Easy Street | |
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Directed by | Charlie Chaplin Edward Brewer (technical director) |
Written by | Charlie Chaplin Vincent Bryan Maverick Terrell |
Produced by | Henry P. Caulfield |
Starring | Charlie Chaplin Edna Purviance Eric Campbell |
Cinematography | Roland Totheroh George C. Zalibra |
Edited by | Charlie Chaplin |
Distributed by | Mutual Film Corporation |
Release date |
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Running time | 19 min USA, 24 min Germany (restored version) |
Country | United States |
Languages | Silent film English intertitles |
Easy Street is a 1917 short action-comedy film starring and directed by Charlie Chaplin.
In a slum area called Easy Street, the police are failing to maintain law and order.
The Little Tramp, a down-and-out derelict, is sleeping rough outside the Hope Mission near the streets of a lawless slum. The sounds of a service in progress draws him wearily inside. After the sermon from the preacher, he is entranced by a beautiful mission worker and organist and he stays after the service. Holding his hand, she pleads him to join the mission, inspiring his religious "awakening". He vows to reform, returning the collection box that he slipped into capacious pants.
Spotting a help-wanted ad for a job at the police station, the Tramp accepts and is assigned the rough-and-tumble Easy Street as his beat. Upon entering the street he finds a bully roughing up the locals and pilfering their money. The Tramp gets on the wrong side of the bully and after a brief chase, the Tramp finds him impervious to his blows. In a display of his great strength, the bully bends a gas streetlamp in two, whereupon Charlie leaps on his back, covers his head with the lamp, and turns on the gas, rendering him unconscious.
After giving him one more shot of gas, he calls the squad to retrieve the Bully. For the moment, the Tramp becomes the cock-of-the-walk in the locality, frightening away the denizens by simply spinning around to face them. Then he helps a woman (who turns out to be the Bully's wife) who has stolen food from a street vendor but she rather 'rewards' him by nearly dropping a flower pot on his head. The mission worker happens by and takes him across the way to another apartment where a couple has a large brood of children whom Charlie feeds by scattering bread crumbs among them as if he were feeding chickens.
The bully is put in handcuffs by the police but manages to escape from the station and returns to Easy Street. After a battle with his wife, he attacks the Tramp. He chases the Tramp fanatically until he manages to knock the bully unconscious by dropping a heavy stove on his head from a two-story window. On returning to his beat on Easy Street, the unruly mob knocks the Tramp unconscious and drops him into a nearby cellar where he manages to save the Mission worker from a nasty junkie after accidentally sitting on the drug addict's upturned needle. Supercharged by the effects of the drug, he takes on the mob and heroically defeats them all, and as a consequence restores peace and order to Easy Street.
By the end of the film, a New Mission is built on Easy Street and the inhabitants flock to it, even including the former bully: now a well-dressed respectable, churchgoing citizen. Arm in arm, The Derelict and The Mission Worker follow them into the church.
It could have been inspired by the similarly named East Street market in the Walworth district of London (where Chaplin is believed to have been born), a suggestion made as early as 1928 in the film The Life Story of Charlie Chaplin by Harry B. Parkinson [1] and reasserted in David Robinson's introduction to the most recent edition of My Autobiography, while the famous trousers and boots of Chaplin's trademark tramp costume may have been drawn from the everyday clothes Chaplin saw worn there.
The Moving Picture World offered the following praise: "In 'Easy Street,' Charlie Chaplin's latest and best, if we may venture to obtrude so decided an opinion, an original key has been struck. At any rate, it is Chaplin at his funniest; and nothing much more entertaining, by way of comedy, could be imagined..." [2]
A reviewer from Variety wrote, "The resultant chaos and several new stunts will be bound to bring the laughter, and the star's display of agility and acrobatics approaches some of the Douglas Fairbanks pranks. Chaplin has always been throwing things in his films, but when he 'eases' a cook stove out of the window onto the head of his adversary on the street below, that pleasant little bouquet adds a new act to his repertoire. Easy Street certainly has some rough work in it--maybe a bit rougher than the others--but it is the kind of stuff that Chaplin fans love. In fact, few who see Easy Street will fail to be furnished with hearty laughter."
An edited version of this film was released as "Charlie On The Beat". It was available in 8mm silent cine format and ran for about 3.5 minutes. [3]
In 1932, Amedee Van Beuren of Van Beuren Studios, purchased Chaplin's Mutual comedies for $10,000 each, added music by Gene Rodemich and Winston Sharples and sound effects, and re-released them through RKO Radio Pictures. Chaplin had no legal recourse to stop the RKO release. [4]
The Immigrant is a 1917 American silent romantic comedy short written and directed by Charlie Chaplin. The film stars Chaplin's Tramp character as an immigrant coming to the United States who is accused of theft on the voyage across the Atlantic Ocean and falls in love with a beautiful young woman along the way. It also stars Edna Purviance and Eric Campbell.
Modern Times is a 1936 American part-talkie comedy film produced, written and directed by Charlie Chaplin. In Chaplin's last performance as the iconic Little Tramp, his character struggles to survive in the modern, industrialized world. The film also stars Paulette Goddard, Henry Bergman, Tiny Sandford and Chester Conklin.
The Tramp, also known as the Little Tramp, was English actor Charlie Chaplin's most memorable on-screen character and an icon in world cinema during the era of silent film. The Tramp is also the title of a silent film starring Chaplin, which Chaplin wrote and directed in 1915.
Behind the Screen is a 1916 American silent short comedy film written by, directed by, and starring Charlie Chaplin, and also starring Eric Campbell and Edna Purviance. The film is in the public domain.
The Van Beuren Corporation was a New York City-based animation studio that produced theatrical cartoons as well as live-action short-subjects from the 1920s to 1936.
The Kid is a 1921 American silent comedy-drama film written, produced, directed by and starring Charlie Chaplin, and features Jackie Coogan as his foundling baby, adopted son and sidekick. This was Chaplin's first full-length film as a director. It was a huge success and was the second-highest-grossing film in 1921. Now considered one of the greatest films of the silent era, it was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress in 2011.
Between Showers is a 1914 short film made by Keystone Studios and directed by Henry Lehrman. It starred Charlie Chaplin, Ford Sterling, Emma Clifton, and Chester Conklin.
The Pawnshop was Charlie Chaplin's sixth film for Mutual Film Corporation. Released on October 2, 1916, it stars Chaplin in the role of assistant to the pawnshop owner, played by Henry Bergman. Edna Purviance plays the owner's daughter, while Albert Austin appears as an alarm clock owner who watches Chaplin in dismay as he dismantles the clock; the massive Eric Campbell's character attempts to rob the shop.
The Floorwalker is a 1916 American silent comedy film, Charlie Chaplin's first Mutual Film Corporation film. The film stars Chaplin, in his traditional Tramp persona, as a customer who creates chaos in a department store and becomes inadvertently entangled in the nefarious scheme of the store manager, played by Eric Campbell, and the store's floorwalker, played by Lloyd Bacon, to embezzle money from the establishment.
The Count is Charlie Chaplin's fifth film for Mutual Film Corporation in 1916. Released on September 4, it co-starred Eric Campbell and Edna Purviance.
The Rink, a silent film from 1916, was Charlie Chaplin's eighth film for Mutual Films. The film co-starred Edna Purviance, Eric Campbell, Henry Bergman, and Albert Austin, and is best known for showcasing Chaplin's roller skating skills. Chaplin's obvious skill on roller skates surprised many of his fans, but Charlie was an experienced performer. As a touring vaudevillian with Fred Karno's pantomime troupe, Chaplin appeared in a roller-skating skit in which he displayed a talent for comedic falls—and the ability to cause other skaters to topple.
The Vagabond is a 1916 American silent romantic comedy film by Charlie Chaplin and his third film with Mutual Films. Released to theaters on July 10, 1916, it co-starred Edna Purviance, Eric Campbell, Leo White and Lloyd Bacon. This film echoed Chaplin's work on The Tramp, with more drama and pathos mixed in with the comedy.
Triple Trouble is a two-reel American silent comedy film that was released in 1918. It stars Charlie Chaplin, Edna Purviance, and Leo White. This film was not an official Chaplin film, even though it has many Chaplin-directed scenes; after he left the studio, Essanay edited it together using outtakes and newly shot footage directed by White. It had already been established in court that Chaplin had no legal control over the films made during his time with Essanay and could not prevent its release. In his 1967 autobiography, Chaplin included "Triple Trouble" in his filmography.
The Adventurer is an American short comedy film made in 1917 written and directed by Charlie Chaplin, and is the last of the twelve films made under contract for the Mutual Film Corporation.
The Fireman is the second film Charlie Chaplin distributed by the Mutual Film Corporation in 1916. Released on June 12, it starred Chaplin as the fireman and Edna Purviance as the daughter to Lloyd Bacon.
The Cure is a 1917 short comedy film written and directed by Charlie Chaplin. The plot revolves around alcohol, being made just prior to prohibition but during a period where the politicians were debating the evils of alcohol.
His Prehistoric Past is a 1914 American short silent comedy film, written and directed by Charlie Chaplin, featuring Chaplin in a stone-age kingdom trying to usurp the crown of King Low-Brow to win the affections of the king's favorite wife. As this film was the final one that Chaplin made at Keystone Studios, it was also the last film he made with most of Keystone's regular roster of comedians. Co-star Mack Swain would not appear in another Chaplin film until 1923 when he had a prominent role in the Chaplin silent film Pay Day.
(Sir) Charlie Chaplin (KBE) (1889–1977) was an English internationally renowned Academy Award-winning actor, comedian, filmmaker and composer who was best known for his career in Hollywood motion pictures from his debut in 1914 until 1952, he however subsequently appeared in two films in his native England. During his early years in the era of silent film, he rose to prominence as a worldwide cinematic idol renowned for his tramp persona. In the 1910s and 1920s, he was considered the most famous person on the planet.
The Rogue is a 1918 American short silent comedy film featuring Billy West and Oliver Hardy produced by King Bee Comedies.
Alfred Eric Campbell was an English actor. He was a key member of Charlie Chaplin's film ensemble, invariably playing an intimidating bully, and appeared in eleven of Chaplin's films before he was killed in a car crash at the age of 38. He is the subject of a documentary by filmmaker Kevin Macdonald.