1. Wheeler Dryden was the son of Hannah Chaplin and music hall entertainer Leo Dryden, and younger half-brother of actors Sir Charlie and Sydney Chaplin.
13 Facts About Wheeler Dryden
1. 2.
Wheeler Dryden moved to the United States in 1918, joining his mother and two half-brothers.
3.
Wheeler Dryden worked as an actor and director, sometimes assisting Charlie Chaplin.
4.
Wheeler Dryden was married for a short time to ballerina Anna Chapple and they had one child together, Spencer Dryden, who became a rock musician with several prominent American bands and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
5.
Wheeler Dryden grew up estranged from her and his two older half-brothers.
6.
At this point, Wheeler Dryden wrote several letters to Chaplin and his half-brother Sydney, but received no response from either of them.
7.
Wheeler Dryden joined the Chaplin brothers and their mother in America in 1918.
8.
Wheeler Dryden entered the growing film world as an actor, and later worked as a director.
9.
Wheeler Dryden appeared in Stan Laurel's Mud and Sand and was the "other man" in the melodrama, False Women.
10.
Wheeler Dryden appears in the supporting roles of a doctor and a clown in Chaplin's last American film, Limelight.
11.
Wheeler Dryden's difficulties were exacerbated by aggressive FBI inquiries into his brother's politics, during the period of increasing anti-Communist actions by government and Hollywood studios in the US.
12.
In 1938 Wheeler Dryden married Alice Chapple, a prima ballerina of the Radio City Music Hall dancers.
13.
Wheeler Dryden took his son to Los Angeles jazz clubs during the 1950s, which inspired his musical ambitions as a jazz and rock drummer.