directorial credits under his belt. Hal B. Wallis, a Warners producer with his own unit, intended to cast Irene Dunne in the picture, but Rapper leaked Wallis' plans to his close friend Bette Davis, who demanded the part from Jack L. Warner. The front office gave in to her demands, and she reciprocated Rapper's favor by asking for him as her director.

Rapper knew that casting Davis' co-stars was important if the picture was to work. He defied Wallis' choice of May Whitty as the mother of Davis' character, stumping for Gladys Cooper, whom Wallis claimed he had never heard of. Cooper received an Oscar nomination in the role. Paul Henreid got his first big break from Rapper, who tested him and then got approval to cast him (although the role made Henreid's career, he later humiliated Rapper at Davis' gala American Film Institute tribute in 1977, where he mocked the director and took credit for the famous scene where he lights two cigarettes at once and hands one to Davis. According to Rapper, Henreid had always wanted to be a successful director, and this engendered a personal enmity in him towards the director who "discovered him").

In addition to Davis and Henreid, Rapper attributed the film's success to lighting cameraman Sol Polito and versatile character actor Claude Rains, who played the psychoanalyst and thus the third side of the love triangle anchored by Davis and Henreid. Rapper felt that after the picture ends, Davis' character eventually will marry her psychoanalyst.

Rapper reteamed with Davis for the highly successful "The Corn Is Green" (1945), a story set in Wales but shot entirely--even the outdoor scenes--on Warners' sound stages. Rapper said that for her role as the Welsh schoolteacher, Davis tried very hard to not use the mannerisms that had made her famous. Rapper believes that John Dall, who played the schoolboy and whom he discovered, did not have a major career and became typecast as a villain because he was androgynous, and the public mood and cinema censorship of the time would not allow such an actor to be a star.

Rapper reportedly broke with Warners over Rhapsodie in Blau (1945), a biography of George Gershwin. He felt that the script, which was approved by the Gershwin family which initially controlled the project, was wrong in that it made Gerswhin a character infatuated with two fictional women, while the real Gershwin was likely only really enthused about his music. Jack Warner, whose studio had never employed Gershwin and thus was an odd choice for the Gershwin family to entrust with his life story, fought the director over his choice of John Garfield to play the composer. Rapper believed that the casting of the film was all-important and its success ultimately was compromised by the casting of the bland Robert Alda at Warner's insistence. Jack Warner would not cast Garfield, as he was seeking leverage in the actor's upcoming contract negotiations. He also vetoed Rapper's second choice of Cary Grant on the grounds that no one would accept Grant as a composer (Warner subsequently took Rapper's insight to heart and cast Grant as Cole Porter in Tag und Nacht denk' ich an dich (1946)). Although he looked like Gershwin, Alda "had a blah personality," Rapper told an interviewer in 1981. The film was showcased at the prestigious Cannes Film Festival, but ultimately it was a failure. Some movie historians believe that Rapper's disenchantment over the failure of the film caused him to eventually break with Warner Bros.

He made Trügerische Leidenschaft (1946) with Davis, which reunited her with "Now, Voyager" co-stars Rains and Henreid. Rapper claims that the movie was compromised when Davis--who was convinced that Rains' performance was stealing the picture from her--went behind Rapper's back and got Jack Warner to change the script so that she could shoot Rains' character in the finale. Rapper believed that the new ending weakened the picture. He also felt that his next picture The Voice of the Turtle (1947), an adaptation of the huge Broadway hit, was compromised by the casting of Ronald Reagan as the leading man. Despite Reagan's trying to beef his part up by inventing bits of business, Rapper believes that Eve Arden stole the film from him and his co-star, Eleanor Parker.

Rapper claimed in 1981 that he left Warners and became a freelancer due to the bad advice of his agent, who told him " . . . the movie business was booming and I could have my pick of assignments." Unfortunately, neither Rapper nor his agent forecast the downturn in the industry caused by the advent of television and the US Justice Department's order that the film studios divest themselves of their theater chains. The industry went into an economic tailspin, and Rapper's career suffered.

His first post-Warners gig was at Columbia Pictures, directing Anna Lucasta (1949). Originally a story of an African-American girl looking for acceptance from society, studio boss Harry Cohn had the girl and her family's ethnic identity changed to Polish, with narrative results that were, in Rapper's words, "pretty bizarre." Rapper wanted future Oscar-winner Susan Hayward for the girl, but Columbia cast Paulette Goddard in order to fulfill a one-picture commitment she had to the studio. Goddard got the role because she had threatened to sue Columbia if the studio didn't fulfill her contract. Rapper said that Goddard was "hopeless in drama. She couldn't match any bits of business and her reading of lines was wooden." Cast in the role of a teenager, Goddard "claimed she was 34 but the records showed it was more like 44." Thus are debacles made.

Rapper returned to Warner Bros. to helm Die Glasmenagerie (1950), the first movie adaptation of a Tennessee Williams play, because producer Charles Feldman requested him. Just off her Oscar win for Schweigende Lippen (1948), the 36-year-old Jane Wyman was cast as the 20-something Laura to boost box-office returns. Tallulah Bankhead was hired to play Amanda Wingfield, but her drunkenness on the set on the second day of shooting led Jack Warner to fire her. Refusing to cast Miriam Hopkins "because of past differences," Warner "positively screamed when I mentioned Bette Davis." Ruth Chatterton was considered, and Ethel Barrymore, who wanted the part, was rejected as being too old. Finally, said Rapper, "that left Gertrude Lawrence, who had little camera experience and was so very jittery she'd cry every time a take was spoiled."

Commenting on the film three decades later, Rapper said, "I still like Kirk Douglas as the gentleman caller and Arthur Kennedy as Tom." The movie, considered one of the least successful adaptations of Williams' work, is barely remembered today and suffers from a bowdlerization of the original play. Williams hated the film as, against his wishes, the script implies a totally different, more upbeat ending than his play.

Of his later films, Rapper felt that they suffered, as he "missed the studio set-up." He claimed "The Brave One" (1956) as his best movie. Die Liebe der Marjorie Morningstar (1958) was his last success at the box office, and his career tailed off in the 1960s, although he continued to direct until the end of the 1970s.

He attributed the failure of The Christine Jorgensen Story (1970) to "casting a beautiful boy [John Hansen] rather than a girl" to play Jorgensen, who rocketed to fame in the 1950s after a sex change. "That, after all, was Christine's story. She always believed she was a woman trapped inside a man's body." Wiedergeboren (1978), based on a memoir of a convicted Watergate co-conspirator who was on President Richard Nixon's staff, was a failure, as Rapper "was prevented from dramatizing the crimes of Charles Colson, only the redemption--and that made for boredom."

"Born Again" turned out to be Rapper's last film, as he reneged on his commitment to direct Sextette (1977), an exploitation film based on the joke of the elderly Mae West taking a (far younger) husband, her sixth. Rapper backed out, as he didn't have the heart for it: "Mae West was too frail-looking. She'd put her hands on her hips but there were no hips; she had faded away. However, I helped her with her line readings. So, you see, I was back to where I started--as a dialog director!"

Irving Rapper's goal late in life was to live in three separate centuries. He died on Dec. 20, 1999, aged 101, a little less than two weeks shy of fulfilling that wish.