Charles Spencer Chaplin was born on April 16th, 1889 in Walworth, London, and lived a Dickensian childhood, shared with his brother, Sydney, that included extreme poverty, workhouses and seeing his mother's mental decline put her into an institution. Both his parents, though separated when he was very young, were music hall artists, his father quite famously so. But it was his mother Charlie idolized and was inspired by during his visits backstage while she performed, to take up such a career for himself.

He achieved his ambition when he joined a dancing troupe, "Eight Lancashire Lads," and this eventually led onto parts in "Sherlock Holmes" and "Casey's Court Circus." Sydney, meanwhile, had joined the famous Fred Karno Company and quickly became a leading player and writer therein. He managed to get Charlie involved, and he too became a Karno star. For both boys, Karno was almost a college of comedy for them, and the period had a huge impact on Charlie especially.

In 1910 Charlie toured the U.S with the Karno group and returned for another in 1912. It was on this tour that he was head hunted by Mack Sennett and his Keystone Film Company, and Charlie was thus introduced into the medium of film. His first film, in 1914, was aptly entitled Making A Living, and Henry Lehrman directed it. He starred in many of his Keystones along side Mabel Normand, who also directed three of his films, but it wasn't until Twenty Minutes of Love that he had a taste of directing for himself, and this quickly became the only way he worked.

His success was such that he was able to move from one company to another, each time on to a better deal. Early on, Chaplin made films at a rate of two per week, and as time progressed, his salary increased tremendously. In 1915, after thirty-five films, he moved to Essanay, and it was here he really found his feet, not to mention his longest serving leading lady, Edna Purviance. Notable films during this period include The Champion, The Tramp, and The Bank. In 1916 he moved to Mutual, with even greater control and financial rewards. At Mutual he made the definitive Chaplin short comedies The Rink, Easy Street, The Cure, and The Immigrant. First National was next, and it was there he constructed his full-length masterpiece The Kid. Shorter comedies of note at this time include Sunnyside and The Idle Class.

Along with his great friend, Douglas Fairbanks, as well as Mary Pickford and D.W Griffith, Chaplin formed United Artists in 1919. He made his first film for them in 1923, the Edna Purviance vehicle, A Woman of Paris, perhaps the least known of his films. But it was followed by four of the most beloved Chaplin classics The Gold Rush, The Circus, City Lights, and Modern Times. It wasn't until 1940 that Chaplin broke his silence to make The Great Dictator, in which he delivered his powerful, famous speech, a statement of his beliefs about a certain dictator named Adenoid Hynkel (guess who). The Great Dictator was followed by two more films: Monsieur Verdoux and Limelight.

Limelight (1952) was the last film he made in America. McCarthyite political maneuverings effectively ejected him from the country and he wasn't to return until 1972, when he received an honorary Academy Award. In the meantime, though heartily welcomed back to Britain, he moved to Switzerland with his wife, Oona O' Neill, and their children. He made two more films, A King In New York (1957, with Dawn Addams) and A Countess From Hong Kong (1967, starring Sophia Loren and Marlon Brando) and spent his final years writing music for his films and enjoying his family life before he died, at 4 A.M. on Christmas Day in 1977.