Designing Women is a 1947 British short film produced by the Central Office of Information for the Council for Industrial Design. It was written by Roger MacDougall based on work by Stephen Potter and Joyce Grenfell, and featured Grenfell, Audrey Fildes, Harry Geldard and Joy Shelton. [1]
The film was part of a project in which the Council for Industrial Design hoped to reach and influence consumers through film and television. [2]
A newly-wed couple unpack their collection of wedding presents, and are visited by two "toga-clad goddesses": Miss Arty (Grenfell) whose visiting card describes her as "assistant in helping you know what she likes" and Miss Design (Fildes), "assistant in helping you know what you like". The quartet discuss various gifts ("Why should a heater look like a peacock?") and Miss Design produces a set of questions for consideration of any object: "Does it work? Is it genuine and well-made? Is it attractive?" [2]
Joyce Irene Grenfell OBE was an English diseuse, singer, actress and writer. She was known for the songs and monologues she wrote and performed, at first in revues and later in her solo shows. She never appeared as a stage actress, but had roles, mostly comic, in many films, including Miss Gossage in The Happiest Days of Your Life (1950) and Police Sergeant Ruby Gates in the St Trinian's series. She was a well-known broadcaster on radio and television. As a writer, she was the first radio critic for The Observer, contributed to Punch and published two volumes of memoirs.
Edith Head was an American costume designer who won a record eight Academy Awards for Best Costume Design between 1949 and 1973, making her the most awarded woman in the Academy's history. Head is considered to be one of the greatest and most influential costume designers in film history.
Sir Wilfred Thomason Grenfell was a British medical missionary to Newfoundland, who wrote books on his work and other topics.
The Pure Hell of St Trinian's is a 1960 British comedy film set in the fictional St Trinian's School. Directed by Frank Launder and written by him and Sidney Gilliat, it was the third in a series of four films.
The Belles of St Trinian's is a 1954 British comedy film, directed by Frank Launder, co-written by Launder and Sidney Gilliat, and starring Alastair Sim, Joyce Grenfell, George Cole, Hermione Baddeley. Inspired by British cartoonist Ronald Searle's St Trinian's School comic strips, the film focuses on the lives of the students and teachers of the fictional school, dealing with attempts to shut them down while their headmistress faces issues with financial troubles, which culminates in the students thwarting a scheme involving a racehorse.
Blue Murder at St Trinian's is a 1957 British comedy film, directed by Frank Launder, co-written by Launder and Sidney Gilliat, and starring Terry-Thomas, George Cole, Joyce Grenfell, Lionel Jeffries and Richard Wattis; the film also includes a brief cameo of Alastair Sim, who reprising his lead role in the 1954 film, The Belles of St. Trinian's. Inspired by the St Trinian's School comic strips by British cartoonist Ronald Searle, the film is the second entry in the St. Trinian's film series, with its plot seeing the students of the fictional school making plans to secure a place on a European tour, all while subsequently aiding a criminal who is secretly seeking to escape the country with stolen jewels.
The Happiest Days of Your Life is a 1950 British comedy film directed by Frank Launder, based on the 1947 play of the same name by John Dighton. The two men also wrote the screenplay. It is one of a stable of classic British film comedies produced by Frank Launder and Sidney Gilliat for British Lion Film Corporation. The film was made on location in Liss and at Riverside Studios, London. In several respects, including some common casting, it was a precursor of the St. Trinian's films of the 1950s and 1960s.
Secret Beyond the Door is a 1947 American film noir psychological thriller and a modern updating of the Bluebeard fairytale, directed by Fritz Lang, produced by Lang's Diana Productions, and released by Universal Pictures. The film stars Joan Bennett and was produced by her husband Walter Wanger. The black-and-white film noir drama is about a woman who suspects her new husband, an architect, plans to kill her.
Linda Joyce Bloodworth-Thomason is an American writer, director, and television producer. She is best known for creating, writing, and producing several television series, most successfully with the sitcoms Designing Women and Evening Shade. She and her husband, Harry Thomason, are also notable for their friendship with former President Bill Clinton, and the role they played in his election campaigns.
Blake Shelton's Barn & Grill is the third studio album by American country music artist Blake Shelton. Released in 2004 on Warner Bros. Records Nashville, it is his second album to achieve RIAA platinum certification. The album produced four singles in "When Somebody Knows You That Well", "Some Beach", "Goodbye Time" and "Nobody but Me." Like his previous album, he co-wrote two songs.
William Christy Cabanne was an American film director, screenwriter, and silent film actor.
High School Hellcats is a 1958 American exploitation film starring Yvonne Lime, Bret Halsey, and Jana Lund and directed by Edward L. Bernds. It is part of a series of exploitation films about juvenile delinquents produced during the 1950s by American International Pictures. American International Pictures released the film as a double feature with Hot Rod Gang. The film is also known as School For Violence.
Bees in Paradise is a 1944 British musical comedy film directed by Val Guest and starring Arthur Askey, Anne Shelton and Peter Graves. It was produced by Edward Black at Gainsborough Pictures. Co-written by director Val Guest and comic Marriott Edgar, who wrote for Will Hay and the Crazy Gang and composed some of Stanley Holloway's famous monologues; this is a lesser known Askey vehicle.
The October Man is a 1947 mystery film/film noir starring John Mills and Joan Greenwood, written by novelist Eric Ambler, who also produced. A man is suspected of murder, and the lingering effects of a brain injury he sustained in an earlier accident, as well as an intensive police investigation, make him begin to doubt whether he is innocent.
Wait Until Dark is a 1967 American psychological thriller film directed by Terence Young and produced by Mel Ferrer, from a screenplay by Robert Carrington and Jane-Howard Carrington, based on the 1966 play of the same name by Frederick Knott. The film stars Audrey Hepburn as a blind woman, Alan Arkin as a violent criminal searching for drugs, and Richard Crenna as another criminal, supported by Jack Weston, Julie Herrod, and Efrem Zimbalist Jr.
Audrey Fildes was a British actress whose first film credit was the 1947 production While I Live. In 1949, she played the role of Louis Mazzini's mother, who was ostracised by her aristocratic family, in the film Kind Hearts and Coronets.
Elizabeth Audrey Withers OBE, known as Audrey Withers, was an English journalist, also active as a member of the Council of Industrial Design. She edited the British magazine Vogue between 1940 and 1960 and was the author of The Palaces of Leningrad (1973) and an autobiography.
Carol Anne Morley is an English film director, screenwriter and producer. She is best known for her semi-documentary Dreams of a Life, released in 2011, about Joyce Carol Vincent, who died in her North London bedsit in 2003, but was not discovered until 2006.
Joyce Rebekah "Joy" Morrissey is an American-born British politician who has served as the Conservative Member of Parliament (MP) for Beaconsfield in Buckinghamshire since 2019. Morrissey achieved ministerial rank as an Assistant Government Whip and has served in that role since July 2022 under three Prime Ministers.
Joy Ride is a 2023 American comedy film directed by Adele Lim, in her feature directorial debut, and written by Cherry Chevapravatdumrong and Teresa Hsiao, from a story by Lim, Chevapravatdumrong, and Hsiao. The film stars Ashley Park, Sherry Cola, Stephanie Hsu, and Sabrina Wu, with Ronny Chieng, Meredith Hagner, David Denman, Annie Mumolo, Timothy Simons, and Daniel Dae Kim appearing in supporting roles.
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