April 2011
Growing up British-Re-living a Lost Childhood at London`s Mediatheque Southbank`
In the old days, when Hollywood signed a foreign star and evolved a big buildup to their career, it was possible to obscure any past characteristics and/or involvements. Even when the Americans signed Hugh Laurie as the eponymous MD in `House` the publicity concealed British origins and referred to him as `having grown up in Britan`. The suggestion was that his parents were Americans (wrong) and were living abroad when he was growing up (also wrong) There was also no mention of partner Stephen Fry, as it was possibly felt the link would tarnish the star`s macho image.
The same motif was played out when Hollywood wanted Dudley Moore. It took Moore a long time before he made the break with Peter Cook and when he did- wow! He shot to fame in `Foul Play` (outdistancing Chevy Chase) and `Arthur` with Liza Minnelli.
With the advent of the BFI Mediatheque it is quite possible to research a star`s origins online, thus dispelling some of the manipulation by Hollywood.
This is not as naive as it sounds as many top British stars have been groomed and publicised in ways which dramatically differ from origins.
Take a look at Vivien Leigh as a supporting player in the Gracie Fields`s film, `Look up and Laugh`. This was Vivien before Alexander Korda and David Selznick moulded her for stardom as possibly the greatest female screen heroine of all time- Scarlett O`Hara in `Gone With the Wind`.
The Vivien Leigh of `Look Up and Laugh` is skinny, chinless and lacking pulchritude (no breasts) So what happened? Hormones? Possibly, as well as a chin implant and some very good dental work.
It`s quite wrong to believe the British are too good for it. The British are as covetous- as keen to be groomed- as anyone else.
On the look-out for a young Vivien Leigh to star in `National Velvet`, MGM`s LB Mayer told Elizabeth Taylor she was perfect but too short. Elizabeth has always said she `willed` herself to grow taller (in two months). Huh? What tosh! Vitamins and/or hormones probably did the trick.
The same could be implied about Richard Burton. In his first film appearance in Emlyn Williams 1844 `The Last Days of Dolwyn` Burton is unrecognizable as a spindly Welsh lad with a lantern jaw, rugged nose and crooked teeth.
The star of the film was Edith Evans who played his adopted mother and who played again with Burton ten years later (but this time in a supporting role) when he made `Look Back in Anger` with Claire Bloom. By then he was a star.
By this time Burton`s teeth had been capped, his features standardized and his voice transformed into that Shakespearean burr we associate with Burton. His screen presence shifted dramatically and instead of the lanky wet we met in `The Last Days of Dolwyn` we see a macho hunk who suggests steroids and Viagra.
What price Hollywood eh?
Sally Ann Howes was a precocious teenager in `Halfway House` who didn`t want her parents to divorce. Her ingenuous good looks had an equine, aristocratic quality. By the time Howes hit the big time the horsey face had been re-fashioned into something infinitely more average.
Madelaine Carroll is another casualty of the Hollywood makeover. Described by Alfred Hitchcock who cast her in `The 39 Steps` (1935) as `the Birmingham tart` and/or `the iceberg`, Carroll is much hotter in the early British films where she resembles Lynn Redgrave. In `The First Born`, a 1928 silent film, Carroll is a brunette whose features had not yet been streamlined. She is also considerably plumper than she later became and has a buoyant, bouncy personality.
Whilst sister Joan was already a polished Rank actress Jackie struggled along in bit parts for years. She plays an English girl in Alvin Rakoff`s 1958 `Passport to Shame`. The film deals with prostitution, exploitation of women and transformation. One girl, victimized because of beauty, commits suicide. Precisely when and/or why Jackie opted for change I do not know but it may have had something to do with Marlon Brando`s support of her careeer and the onerous demands made by Hollywood. Sister Joan fared better, endured less sexual harassment. Superstar Paul Newman remained a staunch lifelong supporter and without making unfair demands on the actress.
Sister of the Ostrer Brothers who owned Gaumont-British film studios, Pamela Ostrer (Kellino-Mason) was cast as the exiled daughter in `Jew Suss`. It is a role and a performance which should have won her a BAFTA. Typically however fame beckons and actors believe they must transform themselves. Pamela Mason was no different. She became the emblem of bossy British womanhood- a pert, blonde Anglo-Saxon chat show hostess on American tv.
Husband James Mason was another makeover. This took me by surprise when discovered as Mason (chin, teeth and voice) was my absolute role-model and that too of my mother. Thus it took about forty minutes for me to realise that James Mason really appears in `The High Command` (1937) except without chin and/or rasping voice.
Peter O`Toole is another casualty of the star system. A larky, hunky Irish player in the days before Hollywood he looked not unlike Michael Caine: a curly-headed, rugged-faced Irishman. Hair, teeth and symmetry changes streamlined O`Toole who also lost about seventy pounds. Any hint of an accent was erased and his voice was cultivated with RP (received pronunciation)
So does it always work? Sadly no! Caine and O`Toole shot to stardom but others who conformed failed to do so. I interviewed Lulu in the Sixties when she appeared in `To Sir with Love`. Lulu has maintained a career at a certain level over a considerable time period. That said, I don`t think she`s a great star (she`s no Elaine Paige) and thus she has got as much as she deserves. Maybe more.
On the other hand, Patricia Routledge has got much less than she deserves. Following a supporting role as high school teacher in a troubled East London school (`To Sir with Love`) Routledge accommodated the system by submitting to certain physical changes. The fact is however the changes didn`t produce instant stardom or whatever it was that Columbia Pictures (who produced the film) might have promised. As a matter of fact, Routledge- who was and is a womanly woman- was always cast as an ugly duckling. I recall one tv show where she plays the daughter of Pat Hayes (a plain old biddy) who bullies the heart out of the girl in the course of the show.
When Routledge was suggested to play Mrs. Lovett in Sondheim`s `Sweeney Todd` the lyricist-composer objected she was too plain. One wonders if Sondheim saw Tod Slaughter`s performance in the old British film as the demon barber of Fleet Street and that of the actress who was cast as Mrs. Lovett?
So what`s the upshot? Sadder but wiser? I don`t think so. Those who follow have not learned from our mistakes. They want to make their own mistakes. Thus deception and deceit are passed from generation to generation. Sadly!
BFI Associate Tutor Sandra Shevey runs film/literary London walks. For more information visit her site
Copyright 2011 Sandra Shevey All Rights Reserved
Growing up British-Re-living a Lost Childhood at London`s Mediatheque Southbank`
In the old days, when Hollywood signed a foreign star and evolved a big buildup to their career, it was possible to obscure any past characteristics and/or involvements. Even when the Americans signed Hugh Laurie as the eponymous MD in `House` the publicity concealed British origins and referred to him as `having grown up in Britan`. The suggestion was that his parents were Americans (wrong) and were living abroad when he was growing up (also wrong) There was also no mention of partner Stephen Fry, as it was possibly felt the link would tarnish the star`s macho image.
The same motif was played out when Hollywood wanted Dudley Moore. It took Moore a long time before he made the break with Peter Cook and when he did- wow! He shot to fame in `Foul Play` (outdistancing Chevy Chase) and `Arthur` with Liza Minnelli.
With the advent of the BFI Mediatheque it is quite possible to research a star`s origins online, thus dispelling some of the manipulation by Hollywood.
This is not as naive as it sounds as many top British stars have been groomed and publicised in ways which dramatically differ from origins.
Take a look at Vivien Leigh as a supporting player in the Gracie Fields`s film, `Look up and Laugh`. This was Vivien before Alexander Korda and David Selznick moulded her for stardom as possibly the greatest female screen heroine of all time- Scarlett O`Hara in `Gone With the Wind`.
The Vivien Leigh of `Look Up and Laugh` is skinny, chinless and lacking pulchritude (no breasts) So what happened? Hormones? Possibly, as well as a chin implant and some very good dental work.
It`s quite wrong to believe the British are too good for it. The British are as covetous- as keen to be groomed- as anyone else.
On the look-out for a young Vivien Leigh to star in `National Velvet`, MGM`s LB Mayer told Elizabeth Taylor she was perfect but too short. Elizabeth has always said she `willed` herself to grow taller (in two months). Huh? What tosh! Vitamins and/or hormones probably did the trick.
The same could be implied about Richard Burton. In his first film appearance in Emlyn Williams 1844 `The Last Days of Dolwyn` Burton is unrecognizable as a spindly Welsh lad with a lantern jaw, rugged nose and crooked teeth.
The star of the film was Edith Evans who played his adopted mother and who played again with Burton ten years later (but this time in a supporting role) when he made `Look Back in Anger` with Claire Bloom. By then he was a star.
By this time Burton`s teeth had been capped, his features standardized and his voice transformed into that Shakespearean burr we associate with Burton. His screen presence shifted dramatically and instead of the lanky wet we met in `The Last Days of Dolwyn` we see a macho hunk who suggests steroids and Viagra.
What price Hollywood eh?
Sally Ann Howes was a precocious teenager in `Halfway House` who didn`t want her parents to divorce. Her ingenuous good looks had an equine, aristocratic quality. By the time Howes hit the big time the horsey face had been re-fashioned into something infinitely more average.
Madelaine Carroll is another casualty of the Hollywood makeover. Described by Alfred Hitchcock who cast her in `The 39 Steps` (1935) as `the Birmingham tart` and/or `the iceberg`, Carroll is much hotter in the early British films where she resembles Lynn Redgrave. In `The First Born`, a 1928 silent film, Carroll is a brunette whose features had not yet been streamlined. She is also considerably plumper than she later became and has a buoyant, bouncy personality.
Whilst sister Joan was already a polished Rank actress Jackie struggled along in bit parts for years. She plays an English girl in Alvin Rakoff`s 1958 `Passport to Shame`. The film deals with prostitution, exploitation of women and transformation. One girl, victimized because of beauty, commits suicide. Precisely when and/or why Jackie opted for change I do not know but it may have had something to do with Marlon Brando`s support of her careeer and the onerous demands made by Hollywood. Sister Joan fared better, endured less sexual harassment. Superstar Paul Newman remained a staunch lifelong supporter and without making unfair demands on the actress.
Sister of the Ostrer Brothers who owned Gaumont-British film studios, Pamela Ostrer (Kellino-Mason) was cast as the exiled daughter in `Jew Suss`. It is a role and a performance which should have won her a BAFTA. Typically however fame beckons and actors believe they must transform themselves. Pamela Mason was no different. She became the emblem of bossy British womanhood- a pert, blonde Anglo-Saxon chat show hostess on American tv.
Husband James Mason was another makeover. This took me by surprise when discovered as Mason (chin, teeth and voice) was my absolute role-model and that too of my mother. Thus it took about forty minutes for me to realise that James Mason really appears in `The High Command` (1937) except without chin and/or rasping voice.
Peter O`Toole is another casualty of the star system. A larky, hunky Irish player in the days before Hollywood he looked not unlike Michael Caine: a curly-headed, rugged-faced Irishman. Hair, teeth and symmetry changes streamlined O`Toole who also lost about seventy pounds. Any hint of an accent was erased and his voice was cultivated with RP (received pronunciation)
So does it always work? Sadly no! Caine and O`Toole shot to stardom but others who conformed failed to do so. I interviewed Lulu in the Sixties when she appeared in `To Sir with Love`. Lulu has maintained a career at a certain level over a considerable time period. That said, I don`t think she`s a great star (she`s no Elaine Paige) and thus she has got as much as she deserves. Maybe more.
On the other hand, Patricia Routledge has got much less than she deserves. Following a supporting role as high school teacher in a troubled East London school (`To Sir with Love`) Routledge accommodated the system by submitting to certain physical changes. The fact is however the changes didn`t produce instant stardom or whatever it was that Columbia Pictures (who produced the film) might have promised. As a matter of fact, Routledge- who was and is a womanly woman- was always cast as an ugly duckling. I recall one tv show where she plays the daughter of Pat Hayes (a plain old biddy) who bullies the heart out of the girl in the course of the show.
When Routledge was suggested to play Mrs. Lovett in Sondheim`s `Sweeney Todd` the lyricist-composer objected she was too plain. One wonders if Sondheim saw Tod Slaughter`s performance in the old British film as the demon barber of Fleet Street and that of the actress who was cast as Mrs. Lovett?
So what`s the upshot? Sadder but wiser? I don`t think so. Those who follow have not learned from our mistakes. They want to make their own mistakes. Thus deception and deceit are passed from generation to generation. Sadly!
BFI Associate Tutor Sandra Shevey runs film/literary London walks. For more information visit her site
Copyright 2011 Sandra Shevey All Rights Reserved
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