Basil Sydney
Birth : 1894-04-23, Essex, England, UK
Death : 1968-01-10
History
Basil Sydney (23 April 1894 – 10 January 1968) was an English stage and screen actor. Sydney made his name in 1915 in the London stage hit Romance by Edward Sheldon, with Broadway star Doris Keane, and he costarred with Keane in the 1920 silent film of the play. The couple married in 1918, and when Keane revived Romance in New York City in 1921, Sydney made his Broadway debut in the parts. He stayed in New York for over a decade playing classical roles such as Mercutio in Romeo and Juliet (1922), Richard Dudgeon in The Devil's Disciple (1923), the title role in Hamlet (1923), Prince Hal in Henry IV, Part I (1926), and Petruchio in Taming of the Shrew (1927).[citation needed] In 1937 he starred in the murder mystery Blondie White in the West End.
He made over 50 screen appearances, most memorably as Claudius in Laurence Olivier's 1948 film of Hamlet. He also appeared in classic films like Treasure Island (1950), Ivanhoe (1952), and Around the World in Eighty Days (1956), but the focus of his career was the stage on both sides of the Atlantic.
King Saul
Directed by Bob McNaught. King Saul of Israel is jealous of the fame and adoration of David, who long ago slew Goliath and brought victory to Saul's armies. Now Saul, egged on by his Edomite counselor Doeg, attempts to have David killed. Saul's son, and David's best friend, Jonathan, conspires to help David, who is reluctant to fight back against his own people the Israelites.
Maurice Seidelman
Famed concert pianist Stephen Orlac survives a plane crash, but his hands are permanently destroyed. Helpful surgeon Volcheff grafts a pair of new hands on the hapless Orlac. Unfortunately, they're the hands of an executed murderer - useless for a pianist, but quite handy for less delicate work...
Emperor of Lilliput
Doctor Gulliver is poor, so nothing - not even his charming fiancée Elisabeth - keeps him in the town he lives. He signs on to a ship to India, but in a storm he's washed off the ship and ends up on an island, which is inhibitated by very tiny people. After he managed to convince them he's harmless and is accepted as one of their citizens, their king wants to use him in war against a people of giants. Compared to them, even Gulliver is a gnome.
Lawyer Hawkins
In a small New England town during the American War of Independence, Dick Dudgeon, a revolutionary American Puritan, is mistaken for local minister Rev. Anthony Anderson and arrested by the British. Dick discovers himself incapable of accusing another human to suffer and continues to masquerade as the reverend.
Sir William Young
The career of Revolutionary War naval hero John Paul Jones, from his youth in Scotland through his service to Catherine the Great of Russia.
Sir John Loring
Mark Loring is madly jealous of his wife, Mary, former American cabaret singer. Due to an automobile accident, she loses her unborn child, and Mark becomes sterile. His father, Brit-stuffy Sir John Loring, has never approved of the marriage and, again, tries to break it up. Believing that a child will hold the marriage together, Mary suggests artificial insemination to Mark, who finally agrees to accompany her to a clinic in Switzerland. However, when she is again pregnant, Mark finds it impossible to reconcile himself to the situation and leaves her. Prompted by his father, Mark sues for divorce, accusing her of adultery. She contests the divorce and a trial concerns itself with whether or not artificial insemination is a question of adultery. The Catholic Church's National League of Decency placed this film on its Condemned" list.
Bulldog
In 1942, a cargo ship jammed with British evacuees from Singapore is sunk by a Japanese sub. A small lifeboat carries a beautiful woman, an army officer, a bigoted administrator, and a black seaman. Only the seaman knows the woman is a nun. The men reveal their true selves under the hardships of survival. Told in a too-long flashback frame.
Julian Fleury
On a Caribbean island, a rich landowner's son, Maxwell Fleury, is fighting for political office against black labor leader David Boyeur. As if the contentious election weren't enough, there are plenty of scandals to go around: Boyeur has a secret white lover and Fleury's wife, Sylvia, is also having an affair. And then, of course, there's the small matter of a recently murdered aristocrat.
The Emperor Franz Joseph
Mayerling is the name of a notorious Austrian village linked to a romantic tragedy. At a royal hunting lodge there, in 1889, Crown Prince Rudolf--desperate over his father's command to put away his teenage mistress, the Baroness Marie Vetsera--shot her to death and killed himself. The misfortune may indeed have been a murder-suicide, but perhaps it was a political assassination, or even the result of a lunatic family vendetta: scholarship is still catching up with the facts.
Reform Club Member
Based on the famous book by Jules Verne the movie follows Phileas Fogg on his journey around the world. Which has to be completed within 80 days, a very short period for those days.
Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Harris G.C.B., O.B.E., A.F.C.
The story of the conception of a new British weapon for smashing the German dams in the Ruhr industrial complex and the execution of the raid by 617 Squadron 'The Dam Busters'.
Mr Crawford
A European family in East Africa finds itself caught up in an uprising by local black Africans against their white colonial masters. Based on the Mau-Mau rebellion in Kenya in the early 1950s.
Bland
Duncan Craig signs on a whaling ship, partly because his own business deal has fallen through, partly to help Judie Nordhall find her father. Rumor has it that her father may have been murdered by Erik Bland, son of her father's partner and her one-time lover. Duncan and Erik find themselves on rival whaleboats and, ultimately, on an ice floe.
King Louis XIV
Squire Pierre St. Laurent returns from wars in India to 17th-century provincial France to find his estate confiscated by governor Narbonne, for back taxes, and resold to Katrina, a Dutch Countess. Katrina offers to return Pierre's property if he will help her get possession of the 'Star of India,' a fabulous sapphire, held at the moment by Narbonne.
Pontius Pilate
In the reign of emperor Tiberius, Gallilean prophet John the Baptist preaches against King Herod and Queen Herodias. The latter wants John dead, but Herod fears to harm him due to a prophecy. Enter beautiful Princess Salome, Herod's long-absent stepdaughter. Herodias sees the king's dawning lust for Salome as her means of bending the king to her will. But Salome and her lover Claudius are (contrary to Scripture) nearing conversion to the new religion. And the famous climactic dance turns out to have unexpected implications...
Waldemar Fitzurse
Sir Walter Scott's classic story of the chivalrous Ivanhoe who joins with Robin of Locksley in the fight against Prince John and for the return of King Richard the Lionheart.
William Fox-Talbot
Now old, ill, poor, and largely forgotten, William Freise-Greene was once very different. As young and handsome William Green he changed his name to include his first wife's so that it sounded more impressive for the photographic portrait work he was so good at. But he was also an inventor and his search for a way to project moving pictures became an obsession that ultimately changed the life of all those he loved.
Captain Smollett
Enchanted by the idea of locating treasure buried by Captain Flint, Squire Trelawney, Dr. Livesey and Jim Hawkins charter a sailing voyage to a Caribbean island. Unfortunately, a large number of Flint's old pirate crew are aboard the ship, including Long John Silver.
Francis Alt
Sad tale of a woman who marries the man her family wishes her to wed, not Wooland, the man she truly loves. Years after her lover's suicide, Herlie joins him before the Gestapo can get to her because of her Jewish ancestry.
Claudius - The King
Winner of four Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Actor, Sir Laurence Olivier’s Hamlet continues to be the most compelling version of Shakespeare’s beloved tragedy. Olivier is at his most inspired—both as director and as the melancholy Dane himself—as he breathes new life into the words of one of the world’s greatest dramatists.
Nick Helmar
In 19th century England, Jassy is a young Gypsy girl blessed with the gift of second sight. Pursued by superstitious villagers, she is rescued by the son of the owner of Mordelaine, a vast stately home. Unfortunately, his father's drinking and gambling threaten the very ownership of the house. Despite her humble origins as a servant girl, Jassy must try to use her talents to climb the social ladder and save Mordelaine for the man whom she loves.
Sir Henry Merriman
A man goes on the run from hardened smugglers.
Rufio
The aging Caesar finds himself intrigued by the young Egyptian queen. Adapted by George Bernard Shaw from his own play.
Major Hammond / Kommandant Orlter
The quiet village of Bramley End is taken over by German troops posing as Royal Engineers. Their task is to disrupt England's radar network in preparation for a full scale German invasion. Once the villagers discover the true identity of the troops, they do whatever they can to thwart the Nazis plans.
Naval captain
Wartime propaganda piece giving the warning "Be like Dad, Keep Mum". A gossipy housewife is overheard talking about what her son is doing by a Nazi spy.
Costello
A professor teaching at a correspondence school discovers that a Nazi agent is trying to prevent a trade treaty being signed between England and South America.
Capt. Fairfax
Before the war, a Fleet Air Arm pilot is dismissed for causing the death of a colleague. Working for a small Greek airline when the Germans invade Greece, he gets a chance to redeem himself and rejoin his old unit on a British carrier. This is regarded the last of the conventional, rather stiff 1930's style Ealing war films, to be succeeded by much more realism and better storytelling.
Samuel Sweetland
Eden Philpotts' "provincial" comic novel and play The Farmer's Wife was first filmed in the silent era by Alfred Hitchcock. The 1940 talkie version was directed by Leslie Arliss, son of stage star George Arliss. The story remained the same: A middle-aged widower attempts to select a wife from his rural district's eligible females (Basil Sydney). Three unsuccessful dalliances later, the farmer settles for his housekeeper, whom the audience has been rooting for all along. The Farmer's Wife is a prime example of the sort of fare that struck a proper chord with British filmgoers, but whose appeal would be lost to any other nationality.
James
Tiny Fox-Collier and her son, Tony, are broke. A cheery and handsome young man about town, Tony knows he can rely on his mother for a brainwave to save them from utter destitution. This she has: a visit is scheduled to the Irish country estate of her old flame Sir Richard Furze, now a wealthy widower with two daughters. But while Tiny is determined to see her son marry the beautiful but haughty Joan, it seems Tony only has eyes for Joan’s spirited younger sister, Baby.
Frank Snell
The Four Men of the title are British WWI veterans who decide to work secretly against enemies of the country. They aren't above a bit of murder or sabotage to serve their ends, but they consider themselves to be true patriots.
Eugene Roget
Tony and his dance partner/wife Gaby headline a Paris musical. Tony becomes the unwilling target for the attentions of performer Yvette. She is later murdered with the dagger used by Tony and his wife in their act, and Gaby is accused of the crime.
A ruthless businessman tries to steal his brother's successful shipping company. He hires a gifted mimic to date one of his brother's daughters to get some inside information about the business. The mimic succeeds only too well, with tragic results.
'Joker' Finnigan
With the police on their tail, a gang of New York criminals decided to relocate to London where they plan a major robbery on a department store.
Dr. Jim Jameson
Rhodes of Africa is a 1936 British biographical film charting the life of Cecil Rhodes. It was directed by Berthold Viertel and starred Walter Huston, Oskar Homolka, Basil Sydney and Bernard Lee.
Louis Chichester
A former boxing champion, now an innkeeper, is accused of stealing a watch from a party of guests at his inn, who happen to be members of English royalty. The old man is arrested and thrown in prison. His son, knowing that his father didn't steal the watch and suspecting a frame-up, follows the royal party to London, where he poses as a wealthy "gentleman" and insinuates himself into the English court in an effort to find out who framed his father and why.
Dr. Peter Fairfax
A formerly blind scientist continues to feign his condition in order to thwart his philandering wife's romantic plans.
Mostyn
An engineer leads the building of a trans-Atlantic tunnel linking Britain and the United States.
Inspector Philip Winton
This is a great rainy day/night murder mystery in a mansion that all whodunit lovers will appreciate. A woman reporter helps an inspector solve the deaths of four financiers on the eve of a group shareout. Based on "Les Six Hommes Morts" (Editions du Masque) by Stanislas-André Steeman.
Hugh Stafford
Staff in a jewellery store hatch a plan to catch a thief.
Reinhardt Conway
Set in an Old Dark House, a man is murdered in his study. With his dying breath, he tells his brother of two clues to finding hidden Eastern Indian jewels that were part of a precious idol. He wants his brother to locate the treasure, so that it can be given to his son. But before the treasure can be found, a third clue must be discovered.
Cmdr. Fosberry
Sir Percy Newbiggin visits the fleet to find ways to economize Naval expenditures. Daughter Celia tags along and organizes a morale-boosting show utilizing ship-board talent. Her fiancé shows up, and romantic complications ensue.
Rowland Stone
After his father's death, Roland Stone learns that his will stipulates that he must go to the South American country of Bunkonia and sell life insurance.
(uncredited)
British Air Ministry short film highlighting the need for the public to stay clear of aircraft wreckage during World War II.
