Noor Mohammed Charlie

Noor Mohammed Charlie
Charlie in Musafir (1940)
Born	Noor Mohammed Memon 1 July 1911 Ranavav village, Porbandar, Saurashtra, India
Died	30 June 1983(1983-06-30) (aged 71) Karachi, Sindh, Pakistan
Occupation	Actor, singer, director
Years active	1925–1969
Children	3

Noor Mohammed Charlie (1911–1983), popularly known as Charlie was an actor born on 1 July 1911 in Ranavav village, Porbandar, Saurashtra, India. Best known for his comedy roles, he was the first 'star' comedian and has been referred to as India's first comedy king. He acted with several top actresses of those days as a comic hero. Being a great fan of Charlie Chaplin, he took the name "Charlie" as his screen name following the release of his popular film The Indian Charlie (1933). He had a successful career in pre-partition India from 1925–1946. His shift to Pakistan following partition saw his career going down with less than 12 films. He shifted to the US to live with his son and returned later to Pakistan where he died in 1983.

Noor Mohammed was born into a Memon family. Hating school as a young boy, Noor Mohammed often played truant to visit cinema theatres. At an early age he started working at repairing broken umbrellas. In 1925 he was employed by the Imperial Film Company at Rs. 40 a month when he walked boldly in announcing that he could sing.

Charlie made his debut in Krishna Film Company's Akalna Bardan (1928) directed by Prafulla Ghosh. At this time he was billed as Noor Mohammed and did other films like Lekh Par Mekh and Vasant Leela. In 1929 he was signed up by Elfin Film Company for The Indian Charlie which was however not released till 1933. His Ezra Mir directed film Zarina in 1932 with the advent of Talkies made him a popular actor. He acted under Ezra Mir in one more film Premi Pagal (1933) and with Sarvottam Badami in Chandrahasa (1933). These films made him very popular with the audience. Finally, in 1933 The Indian Charlie was released which "became such a huge sensation", catapulting him to stardom. The success of the film was the reason for the change of name to Noor Mohammed "Charlie", and in later films as just "Charlie".

In 1934, Charlie joined Ranjit Film Company acting in successful films like Toofani Taruni (1934), Toofan Mail (1934) and Barrister's Wife (1935). He often co-starred with other famous comedians like Dixit and Ghory. The 1940s saw him acting in several hit films. Musafir (1940) directed by Chaturbhuj Doshi in which Charlie played a foreign-returned prince who on his return finds his kingdom in a mess became very popular. Other films of this time include Dhandora (1941) which he directed, A. R. Kardar's Pagal (1941), Jayant Desai's Bansari (1943), Mehboob Khan's Taqdeer (1943), Jayant Desai's Manorama (1944), Mahesh Chandra's Chand Tara (1945), Zia Sarhadi's Yateem (1945) and Phani Majumdar's Insaaf (1946). He starred with top actresses like Swarnalata, Mehtab , Leela Chitnis. He sang with artists like Suraiya and Amirbai Karnataki. At the height of his success he charged more than Prithviraj Kapoor and other top stars of that time.