Well, Ladies and Gentleman, it is with a heavy heart that I pen my final introduction to the Charlie Chaplin newsletter, for this issue marks the end of my tenure as editor. I have enjoyed the last three years immensely and will miss the writing of it, working with discoverchaplin.com's Ted Lu in making it look pretty and in hearing from you all afterwards with your thoughtful comments. My biography of Syd is now taking all of my time (and I don't think Charlie would mind that too much). Thanks to all of you. It's clearly time to move on and I could end the newsletter with no better person than Charly Sistovaris, a member of the Chaplin family itself.
Because I've haunted the Association Chaplin office in Paris for the last five years, working on various projects and research there, I have had the pleasure of getting to know Charly. A warm and wonderful person, I hope the following interview will give you a bit of a glimpse into who Charly is himself and what it's like to be within the Chaplin family looking out of that picture-window that is the Charlie Chaplin legacy-a window that can be both rosy-colored and stopped up with aluminum foil. Thanks to Charly for helping us to see through that window for a moment or two and thanks to all of my interviewees over the past year who have cordially contributed to this project in honor of Charlie's 30th anniversary year.
Meanwhile, www.thelittlefellow.org will continue, as will my new website on Syd, www.sydchaplin.com - a site that will be changing drastically over the next few months as I make better use of it. I hope you will keep in touch. All my best to everyone.
Born in 1971 the son of Charlie's second
eldest daughter Josephine and Nicholas
Sistovaris, Charly was raised in France.
He wanted to become a neurologist, but
went to a cinema school instead. Charly
worked two years in a show for Bejart
(see below) and tried writing for many
years. He is a self-taught computer programmer,
and with these skills, started working
for the Association Chaplin three years
ago. Charly has one daughter and lives
in Paris.
Charly, I understand you were
in a program some time ago, entitled "Mr.
C," in which auditions are held for someone
to fill Charlie's shoes-to be the next
Chaplin-but no one can be found who possesses
all the necessary attributes. Can you
talk more about this show and your role
in it? How was it generally received?
It was an amazing experience... pretty
frightening, too. I was only 20, had very
little experience with theater and suddenly
I had to play in front of thousands of
people in the middle of highly professional
dancers with one of the greatest choreographers,
Maurice Bejart. For two years every now
and then I had to hop on a plane, leaving
my post-teenage life behind me, to throw
myself in the arena. Still today when
I hear the music of Chaplin that preceded
my entrance on scene, I get knots in my
stomach. The show was an homage to Chaplin
with the underlying idea that Chaplin
is inimitable. So, rather than having
a lousy lookalike doing the Chaplin walk-on
scene, it would be an evocation of his
films and characters surrounding him,
e.g., the bathing beauties, the police
chase, boxing scenes, and transcriptions
of some memories my aunt Annie (playing
the main part) and I mentioned to Bejart.
I don't know what the show looked like
from the "outside," but being in it was
like walking in a dream. Bejart's powerful
universe/vision intertwined with Chaplin's
world brought something of my grandfather's
films back to life. Just like when Mia
Farrow enters the cinema screen in Woody
Allen's film The Purple Rose of Cairo...
Your participation in
this show preceded your working in the
Association Chaplin office. Do you think
your experience performing in that show
provided you with another level of understanding
of your grandfather that perhaps caused
you to want to contribute to the Association's
efforts and mission? Can you talk about
what you do there?
Working for the Association was rather
an accident. I always wanted to write,
but never found the discipline to finish
a novel. A few years ago my mother suggested
I could work for the Association with
no hope I would accept. But she was
lucky, because I was broke that day
and at an impasse with my writings.
When I arrived, I was stunned by the
amount of paperwork and thought I could
ease a few things by injecting some
IT automation into the flow. So I started
writing unfinished programs instead
of unfinished books!... Today my main
activity is on the charliechaplin.com
website. The web is a fascinating
medium and I sometimes relate to my
grandfather in the sense that the Internet
is an emerging medium the same way cinema
was in the early 1920s. Social networking,
the wisdom of crowds, users being actors,
and all those web 2.0 trends are opening
an avenue to something unique despite
the dead ends. In my little niche, I'm
trying to give Chaplin admirers a way
to pursue the experience they have with
his films, as well as keeping people
informed of all the activities going
on about him.
I've talked to you many times
now, Charly. I would have to say that-to
me-some of what you've inherited from
your grandfather includes 1) an incredible
physical grace and litheness,
2) a charming shyness or tentativeness
and 3) a great passion for ideas. What would
you say you've inherited from your grandfather
and what would you have liked to inherit?
Thank you for the compliments! A very
short answer: I wish I had inherited his
discipline for work.
You said
recently that you'd just begun to appreciate
your grandfather as an historical figure.
As I found when researching "A Comedian
Sees the World," he seemed to be-especially
on that trip-hobnobbing with some of
the most important personages of the
time, men and women who certainly shaped
the world into what it has become today, good
or bad. How has your knowledge of this
changed your feelings toward him, of has
it? Of which interaction / confrontation
/ experience are you most proud (or intrigued)
and why?
This is the subject of a book... As
you know Chaplin's fame and success
with the character of the Little Tramp
was immediate and huge. Talent and historical
context don't explain the magnitude
of this sudden worldwide popularity.
I think that the Little Tramp touches
a chord that is close to something religious
or sacred. It was once said that Chaplin
was as famous as Jesus Christ. Ironically
he died on the 25th of December. In
a world of frightening transitions (the
industrial revolution, exploding megalopolies,
a collapsing Europe, emerging superpower
states, dictatorships...), the common
references of human communities were
losing ground. In such a context the
figure of the Little Tramp brought back
a sense of dignity in a way I believe
quite similar to the way the figure
of Jesus helped the left-behinds in
the Roman Empire regain faith in themselves.
Symbolically the law is blind. It destroys
people who don't conform to its rules.
Strikingly, when the Little Tramp hands
over a rose to the ex-blind girl in
City Lights, something amazing
happens. She sees the real person behind
the fantasy. Her savior isn't some handsome,
rich millionaire, but the naked humanity
of a poor little tramp. The message
is similar: God is human. When the laws
of society overwhelm the basic truth
of individuals, we reach a breaking
point; are we just a cog in some supernatural
mechanism or human beings driven by
some sort of free will? Chaplin definitely
refused to accept the idea of being
a cog...... a part of that slippery
theory, (Fellini said Chaplin was "our
Adam" so let's leave the theological
debate for another time). Einstein,
Churchill, Gandhi, Roosevelt. As you
say they shaped the world. Only Stalin
is missing from the picture, and I'm
happy they never met!
As a member of the larger "Chaplin family," what are your hopes and fears about Charlie's longevity-in terms of his creative and historical status? How do you hope your own daughter will come to regard her great grandfather and his work?
I often see Chaplin associated with
the idea of nostalgia. Some Americans
still confuse him with an "evil
communist." In England they consider
him too weepy. In France many intellectuals
(although he was very appreciated by
them) have the reflex of comparing him
to Buster Keaton to emphasize the fact
that the latter was a better "cineaste."
Over the trajectory of misconception
to stupidity, I don't know which one
comes first, but I'm really not worried.
I have seen over and over all of his
feature films, and I may have noticed
now and then a weak gag, a little clunk
in the rhythm, but I never ever cease
to discover new emotions, new subtleties,
new comic depths, and new meanings.
Even if I try to remain objective, I
cannot help becoming overwhelmed by
my emotions. Chaplin was a perfectionist,
a man rooted with a deep trauma who
put all his soul and genius in his work
(and not just his talent, as Oscar Wilde
would say of himself). His struggle
for life, the deep intimacy he finds
in laughter and drama, and the amazing
humanity he gets out of it, shines in
every second of his masterpieces. Would
it be presumptuous to say Chaplin's
work is a diamond in the history of
cinema art the way Shakespeare was in
literature or Bach in music? I don't
think so. Oh, and my daughter (three
years old) already loves him.