British Stage & Screen

Margaret Lockwood with Norman Wisdom and Glynis Johns at the British Film Academy Awards, 1954

Glynis Johns in Mad about Men (1954)

Deborah Kerr and Glynis Johns in VACATION FROM MARRIAGE (1945) dir. Alexander Korda

"Peter Eade rang to say I'd got the film part!!! Wishart!!! The leads are Jack Hawkins and Glynis Johns. It seems fantastic. But I know that it is part of the pattern. I am destined to be a good actor."

RIP to British actress Glynis Johns (October 5, 1923 – January 4, 2024).

Dirk Bogarde in The Gentle Gunman (1952) dir. Basil Dearden

photo from my dear @margotfonteyns <33

Deborah Kerr in Love on The Dole (1941) dir. John Baxter

Jean Simmons at home, 1946

Margaret Lockwood and Glynis Johns with Walt Disney at the London premiere of Peter Pan, 1953. Both actresses had famously played Peter on the West End stage: Glynis in 1943 and Margaret in 1949 and 1950.

“Vivien Leigh and Laurence Olivier are about to do one of the umpteen love scenes in Lady Hamilton. Olivier tickles Vivien’s wrist. She giggles. And cameraman Rudolph Maté shouts, ‘That’s right. Smile. I’m putting a special light on your smile.’ As though she needed it!” – Sheilah Graham

Pressburger’s interest in the story grew beyond his initial role as screenwriter, to the point that he and Michel Powell attempted as early as December 1941 to buy the film for their own production company (The Archers). The idea of featuring a professional dancer in the lead role still hadn’t occurred, and both Powell and Pressburger wanted Vivien Leigh for the role. Korda eventually gave up on the project after divorcing Oberon in 1945, and the rights to the property were sold to The Archers shortly afterwards–culminating in the version of The Red Shoes which is known and loved to this day.

Jean Simmons as Ophelia in Hamlet (1948)

Vivien Leigh photographed by Wilfrid Newton for Caeser and Cleopatra (1945)

Costume design by Julie Harris for Margaret Lockwood as the Wicked Stepmother in The Slipper and the Rose (1976)

This was one of several scenes ordered to be re-shot by Joe Breen who considered Margaret’s low-cut Restoration gowns to be too revealing for the sensibilities of American audiences. When told about the need for re-takes, Margaret quipped: “Where did he sit when he saw the picture–in the upper circle?”