Douglas Fairbanks: Charlie Chaplin’s best friend and founder of the Academy Awards (Oscars)

Douglas Fairbanks was the “First King of Hollywood”. His life story unfolds with American history and the emergence of the film industry as backdrop. His films crossed all borders. His physique and style made him the perfect American icon. At a time when the country did not have any self-doubt, he represented America like no one else: strong, confident, heroic, smiling and conquering. He was “Everybody’s Hero”.

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Fairbanks also became one of Hollywood´s founding fathers. In 1919 together with his best friend, Charlie Chaplin, his bride-to-be Mary Pickford, and director D. W. Griffith, he started the United Artists Studio which is still a Hollywood player today. In 1927, Fairbanks was a founding member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. As the host of its first prize giving ceremony in 1929, he handed out 14 awards to his peers, but he never received an Oscar himself during his lifetime. Also in 1929 he was involved in the establishment of the School of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California, thereby creating one of the first faculties for film studies.

No Superman without a Fairbanks signature pose, no Batman without The Mark of Zorro, no Mickey
Mouse without Fairbanks and Chaplin, as Walt Disney once admitted. He was even thinking of Fairbanks when he was creating Prince Charming in Snow White.

Original title: I, Douglas Fairbanks
Narrated by Peter Facinelli
Produced by Wichita Films
Directed by Clara & Julia Kuperberg
Licensed by Poorhouse International, 2018