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shape. After a study of the work of Max Linder and Lucca in France, he had left the Biograph Studio to become director of the Keystone Productions.
Once established, he began to put into practice the theories he had derived from the Continental school of film making, and produced comedies that were original in their blending of charm with burlesque — his Bathing Beauties and his Keystone Cops were symbolic of this blending.
The Keystone Comedians, like those trained by Karno, drew upon the earliest essences of comedy for their effects — misunderstandings, disguises, enormous effort exerted for a result that never came off, violent anger over incidents that had never taken place, imagined slights that led to chaos, incongruity of person or situation. The sources of their comedy went back to the earliest known form of theatre; and that was the secret of their universal popularity, and the reason why Sennett found in Karno's comedians all that he wished for in his own.
If Chaplin's first slice of luck in his career was his engagement by Karno, the second certainly was his work with Sennett. The latter, himself an innovator, allowed Chaplin to evolve his own line to a remarkable degree, always, of course, within the existing framework of the Keystone Comedy.
In the year he spent at the Keystone Studio, Chaplin acquired the rudiments of his own special brand of comedy in terms of film; and, slowly, Charlie the little tramp began to emerge. One by one the endearing mannerisms crept in — the vertical salute of the little bowler hat, the turned-out feet, the trick of throwing a cigarette end over his shoulder and kicking it away. Both these last were taken from Fred Kitchen, a fine music-hall comedian who was also Karnotrained, and whom Chaplin watched with interest in his youth.*
* Fred Kitchen died on April 1st, 1951. Footnote quotation from The Stage newspaper of April 5th, 1951 :
One of the few remaining links with the old-time music-hall has gone with the death, last Sunday, of Fred Kitchen. Mr. Kitchen, who was 77 and died in a Hampton-hill nursing home, was discovered by Fred Karno more than fifty years ago. Large-hearted in his generosity of feeling and big physically, Fred Kitchen was the originator the catch-phrase "Meredith, we're in ! " — the last line of his famous music-hall sketch, "Moses and Son", which he toured for many years. He became a leading comedian for Fred Karno. He claimed to be the first comedian to wear outsize boots, and when asked why he never played in America, replied that everyone there would say he was imitating Charlie Chaplin.
It was Mr. Kitchen who helped Chaplin when the Kennington boy was setting out on his professional career. Fred Kitchen, a master of mime himself, taught Chaplin the rudiments of this art. At seven he was earning a few shillings a week. But by 1918 his salary was £450 a week for appearances at the Folies Bergere in Paris. He did not often appear in the