A Woman (1915)
After brawling with a stranger in the park and being invited home by his unwitting wife and daughter, Charlie is nearly caught when the husband returns and recognizes him. He escapes detection by borrowing the daughter's dress and passing himself off as a woman.
A Woman was the third and last time Chaplin played a female role on screen, and contemporary reviewers singled out his impersonation here, mink stole and all, as the most convincing of the three.
Background
A Woman was Chaplin’s ninth film for Essanay, written and directed by Chaplin and produced by Jess Robbins at the Majestic Studio in Los Angeles, released on July 12, 1915. The first half plays out as a standard park comedy, with the Tramp causing trouble around a flirtatious woman and a nearby lake, before the plot turns: after Edna’s father forbids her to see him, Charlie borrows the daughter’s dress to sneak back into the house undetected. It was the third and last time Chaplin played a woman on screen, following two earlier female impersonations in the Keystone shorts The Masquerader and A Busy Day.
What to watch for
Contemporary reviewers singled out Chaplin’s impersonation here as his most convincing, and the film plays the disguise for sustained comic tension rather than a single quick gag, as the husband nearly recognizes him more than once. The premise was enough to get the film banned outright in Great Britain on first release, reportedly over its suggestion of an older man pursuing a much younger woman combined with unease about the cross-dressing; the ban held until 1916. Watching the escape sequence today, the comedy depends less on broad slapstick than on Chaplin’s control of small, nervous gestures as the impersonation keeps nearly failing.
