Maurice Chevalier

Chevalier was an infantryman in the French army during World War I and was captured by German troops in 1914. He spent two years in the Alten Grabow POW camp.

Maurice Chevalier's first working job was as an acrobat, until a serious accident ended that career. He turned his talents to singing and acting, and made several short films in France. During World War I he enlisted in the French army. He was wounded in battle, captured and placed in a POW camp by the Germans. During his captivity he learned English from fellow prisoners. After the war he returned to the film business, and when "talkies" came into existence, Chevalier traveled to the US to break into Hollywood. In 1929 he was paired with operatic singer/actress Jeanette MacDonald to make The Love Parade (1929). Although Chevalier was attracted to the beautiful MacDonald and made several passes at her, she rejected him firmly, as she had designs on actor Gene Raymond, who she eventually married. He did not take rejection lightly, being a somewhat vain man who considered himself quite a catch, and derided MacDonald as a "prude". She, in turn, called him "the quickest derrière pincher in Hollywood".

In the late 1930s he returned to Europe, making several films in France and England. World War II interrupted his career and he was dogged by accusations of collaboration with the Nazi authorities occupying France, but he was later vindicated.

They made three more pictures together, the most successful being Love Me Tonight (1932).

From 1941 to 1945, he sang the songs composed by Henri Betti with the lyrics of Maurice Vandair as "Notre Espoir" (1941), "La Chanson du Maçon" (1941) and "La Fête à Neu-Neu" (1943).

In 1944, after Paris was liberated by the Allies, Chevalier was arrested by French authorities on charges of collaborating with the Nazis during the occupation and put on trial. He was acquitted, but feelings ran high against him among the French public and government, and it was several years before he was granted a visa to leave the country.

In the 1950s he returned to Hollywood, older and gray-headed.

In 1951, the U.S. State Department declared Chevalier "potentially dangerous" to the security of the United States because he had signed a petition against nuclear weapons called the Stockholm Appeal.

He made Gigi (1958), from which he took his signature songs, "Thank Heaven for Little Girls" and "I Remember it Well". He also received a special Oscar that year.

Interviewed in "The Great Comedians Talk About Comedy" by Larry Wilde. [1968]