Geraldine Leigh Chaplin (born July 31, 1944) is an English-American actress and the daughter of Charlie Chaplin.
Chaplin first came to prominence for her Golden Globe-nominated role of Tonya in David Lean’s Doctor Zhivago (1965). She received her second Golden Globe nomination for Robert Altman’s Nashville (1975). She also appeared in his other pictures, Buffalo Bill and the Indians, or Sitting Bull’s History Lesson (1976) and A Wedding (1978) . She received a BAFTA nomination for her role in Welcome to L.A. (1976). She then appeared in Roseland (1977) and Remember My Name (1978). She played her grandmother in the biopic, Chaplin (1992) for which she received her third Golden Globe nomination. She also appeared in The Age of Innocence (1993), Jane Eyre (1996), Mother Teresa: In the Name of God’s Poor (1997) and The Wolfman (2010).
Chaplin has notably been involved in European cinema, most notably taking French and Spanish-speaking roles. She starred in Claude Lelouch’s Les Uns et les Autres (1981), the Alain Resnais comedy, Life Is a Bed of Roses (1983) and the Jacques Rivette experimental film, Love on the Ground (1984). She has, arguably, enjoyed her greatest critical success collaborating with Carlos Saura. She starred in several notable films by the director, such as Ana and the Wolves (1973), Cría cuervos (1976), Elisa, vida mía (1977) and Mamá cumple cien años (1979). She collaborated with Pedro Almodóvar in Talk to Her (2002). She was awarded a Goya Award for her role in En la ciudad sin límites (2002) and was nominated again for The Orphanage (2007). Her contribution to Spanish cinema culminated in her being awarded the Gold medal by the Spanish Academy of Cinematographic Arts and Sciences in 2006.
Personal life
Geraldine Chaplin was born in Santa Monica, California, the fourth child of actor/director Charlie Chaplin. She was the first of his eight children with his fourth and last wife, Oona O’Neill (daughter of playwright Eugene O’Neill and author Agnes Boulton). When Chaplin was 8, the family moved to Switzerland where Chaplin attended boarding school and became fluent in French and Spanish. In 1967 she began what would become a twelve-year relationship with Carlos Saura, who directed her in several Spanish-language pictures. In a 1977 interview, Chaplin explained the difficulties of working together: “On the set it’s easy. But at home it’s hard. For me, anyway, everything I don’t say on the set..”.
In 1978 the Chaplin family were the victims of a failed extortion plot by kidnappers who had stolen the body of Charlie Chaplin. Geraldine negotiated with the kidnappers, who threatened to shoot her infant son in the knees.
After living in Spain for over 25 years, she left in 1992 after being accused by Spanish intelligence services of being a terrorist arms dealer. The Basque terror group ETA had made a false claim that Chaplin supported the group’s cause. Although Chaplin was cleared of any association, she was still viewed with suspicion, and she returned to the family home in Vevey, Switzerland. In the same year, a detainee from a left-wing Chilean group that collaborated with ETA alleged that plans for the 1988 kidnapping of Madrid businessman Emiliano Revilla were made during meetings at the Madrid home of Chaplin’s partner, Chilean cinematographer Patricio Castilla.
She married Castilla in 2006. She has two children: Shane, a psychologist (b. 1974, by Saura), and Oona, an actress (b. 1986, by Castilla).
Geraldine Chaplin is also the half sister of Sydney Chaplin, Charles Chaplin, Jr. and Norman Chaplin. She has a beachside home in Miami, Florida and also lives alternately between Madrid and Switzerland.
Career
When Chaplin was eight years old, she appeared uncredited in her father’s film Limelight. She attended the Royal Ballet School but, when her dream of becoming a ballet dancer ended, she followed her father into the acting profession. David Lean chose her to play Tonya, the main character’s wife, in his film Doctor Zhivago, (1965) for which she received a Golden Globe nomination. In an interview to publicize the film, she explained, “Because of my name, the right doors opened.” In 1967, she made her Broadway debut in Lillian Hellman’s The Little Foxes. Her performance was praised by Clive Barnes in a review published in The New York Times. Barnes noted that Chaplin “acts with spirit and force,” all the while “acting with a magnificently raw-voiced sincerity” in what was a performance of “surprising power.”
In the same year, she also began what would become a significant collaboration when she starred in Carlos Saura’s Spanish-language psychological thriller, Peppermint Frappé. She later starred in (and occasionally co-wrote scripts for) later Saura films such as Ana and the Wolves (1973), Cría cuervos (1976), Elisa, vida mía (1977) and Mamá cumple cien años (1979). Cría cuervos is regarded as their finest collaboration, winning the Special Jury Prize Award at the 1976 Cannes Film Festival. Vincent Canby praised Chaplin’s “superb” performance.
In 1970, she starred alongside Charlton Heston in the American historical film The Hawaiians. In 1974 she starred in The Three Musketeers, as well as the sequel a year later, The Four Musketeers. In 1975 she starred as a BBC reporter in Robert Altman’s Nashville, for which she received a Golden Globe nomination for Best Supporting Actress. She later starred in the Altman films Buffalo Bill and the Indians, or Sitting Bull’s History Lesson (1976) and A Wedding (1978).
In an interview with The New York Times in 1977, Chaplin cited that her career was going more successfully in Europe than in the United States. She complained that that “I only seem to work with Altman here … I don’t have any offers in this country, none. Not even an interesting script to read. The only person who ever asks me is Altman – and James Ivory.”
Chaplin starred in several films produced by Altman and directed by Alan Rudolph, with a BAFTA-nominated role in Welcome to L.A. (1976), in which she played a housewife addicted to cab rides. She received critical acclaim for her role in Remember My Name (1978), in which she played Anthony Perkins’ murderous estranged wife. She also starred in Rudolph’s 1920s set film, The Moderns (1988).
Chaplin has starred in several French-language roles, including Jacques Rivette’s Love on the Ground (1984) and the Alain Resnais films Life Is a Bed of Roses (1983) and I Want to Go Home (1989).
In 1992, she played the role of her grandmother Hannah Chaplin in the biographical film about her father, Chaplin, for which she was nominated for another Golden Globe award. A year later she was directed by Martin Scorsese in The Age of Innocence. In 1996 she appeared in Franco Zeffirelli’s Jane Eyre.
Chaplin received a Goya Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in Spanish-Argentine thriller, In the City Without Limits (2001). Other notable Spanish films she appeared in include Pedro Almodóvar’s Talk to Her (2002), and The Orphanage (2007), for which she received a Goya Award nomination. She also recently starred in the Catalan drama, The Mosquito Net (2010), for which she was awarded the Crystal Globe. In 2006 Chaplin was awarded the Gold medal by the Academia de las Artes y las Ciencias Cinematográficas de España for her contribution to cinema.
In 2010, she was cast alongside Peter O’Toole in the UK-French ballet drama Jennifer and the Swan.
Most recently, she appeared in There Be Dragons (2011) and The Monk (2011). Her upcoming films include Americano, a drama also starring Salma Hayek, as well as …And If We All Lived Together with Jane Fonda. —Wikipedia
