Smile – The Story of Charlie Chaplin.
Devised and performed by Marcel Cole. The Courtyard of Curosities at the State Library and Migration MuseumCirculating Library. State
Library of South Australia. Adelaide Fringe March 11 – March 23rd. 2025.
Reviewed by Peter Wilkins
It is impossible to leave Marcel Cole’s latest show Smile- The Story of Charlie Chaplin without a smile on your face and a spring in your step. The Circulating Library with its bookshelves of old books reaching to the ceiling is the ideal venue for this affectionate and fascinating show about the darling of the silent screen. Last year’s Fringe I managed to catch Cole’s production of The Ukelele Man about the life of Georg Formby and I knew that this year I would be in for a special treat and I wasn’t disappointed.
Smile- The Story of Charlie Chaplin tells the story of the life of
Chaplin from his early career as the Little Tramp in Mack Sennett silent movies
to his career in talking pictures, his denouncement by Senator McCarthy’s
purgative House Unamerican Activities as a Communist, his exile to Switzerland and
his eventual return to receive a Lifetime Achievement Award at the 1977 Oscars Award
Ceremony.
It is an extraordinary life and Cole captures the key moments with an endearing charm that makes engagement utterly irresistible. Cole is a brilliant mime artist. He was trained at the prestigious Jacques Le Coqu’s International School of Theatre in Paris. Little wonder that he can capture Chaplin’s unique walk, gesture and expression with such authenticity. The whirring sound of an old movie camera takes us back to the start of the twentieth century and Chaplin’s first movie The Gold Rush. Cole strikes a plaintive figure, digging for gold or eating a shoe. This is trademark Chaplin sketched with perfect precision, infusing every nuance with bewildered naivety. Cole captures the clown who can make us laugh at his antics one moment and cry at his predicament the next.
To heighten the comedy, an unsuspecting member of the audience is brought up from the audience, donned with a Keystone Cop’s hat and instructed to whack Cole’s head with a rubber truncheon. It’s a familiar action that leads to a chase through the intimate space and amongst the audience much to their delight. Audience participation is a regular part of this show. A woman plays his first wife at the time of the proposal. Another his second. A member of the audience refuses so her husband is selected to play Oona, his final companion and mother to his children. Audience participation can be a risky business, but Cole’s invitation to take the risk and whispered instruction is so welcoming that everyone bar one was happy to oblige. Each was rewarded with enthusiastic audience applause.
The show shifts into a later
period as Cole picks up a book from the shelf and My Biography appears on the screen. It is here that Cole demonstrates his
remarkable versatility as an actor and where his performance resonates with a
very different tone. Chaplin’s bitter parody of Hitler in his film The Great Dictator offers a timely
warning and the final speech of the film is delivered by Cole. He is still and
the speech that comes at the close of his first talking picture has a relevance
that resonates today and down through the centuries. Cole delivers it simply, a
plea for humanity void of greed and hate and the lust for power. Although the
speech is delivered by the little Jewish Barber in The Great Dictator also played by Chaplin, we sense in Cole’s
beautifully delivered plea that this is Chaplin the man talking. It is
therefore ironic that this humanitarian should fall victim to the madness of
McCarthy’s scourge against Communism. Cole makes us feel for the man who gave
the world such pleasure. I cannot imagine anyone else playing Chaplin with such
heart and sensitivity. An audience member is seated in a chair on
the stage. The coat is placed over him and his eyes are closed as Cole brings
to an end Chaplin’s autobiography. The old title on the screen casts us back to
those early pictures when we were simply shown THE END,
Smile-The Story of Charlie Chaplin
is a show that makes you laugh at the funny carryings-on, feel a lump in
the throat at the poignant moments and invite you to think about how we treat
each other and care for the world we live in. Through it all the enormously
talented Cole captivates our hearts and our minds with a performance that lifts
our spirits and teaches us to smile. Do not miss Smile-The Story of Charlie
Chaplin if it is appearing in a theatre near you.
