Charles Chaplin's two-reel version of this film, his final release for the Essanay Company, premiered in December 1915. After Chaplin left the studio, Essanay expanded the film, adding new scenes with Ben Turpin and Wesley Ruggles as gypsies, reinserting outtakes Chaplin had discarded and even splicing in multiple takes of scenes already included. Essanay's four-reel "feature" was released in April 1916. Chaplin was furious and filed a lawsuit against his former employers, but Essanay won the case in court. Prints of Essanay's version circulated for decades. In the 1990s an approximation of Chaplin's original version was at long last reconstructed by Kino Video.
Most circulating prints of this four-reel edition now stem from a 1928 reissue by a company called Quality Amusement Corp.
This film received its New York City television premiere Wednesday 28 February 1945 on WABD (then broadcasting on Channel 4); it was once again telecast 8 December 1948 on WPIX (Channel 11).
The film was restored in 2014 through the Chaplin Essanay Project.
Restoration work was carried out at L'Immagine Ritrovata laboratory in 2013.
A Burlesque on Carmen (1915) has been restored by Fondazione Cineteca di Bologna and Lobster Films in collaboration with Film Preservation Associates, from a di-acetate tinted print preserved at the Cinémathèque française and a black and white nitrate print in the Blackhawk Collection preserved at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Some fragments were added from a nitrate dupe negative preserved at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), and a nitrate dupe negative preserved at the Library of Congress.
The film reconstruction is based on David Shepard's extensive research on the Chaplin Archive, while the main title's logo has been reconstructed from the original title taking from the film Work (1915).
Intertitles have been reconstructed according to David Shepard's reconstruction with a neutral font.
A Burlesque on Carmen (1915) has been restored by Fondazione Cineteca di Bologna and Lobster Films in collaboration with Film Preservation Associates, from a di-acetate tinted print preserved at the Cinémathèque française and a black and white nitrate print in the Blackhawk Collection preserved at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Some fragments were added from a nitrate dupe negative preserved at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), and a nitrate dupe negative preserved at the Library of Congress.
The film reconstruction is based on David Shepard's extensive research on the Chaplin Archive, while the main title's logo has been reconstructed from the original title taking from the film Work (1915).
Intertitles have been reconstructed according to David Shepard's reconstruction with a neutral font.