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Michael Elphick
Michael John Elphick (19 September 1946 – 7 September 2002) was an English film and television actor. He played the eponymous private investigator in the ITV series ''Boon'' and Harry Slater in BBC's ''EastEnders''. He was nominated for a BAFTA Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance in the 1983 film '' Gorky Park''. In his prime, Elphick always looked older than he was, and with his gruff Sussex accent and lip-curling sneer he often played menacing hard men. Elphick struggled with a highly publicised addiction to alcohol; at the height of his problem he admitted to consuming two litres of spirits a day, which contributed to his death from a heart attack in 2002. Early life Elphick grew up in Chichester, Sussex, where his family had a butcher's shop. He was educated at Lancastrian Secondary Modern Boys School in Chichester, where he took part in several school productions including ''Noah'' and ''A Midsummer Night's Dream''. He initially considered joinin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Boon (TV Series)
''Boon'' is a British television drama starring Michael Elphick, David Daker, and later Neil Morrissey. It was created by Jim Hill and Bill Stair and filmed by Central Television for ITV, and was originally broadcast between 1986 and 1995. It revolved around the life of an ex-fireman called Ken Boon. - a motorcycle-obsessed small time businessman who at the same time acts as a private investigator, bodyguard and general troubleshooter. Since 16 January 2017 it has been rerun on UKTV channel Drama. The show was memorable for its theme tune - Hi Ho Silver by Scottish singer Jim Diamond, which became a major UK top ten hit single in 1986. Premise Ken Boon (Elphick) and Harry Crawford (Daker) are both old-fashioned 'smokeys' (firemen) in the West Midlands Fire Service. In episode 1 Crawford takes early retirement and moves to Spain to open a bar, leaving Ken behind. Ken attends a house fire in which a child is trapped upstairs. Realising that he must act quickly, he goes into t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
British Merchant Navy
The Merchant Navy is the maritime register of the United Kingdom and comprises the seagoing commercial interests of UK-registered ships and their crews. Merchant Navy vessels fly the Red Ensign and are regulated by the Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA). King George V bestowed the title of "Merchant Navy" on the British merchant shipping fleets following their service in the First World War; a number of other nations have since adopted the title. Previously it had been known as the Mercantile Marine or Merchant Service, although the term "Merchant Navy" was already informally used from the 19th century. History The Merchant Navy has been in existence for a significant period in English and British history, owing its growth to trade and imperial expansion. It can be dated back to the 17th century, when an attempt was made to register all seafarers as a source of labour for the Royal Navy in times of conflict. That registration of merchant seafarers failed, and it was not s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The First Great Train Robbery
''The First Great Train Robbery'' (known in the United States as ''The Great Train Robbery'') is a 1978 Irish heist comedy film directed by Michael Crichton, who also wrote the screenplay based on his 1975 novel '' The Great Train Robbery''. The film stars Sean Connery, Donald Sutherland and Lesley-Anne Down. Plot In 1855 Edward Pierce, seemingly a charismatic member of London's high society, is secretly a master thief. He plans to steal a monthly shipment of gold from the London to Folkestone train which is meant as payment for British troops fighting in the Crimean War. The gold is heavily guarded in two heavy safes in the baggage car, each of which has two locks, requiring a total of four keys. Pierce recruits Robert Agar, a pickpocket and screwsman. Pierce's mistress Miriam (Lesley-Anne Down) and his chauffeur Barlow (George Downing) join the plot, and a train guard, Burgess, is bribed into participation. The executives of the bank who arrange the gold transport, the ma ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hamlet
''The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark'', often shortened to ''Hamlet'' (), is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play, with 29,551 words. Set in Denmark, the play depicts Prince Hamlet and his attempts to exact revenge against his uncle, Claudius, who has murdered Hamlet's father in order to seize his throne and marry Hamlet's mother. ''Hamlet'' is considered among the "most powerful and influential tragedies in the English language", with a story capable of "seemingly endless retelling and adaptation by others". There are many works that have been pointed to as possible sources for Shakespeare's play—from ancient Greek tragedies to Elizabethan plays. The editors of the Arden Shakespeare question the idea of "source hunting", pointing out that it presupposes that authors always require ideas from other works for their own, and suggests that no author can have an original idea or be an originator. When ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tony Richardson
Cecil Antonio "Tony" Richardson (5 June 1928 – 14 November 1991) was an English theatre and film director and producer whose career spanned five decades. In 1964, he won the Academy Award for Best Director for the film ''Tom Jones (1963 film), Tom Jones''. Early life Richardson was born in Shipley, West Yorkshire, Shipley, West Riding of Yorkshire in 1928, the son of Elsie Evans (Campion) and Clarence Albert Richardson, a chemist. He was head girl and head boy, Head Boy at Ashville College, Harrogate and attended Wadham College, University of Oxford. His Oxford contemporaries included Rupert Murdoch, Margaret Thatcher, Kenneth Tynan, Lindsay Anderson and Gavin Lambert. He had the unprecedented distinction of being the President of both the Oxford University Dramatic Society and the Experimental Theatre Club (the ETC), in addition to being the theatre critic for the university magazine ''Isis magazine, Isis''. Those he cast in his student productions included Shirley William ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
First World War
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fighting occurring throughout Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Pacific, and parts of Asia. An estimated 9 million soldiers were killed in combat, plus another 23 million wounded, while 5 million civilians died as a result of military action, hunger, and disease. Millions more died in genocides within the Ottoman Empire and in the 1918 influenza pandemic, which was exacerbated by the movement of combatants during the war. Prior to 1914, the European great powers were divided between the Triple Entente (comprising France, Russia, and Britain) and the Triple Alliance (containing Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Italy). Tensions in the Balkans came to a head on 28 June 1914, following the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdina ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Guardian
''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Guardian Media Group, owned by the Scott Trust. The trust was created in 1936 to "secure the financial and editorial independence of ''The Guardian'' in perpetuity and to safeguard the journalistic freedom and liberal values of ''The Guardian'' free from commercial or political interference". The trust was converted into a limited company in 2008, with a constitution written so as to maintain for ''The Guardian'' the same protections as were built into the structure of the Scott Trust by its creators. Profits are reinvested in journalism rather than distributed to owners or shareholders. It is considered a newspaper of record in the UK. The editor-in-chief Katharine Viner succeeded Alan Rusbridger in 2015. Since 2018, the paper's main news ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Swiss Cottage
Swiss Cottage is an area of Hampstead in the London Borough of Camden, England. It is centred on the junction of Avenue Road and Finchley Road and includes Swiss Cottage tube station. Swiss Cottage lies north-northwest of Charing Cross. The area was named after a public house in the centre of it, known as "Ye Olde Swiss Cottage". History Toponymy According to the ''Dictionary of London Place Names'' (2001), the district is named after an inn called ''The Swiss Tavern'' that was built in 1804 in the style of a Swiss chalet on the site of a former tollgate keeper's cottage, and later renamed ''Swiss Inn'' and in the early 20th century ''Swiss Cottage''. Urban development The district formed part of the ancient parish of Hampstead. It developed following the Finchley Road Act 1826, which authorised construction of Finchley New Road and Avenue Road, with ''The Swiss Tavern'' built at the junction of the new roads. The former Swiss Cottage station was opened by the Metr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Central School Of Speech And Drama
The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama was founded by Elsie Fogerty in 1906, as The Central School of Speech Training and Dramatic Art, to offer a new form of training in speech and drama for young actors and other students. It became a constituent college of the University of London in 2005 and is a member of Conservatoires UK and the Federation of Drama Schools. Courses The school offers undergraduate, postgraduate, research degrees and short courses in acting, actor training, applied theatre, theatre crafts and making, design, drama therapy, movement, musical theatre, performance, producing, research, scenography, stage management, teacher training, technical arts, voice and writing. History In 2006, the Webber Douglas Academy of Dramatic Art was absorbed into Central. On 29 November 2012, the 'Royal' title was bestowed on the school by Queen Elizabeth II in recognition of its reputation as a "world-class institution for exceptional professional training in theatr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sybil Thorndike
Dame Agnes Sybil Thorndike, Lady Casson (24 October 18829 June 1976) was an English actress whose stage career lasted from 1904 to 1969. Trained in her youth as a concert pianist, Thorndike turned to the stage when a medical problem with her hands ruled out a musical career. She began her professional acting career with the company of the actor-manager Ben Greet, with whom she toured the US from 1904 to 1908. In Britain she played in old and new plays on tour and in the West End theatre, West End, often appearing with her husband, the actor and director Lewis Casson. She joined the the Old Vic, Old Vic company during the First World War, and in the early 1920s George Bernard Shaw, Bernard Shaw, impressed by seeing her in a tragedy, wrote ''Saint Joan (play), Saint Joan'' with her in mind. She starred in it with great success. She became known as Britain's leading tragedienne, but also appeared frequently in comedy. During the Second World War, Thorndike and her husband toured ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Michael Redgrave
Sir Michael Scudamore Redgrave CBE (20 March 1908 – 21 March 1985) was an English stage and film actor, director, manager and author. He received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance in ''Mourning Becomes Electra'' (1947), as well as two BAFTA nominations for Best British Actor for his performances in ''The Night My Number Came Up'' (1955) and ''Time Without Pity'' (1957). At the 4th Cannes Film Festival, he won Best Actor for his performance in '' The Browning Version'' (1951). Youth and education Redgrave was born in Bristol, England, the son of actress Margaret Scudamore and the silent film actor Roy Redgrave. Roy left when Redgrave was six months old to pursue a career in Australia. He died when Redgrave was 14. His mother subsequently married Captain James Anderson, a tea planter. Redgrave greatly disliked his stepfather. He studied at Clifton College and Magdalene College, Cambridge. Clifton College Theatre was opened in 1966 by Redg ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Laurence Olivier
Laurence Kerr Olivier, Baron Olivier (; 22 May 1907 – 11 July 1989) was an English actor and director who, along with his contemporaries Ralph Richardson and John Gielgud, was one of a trio of male actors who dominated the Theatre of the United Kingdom, British stage of the mid-20th century. He also worked in films throughout his career, playing more than fifty cinema roles. Late in his career, he had considerable success in television roles. His family had no theatrical connections, but Olivier's father, a clergyman, decided that his son should become an actor. After attending a drama school in London, Olivier learned his craft in a succession of acting jobs during the late 1920s. In 1930 he had his first important West End theatre, West End success in Noël Coward's ''Private Lives'', and he appeared in his first film. In 1935 he played in a celebrated production of ''Romeo and Juliet'' alongside Gielgud and Peggy Ashcroft, and by the end of the decade he was an establish ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
