French postcard by Edition Pathe Frères. Caption: M. Charles Arling.
Charles Arling (1880–1922) was a Canadian actor of the silent era. He appeared in 132 American films between 1909 and 1922.
Charles Arling was born Charles E. Parr in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, on 22 August 1880. In 1909 he started to work as supporting actor at American Biograph in New York, and was directed by D.W. Griffith in e.g. The Open Gate (1909), In Little Italy (1909), In 1910 he also started to work at IMP (Independent Moving Pictures), where he had the lead in various comedies and dramas in 1910-1911, some also with King Baggot. While the first films at IMP were by unknown directors, later ones were by Thomas Ince and starred Mary Pickford and her husband Owen Moore. In 1911 Arling moved to the American Pathé company, where he was the male lead in avalanche of short dramas, comedies, thrillers and westerns, starting with the thriller Saved by Telegraphy (1911). At Pathé, he was at times directed by the first Native American film director James Young Deer, e.g. in the early western A Western Courtship (1911), but many of Arling's films were by unknown directors, such as Short-Lived Happiness (1911). From mid-1911, Arling acted in several Pathé-shorts directed by George LeSoir, with Pearl White and Henry B. Walthall as co-actors. In 1912 Leopold Wharton directed Arling in several short dramas and comedies. In 1913 Arling often acted opposite Gwendolyn Pates in comedies and dramas shot at Pathé. Until the end of 1914, Arling continued to act in a large string of shorts and then moved over to Keystone, where he worked as of early 1915. At Keystone, Arling worked with comedians such as Fatty Arbuckle, Mabel Normand, Ford Sterling, Chester Conklin, and Polly Moran.
Early 1916 Arling moved to Jesse Lasky, to play in his first feature, The Selfish Woman, starring Wallace Reid and Cleo Ridgely, and directed by E. Mason Hopper. Arling played a father who tries to steal the job from his own son (Reid). Ridgely is the society lady, whom Reid marries. She first plots against him, but he wins her over and together they fight against those plotting to destroy Tom's work. In 1917 Arling acted in a series of comical shorts at Fox (e.g. with Hank Mann), but he also acted in features at Fox, Bernstein Pictures, and in particular Jesse Lasky, where he acted in films by William Desmond Taylor and starring Jack Pickford. Arling wandered from one studio to another in the late teens, including Metro Pictures, William S. Hart Productions, National, Fox and Lasky. he also played the male lead in the Nell Shipman movie, Back to God's Country (1919), based on the novel Wapi the Walrus by James Oliver Curwood. The film was shot on location in California and Idaho in the US and in Alberta in Canada. Arling played the evil captain (he often played elderly bad guys), who has killed Shipman's father. As her husband is unable to protect her, she has to put up her own fight and concoct her own ruses.
In the early 1920s Arling kept being busy acting in feature films at various companies (Goldwyn, Selznick, Louis B. Mayer, Universal) and with directors such as Marshall Neilan (In Old Kentucky, 1919), King Vidor (The Jack-Knife Man, 1920), B. Reeves Eason (the Harry Carey western Blue Streak McCoy, 1920), and Jack Conway (A Daughter of the Law, 1921 starring Carmel Myers). Charles Arling's last performance was in Her Night of Nights (Hobart Henley, 1922), starring Marie Prevost. Arling died on 21 April 1922 from pneumonia at the age of 46 in Los Angeles. He acted in 132 films, of which 30 were features.
Sources: English Wikipedia, IMDB.
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