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and show signs that they have inherited their father's talents, if not his genius. Charles junior has turned to legitimate theatre, and it has been rumoured that he may play Hamlet on Broadway; while Sydney may make his screen debut in his father's next film, Limelight.
The new film is said to be based on the life of the music-hall star Mark Sheridan, who enjoyed enormous popularity in his day. A contemporary of T. E. Dunville, Arthur Reece and Charles Godfrey, he shared with them the peculiar gusto and vitality of the real music-hall turn. He ended tragically. He shot himself during a breakdown largely due to the belief that the public were growing tired of him. The theme of Limelight is that of "an ageing musichall comedian who wants to make a comeback, but has lost his confidence and is haunted by the fear that he can no longer get the laughs" — a Chaplinesque transmutation perhaps of Mark Sheridan's tragic suicide.
A factor of great interest in the making of this film is that it seems likely to lead Chaplin into choreography. Some months ago, Constance Collier (who in the earliest days of her successful stage career herself appeared in music-hall) gave a tea party in her New York flat to reunite old friends. Markova and Dolin were there, on their way back to England. Suddenly the door opened, and Chaplin and his young wife came in, Charlie's eyes vivid with cold, and both glad to escape for a while the freezing temperature outside.
Chaplin fell upon his friends with enthusiasm, and even before he had removed his coat, had begun to tell them of an idea for a ballet — The Death of Columbine — he planned to include in his next film. Leaping to his feet, thrusting his cup at Oona, he began to dance and mime the theme, giving so vivid an impression of the whole ballet, in such detail, that Markova and Dolin saw exactly what he meant to achieve. A final pirouette brought him to face them, his eyes alight. "Will you dance it for me? Will you?"
With one voice two world-famous dancers, fired with his vision, said: "When?" "Ah, that! You know me! Maybe in a few months, maybe in a year or two — you know how I work. But I'll call upon you when the moment comes. Will you dance it for me then?"
They did indeed know how he worked, with what delight and pleasure in the planning of each significant detail, with what absolute knowledge of what he wanted, and how he meant to achieve it. His enthusiasm and his ballet were both irresistible; and when the time comes, Markova and Dolin will dance it for him.
Now that the stormy years are over, his life has settled down to a leisurely routine, broken by the sudden and imperious demands of his children. His day begins late, and is given over to periods of study or