I'm John Batcher with the new book, Charlie Chaplin v. America by Scott Aman.

When arts, sex, and politics collided, Charlie Chaplin arrives in America with the Carnot Group.

My notes say 1910 and 1913. At first, America overwhelms him. He comes to New York and the vaudeville halls, but he comes to love it and travels with the burlesque, the vaudeville, including the Marx brothers, and Stan Laurel is mentioned.

Stan Laurel knew Charlie in London at the time. This is the Laurel and Hardy.

What did he make of him? What was his opinion of the young Charlie Chaplin? Laurel thought

Chaplin was prodigiously talented and studied him carefully on stage. He thought Chaplin was

strange as a human being. He wasn't like the other vaudevillians. He didn't mingle particularly with the other vaudevillians. He didn't go out, you know, scouting around for girls after the show. He'd stick around and read books. And his professional habits were bizarre. You know, you're supposed to be there a half hour before curtain if you're a performer. And Chaplin wouldn't be there, and there'd be five minutes before curtain.

And everybody's panic. Where's Charlie? Charlie's not here. And Charlie was the star of the show by this time. And Laurel was Chaplin's understudy. So they tell him to get his makeup on and get ready to go on, at which point Chaplin would breeze in a few minutes before curtain, slap his makeup on, take his position, the curtain would rise,

and Chaplin would breeze in a few minutes before curtain, slap his makeup on, take his position, the curtain would rise,

and Chaplin would slay the audience reliably.

And this drove Laurel crazy because, A, he didn't get a chance to perform.

And it was also vaguely unprofessional.

But what I take from that story, which was a recurring thing on the carnal company, is that Chaplin had absolutely 100% self-confidence in his professional abilities, even as a young man.

He wasn't nervous about performing.

He didn't have stage fright.

He knew he could control the audience and do his job and make the audience laugh.

And he didn't have to sweat it, in other words.

Whereas a lot of performers, perhaps most performers, have terrible stage fright and they're

nervous.

And they use that nervousness to point themselves up for a performance.

Chaplin wasn't nervous.

He didn't need to be nervous to point himself up for a performance.

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