Ben Travers was an English writer. His output includes more than 20 plays, 30 screenplays, 5 novels, and 3 volumes of memoirs. He is most notable for his long-running series of farces first staged in the 1920s and 1930s at the Aldwych Theatre. Many of these were made into films and later television productions.
Thomas Kirby Walls was an English stage and film actor, producer and director, best known for presenting and co-starring in the Aldwych farces in the 1920s and for starring in and directing the film adaptations of those plays in the 1930s.
John Robertson Hare, OBE was an English actor, who came to fame in the Aldwych farces. He is remembered by more recent audiences for his performances as the Archdeacon in the popular BBC sitcom, All Gas and Gaiters.
Mary Bessie Brough was an English actress in theatre, silent films and early talkies, including eleven of the twelve Aldwych farces of the 1920s and early 1930s.
Herbert Sydney Wilcox CBE was a British film producer and director.
William Percy Lipscomb was a British-born Hollywood playwright, screenwriter, producer and director. He died in London in 1958, aged 71.
Ralph Clifford Lynn was an English actor who had a 60-year career, and is best remembered for playing comedy parts in the Aldwych farces first on stage and then in film.
Gordon James was an English actor who became known as the "heavy" in the Aldwych farces, between 1923 and 1933. He also appeared in some twenty films between 1929 and 1942.
Winifred Florence Shotter was an English actress best known for her appearances in the Aldwych farces of the 1920s and early 1930s.
Ethel Coleridge was an English actress, best known for her roles in the original Aldwych farces in the 1920s and 1930s.
Rookery Nook is a 1970 British television production by the BBC.
Rookery Nook was a 1953 British live television production of the comedy play by Ben Travers broadcast on 23 May 1953. Featuring in this version were Peter Cushing, David Stoll, and Lally Bowers.
Rookery Nook is a farce by the English playwright Ben Travers based on his own 1923 novel. It was first given at the Aldwych Theatre, London, the third in the series of twelve Aldwych farces presented by the actor-manager Tom Walls at the theatre between 1923 and 1933. Several of the actors formed a regular core cast for the Aldwych farces. The play depicts the complications that ensue when a young woman, dressed in pyjamas, seeks refuge from her bullying stepfather at a country house in the middle of the night.
Turkey Time is a 1933 British comedy film directed by Tom Walls and starring Walls, Ralph Lynn, Robertson Hare and Dorothy Hyson. The screenplay concerns a group of guests come to stay with the Stoatt family in the seaside town of Eden Bay for Christmas. They soon become involved with an impoverished concert performer whose innocent presence in the house leads to a series of misunderstandings. It was adapted from the 1931 play Turkey Time by Ben Travers, one of the Aldwych Farces.
Turkey Time is a farce by Ben Travers. It was one of the series of Aldwych farces that ran nearly continuously at the Aldwych Theatre in London from 1923 to 1933. The story concerns two guests, staying at the Stoatt household for Christmas, who offer shelter to a pretty concert performer left stranded when her employer absconds, leaving his cast unpaid.
The Aldwych farces were a series of twelve stage farces presented at the Aldwych Theatre, London, nearly continuously from 1923 to 1933. All but three of them were written by Ben Travers. They incorporate and develop British low comedy styles, combined with clever word-play. The plays were presented by the actor-manager Tom Walls and starred Walls and Ralph Lynn, supported by a regular company that included Robertson Hare, Mary Brough, Winifred Shotter, Ethel Coleridge, and Gordon James.
Thark is a farce by the English playwright Ben Travers. It was first given at the Aldwych Theatre, London, the fourth in the series of twelve Aldwych farces presented at the theatre by the actor-manager Tom Walls between 1923 and 1933. It starred the same cast members as many of the other Aldwych farces. The story concerns a reputedly haunted English country house. Investigators and frightened occupants of the house spend a tense night searching for the ghost.
A Night Like This is a farce by Ben Travers, written as one of the series of Aldwych farces staged nearly continuously at the Aldwych Theatre, London, from 1923 to 1933. The farces were directed by Tom Walls, who co-starred in most of them with Ralph Lynn, and a supporting cast of regular Aldwych performers. The play is a spoof of detective plays and thrillers, with the two stars successfully taking on a criminal gang. Eventually, the gang is rounded up, and the jewels taken from the heroine are restored to their proper owner.
Thark is a 1932 British film farce, directed by Tom Walls, with a script by Ben Travers. In addition to Walls, the film stars Ralph Lynn and Robertson Hare. The film is a screen adaptation of the original 1927 Aldwych farce play Thark. It was made at British and Dominion's Elstree Studios.
Fifty-Fifty is a farce by H. F. Maltby, adapted from a French original, Azaïs, by Louis Verneuil and Georges Berr. It was the penultimate work of the series of Aldwych farces that ran nearly continuously at the Aldwych Theatre in London from 1923 to 1933. The play centres on the sudden rise of an impoverished music teacher to become manager of a grand casino.
