Dame Thora Hird was an English actress and comedian, presenter and writer. In a career spanning over 70 years, she appeared in more than 100 film and television roles, becoming a household name and a British institution.
This Sporting Life is a 1963 British kitchen sink drama film directed by Lindsay Anderson. Based on the 1960 novel of the same name by David Storey, which won the 1960 Macmillan Fiction Award, it recounts the story of a rugby league footballer, Frank Machin, in Wakefield, a mining city in Yorkshire, whose romantic life is not as successful as his sporting life. Storey, a former professional rugby league footballer, also wrote the screenplay.
Peter William Shorrocks Butterworth was an English actor and comedian, best known for his appearances in the Carry On series of films. He was also a regular on children's television and radio, and was known for playing The Monk in Doctor Who. Butterworth was married to the actress and impressionist Janet Brown.
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.
The British New Wave is a style of films released in Great Britain between 1959 and 1963. The label is a translation of Nouvelle Vague, the French term first applied to the films of François Truffaut, and Jean-Luc Godard among others.
Woman in a Dressing Gown is a 1957 British drama film directed by J. Lee Thompson and starring Yvonne Mitchell, Anthony Quayle, Sylvia Syms, and Carole Lesley. The film won four awards at the 7th Berlin International Film Festival including the first ever FIPRESCI Prize and a special mention for "Best Foreign Film". Mitchell won the Silver Bear for Best Actress. The film also won the 1958 Golden Globe Award for Best English-Language Foreign Film.
A Kind of Loving is a novel by the English novelist Stan Barstow. It has also been translated into a film of the same name, a television series, a radio play and a stage play.
June Ritchie is a British actress.
The Boys is a 1962 British courtroom drama film, directed by Sidney J. Furie and with a screenplay by Stuart Douglass.
Further Up the Creek is a 1958 British comedy film written and directed by Val Guest and starring David Tomlinson, Frankie Howerd, Shirley Eaton, Thora Hird, Desmond Llewelyn and Lionel Jeffries. It served as a follow up to Up the Creek, with Peter Sellers not reprising his role because it clashed with the filming of The Mouse That Roared. Frankie Howerd replaced him.
These Dangerous Years is a 1957 British drama musical film directed by Herbert Wilcox and starring George Baker, Frankie Vaughan, Carole Lesley, Thora Hird, Kenneth Cope, David Lodge and John Le Mesurier.
Anthony Sagar was an English character actor and a member of the National Theatre. He was prolific screen performer and appeared in many films and television series including the 1959 adaptation of The Moonstone, Steptoe and Son, The Avengers and Dad's Army.
Two Thousand Women is a 1944 British comedy-drama war film about a German internment camp in Occupied France which holds British women who have been resident in the country. Three RAF aircrewmen, whose bomber has been shot down, enter the camp and are hidden by the women from the Germans.
For Better, for Worse is a 1954 British comedy film in Eastmancolor directed by J. Lee Thompson and starring Dirk Bogarde, Susan Stephen and Cecil Parker. It was based on Arthur Watkyn's play of the same title which had run for over 500 performances in the West End starring Leslie Phillips and Geraldine McEwan. It was released in the United States as Cocktails in the Kitchen.
The Weaker Sex is a 1948 British drama film directed by Roy Ward Baker and starring Ursula Jeans, Cecil Parker and Joan Hopkins.
Just My Luck is a 1957 British sports comedy film directed by John Paddy Carstairs and starring Norman Wisdom as a worker in a jewellery shop. The cast also included Margaret Rutherford, Jill Dixon and Leslie Phillips. It was shot at Pinewood Studios near London with sets designed by the art director Ernest Archer.
Tread Softly Stranger is a 1958 British crime drama directed by Gordon Parry and starring Diana Dors, George Baker and Terence Morgan. The film was shot in black-and-white in film noir style, and its setting in an industrial town in northern England mirrors the kitchen sink realism movement coming into vogue in English drama and film at the time. The screenplay was adapted from the stage play Blind Alley (1953) by Jack Popplewell.
The Love Match is a 1955 British black and white comedy film directed by David Paltenghi and starring Arthur Askey, Glenn Melvyn, Thora Hird and Shirley Eaton. A football-mad railway engine driver and his fireman are desperate to get back in time to see a match. It was based on the 1953 play by Glenn Melvyn, one of the stars of the film. A TV spin-off series Love and Kisses, appeared later in 1955.
Rattle of a Simple Man is a 1964 British comedy-drama film directed by Muriel Box and starring Diane Cilento, Harry H. Corbett and Michael Medwin, based on the 1963 play by Charles Dyer. The screenplay is about a naive man who becomes involved with a prostitute.
A Boy, a Girl and a Bike is a 1949 British romantic comedy film directed by Ralph Smart and starring John McCallum, Honor Blackman and Patrick Holt. The film's art direction was by George Provis. The film concerns the romantic escapades and adventures of a Yorkshire cycling club.
