Syd Chaplin
| Sydney Chaplin | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born |
Sydney John Hill 16 March 1885 London, England |
| Died | 16 April 1965 (aged 80) Nice, France |
| Occupation | Actor |
| Years active | 1905–1929 |
| Spouse(s) | Minnie (d.1936) Henriette (Gypsy) |
| Relatives |
Charlie Chaplin (half-brother) Wheeler Dryden (half-brother) |
Sydney John "Syd" Chaplin (16 March 1885 – 16 April 1965) was an English actor. He was the elder half-brother of Sir Charlie Chaplin and served as his business manager, and a half-uncle of the actor Sydney Chaplin (1926–2009), who was named after him.
Chaplin was born as Sydney John Hill, to 19-year-old Hannah Hill in London. Hannah claimed Sydney's father was a man named Sydney Hawkes, but his father's identity was never verified. He began using the Chaplin surname following his mother's marriage to Charles Chaplin, Sr., a year after his birth. While Syd and brother Charlie were in the Cuckoo Schools in Hanwell following his mother's mental collapse, Syd was placed in the programme designed to train young boys to become seamen, on the Exmouth training ship docked at Grays, Essex. He followed this training period with several years working on ships, receiving high marks from all of his employers. But his ambition was to get into the entertainment business and he left his final voyage with that in mind.
In 1905 Charlie and Sydney worked briefly together in one of their first stage appearances, Sherlock Holmes. Syd was briefly cast as a villain in that play. In 1906 however, he landed a contract with Fred Karno, of Karno's London Comedians and was to fight hard to bring Charlie into the company two years later. Charlie never achieved the sort of fame Syd did as a principal comedian for that company, but that was to be the only time that Syd was able to outdo his brother—at least in front of an audience.
After Charlie achieved world-wide fame in the 1910s, the brothers discovered they had another half-brother through their mother, Wheeler Dryden, who had been removed from his mother's care as an infant and brought up abroad by his father. Wheeler was also an actor, and the brothers reunited in Hollywood in 1918, occasionally working together at Chaplin's studio through to the 1950s.
As Charlie was negotiating his Keystone contract, he suggested Sydney be asked to join the company, and Syd and his wife Minnie Chaplin arrived in California in October 1914. Syd made a few comedies there, including the "Gussle" comedies, and the feature-length A Submarine Pirate in 1915, which, second to Tillie's Punctured Romance, was the most financially successful comedy Keystone ever made.
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