HOME





The Man In Grey (novel)
''The Man in Grey'' was a novel by the British writer Lady Eleanor Smith first published in 1941. It was a melodrama set in Regency Britain. A young woman unhappily married to a cold aristocrat falls in love with a strolling actor, but her hopes of eloping to happiness are wrecked by an old school friend who murders her in order to be able to marry her husband. Adaptation In 1943 the novel was adapted into a film by Gainsborough Pictures directed by Leslie Arliss and starring James Mason in the title role as well as Margaret Lockwood, Phyllis Calvert and Stewart Granger. The film was a major commercial and critical success and was the first of the series of Gainsborough melodramas which dominated the British box office during the later years of the war during the immediate post war years. Another Smith novel ''Caravan'' was turned into a 1946 film ''Caravan Caravan or caravans may refer to: Transport and travel *Caravan (travellers), a group of travellers journeying together ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Gainsborough Melodramas
The Gainsborough melodramas were a sequence of films produced by the British film studio Gainsborough Pictures between 1943 and 1947 which conformed to a melodramatic style.Brooke, Michael. (2014)Gainsborough Melodrama Screenonline British Film Institute. Retrieved 21 March 2020. The melodramas were not a film series but an unrelated sequence of films which had similar themes that were usually developed by the same film crew and frequently recurring actors who played similar characters in each. They were mostly based on popular books by female novelists and they encompassed costume dramas, such as '' The Man in Grey'' (1943) and '' The Wicked Lady'' (1945), and modern-dress dramas, such as ''Love Story'' (1944) and '' They Were Sisters'' (1945). The popularity of the films with audiences peaked mid-1940s when cinema audiences consisted primarily of women. The influence of the films led to other British producers releasing similarly themed works, such as '' The Seventh Veil'' ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Novels Set In The 19th Century
A novel is a relatively long work of narrative fiction, typically written in prose and published as a book. The present English word for a long work of prose fiction derives from the for "new", "news", or "short story of something new", itself from the la, novella, a singular noun use of the neuter plural of ''novellus'', diminutive of ''novus'', meaning "new". Some novelists, including Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville, Ann Radcliffe, John Cowper Powys, preferred the term "romance" to describe their novels. According to Margaret Doody, the novel has "a continuous and comprehensive history of about two thousand years", with its origins in the Ancient Greek and Roman novel, in Chivalric romance, and in the tradition of the Italian renaissance novella.Margaret Anne Doody''The True Story of the Novel'' New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1996, rept. 1997, p. 1. Retrieved 25 April 2014. The ancient romance form was revived by Romanticism, especially the histor ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


British Novels Adapted Into Films
British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, the English language as spoken and written in the United Kingdom or, more broadly, throughout the British Isles * Celtic Britons, an ancient ethno-linguistic group * Brittonic languages, a branch of the Insular Celtic language family (formerly called British) ** Common Brittonic, an ancient language Other uses *'' Brit(ish)'', a 2018 memoir by Afua Hirsch *People or things associated with: ** Great Britain, an island ** United Kingdom, a sovereign state ** Kingdom of Great Britain (1707–1800) ** United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland (1801–1922) See also * Terminology of the British Isles * Alternative names for the British * English (other) * Britannic (other) * British Isles * Brit (other) * ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

1941 British Novels
Events Below, the events of World War II have the "WWII" prefix. January * January–August – 10,072 men, women and children with mental and physical disabilities are asphyxiated with carbon monoxide in a gas chamber, at Hadamar Euthanasia Centre in Germany, in the first phase of mass killings under the Action T4 program here. * January 1 – Thailand's Prime Minister Plaek Phibunsongkhram decrees January 1 as the official start of the Thai solar calendar new year (thus the previous year that began April 1 had only 9 months). * January 3 – A decree (''Normalschrifterlass'') promulgated in Germany by Martin Bormann, on behalf of Adolf Hitler, requires replacement of blackletter typefaces by Antiqua. * January 4 – The short subject '' Elmer's Pet Rabbit'' is released, marking the second appearance of Bugs Bunny, and also the first to have his name on a title card. * January 5 – WWII: Battle of Bardia in Libya: Australian and British troops defe ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  




Caravan (1946 Film)
''Caravan'' is a 1946 British black-and-white drama film directed by Arthur Crabtree. It was one of the Gainsborough melodramas and is based on the 1942 novel ''Caravan'' by Eleanor Smith. Stewart Granger later called the movie "terrible".Brian MacFarlane, ''An Autobiography of British Cinema'', Methuen 1997 p 230 Plot In late 19th-century London, destitute Richard Darrell (Stewart Granger) rescues Don Carlos (Gerard Heinz) from two robbers. When Richard returns for the manuscript he inadvertently left behind, he is encouraged by Don Carlos to talk about his background. The son of a poor country doctor, he met the upper class Oriana Camperdene and Francis Castleton during their childhood; he and Francis became rivals for Oriana's affections. Oriana and her father left for Spain, but the couple were reunited as adults and agreed to marry, much to Francis's disgust. However, they postponed the wedding for a year so that Richard could go to London and make his fortune as a writer. ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Caravan (novel)
''Caravan'' is a melodramatic novel by the British writer Lady Eleanor Smith first published in 1942. A young Englishman James Darrell goes on the road living with the Romany people in England while trying to make enough money as a writer to marry his sweetheart Oriana. However, she does not wait for him and marries a wealthy young Englishman. James then undertakes a mission to Spain for a business friend, while there he is attacked and robbed. He is rescued by a gypsy woman but he has lost his memory. Having lost his memory, he marries the gypsy girl, Rosal, without knowing of his former life in Britain. When his memory returns he resents the gypsy girl for deceiving him but stays with her and works as a secretary for a famous bullfighter. When Rosal is accidentally killed by the bullfighter the hero goes to Morocco. Upon his return to England his book on his journeys in Spain make him a famous and wealthy man. He reunites with his first love, Oriana, who is trapped in a love ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Stewart Granger
Stewart Granger (born James Lablache Stewart; 6 May 1913 – 16 August 1993) was a British film actor, mainly associated with heroic and romantic leading roles. He was a popular leading man from the 1940s to the early 1960s, rising to fame through his appearances in the Gainsborough melodramas. Early life He was born James Lablache Stewart in Old Brompton Road, Kensington, West London, the only son of Major James Stewart, OBE and his wife Frederica Eliza (née Lablache). Granger was educated at Epsom College and the Webber Douglas Academy of Dramatic Art. He was the great-great-grandson of the opera singer Luigi Lablache and the grandson of the actor Luigi Lablache. Stewart Granger lived in Bournemouth at 57 Grove Road with his mother. His mother owned the property now called "East Cliff Cottage Hotel" until 1979. When he became an actor, he was advised to change his name in order to avoid being confused with the American actor James Stewart. Granger was his Scottis ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Eleanor Smith (writer)
Lady Eleanor Furneaux Smith (7 August 1902 – 20 October 1945) was an English writer and active member of the Bright Young Things. Life Born in Birkenhead, England in 1902, Smith was the eldest child of the politician F. E. Smith's three children; her mother was Margaret Furneaux, daughter of the academic Henry Furneaux. Eleanor Smith was great-granddaughter of Joseph Severn on her mother's side, the Devonshire Furneaux, a Norman family. Her brother was Frederick Smith, 2nd Earl of Birkenhead, and her sister Lady Pamela married Hon. Michael Berry. Her father was created Earl of Birkenhead in 1922. She went to Miss Douglas's school at Queen's Gate. At Queen's Gate she met Lady Allanah Harper, Zita Jungman, and Teresa "Baby" Jungman and together they became early members of what the British press would call the " Bright Young Things", a nickname given by the tabloid press to a group of bohemian young aristocrats and socialites in 1920s London. As a young girl, sh ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Phyllis Calvert
Phyllis Hannah Murray-Hill (née Bickle; 18 February 1915 – 8 October 2002), known professionally as Phyllis Calvert, was an English film, stage and television actress. She was one of the leading stars of the Gainsborough melodramas of the 1940s such as ''The Man in Grey'' (1943) and was one of the most popular movie stars in Britain in the 1940s. She continued her acting career for another 50 years. In the words of an article by Michael Brooke for the BFI's Screenonline website: "Most of the time she drew what looked like the short straw, playing the 'good girl' in films that revelled in the exploits of her wicked opposite number, and it says much for her talent and charisma that she was able to hold attention in what must have seemed thankless parts – she herself acknowledged that 'I do think it is much more difficult to establish a really charming, nice person than a wicked one – and make it real'." Biography Born in Chelsea, London, she trained at the Margaret Morris ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Margaret Lockwood
Margaret Mary Day Lockwood, CBE (15 September 1916 – 15 July 1990), was an English actress. One of Britain's most popular film stars of the 1930s and 1940s, her film appearances included '' The Lady Vanishes'' (1938), ''Night Train to Munich'' (1940), ''The Man in Grey'' (1943), and ''The Wicked Lady'' (1945). She was nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best British Actress for the 1955 film '' Cast a Dark Shadow''. She also starred in the television series ''Justice'' (1971–74). Early life Lockwood was born on 15 September 1916 in Karachi, British India, to Henry Francis Lockwood, an English administrator of a railway company, and his third wife, Scottish-born Margaret Eveline Waugh. She returned to England in 1920 with her mother, brother 'Lyn' and half-brother Frank, and a further half-sister 'Fay' joined them the following year, but her father remained in Karachi, visiting them infrequently. She also had another half-brother, John, from her father's first marriage, broug ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]