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James Donald (Papuan Politician)
James Donald (18 May 1917 – 3 August 1993) was a Scottish actor. Tall and thin, he specialised in playing authority figures, particularly military doctors. Early life Donald was born in Aberdeen, the fourth son of a Scottish Presbyterian minister. His mother died when he was 18 months old and his father remarried. Donald grew up in Galashiels and was educated at Rossall School on Lancashire's Fylde coast. He briefly attended McGill University in Montreal, but due to asthma, he transferred to the University of Edinburgh. Donald originally intended to be a teacher, but seeing Sir Cedric Hardwicke and Dame Edith Evans in ''The Late Christopher Bean'' made him decide to be an actor. He began seeing as many shows as possible and studied at the London Theatre Studio for two years. He made his stage debut in 1938 in ''The White Guard'' and he began to get work regularly on stage. He appeared in ''Twelfth Night'' with Michael Redgrave and understudied John Gielgud in ''King L ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aberdeen
Aberdeen (; sco, Aiberdeen ; gd, Obar Dheathain ; la, Aberdonia) is a city in North East Scotland, and is the third most populous city in the country. Aberdeen is one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas (as Aberdeen City), and has a population estimate of for the city of Aberdeen, and for the local council area making it the United Kingdom's 39th most populous built-up area. The city is northeast of Edinburgh and north of London, and is the northernmost major city in the United Kingdom. Aberdeen has a long, sandy coastline and features an oceanic climate, with cool summers and mild, rainy winters. During the mid-18th to mid-20th centuries, Aberdeen's buildings incorporated locally quarried grey granite, which may sparkle like silver because of its high mica content. Since the discovery of North Sea oil in 1969, Aberdeen has been known as the offshore oil capital of Europe. Based upon the discovery of prehistoric villages around the mouths of the rivers ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Gielgud
Sir Arthur John Gielgud, (; 14 April 1904 – 21 May 2000) was an English actor and theatre director whose career spanned eight decades. With Ralph Richardson and Laurence Olivier, he was one of the trinity of actors who dominated the British stage for much of the 20th century. A member of the Terry family theatrical dynasty, he gained his first paid acting work as a junior member of his cousin Phyllis Neilson-Terry's company in 1922. After studying at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art he worked in repertory theatre and in the West End theatre, West End before establishing himself at the Old Vic as an exponent of William Shakespeare, Shakespeare in 1929–31. During the 1930s Gielgud was a stage star in the West End and on Broadway theatre, Broadway, appearing in new works and classics. He began a parallel career as a director, and set up his own company at the Sondheim Theatre, Queen's Theatre, London. He was regarded by many as the finest Prince Hamlet, Hamlet of his era, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
L'Aigle à Deux Têtes
''L'Aigle à deux têtes'' is a French play in three acts by Jean Cocteau, written in 1943 and first performed in 1946. It is known variously in English as ''The Eagle with Two Heads'', ''The Eagle Has Two Heads'', ''The Two-Headed Eagle'', ''The Double-Headed Eagle'', and ''Eagle Rampant''. The title refers to the double-headed eagle of heraldry. Cocteau also directed a film of his play which appeared in 1948. Cocteau said that he took his inspiration for the play from the separate stories of Ludwig II of Bavaria and of the Empress Elisabeth of Austria. Ludwig was found drowned in Lake Starnberg in Bavaria in circumstances which have never been satisfactorily explained. Elisabeth was stabbed in the heart by an assassin while out walking in Geneva. For his portrait of the Queen, Cocteau drew upon the portrait of Elisabeth given by Remy de Gourmont in his ''Promenades littéraires''. He was also concerned to create characters which called for a grand style of acting in a tradit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Royal Army Service Corps
The Royal Army Service Corps (RASC) was a corps of the British Army responsible for land, coastal and lake transport, air despatch, barracks administration, the Army Fire Service, staffing headquarters' units, supply of food, water, fuel and domestic materials such as clothing, furniture and stationery and the supply of technical and military equipment. In 1965 its functions were divided between other Corps ( RCT and RAOC) and the RASC ceased to exist; subsequently, in 1993, they in their turn (with some functions of the Royal Engineers) became the "Forming Corps" of the Royal Logistic Corps. History For centuries, army transport was operated by contracted civilians. The first uniformed transport corps in the British Army was the Royal Waggoners formed in 1794. It was not a success and was disbanded the following year. In 1799, the Royal Waggon Corps was formed; by August 1802, it had been renamed the Royal Waggon Train. This was reduced to only two troops in 1818 and finally ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
British Army
The British Army is the principal land warfare force of the United Kingdom, a part of the British Armed Forces along with the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force. , the British Army comprises 79,380 regular full-time personnel, 4,090 Gurkhas, and 28,330 volunteer reserve personnel. The modern British Army traces back to 1707, with antecedents in the English Army and Scots Army that were created during the Restoration in 1660. The term ''British Army'' was adopted in 1707 after the Acts of Union between England and Scotland. Members of the British Army swear allegiance to the monarch as their commander-in-chief, but the Bill of Rights of 1689 and Claim of Right Act 1689 require parliamentary consent for the Crown to maintain a peacetime standing army. Therefore, Parliament approves the army by passing an Armed Forces Act at least once every five years. The army is administered by the Ministry of Defence and commanded by the Chief of the General Staff. The Brit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Noël Coward
Sir Noël Peirce Coward (16 December 189926 March 1973) was an English playwright, composer, director, actor, and singer, known for his wit, flamboyance, and what ''Time'' magazine called "a sense of personal style, a combination of cheek and chic, pose and poise"."Noel Coward at 70" ''Time'', 26 December 1969, p. 46 Coward attended a dance academy in London as a child, making his professional stage début at the age of eleven. As a teenager he was introduced into the high society in which most of his plays would be set. Coward achieved enduring success as a playwright, publishing more than 50 plays from his teens onwards. Many of his works, such as '' |
Present Laughter
''Present Laughter'' is a comic play written by Noël Coward in 1939 but not produced until 1942 because the Second World War began while it was in rehearsal, and the British theatres closed. The title is drawn from a song in Shakespeare's ''Twelfth Night'' that urges '' carpe diem'' ("present mirth hath present laughter"). The play has been frequently revived in Britain, the US and beyond. The plot depicts a few days in the life of the successful and self-obsessed light comedy actor Garry Essendine as he prepares to travel for a touring commitment in Africa. Amid a series of events bordering on farce, Garry has to deal with women who want to seduce him, placate both his long-suffering secretary and his wife, cope with a crazed young playwright, and overcome his impending mid-life crisis (he has recently turned forty). The character is a caricature of the author's real-life persona, as Coward acknowledged. Coward starred as Garry during the original run, which began with a lon ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Way Ahead
''The Way Ahead'' (also known as ''Immortal Battalion'') (1944) is a British Second World War drama film directed by Carol Reed. The screenplay was written by Eric Ambler and Peter Ustinov. The film stars David Niven, Stanley Holloway and William Hartnell along with an ensemble cast of other British actors, including Ustinov in one of his earliest roles. ''The Way Ahead'' follows a group of civilians who are conscripted into the British Army and, after training, are shipped to North Africa where they are involved in a battle against the Afrika Korps. Plot In the days after the Dunkirk evacuation in the Second World War, recently commissioned Second Lieutenant Jim Perry (Niven), a pre-war Territorial Army (United Kingdom), Territorial private (rank), private soldier, is posted to the (fictional) Duke of Glendon's Light Infantry, known as the "Dogs", to train replacements to fill its depleted ranks. He is joined by Sergeant Ned Fletcher (Hartnell), a veteran of the British Expedi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
San Demetrio London
''San Demetrio London'' is a 1943 British World War II docudrama based on the true story of the 1940 salvage of the tanker MV ''San Demetrio'' by some of her own crew, who reboarded her after she had been set on fire by the German heavy cruiser ''Admiral Scheer'' and then abandoned, during the Battle of the Atlantic. The film was produced by Michael Balcon for Ealing Studios and directed by Charles Frend. Plot The film is a reconstruction of the story of the salvage of the British tanker, MV ''San Demetrio''. Carrying a cargo of oil home from Galveston, Texas, she was abandoned by her crew having been set on fire by shells from the German cruiser ''Admiral Scheer''. Of the three lifeboats which escaped the damaged tanker, two were picked up by other ships. After drifting for three days, the occupants of the third, who included the chief engineer and the second officer, reboarded the burning ''San Demetrio'', extinguished the fires, and, having managed to restart the engines, r ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Went The Day Well?
''Went the Day Well?'' is a 1942 British war film adapted from a story by Graham Greene and directed by Alberto Cavalcanti. It was produced by Michael Balcon of Ealing Studios and served as unofficial propaganda for the war effort. The film shows a Southern English village taken over by German paratroopers, reflecting the greatest potential nightmare for the British public of the time, although the threat of German invasion had largely receded by that point. The film is notable for its unusually frank, for the time, depiction of ruthless violence. Plot The story is told in flashback by a villager (Mervyn Johns). During the Second World War, a group of seemingly authentic British soldiers arrive in the small, fictitious English village of Bramley End. It is the Whitsun weekend, life is even quieter than usual and there is almost no road traffic. At first they are welcomed by the villagers, until doubts set in about their true purpose and identity. After they are revealed to be Germ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
In Which We Serve
''In Which We Serve'' is a 1942 British patriotic war film directed by Noël Coward and David Lean. It was made during the Second World War with the assistance of the Ministry of Information (United Kingdom), Ministry of Information. The screenplay by Coward was inspired by the exploits of Captain Louis Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma, Lord Louis Mountbatten, who was in command of the destroyer when it was sunk during the Battle of Crete. Coward composed the film's music as well as starring in the film as the ship's captain. The film also starred John Mills, Bernard Miles, Celia Johnson and Richard Attenborough in his first screen role. ''In Which We Serve'' received the full backing of the Ministry of Information, which offered advice on what would make good propaganda and facilitated the release of military personnel. The film is a classic example of wartime British cinema through its patriotic imagery of national unity and social cohesion within the context of t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alibi (1942 Film)
''Alibi'' is a 1942 British mystery film directed by Brian Desmond Hurst and starring Margaret Lockwood, James Mason and Hugh Sinclair. It was based on the novel ''L'Alibi'' by Marcel Achard. Premise Police hunt for the killer of a nightclub hostess in pre-war Paris. Cast * Margaret Lockwood as Helene Ardouin * Hugh Sinclair as Inspector Calas * James Mason as Andre Laurent * Raymond Lovell as Prof. Winkler * Enid Stamp-Taylor as Dany * Hartley Power as Gordon * Jane Carr as Delia * Edana Romney as Winkler's Assistant * Rodney Ackland as Winker's Assistant * Elisabeth Welch as Singer * Olga Lindo as Mlle. Loureau * Muriel George as Mme. Bretonnet * George Merritt as Bourdille * Judy Gray as Josette * Philip Leaver as Dodo Production Lockwood had just given birth to her daughter. It was the first time Lockwood worked with James Mason. She said Mason wanted star billing and was unhappy at being given feature billing. She said the film "was anything but a success ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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