Not only was his work controversial, but Charlie Chaplin’s private life also made headlines. He was married four times and had eleven children in all.
His first wife was the then 16-year-old actress Mildred Harris: When she informed him that she was pregnant, Chaplin wanted to avoid a scandal and married her. However, it turned out that the pregnancy was just a false alarm. The two later had a child, but the boy died when he was just three days old. Chaplin and Harris separated a short time later.
Under similar circumstances, when he was 35, he married the 16-year-old actress Lita Greywhen she was expecting a child from him. They had two sons before also splitting up.
The third wife was the actress Paulette Goddard, they divorced in 1942. Around the same time, Chaplin was involved in a paternity suit in which actress Joan Barry was the plaintiff. Blood tests showed that Chaplin was not the father of Barry’s baby, but such tests were not admissible as evidence in court at the time. Chaplin lost the case.
His public reputation was already bad when another scandal followed: at the age of 54 he married the then 18-year-old Oona O’Neill. The big age difference was a thorn in the side of many. Chaplin was married to Oona for 34 years and the couple had eight children together.
In parallel with the negative headlines, there were also problems with the FBI: the actor was suspected of being a communist. When he traveled to England in 1952 for the premiere of his film “Rampenlicht”, he was no longer allowed to enter the USA.
