Essanay Studios

Chaplin's spoof of Cecil B. DeMille's Carmen, released the same year as the film it mocks. Chaplin plays Darn Hosiery, the Don José figure — a dim Spanish officer seduced and ruined by the gypsy Carmen (Edna Purviance) — with Ben Turpin as the toreador Remendado, mangling his name in the bargain. The parody is affectionate but pointed, and its mock-tragic ending is a real gag rather than a whimper. Essanay later padded the two-reeler out to four reels with discarded footage for a 1918 re-release, prompting Chaplin to sue the studio; most surviving prints derive from that expanded version. As a work published before 1930, it is in the public domain in the United States.

Comedy · Silent

A Charlie Chaplin Essanay comedy in which the Tramp disrupts a family outing in the park. After charming a young woman and infuriating her father and suitor, Chaplin retreats to a hotel where he encounters the family again. In the film's famous sequence, Chaplin disguises himself as a woman to evade pursuit, leading to a farcical series of mistaken identities and flirtations—including the girl's father making advances toward the cross-dressed Tramp. The film showcases Chaplin's mastery of gender-bending comedy, a device he would refine throughout his career. The film is in the public domain.

Comedy · Silent

Chaplin's last film for Essanay before he jumped to Mutual for ten times the salary. Released from prison, Chaplin's ex-convict is determined to go straight, but the world won't let him: a bogus parson swindles him out of what little money he has, and an old cellmate ropes him into a bungled burglary. Inside the house, the family's daughter (Edna Purviance) takes pity on the would-be thief, giving the short a surprising streak of sympathy for its outcast hero. Less frenetic than the earlier Essanays, Police points toward the blend of slapstick and sentiment Chaplin would perfect at Mutual. As a work published before 1930, it is in the public domain in the United States.

Comedy · Silent

A 1916 American silent film and the only surviving filmed record of William Gillette's legendary stage performance as Sherlock Holmes. Directed by Arthur Berthelet for Essanay Studios, the film adapts Gillette's 1899 play, which drew on Arthur Conan Doyle's "A Scandal in Bohemia," "The Final Problem," and A Study in Scarlet. Gillette had played Holmes over 1,300 times on stage and shaped many of the character's iconic elements, including the deerstalker hat and calabash pipe. Long believed lost, a nitrate print was discovered in the Cinémathèque Française archive in 2014 and restored by the San Francisco Silent Film Festival. The film is in the public domain.

Mystery · Crime · Silent

A 1916 American silent film and the only surviving filmed record of William Gillette's legendary stage performance as Sherlock Holmes. Directed by Arthur Berthelet for Essanay Studios, the film adapts Gillette's 1899 play, which drew on Arthur Conan Doyle's "A Scandal in Bohemia," "The Final Problem," and A Study in Scarlet. Gillette had played Holmes over 1,300 times on stage and shaped many of the character's iconic elements, including the deerstalker hat and calabash pipe. Long believed lost, a nitrate print was discovered in the Cinémathèque Française archive in 2014 and restored by the San Francisco Silent Film Festival. The film is in the public domain.

Mystery · Crime · Silent