Well, here’s a romantic little tale from the gossip columns involving Patricia Arquette (film actress) and Thomas Jane (I haven’t a clue), who proposed to her in the following manner as described in the Philadelphia Daily News:

Last week Thomas Jane told Tattle’s Baird Jones at the premiere party for “The Mist” at NYC’s Rosa Mexicano how he popped the question to wife Patricia Arquette.

“My marriage proposal was very simple,” he said. “I cut myself into a Charlie Chaplin film and rented out a silent movie theater in Los Angeles and invited my wife to be on a date to go see a silent film.

“… When we walked in, the theater was dark and you could not see that it was empty. Then I had the projectionist and the owner laughing and trying to make it sound like there were people there.

“About 20 minutes into it, I cut myself into the film with cards. Chaplin swallowed a whistle and in the movie there was a host of a party who gathered everyone around a piano to sing a song with cards. Then they cut to me with cards and each card said, ‘Will’ ‘You’ ‘Marry’ ‘Me’ ‘Patricia.’ I had dressed myself up like a waiter and Patricia (Arquette) was sitting there thinking to herself, ‘Who is this waiter?’

“… Finally it dawned on her what was going on. She shouted ‘Yes’ at the screen, over and over. Then we had the projectionist run it again just for fun. I kept a copy.”

The Chaplin film in question is City Lights, which features the whistle-swallowing gag which takes place during a party. So how did Mr Jane go about this? Did he really get a print of City Lights, then shoot extra scenes to correspond with those from the original film? Was it all digital trickery? How convincing was it? How much did it all cost? What might the Chaplin estate think?