Lisa Stein Haven, Ph.D.

Haven is an expert in all things Charlie Chaplin, who burst on the scene during World War I and became an American icon by the Great Depression in the late 1920s.

Chaplin gained worldwide popularity and recognition beginning in the 1910s for his "Little Tramp" character, a man dressed in a mishmash of ill-fitted suiting, bushy mustache, Derby hat and bamboo cane. That character has become one of the most iconic film images of all time. The Little Tramp's antics, slapstick comedy and pathos created a timeless persona that critics and audiences are still applauding and analyzing.

In the process of completing a dissertation on the silent film actor, Stein Haven developed a relationship with the Chaplin family and published a new edition of Chaplin's 1934 travel narrative, "A Comedian Sees the World." In 2010, the 100th anniversary of Charlie's first trip to America, Haven hosted the first international Charlie Chaplin conference ever held on American soil at Ohio University-Zanesville, that culminated with a showing of a lost Keystone Studios film, "A Thief Catcher."

"A Thief Catcher," missing for decades and presumed lost, was recently recovered at an antique sale in Michigan. The film features Chaplin in his only known performance as one of the "Keystone Kops," a pack of bumbling police officers created and popularized by the studio. The Zanesville showing was only the fourth venue to play the film since its rediscovery.

Haven brings her interest in the history of silent film comedians and comediennes into the college classroom to make traditional lecture classes more interesting.

"Utilizing examples from classics such as Charlie Chaplin film helps students relate literature to something with which they are often familiar; visual entertainment," she says. "By introducing my students to Chaplin's character and carrying it throughout the course, they can realize elements that writers of modernist period and beat generation focused on in their work."

From print to presentation, and classroom, Haven is well-recognized for her insight on classic comedians, publishing two books on Chaplin family members. "A Comedian Sees the World," is an edition of Charlie Chaplin's early 1930's travel book by the same name. Haven wrote the introduction, extensive notes, and appendices of the new edition of the book, which was launched at the Il Cinema Ritrovato Festival in Bologna, Italy. During fall 2007 Haven's book was also featured at the Artelibro: Festival del Libro d' Arte in Bologna.

In 2010, Haven released "Syd Chaplin: A Biography," the first study of the life and art of Chaplin's brother, who has been credited for establishing Charlie's career and founding Hollywood enterprises such as United Artists and the nation's first domestic airline, the Syd Chaplin Aircraft Corporation.

Her latest book is "Charlie Chaplin's Little Tramp in America, 1947-1977." She's now writing on French comedian Max Linder.

She published the first biography in English on French silent film comedian Max Linder, who pre-dated and therefore influenced Chaplin and most other American comedians, having begun his career in 1905 (as opposed to Chaplin’s 1914).  The book is entitled  The Rise and Fall of Max Linder: Cinema’s First Celebrity   (2021) and features a filmography by EYE Film museum Amsterdam Curator Catherine Cormon.  The book was launched at the Giornate del Cinema Muto festival in Pordenone, Italy in October 2021, the most important silent film festival in the world.

Haven also completed the manuscript for  Early Charlie Chaplin: Final Shorts and First Features  this July for Pen & Sword Press, UK and is currently working on  Early Buster Keaton: From the Vaudeville Stage to Comique Films, 1899 to 1920  to be submitted to the same press in early January 2023.