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Early Charlie Chaplin

The Artist as Apprentice at Keystone Studios
by James L. Neibaur
Early Charlie Chaplin: The Artist as Apprentice at Keystone Studios. Scarecrow. Mar. 2012. c.272p. photogs. bibliog. index. ISBN 9780810882423. $55. FILM
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Silent film historian Neibaur (The Fall of Buster Keaton) examines Charlie Chaplin's first 36 screen appearances in short films over a one-year period at Keystone Studios. Detailed background information about each production and critical analysis of the content is provided. The result is a text that functions better as a reference source than as a narrative. Neibaur characterizes Chaplin's time at Keystone as a period of rapid development for the perfectionist screen actor and director and examines how the concept of the movie star emerged. Ted Okuda and David Maska's 2005 Charlie Chaplin at Keystone and Essanay covers similar ground, but a 2010 British Film Institute restoration of Chaplin's Keystone films has altered the body of work being studied, making this a necessary update.
VERDICT Less a biographical account than a study of the films in question, this is nonetheless the most complete look at this period of Chaplin's career. For cinema scholars and silent film fans.
Reviewed by Jeremy Heilman, New York , Feb 15, 2012
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