''Friends and Neighbours'' is a 1959 British
comedy film
A comedy film is a category of film which emphasizes humor. These films are designed to make the audience laugh through amusement. Films in this style traditionally have a happy ending (black comedy being an exception). Comedy is one of the ol ...
directed by
Gordon Parry and starring
Arthur Askey
Arthur Bowden Askey, (6 June 1900 – 16 November 1982) was an English comedian and actor. Askey was known for his short stature (5' 2", 1.58 m) and distinctive horn-rimmed glasses, and his playful humour incorporating improvisation ...
,
Megs Jenkins
Muguette Mary "Megs" Jenkins (21 April 1917 – 5 October 1998) was an English character actress who appeared in British films and television programmes.
Life and career
Jenkins was born in Birkenhead, Cheshire, the daughter of a construction ...
and
Peter Illing
Peter Illing (4 March 1899 – 29 October 1966) was an Austrian-born British film and television actor.
Selected TV series
* ''Deadline Midnight'' (1961) as Captain Dnieprovsky
* ''The Saint'' (1962) as Inspector Buono
Filmography
* ''The Silv ...
.
BFI.org
/ref>
Plot
At the height of the Cold War
The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because the ...
, a working-class British family have to entertain two visitors from Russia.
Cast
* Arthur Askey
Arthur Bowden Askey, (6 June 1900 – 16 November 1982) was an English comedian and actor. Askey was known for his short stature (5' 2", 1.58 m) and distinctive horn-rimmed glasses, and his playful humour incorporating improvisation ...
... Albert Grimshaw
* Megs Jenkins
Muguette Mary "Megs" Jenkins (21 April 1917 – 5 October 1998) was an English character actress who appeared in British films and television programmes.
Life and career
Jenkins was born in Birkenhead, Cheshire, the daughter of a construction ...
... Lily Grimshaw
* Peter Illing
Peter Illing (4 March 1899 – 29 October 1966) was an Austrian-born British film and television actor.
Selected TV series
* ''Deadline Midnight'' (1961) as Captain Dnieprovsky
* ''The Saint'' (1962) as Inspector Buono
Filmography
* ''The Silv ...
... Nukita
* Tilda Thamar
Tilda Thamar (born Matilde Sofía Margarita Abrecht; 7 December 1921 – 12 April 1989) was an Argentine actor. She was born in Entre Rios Province, Argentina, in 1921. She was married to Spanish portrait painter Alejo Vidal-Quadras and divorced ...
... Olga
* Reginald Beckwith
William Reginald Beckwith (2 November 190826 June 1965) was an English film and television actor, who made over one hundred film and television appearances in his
career. He died of a heart attack aged 56.
Beckwith was also a film critic and ...
... Wilf Holmes
* June Whitfield
Dame June Rosemary Whitfield (11 November 1925 – 29 December 2018) was an English radio, television, and film actress.
Her big break was a lead in the radio comedy ''Take It from Here'', which aired on the BBC Light Programme in 1953. ...
... Doris Holmes
* Danny Ross ... Sebastian Green
* Catherine Feller
Catherine Feller (born 1939) is a British actress and educator. She is perhaps best known for her role as Oliver Reed's love interest in the Hammer Film Productions' ''The Curse of the Werewolf'' (1961). She appeared in '' Waltz of the Toreador ...
... Susan Grimshaw
* Jess Conrad
Jess Conrad (born Gerald Arthur James; 24 February 1936) is an English stage and screen actor and singer. As a boy he was nicknamed "Jesse" after American outlaw Jesse James; as there was already an actor named "Gerald James" in Actors' Equity, a ...
... Buddy Fisher
* George A. Cooper
George Alphonsus Cooper (7 March 1925 – 16 November 2018)
was an English actor and voice artist. He died in November 2018 at the age of 93.
Early life
Cooper was born in Leeds, the son of William and Eleanor (née Dobson) Cooper. His father ...
... Wheeler, George
* Max Robertson
William Maxwell Robertson (28 August 1915 – 20 November 2009) was a sports commentator, radio and television presenter and author. He is best remembered for his forty years of tennis coverage on BBC Radio.
Life and career
Robertson was ...
... TV announcer
* Arthur Howard
Arthur Howard (born Arthur John Steiner; 18 January 1910 – 18 June 1995) was an English stage, film and television actor.
Life and career
Born in Camberwell, London, Howard was the younger son of Lilian (née Blumberg) and Ferdinand "Frank" ...
... Rev. Dobson
* Eynon Evans
Evan Eynon Evans (18 May 1904 – 1989) billed as Eynon Evans and also known as E. Eynon Rees, was a Welsh writer and film actor of the 1950s, mainly known for his radio and television work. During the 1940s he appeared on the BBC radio vari ...
... Shopkeeper
* Linda Castle ... Gloria Stockwell
* Ken Parry
Ken Parry (20 June 1930 – 5 December 2007), was an English actor, born in Wigan, Lancashire. Bald, portly and cherubic, Parry portrayed mainly comic character parts in a number of films, but was more prolific on television, in such series as ''Th ...
... Sid
* Steven Scott ... Bus superintendent
* Richard Walter ... Bus inspector
* Donald Bisset
Donald Bisset (30 August 1910 – 10 August 1995), was an English actor. He also wrote stories for children which he mostly illustrated himself. They have been translated into 16 languages.
Selected filmography
* ''Murder in the Cathedral'' ...
... Porter
* Anatole Smirnoff ... Russian embassy official
* Laurence Herder ... 1st Russian
* Paul Bogdan ... 2nd Russian
* Alan Scott ... 3rd Russian
* Dudley Jones ... Sam
* Robert Checksfield ... Policeman
* Ruth Kettlewell
Ruth Kettlewell (born Ruth Anne Berry, 13 April 1913 – 17 July 2007) was an English actress. She was, by her own admission, a "character bag"; that is, a face recognisable to regular television viewers, but not a household name.
Early life
Ke ...
... Woman in club
* Camilla Hasse ... 1st Girl
* Julia Sutton ... 2nd Girl
* Pauline Shepherd ... 3rd Girl
* Judy Cornwell
Judy Valerie Cornwell (born 22 February 1940) is an English actress and writer best known for her role as Daisy in the successful British sitcom ''Keeping Up Appearances'' (1990–1995). She also played Anya Claus in '' Santa Claus: The Movie ...
... 4th Girl
References
External links
*
1959 films
Films directed by Gordon Parry
1959 comedy films
British comedy films
British films based on plays
1950s English-language films
1950s British films
{{1950s-UK-comedy-film-stub