In September 1931, two of the world’s most celebrated and influential men met in a house in Canning Town, London. Despite coming from completely different backgrounds, the unusual meeting between Charlie Chaplin and Mahatma Gandhi took place with a shared understanding of the struggles of the poor and the working classes.
Mahatma Gandhi and Charlie Chaplin were both forged in the 19th century, and both went on to become icons of the 20th. Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was an Indian lawyer, anti-colonial nationalist, and political ethicist who employed nonviolent resistance to lead the successful campaign for India’s independence from British rule and to later inspire movements for civil rights and freedom across the world.
Sir Charles Spencer Chaplin Jr. KBE was an English comic actor, filmmaker, and composer who rose to fame in the era of silent film and therefore will always have an important place in the history of mime. He became a worldwide icon through his screen persona, the Tramp, and is considered one of the film industry’s most important figures.
Even though the two were both giants- in completely different fields – the meeting between them went quite well and created a large buzz around the public.
When Charlie Chaplin and Mahatma Gandhi Met
The reason for this meeting was a Round Table Conferences, a series of meetings between the British government and political representatives of India, in the times before the reform and independence of the country from British rule. It was Gandhi’s first visit to Britain since he joined the Freedom movement.
The Conference was over and Gandhi was preparing for his departure when a telegram reached him. Someone named Charles Chaplin, who was in Britain at that time, had requested to meet him. Gandhi, who said to have seen only two films (in Hindi) in his life and didn’t have the slightest clue who this gentleman is, replied politely that he did not have the time for such a meeting, and asked his aids to decline the invitation.
As the blogger Vijayamadhav wrote in Medium, one of the aids quickly replied: “Charlie Chaplin! He’s the world’s hero. You simply must meet him. His art is rooted in the life of working people, he understands the poor as well as you do, he honors them always in his pictures”.
Gandhi was intrigued – and probably thought that the photo-opp would be good for the cause – and the meeting of Charlie Chaplin and Gandhi was scheduled.
The meeting
Charlie Chaplin had written about this meeting very fondly in his autobiography, My Autobiography.
The assembly was wildly coated within the media and Charlie Chaplin had written that they met in a “humble little house in the slum district of the East India Dock Road. Press and Photographers packed both floors.”
From all topics, Chaplin opened with a question to Gandhi about his “abhorrence of machinery”. Chaplin recalls walking up the steps to meet Gandhi. He was nervous, and rehearsed his lines (he was an actor, after all). one the two met, Chaplin said:
I am all for the freedom of your country and its people. But there is one thing that I don’t understand. Why do you oppose the use of machines? Don’t you think that a lot of work would come to a standstill if machines are not used?”
To which the Mahatma replied:
Machinery prior to now has made us depend on England, and the one method we are able to rid ourselves of that dependency is to boycott all items made by equipment.
Hearing Gandhi’s thoughts on the topic, Chaplin later wrote: “I obtained a lucid object lesson in tactical maneuvering in India’s fight for freedom, inspired, paradoxically, by a realistic, virile-minded visionary with a will of iron to carry it out.”
The encounter was a brief one, but it left a deep impression on Chaplin. In 1935 Chaplin released his critically acclaimed movie “Modern Times”, about a factory production line worker who is thrown out on the street for his manic behavior, in a comedic satire of the industrialized age. The movie deals with the problems of overwork, unemployment, and corporations lack of morale – along the usual slapstick comedy that synonymous the great mime artist in Chaplin.
Did this meeting with Gandhi have some influence on the making of the film? we will never know.
Another interesting meeting Charlie Chaplin had is with the famous physicist and Noble winner Albert Einstein. Read more about it in the link.