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Miss London Ltd
''Miss London Ltd.'' is a 1943 British, black-and-white, comedy, musical, war film, directed by Val Guest and starring Arthur Askey and Evelyn Dall. It was produced by Edward Black, Maurice Ostrer, Fred Gunn and Gainsborough Pictures. Plot This musical comedy playing in wartime London, stars Arthur Askey as Arthur Boden alias Miss London, the name of the escort agency he inherited from his mother. Soon he is joined by his new American partner, Terry Arden (Evelyn Dall), as she inherited the other half of the Agency from her parents, who just arrived from abroad. The first thing she accomplishes is to clean up the office, together with her partner. Then they have to renew the files of escort-Ladies. In order to do so, each of them goes searching in different places. Arthur Boden is assigned to the railway station and finally he finds railway clerk Gail Martin ( Anne Shelton) to hire. The opening sequence of the film features the latter singing "The 8.50 Choo Choo For Waterlo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Val Guest
Val Guest (born Valmond Maurice Grossman; 11 December 1911 – 10 May 2006) was an English film director and screenwriter. Beginning as a writer (and later director) of comedy films, he is best known for his work for Hammer, for whom he directed 14 films, and science fiction films. He enjoyed a long career in the film industry from the early 1930s until the early 1980s. Reprinted from ''Reference Guide to British and Irish Film Directors'' Early life and career Guest was born to John Simon Grossman and Julia Ann Gladys Emanuel in Maida Vale, London. He later changed his name to Val Guest (officially in 1939). His father was a jute broker, and the family spent some of Guest's childhood in India before returning to England. His parents divorced when he was young, but this information was kept from him. Instead he was told that his mother had died. He was educated at Seaford College in Sussex, but left in 1927 and worked for a time as a bookkeeper. Guest's initial career was as a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ronald Shiner
Ronald Alfred Shiner (8 June 1903 – 29 June 1966) was a British stand-up comedian and comedy actor whose career encompassed film, West End theatre and music hall. Career Early life and career When he was seventeen, Shiner joined the Royal North-West Mounted Police, after which he became a signalman and a wireless operator, then a farmer. He also worked as a greengrocer, milkman and book makers clerk. He served for three years in the British Army. Army concerts gave him a taste for the stage. He made his stage debut in 1928 in ''Dr Syn'' and the following year became a stage director at the Stage Society. During the early 1930s he appeared in a number of West End plays at the Whitehall Theatre by Walter C. Hackett including '' Good Losers'', '' Take a Chance'', '' Afterwards'' and '' Road House''. Film extra Shiner's first film was '' Wild Boy'' (1934) with Sonnie Hale and Flanagan & Allen. He had support roles in '' My Old Dutch'' (1934), '' Doctor's Orders'' (1934) and ''I ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1943 Films
The year 1943 in film featured various significant events for the film industry. Top-grossing films (U.S.) The top ten 1943 released films by box office gross in North America are as follows: Events * January 23 – The film ''Casablanca'' is released nationally in the United States and becomes one of the top-grossing pictures of 1943. It goes on to win the Best Picture and Best Director awards at the 16th Academy Awards. * February 20 – American film studio executives agree to allow the United States Office of War Information to censor films. * June 1 – Veteran English stage and screen actor Leslie Howard dies at the age of 50 in the crash of BOAC Flight 777 off the coast of Galicia, Spain. While best remembered for his role as Ashley Wilkes in ''Gone with the Wind'', Howard had roles in many other notable films and was twice nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor. * November 23 – British Forces Broadcasting Service begins operation * December 31 – New York Ci ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Manning Sherwin
Manning Sherwin (January 4, 1902 – July 26, 1974) was an American composer. Born in Philadelphia, Sherwin attended Columbia University before embarking upon a long career in musical theatre and films. His most enduring composition is the music for "A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square", lyrics by Eric Maschwitz, written for ''New Faces'' in 1940. Another wartime success, published in 1939, was " Who's Taking You Home Tonight?", with lyrics by Tommie Connor. He settled in Britain in 1938, and contributed to George Posford's ''Magyar Melody''. His musical ''Sitting Pretty'', whose main hit was the duet "I'll Take a Little Time", was pulled early due to the outbreak of war, and he countered with ''Get A Load of This'' which achieved 698 West End performances (1941-3), ''Something in the Air'' (1943-4) (336 performances, plus 163 more in 1944-5), and '' Under the Counter'' (665 perfs in 1945-7). During the war he worked for British cinema, providing the music for hit wartime come ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Patricia Owens (actress)
Patricia Molly Owens (January 17, 1925 – August 31, 2000) was a Canadian-born American actress, working in Hollywood. She appeared in about 40 films and 10 television episodes in a career lasting from 1943 to 1968. Early work Owens moved to England in 1933 with her parents (her Welsh father Arthur Owens was later to become an MI5 double agent), and 10 years later, at age 18, she made her motion-picture debut in the musical comedy ''Miss London Ltd''. The following year, she had a small role in Harold French's social satire ''English Without Tears''. Her career continued in this manner for a few years, Owens getting ever-larger roles in movies. Her career received a boost when she was seen by a 20th Century Fox executive while performing in a stage production of ''Sabrina Fair'', and was offered a screen test. The result was a contract with the studio and a move to Hollywood. Her first American film was '' Island in the Sun'' (1957), followed by ''No Down Payment'', both fo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Virginia Keiley
Virginia Keiley (1918–1990) was a British actress. She began her career at Gainsborough Pictures appearing in a number of glamorous but small, sometimes uncredited roles in the studio's comedies and melodramas. After the Second World War she graduated to more substantial parts including playing the female lead in the 1951 Spanish comedy ''I Want to Marry You''.Lara & Rodríguez p.189 Her final screen appearance was in an episode of the British television series ''The Vise'' in 1959. Selected filmography * ''King Arthur Was a Gentleman'' (1942) * '' Rose of Tralee'' (1942) * ''Miss London Ltd.'' (1943) * ''It's That Man Again'' (1943) * '' Love Story'' (1944) * '' Fanny by Gaslight'' (1944) * ''Carnival'' (1946) * ''Nocturne'' (1946) * ''The Locket'' (1946) * ''If Winter Comes'' (1947) * ''Red, Hot and Blue'' (1949) * '' Fancy Pants'' (1950) * ''I Want to Marry You'' (1951) * '' The Night Is Ours'' (1953) * '' The Sparrows of Paris'' (1953) * '' Morning Call'' (1957) * ''Operatio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jean Kent
Jean Kent (born Joan Mildred Field; 29 June 1921 − 30 November 2013) was an English film and television actress. Biography Born Joan Mildred Field (sometimes incorrectly cited as Summerfield) in Brixton, London in 1921, the only child of variety performers Norman Field (né Summerfield) and Nina Norre ( Mildred Noaks), whose marriage was registered in 1925, according to the General Register Index of England and Wales. Kent started her theatrical career at age 10 in 1931 as a dancer. She used the stage name Jean Carr when she appeared as a chorus girl in the Windmill Theatre in London from which she was fired by Vivian Van Damm. Gainsborough Pictures She signed to Gainsborough Pictures during the Second World War. Kent had small roles in ''It's That Man Again'' (1943), ''Miss London Ltd.'' (1943) and ''Warn That Man'' (1944). Kent had a good role in ''Two Thousand Women'' (1944), playing a stripper who is interned by the Germans. She was a Pacific Islander in '' Bees in Para ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Peter Graves, 8th Baron Graves
Peter George Wellesley Graves, 8th Baron Graves (21 October 1911 – 6 June 1994) was an English actor. Born in London, Graves was the son of Henry Algernon Claude Graves, 7th Baron Graves. Admiral Thomas Graves, 1st Baron Graves, was his great-great-great-grandfather. He was educated at Harrow School. Biography Known during his acting career as Peter Graves, he specialised in light comedies and musicals, often cast as dapper young men about town. His career peaked in the mid-to-late 1940s, beginning with the films of director/writer Val Guest, including ''Miss London Ltd.'' (1943) and '' Bees in Paradise'' (1944), opposite Arthur Askey; and ''Give Us the Moon'' (1944) and ''I'll Be Your Sweetheart'' (1945), opposite Margaret Lockwood. Other roles included the lead in '' Spring Song'' (1946), and George IV in both ''The Laughing Lady'' (1946) and ''Mrs. Fitzherbert'' (1947). He also appeared in a number of films by Herbert Wilcox, such as the popular musicals ''Spring in Park ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jack Train
Jack Train (28 November 1902 – 19 December 1966) was a British comic actor best known for his appearances as a variety of eccentric characters in the BBC radio series ''It's That Man Again'' (''ITMA''). Life and career Train was born in Plymouth, Devon on 28 November 1902."Mr Jack Train", ''The Times'', 20 December 1966, p. 10 During his service in the Royal Navy in the First World War he began performing as an entertainer. Leslie Hore-Belisha, later Minister for War, saw his act when he was entertaining sailors at Devonport, advised him to turn professional and arranged an audition for him. In 1928 he made his first West End appearance, in a Herbert Farjeon revue called ''Many Happy Returns''. His only stage appearance in a serious play was in ''Journey's End'', after which he spent five years as the straight man to Nervo and Knox. He first broadcast in 1924 and was heard on the air frequently, mostly in light entertainment but from time to time in serious drama. In Octo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Max Bacon (actor)
Max David Bacon (1 March 1904, London, England – 3 December 1969, London, England) was a British actor, comedian and musician (drummer and occasional vocalist in Ambrose (bandleader), Ambrose's band). Although he was British-born, his comedic style centred on his pseudo-European, Yiddish accent and in his straight-faced mispronunciation of words. Biography Bacon's father came from a leather-working family to London from Katowice, then in Galicia (Eastern Europe), Galicia in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. In London, his father worked as a basket-weaver. Before becoming a character actor, Bacon was a drummer in Britain during the 1920s and 1930s. He was taught by the vocalist and drummer Harry Bentley. After a couple of years at the Florida Club with Ronnie Munro's band he began a long association with Ambrose (bandleader), Ambrose's Orchestra, with whom he recorded as drummer and occasionally as Yiddish vocalist. In the late 1930s he had become well known enough to tour the halls ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Richard Hearne
Richard Lewis Hearne (30 January 1908 – 23 August 1979) was an English actor, comedian, producer and writer. He is best remembered for his stage and television character Mr Pastry. Career Hearne was born in Norwich, Norfolk, in 1908, the son of Richard and Lily May Hearne. Richard senior came from a theatrical family – his mother had been on the stage and he himself was a performing acrobat. Hearne worked on and off for the BBC for thirty years; he became the first performer to be known as a "television star" and also the first to have his own television series. The series, with the theme tune "Pop Goes The Weasel", had episodes lasting 25 minutes in which Hearne assumed the character of "Mr Pastry" – an old man with a walrus moustache, dressed in a black suit or raincoat and with a trademark bowler hat. Each week, the bumbling old man would have adventures, partly slapstick, partly comic dance, with two young friends. Jon Pertwee also starred in the show in a variety of r ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Marx Brothers
The Marx Brothers were an American family comedy act that was successful in vaudeville, on Broadway, and in motion pictures from 1905 to 1949. Five of the Marx Brothers' thirteen feature films were selected by the American Film Institute (AFI) as among the top 100 comedy films, with two of them, '' Duck Soup'' (1933) and '' A Night at the Opera'' (1935), in the top fifteen. They are widely considered by critics, scholars and fans to be among the greatest and most influential comedians of the 20th century. The brothers were included in AFI's 100 Years... 100 Stars list of the 25 greatest male stars of Classical Hollywood cinema, the only performers to be included collectively. The brothers are almost universally known by their stage names: Chico, Harpo, Groucho, Gummo, and Zeppo. There was a sixth brother, the first born, named Manfred (Mannie), who died in infancy; Zeppo was given the middle name Manfred in his memory. The core of the act was the three elder brothers: C ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
