Second Best Bed

Last updated

Second Best Bed
Directed by Tom Walls
Written by Ben Travers
Produced by Max Schach
Starring
CinematographyJack E. Cox
Edited by Lynn Harrison
Music byVan Phillips
Production
company
Distributed by General Film Distributors
Release date
January 1938
Running time
74 minutes
CountryUnited Kingdom
LanguageEnglish

Second Best Bed is a 1938 British comedy film directed by Tom Walls and starring Walls, Jane Baxter and Veronica Rose. [1] The screenplay is by Ben Travers, based on an earlier story of his. Walls and Travers had worked together on the Aldwych farces. The screenplay concerns a newly married couple who soon run into domestic difficulties when the wife refuses to obey her husband's every order. [2]

Contents

It was an independent production made at Shepperton Studios. The film's sets were designed by the art director Walter Murton.

Main cast

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Penelope Wilton</span> English actress

Dame Penelope Alice Wilton, Lady Holm, is an English actress.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ben Travers</span> English writer

Ben Travers was an English writer. His output includes more than 20 plays, 30 screenplays, 5 novels, and 3 volumes of memoirs. He is best remembered 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.

<i>Very Important Person</i> (film) 1961 British film

Very Important Person is a 1961 British comedy film directed by Ken Annakin and written by Jack Davies and Henry Blyth. The cast includes several well-known British comedy and character actors, including James Robertson Justice, Stanley Baxter in a dual role as a dour Scottish prisoner and a German prisoner-of-war camp officer, Eric Sykes, John Le Mesurier, Leslie Phillips and Richard Wattis.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jane Baxter</span> British actress

Jane Baxter was a British actress. Her stage career spanned half a century, and she appeared in a number of films and in television.

<i>Fighting Stock</i> 1935 British film

Fighting Stock is a 1935 British comedy film directed by and starring Tom Walls. It also features Robertson Hare, Lesley Wareing and Herbert Lomas. its plot involves a Brigadier who retires to a country cottage for some quiet fishing, but it soon overtaken by madcap events. The screenplay is by Ben Travers based on his earlier stage play of the same name, and the cast included cast members from Travers's Aldwych Farces.

Foreign Affaires is a 1935 British comedy film directed by and starring Tom Walls. It also features Ralph Lynn, Robertson Hare, Norma Varden and Cecil Parker. The screenplay is by Ben Travers, and the cast included cast members from the Walls and Travers Aldwych Farces.

<i>Pot Luck</i> (1936 film) 1936 British film

Pot Luck is a 1936 British comedy film directed by and starring Tom Walls. The screenplay is by Ben Travers based loosely on his 1930 stage play A Night Like This. It also featured Ralph Lynn, Robertson Hare, Diana Churchill and Martita Hunt. The cast included members of the regular Aldwych Farce company.

A Cup of Kindness is a 1934 British comedy film directed by and starring Tom Walls. It also featured Ralph Lynn, Robertson Hare, Dorothy Hyson and Claude Hulbert. It was based on a 1929 play by Ben Travers of the same name, one of the Aldwych farces, and had four of the same cast members. Graham Moffatt, later of Will Hay fame, made his debut appearance as a choir boy in this film.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Veronica Rose</span> British actress

Veronica Rose was a British stage and film actress.

<i>Turkey Time</i> (1933 film) 1933 film

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.

<i>Turkey Time</i> (play)

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.

<i>Thark</i> (play) Play written by Ben Travers

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.

<i>A Cuckoo in the Nest</i> 1925 British comedy play

A Cuckoo in the Nest is a farce by the English playwright Ben Travers. It was first given at the Aldwych Theatre, London, the second in the series of twelve Aldwych farces presented by the actor-manager Tom Walls at the theatre between 1923 and 1933. Several of the cast formed the regular core cast for the later Aldwych farces. The plot concerns two friends, a man and a woman, who are each married to other people. While travelling together, they are obliged by circumstances to share a hotel bedroom. Everyone else assumes the worst, but the two travellers are able to prove their innocence.

<i>Plunder</i> (play)

Plunder is a farce by the English playwright Ben Travers. It was first given at the Aldwych Theatre, London, the fifth 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 shows two friends committing a jewel robbery, for arguably honourable reasons, with fatal results.

<i>A Cuckoo in the Nest</i> (film) 1933 film

A Cuckoo in the Nest is a 1933 British film, directed by Tom Walls, with a script by Ben Travers. It is a screen adaption of the original 1925 Aldwych farce of the same title. The film was remade in 1954 as Fast and Loose.

<i>A Night Like This</i> (film) 1932 film

A Night Like This is a 1932 comedy film directed by Tom Walls and starring Walls, Ralph Lynn and Winifred Shotter. Ben Travers wrote the screenplay, adapting his own play, the original 1930 Aldwych farce of the same title.

<i>Marry the Girl</i> (play)

Marry the Girl is a farce by George Arthurs and Arthur Miller. It was one of the series of Aldwych farces that ran at the Aldwych Theatre in London nearly continuously from 1923 to 1933. The play centres on a breach of promise case brought before a British court of justice.

<i>For Valour</i> (1937 film) 1937 British film

For Valour is a 1937 British comedy film directed by Tom Walls and starring Walls, Ralph Lynn and Veronica Rose. It was made at Shepperton Studios, with sets designed by Oscar Werndorff. Unlike previous films starring Walls and Lynn, it was based on an original screenplay rather than one of the Aldwych Farces. Both Walls and Lynn played dual roles of two Boer War veterans and their son and grandson respectively. It was the last time the two actors, who had been one of the most popular film comedy teams of the decade, appeared together on screen.

Stormy Weather is a 1935 British comedy film directed by Tom Walls and starring Walls, Ralph Lynn and Robertson Hare.

References

  1. BFI.org
  2. Lanier, Douglas (2006). "Film Spin-offs and Citations: On the Virtues of Illegitimacy". In Burt, Richard (ed.). Shakespeares After Shakespeare: An Encyclopedia of the Bard in Mass Media and Popular Culture. Vol. One. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. p. 307. ISBN   9780313331169.