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Charley Chase (Charles Joseph Parrott) (October
20, 1893-June 20, 1940) was an American comedian, screenwriter and film
director, best known for his work in Hal Roach
short film comedies. He was the older brother of
comedian/director James Parrott.



Born Charles Parrott in Baltimore, Maryland, Chase
started his career in films by working at the Al
Christie comedy unit in 1912. He then moved to 
Keystone Studios where he began appearing in bit
parts in the Mack Sennett films, including those
of Charles Chaplin.

In 1920, he began working as a film director for
Hal Roach Studios; among his notable early works
for Roach was supervising the first entries in the
Our Gang series. He eventually moving back in
front of the camera with his own series of shorts,
adopting the screen name Charley Chase. Chase's
initial comedies were directed by Leo McCarey, who
in collaboration with Chase formed the comic style
of the series, with an emphasis on situation
comedy, characterization, and farce instead of
knockabout slapstick.  From the start of his
series until his death, Chase remained the guiding
hand behind the films, acting as director, writer,
and editor (though he only began to receive
director's credit at Roach in 1933 as Charles
Parrott.)  Chase's starring shorts of the 1920s,
particularly Mighty Like a Moose, Fluttering
Hearts, and Limousine Love, are among the finest
in the silent comedy genre. 
 
Charley Chase moved with ease into sound films in
1929 and continued to be quite prolific,
occasionally putting his fine singing voice on
display and including his self-penned songs in his
comedy shorts. Chase's The Pip From Pittsburg,
produced in 1931, is one of the most celebrated
Hal Roach comedies of the 1930s.  Throughout the
decade, the Charley Chase shorts continued to
stand alongside Laurel and Hardy and Our Gang as
the hallmark output of the Roach studio.  Chase
appeared on-screen with Laurel and Hardy a number
of times, and co-starred in their 1933 feature
film Sons of the Desert. Chase's failure to adapt
to the feature film format was primarily
responsible for his dismissal from the Hal Roach
Studio in 1936. 

In 1937, Chase began working at Columbia Pictures,
where he spent the rest of his career continuing
to star in his series of comedies as well as
directing other Columbia personalities, such as
The Three Stooges.  Chase's tumultuous,
fast-living lifestyle (he suffered from alcoholism
for most of his professional career) began to take
a serious toll on the comedian's health.  Though
still often producing quality comedies—such as
one of his last, The Heckler, which is considered
to be one of his best—Chase's physical decline
could not be ignored when viewing his work from
the late 1930s.  Charley Chase died of a heart
attack in California on June 20, 1940.

==Renewed Interest==
Since the 1990s, there has been a small revival of
interest in the films of Charley Chase, due in
large part to the increased availability of his
work and the undated, contemporary feel of his
best comedies.  An extensive website, The World of
Charley Chase, was created in 1996, and a
biography, Smile When the Raindrops Fall, was
published in 1997.  His films, particularly his
canonical silent work, are being screened in
reperatory theaters more often than ever.  Chase's
sound comedies for Hal Roach were briefly
televised in the late 1990s on the short-lived
American cable network The Odyssey Channel.  A
retrospective of his silent comedies organized by
The Silent Clowns Film Series was held in 1999 in
New York City.  A marathon of his silent films
took place in 2005 on the American cable
television network Turner Classic Movies.  A
Charley Chase DVD collection was released in 2004,
and another more extensive DVD set is due out in
2005.
==Books==
* Anthony, Brian and Edmonds, Andy (1997). Smile
When the Raindrops Fall: The Story of Charley
Chase. Scarecrow Press. First biography on Charley
Chase.