Editing The Great Dictator (section)

==Production==
[[File:Costume Adenoïd Hynkel.jpg|thumb|left|upright|Costume of Adenoid Hynkel]]
According to Jürgen Trimborn's biography of Nazi propaganda filmmaker [[Leni Riefenstahl]], both Chaplin and French filmmaker [[René Clair]] viewed Riefenstahl's ''[[Triumph of the Will]]'' together at a showing at the New York [[Museum of Modern Art]]. Filmmaker [[Luis Buñuel]] reports that Clair was horrified by the power of the film, crying out that this should never be shown or the West was lost. Chaplin, on the other hand, laughed uproariously at the film. He used it to inspire many elements of ''The Great Dictator'', and, by repeatedly viewing this film, Chaplin could closely mimic Hitler's mannerisms.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.criterion.com/films/27605-the-great-dictator|title=The Great Dictator|website=The Criterion Collection}}</ref>

Trimborn suggests that Chaplin decided to proceed with making ''The Great Dictator'' after viewing Riefenstahl's film.<ref>{{cite book |title=Leni Riefenstahl: A Life |last=Trimborn |first=Jürgen |year=2007 |publisher=Macmillan |isbn=978-0-374-18493-3 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/leniriefenstahll00trim/page/123 123–124] |url=https://archive.org/details/leniriefenstahll00trim/page/123 }}</ref> Hynkel's rally speech near the beginning of the film, delivered in German-sounding [[gibberish]], is a caricature of Hitler's oratory style, which Chaplin also studied carefully in newsreels.<ref>{{cite journal |first=R. |last=Cole |year=2001 |title=Anglo-American Anti-fascist Film Propaganda in a Time of Neutrality: ''The Great Dictator'', 1940". |journal=Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television |volume=21 |number=2 |pages=137–152 |doi=10.1080/01439680120051488 |s2cid=159482040 |quote=[Chaplin sat] for hours watching newsreels of the German dictator, exclaiming: Oh, you bastard, you! }}</ref>

The film was directed by Chaplin (with his half-brother [[Wheeler Dryden]] as assistant director), and written and produced by Chaplin. The film was shot largely at the [[Charlie Chaplin Studios]] and other locations around Los Angeles.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.vulture.com/2014/12/charlie-chaplin-great-dictator-history.html |title=The Interview Has Renewed Interest in Chaplin's The Great Dictator, Which Is a Great Thing |newspaper=Vulture |first=Bilge |last=Ebiri |date=December 19, 2014 |access-date=December 28, 2020}}</ref> The elaborate World War I scenes were filmed in [[Laurel Canyon, Los Angeles, California|Laurel Canyon]]. Chaplin and [[Meredith Willson]] composed the music.

Chaplin wanted to address the escalating violence and repression of Jews by the Nazis throughout the late 1930s, the magnitude of which was conveyed to him personally by his European Jewish friends and fellow artists. [[Nazi Germany]]'s repressive nature and [[militarist]] tendencies were well known at the time. [[Ernst Lubitsch]]'s 1942 ''[[To Be or Not to Be (1942 film)|To Be or Not To Be]]'' dealt with similar themes, and also used a mistaken-identity Hitler figure. But Chaplin later said that he would not have made the film had he known of the true extent of the Nazis' crimes.<ref name="trampdict">{{cite AV media |people=Branagh, Kenneth (narrator) |author-link=Kenneth Branagh  |title=Chaplin and Hitler: The Tramp and the Dictator |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00fsv6s |medium=television |publisher=BBC |year=2002 |access-date=December 28, 2020 }}</ref> After the horror of the Holocaust became known, filmmakers struggled for nearly 20 years to find the right angle and tone to satirize the era.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://schikelgruber.net/movies.html |title=Searching for Hitler and His Henchmen: Hitler in the Movies |access-date=2013-05-04 |website=schikelgruber.net |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131027225753/http://schikelgruber.net/movies.html |archive-date=October 27, 2013 |url-status=dead }}</ref>

In the period when Hitler and his Nazi Party rose to prominence, Chaplin was becoming internationally popular. He was mobbed by fans on a 1931 trip to Berlin, which annoyed the Nazis. Resenting his style of comedy, they published a book titled ''The Jews Are Looking at You'' (1934), describing the comedian as "a disgusting Jewish acrobat" (although Chaplin was not Jewish). [[Ivor Montagu]], a close friend of Chaplin's, relates that he sent the comedian a copy of the book and always believed that Chaplin decided to retaliate with making ''Dictator''.<ref>{{cite magazine |last=Stratton |first=David |date=February 21, 2002 |url=https://variety.com/2002/film/reviews/the-tramp-and-the-dictator-1200551216/ |title=The Tramp and the Dictator |magazine=[[Variety (magazine)|Variety]] |access-date=December 28, 2020 }}</ref>

In the 1930s, cartoonists and comedians often built on Hitler and Chaplin having similar mustaches. Chaplin also capitalized on this resemblance in order to give his Little Tramp character a "reprieve".<ref>{{cite book |title=The Comedy of Charlie Chaplin: Artistry in Motion |last1=Kamin |first1=Dan |first2=Scott |last2=Eyman |year=2011 |publisher=Scarecrow Press |isbn= 978-0-8108-7780-1 |pages=154–155}}</ref>

In his memoir ''My Father, Charlie Chaplin'', Chaplin's son [[Charles Chaplin Jr.]] described his father as being haunted by the similarities in background between him and Hitler; they were born four days apart in April 1889, and both had risen to their present heights from poverty. He wrote:

<blockquote>
Their destinies were poles apart. One was to make millions weep, while the other was to set the whole world laughing. Dad could never think of Hitler without a shudder, half of horror, half of fascination. "Just think", he would say uneasily, "he's the madman, I'm the comic. But it could have been the other way around."<ref>{{cite web |last=Singer |first=Jessica |date=September 14, 2007 |url=http://brattleblog.brattlefilm.org/?p=98 |title=The Great Dictator |work=Brattle Theatre Film Notes |access-date=December 28, 2020 |archive-date=January 3, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110103065709/http://brattleblog.brattlefilm.org/?p=98 |url-status=dead }}</ref>
</blockquote>

Chaplin prepared the story throughout 1938 and 1939, and began filming in September 1939, six days after the beginning of [[World War II]]. He finished filming almost six months later. The 2002 TV documentary on the making of the film, ''The Tramp and the Dictator'',<ref>Internationally co-produced by four production companies, including BBC, [[Turner Classic Movies]], and Germany's Spiegel TV</ref> presented newly discovered footage of the film production (shot by Chaplin's elder half-brother [[Sydney Chaplin|Sydney]]) that showed Chaplin's initial attempts at the film's ending, filmed before the [[fall of France]].<ref name="trampdict"/>

According to ''The Tramp and the Dictator'', Chaplin arranged to send the film to Hitler, and an eyewitness confirmed he saw it.<ref name="trampdict"/> Hitler's architect and friend [[Albert Speer]] denied that the leader had ever seen it.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.sueddeutsche.de/kultur/charlie-chaplins-hitler-parodie-fuehrer-befiehl-wir-lachen-1.877249-3 |title=Charlie Chaplins Hitler-Parodie: Führer befiehl, wir lachen! |trans-title=Charlie Chaplin's Hitler parody: Fiihrer commands, we laugh! |date=May 19, 2010 |language=de |access-date=December 28, 2020 }}</ref> Hitler's response to the film is not recorded, but another account tells that he viewed the film twice.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Wallace |first1=Irving |last2=Wallechinsky |first2=David |last3=Wallace |first3=Amy |last4=Wallace |first4=Sylvia |publisher=William Morrow |date=February 1980 |title=The Book of Lists 2 |page=200 |isbn= 9780688035747 }}</ref>

Some of the signs in the shop windows of the ghetto in the film are written in [[Esperanto]], a language that Hitler condemned as an [[anti-nationalist]] Jewish plot to destroy German culture because it was an [[Esperanto|international language]] whose [[L. L. Zamenhof|founder]] was a Polish Jew.<ref>{{cite book |title=Mind & Society Fads |first1=Frank W. |last1=Hoffmann |first2=William G. |last2=Bailey |year=1992 |publisher=Haworth Press |isbn=978-1-56024-178-2 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AzFuFjFwVSYC&pg=PA116 |page=116 |quote=Between world wars, Esperanto fared worse and, sadly, became embroiled in political power moves. Adolf Hitler wrote in ''Mein Kampf'' that the spread of Esperanto throughout Europe was a Jewish plot to break down national differences so that Jews could assume positions of authority.... After the Nazis' successful Blitzkrieg of Poland, the Warsaw Gestapo received orders to 'take care' of the [[L. L. Zamenhof|Zamenhof]] family.... Zamenhof's son was shot... his two daughters were put in [[Treblinka extermination camp|Treblinka death camp]]. }}</ref>