Charlie Chaplin's life is usually told in two great acts: the rise from the poor streets of London to the summit of Hollywood, and the brilliant years spent on that summit. Yet there is a third act, often left in the shadows: the years of exile. The man who lived and worked in America for some forty years and shaped its cinema spent the last quarter of his life in Switzerland, in a manor overlooking Lake Geneva. These years are the story of both a rupture and an unexpected peace.
1952: A Journey with No Return
In September 1952 Chaplin sailed for Europe with his wife Oona and their children for the London premiere of Limelight. While the ship was still on the Atlantic, the US Attorney General announced that Chaplin's re-entry permit had been revoked. If Chaplin wished to return to America, he would face an inquiry into his political views and his "moral character."
The decision did not come out of nowhere. In the early years of the Cold War, fear of communism was rising in America, and Chaplin had long been a target. The fact that he had never become a US citizen, the social criticism in his films, his speeches during the war years and scandals in his private life had all become ammunition for the conservative press and some politicians. It is also now well known that the FBI kept a file on him for many years.
Chaplin decided not to go back. It was Oona who travelled to America to settle his assets and affairs. Soon afterwards she also gave up her US citizenship. The family now needed a new home.
Chaplin's response to the decision carried more weariness and hurt than anger. He knew that he owed his youth, his opportunities and much of his fortune to America; but he also had to accept that the same country now saw him as an unwanted foreigner. In the years that followed, the bitterness in his voice when he spoke about America never entirely faded.
Manoir de Ban: A House by the Lake
In 1953 the Chaplins settled in Switzerland, in a large manor called Manoir de Ban in the village of Corsier-sur-Vevey, near Vevey. With its extensive grounds, old trees and views over Lake Geneva and the Alps, the house was a world as far as possible from the noise of Hollywood. Chaplin spent the rest of his life there.
Switzerland gave him something America could not: being left alone. The villagers treated their famous neighbour with respectful distance. Chaplin walked in the garden, composed music, prepared new scores for his old films and spent time with his family. Today the same manor is open to visitors as a museum devoted to Chaplin's life and work.
The Swiss years were also when Chaplin reunited with his old films. He composed new scores for many of his silent-era works and prepared them for re-release to new generations. In a sense, Manoir de Ban became the archive and workshop of the Tramp's world. Those silent films, which Hollywood no longer cared about, found a second life in this quiet house.
Oona and a Large Family
It is impossible to tell the story of the exile years without Oona. The daughter of playwright Eugene O'Neill, she had married Chaplin in 1943, and despite the large age gap between them, the marriage became the most stable relationship of Chaplin's life. The couple had eight children in all, some of them born during the Swiss years. Several of the children later made their own way in film and theatre; the best known is the actress Geraldine Chaplin.
After years in Hollywood marked by turbulent marriages, courtrooms and press pressure, Manoir de Ban became a home where Chaplin could finally live as a family man. Many accounts describe this period as calm and happy for him.
Oona was also Chaplin's closest friend and first reader. She was the first to hear his scripts, his music and the drafts of his autobiography, and she gave her opinion without hesitation. It was largely her presence that lightened the weight of loneliness exile could have brought.
A King in New York: An Answer from Afar
Chaplin did not fall silent in exile. A King in New York, shot in England in 1957, was a direct satire of the atmosphere that had driven him out. Chaplin plays King Shahdov, who flees a revolution in his country and takes refuge in New York. The king witnesses the advertising frenzy, television's habit of turning everything into a show and, finally, the communist witch-hunt. A small boy interrogated on suspicion of communism is played by Chaplin's son Michael Chaplin.
The film was shown in Europe but did not reach American screens for many years. Critics do not count it among Chaplin's great films; its tone is at times bitter and angry. Still, it is an important document of an artist trying to answer a system that wronged him with laughter.
One striking detail is Chaplin's bewildered gaze at the new world, especially television and advertising. The man who had once satirised factory machines now took aim at the media machine that turned everything into spectacle. In this sense A King in New York is like an older, wounded relative of Modern Times.
During these years Chaplin also wrote his autobiography, published in 1964. In 1967 he directed A Countess from Hong Kong, starring Marlon Brando and Sophia Loren. It would be his last film.
The film drew harsh reviews; yet Chaplin's desire to return behind the camera despite his advancing age showed that his creative energy had not died out in exile. At his home in Switzerland he kept thinking about new projects until his final years.
1972: The Applause That Came Twenty Years Later
In 1972 the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences invited Chaplin to Los Angeles to receive an honorary award. Chaplin set foot on American soil for the first time in some twenty years. He first attended events held in his honour in New York, then came to the Oscar ceremony.
When he came on stage the audience rose to its feet and the applause went on for a long time. The man once turned away at the door was now welcomed in the warmest possible way.
The award honoured the incalculable contribution he had made to motion pictures as the art form of the century. Looking old and tired, Chaplin gave a short, emotional speech of thanks. The same year saw the belated Los Angeles release of Limelight, which won the Oscar for its score the following year. Chaplin, however, did not stay in America; he returned to his home in Switzerland.
In 1975 he was knighted by the Queen. On 25 December 1977, Christmas Day, he died at his home in Corsier-sur-Vevey and was buried in the village cemetery. Years later Oona was buried beside him.
The exile years add a bitter note to Chaplin's story, but they also give it an ending. Just as the Tramp does at the end of his films, Chaplin turned his back on a world that did not want him and set off down the road. The difference was that this time, at the end of the road, a house by the lake and a family were waiting for him.