Charlie Chaplin, Jr. describes Easter 1938

Up until this year, Syd and I had not participated in the coloring of the eggs. But that Easter Eve we were allowed to help Paulette, all three of us working away in the living room. Dad reserved himself the hiding of the eggs, a chore he loved because of its conspiratorial nature. I have never ceased to be amazed at the simplicity of the things in which my father found so much pleasure. I can remember him with that sly expression on his face, packing us off to bed so he would have freedom to work. He hid the eggs in the chairs and the sofa of the living room, in the dining room, out on the lawn.

Easter morning we had a late breakfast together on the porch, and the relaxed atmosphere was like a burst of sunshine after Dad’s tension of the last months. A little later Syd’s and my friends gathered for the hunt. Soon there were children all over the place, squealing and yelling and tearing everything apart in their exuberant search. And there was Dad following right behind us with his hands clasped behind his back, as though to keep from rooting out the eggs himself.

“Now you’re hot! Now you’re cold! Lukewarm now!” his steady monologue guided us like manikins on a string until we found them all. (My Father, Charlie Chaplin, 1960)