Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
When Charlie Met Joan: The Tragedy of the Chaplin Trials and the Failings of American Law

When Charlie Met Joan: The Tragedy of the Chaplin Trials and the Failings of American Law

Kiesel, Diane

Hardcover

Entertainment & Performing ArtsHistorical FiguresGeneral Law

Currently unavailable to order

ISBN10: 0472133586
ISBN13: 9780472133581
Publisher: University of Michigan Press
Published: Feb 11 2025
Pages: 408
Weight: 1.80
Height: 1.40 Width: 6.10 Depth: 9.10
Language: English

2026 PROSE Award Category Winner for Biography and Autobiography

2026 New York Law School Otto L. Walter Distinguished Writing Award

Charlie Chaplin, the silent screen's Little Tramp, was beloved by millions of movie fans until he starred in a series of salacious, real-life federal courtroom dramas. The 1944 trial was described by ace New York Daily News reporter Florabel Muir as the best show in town. The leading lady was a woman under contract to his studio--red-haired ingénue Joan Barry, Chaplin's protégée and former mistress. Although he beat the federal criminal trial, Chaplin lost a paternity case and had to pay child support despite blood type evidence that proved he was not the child's father.

A decade later during the Cold War, the U.S. government used the Barry trials as an excuse to bar the left-leaning, sexually adventurous, British-born comic from the country he had called home for forty years. Not only did these trials have a lasting impact on law; they also raise concerns about the power of celebrity, Cold War politics, the media frenzy surrounding high-profile court proceedings, and the sorry history of the casting couch. When Charlie Met Joan examines these trials from the perspective of both parties, asking whether Chaplin was unfairly persecuted by the government because of his left-leaning political beliefs, or if he should have been held more accountable for his cavalier treatment of Barry and other women in his life.

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