Charley Chase (Director)
Charley Chase (born October 20, 1893 in Baltimore , Maryland as Charles Joseph Parrott Jr. , † June 20, 1940 in Hollywood ) was an American film actor , director , screenwriter and producer , who was mainly successful as a comedian.
Life
Charley Chase began his acting career as a teenager in vaudeville theaters. At the age of 20 he made his first short film in 1914 and appeared in his early years in the slapstick comedies of producer Mack Sennett , who was called the King of Comedy in those years , alongside Charlie Chaplin , among others . His name quickly gained prominence and he took on leading roles; at the same time, Chase worked behind the camera as a director and screenwriter from an early age. In 1920 the famous comedy producer Hal Roach hired him to direct his short films, so Chase was responsible for some parts of the series The Little Rascals and for many Lloyd Hamilton films . As a performer, Chase worked for Roach in the 1920s, primarily with director Leo McCarey . Charley Chase created the screen character of an average comedic American, who often gets helpless in surreal situations and is overwhelmed by them.
In contrast to most comedians, Chase successfully made the switch to talkies in the late 1920s; his short films remained popular. In 1933 he made a guest appearance as a crazy party guest in Hal Roach's The Sons of the Desert with Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy . Laurel and Hardy returned the favor to Chase by also making a guest appearance in his 1933 comedy On the Wrong Trek . When Hal Roach only wanted to make the more profitable feature-length films in the mid-1930s, Chase turned it down because he continued to rely on the short film. Thereupon there was a break between Roach and Chase. The comedian then moved to Columbia Pictures , where he continued to make other short films successfully in the business until his untimely death. In total, Charley Chase appeared in around 275 films over the course of his career, and he also directed more than 150 films.
Long forgotten about his comedies, Chase's comedies have been rediscovered since the 1990s and have gained more attention in recent times - Mighty Like a Moose (1926) was even listed in the 2007 National Film Registry . Charley Chase became known in Germany in the 1970s for the short films compiled for ZDF in the series Fathers of Clothes . He is honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame .
In May 1939, his younger brother James Parrott died as a result of a longstanding drug addiction, which Charley Chase privately plunged into depression and alcohol problems. He then died of a heart attack just one year after his brother at the age of 46 .
Filmography (selection)
- 1914: The Masquerader
- 1914: Tillie's troubled romance (Tillie's Punctured Romance)
- 1914: The Rounders
- 1914: The Knockout
- 1924: All Wet
- 1925: Looking for Sally
- 1926: Mighty Like a Moose
- 1926: Fuchsteufelswild (Crazy Like a Fox)
- 1927: The House of a Thousand Joys (Call of the Cuckoo)
- 1927: Fluttering Hearts
- 1928: Love limousine
- 1931: The Pip From Pittsburgh
- 1933: Arabian tights
- 1933: The Sons of the Desert
- 1935: Public Ghost
- 1936: On the Wrong Trek
- 1938: Violent Is the Word for Curly
- 1940: The Heckler
Awards
- Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame
Web links
- Charley Chase in the Internet Movie Database (English)
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Chase, Charley |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Parrott, Charles Joseph Jr. |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | US-American actor |
| DATE OF BIRTH | October 20, 1893 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Baltimore , Maryland , USA |
| DATE OF DEATH | June 20, 1940 |
| Place of death | Hollywood |