WILTON – Classic silent film comedy, “The Gold Rush” starring Charlie Chaplin, will return to the big screen later this month in Wilton.

The screening will take place on Nov. 26 at 2 p.m. at the Town Hall Theatre, 40 Main St. in Wilton. Admission is free; donations are accepted, with $10 per person suggested to defray expenses.

The screening, the latest in the venue’s silent film series, will feature live accompaniment by Jeffrey Rapsis, a New Hampshire composer who specializes in creating music for silent films.

“The Gold Rush,” a 1925 landmark comedy and one of the top-grossing films of the silent era, finds Chaplin’s iconic Little Tramp character journeying to the frozen wastelands of Canada’s Yukon Territory. There as a prospector, the Tramp’s search for gold turns into a pursuit of romance, but with plenty of laughs along the way.

The film contains several famous scenes, both comical and dramatic, including a starving Chaplin, who is forced to eat his shoe for Thanksgiving dinner and a heart-breaking New Year’s Eve celebration.

As a comedian, Chaplin emerged as the first superstar in the early days of cinema. From humble beginnings as a musical hall entertainer in England, he came to Hollywood and used his talents to quickly rise to the pinnacle of stardom in the then-new medium of motion pictures. His popularity never waned and his image remains recognized around the world to this day.

“The Gold Rush,” regarded by many critics as Chaplin’s best film, is a prime example of his unique talent for combining slapstick comedy and intense dramatic emotion.

“‘The Gold Rush’ is still an effective tear-jerker,” said critic Eric Kohn of indieWIRE. “In the YouTube era, audiences — myself included — often anoint the latest sneezing panda phenomenon as comedic gold. Unless I’m missing something, however, nothing online has come close to matching the mixture of affectionate fragility and seamless comedic inspiration perfected by the Tramp.”

Rapsis, who uses original themes to improvise silent film scores, said the best silent film comedies often used visual humor to create laughter out of simple situations. Because of this, audiences continue to respond to them in the 21st century, especially if they’re presented as intended — with an audience and live music.

“These comedies were created to be shown on the big screen as a communal experience,” Rapsis said. “With an audience and live music, they still come to life as their creators intended them to. So this screening is a great chance to experience films that first caused people to fall in love with the movies,” he said.

Rapsis achieves a traditional movie score sound for silent film screenings by using a digital synthesizer that reproduces the texture of the full orchestra.

For additional information, call the theater at 603-654-3456.