This group shot from 1918 appears to have been taken on a movie set. Left to right are Polly Thomson, Anne, Helen, and Charlie Chaplin. He was a major comic actor from the era of silent films. Behind them are film props and camera equipment. Chaplin sits with legs crossed, wearing a scruffy costume and his signature look of dark eyebrows and small, dark, bushy moustache. Helen has her left hand on his shoulder and her right hand on Anne's mouth. Both Helen and Anne have furs draped on their shoulders. Photo credit: Culver.
The warm climate was good for Anne's health and for a short while she enjoyed the excitement and glamour of Hollywood. Helen was very aware that most of the people they met ignored Anne and focused their attention on her. This was not the case with Charlie Chaplin. At a dinner that he hosted, Chaplin spent the entire time talking to Anne about his life and his marriage. Afterward he invited them to a private screening of two of his movies, A Dog's Life and Man-At-Arms.
Helen wrote the following about their experience in Hollywood:
Everybody was friendly, but in their compliments to me I was unintentionally left with a defrauded feeling. Few, if any, spoke of Teacher as one who deserved special praise for having ploughed furrows through my limitations and given me the precious harvest of my human heritage. However, Teacher was her exuberant, charming self with Charlie Chaplain [sic]. They had both endured poverty and the deformations it creates in body and soul. They had both struggled for education and social equality, and as success had crowned their efforts they had poured themselves out in tenderness to the unprivileged. Both were shy and unspoiled by their victories over fate. So it was natural that they should understand each other and form one of the friendships that afford solace to great artists in a world too often unfaithful to the children of genius.
