Dorice Fordred (25 November 19024 August 1980) was a South African actress, best known for character parts and Shakespearean roles on the London stage.'Miss Dorice Fordred: Noted stage actress', ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British Newspaper#Daily, daily Newspaper#National, national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its modern name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its si ...

'', August 13, 1980. The ''

Brooklyn Daily Eagle The ''Brooklyn Eagle'' (originally joint name ''The Brooklyn Eagle'' and ''Kings County Democrat'', later ''The Brooklyn Daily Eagle'' before shortening title further to ''Brooklyn Eagle'') was an afternoon daily newspaper published in the city ...

'' commented in 1931, "She is one of those rare things, a young and attractive character actress.""Dorice Fordred Comes from Veldt and Began at Old Vic"
''Brooklyn Daily Eagle'' (25 October 1931): 61. via

Newspapers.com Ancestry.com LLC is an American genealogy company based in Lehi, Utah. The largest for-profit genealogy company in the world, it operates a network of genealogical, historical records, and related genetic genealogy websites. It is owned by The ...

Early life

Dorice Fordred was born and raised near

Port Elizabeth Gqeberha ( , ), formerly named Port Elizabeth, and colloquially referred to as P.E., is a major seaport and the most populous city in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. It is the seat of the Nelson Mandela Bay Metropolitan Municipal ...

, Cape Colony. She went to England to study theatre. "Living on the veldt gives you – you can't help it, no matter who you are – a susceptibility to simple, earthy rhythms," she explained to an American interviewer in 1931.

Career

Dorice Fordred spent most of her career on the London stage, where she debuted in 1923 and appeared regularly in the 1920s and 1930s. London productions featuring Fordred in the cast included ''The Two Gentlemen of Verona'' (1923); ''Troilus & Cressida'' (1923); ''The School for Scandal'' (1923–24); ''Faust'' (1924); ''The Taming of the Shrew'' (1924); ''A Midsummer Night's Dream'' (1924); ''Everyman'' (1925); ''Hamlet'' (1925); ''Macbeth'' (1925); ''Twelfth Night'' (1925); ''Riverside Nights'' (1926); ''The Widowing of Mrs. Holroyd'' (1926); ''Trelawney of the Wells'' (1926-1927); ''Thunder on the Left'' (1928); ''Some Showers'' (1928); ''The Iron Law'' (1929); ''Murder on the Second Floor'' (1929-1930); ''Love's Labour Lost'' (1930); ''Debonair'' (1930); ''Getting Rid of Gertie'' (1930); ''Cynara'' (1930–31); ''Three Flats'' (1931); ''The Force of Circumstance'' (1931); ''Musical Chairs'' (1932); ''Half-Holiday'' (1932); ''Earthquake in Surrey'' (1932); ''Francis Thompson'' (1933); ''Bellairs'' (1933); '' A Sleeping Clergyman'' (1933); ''Viceroy Sarah'' (1934); ''Summer's Lease'' (1935); ''Othello'' (1924 and 1935); ''King Lear'' (1936); ''Sonata'' (1936); ''The Ante-Room'' (1936); ''Adults Only'' (1939); ''We At the Crossroads'' (1939). Dorice Fordred also appeared in films, including ''Blue Bottles'' and ''Daydreams'' (both 1928), both short films, now lost, based in stories by

H. G. Wells Herbert George Wells (21 September 1866 – 13 August 1946) was an English writer, prolific in many genres. He wrote more than fifty novels and dozens of short stories. His non-fiction output included works of social commentary, politics, hist ...

, and both starring

Elsa Lanchester Elsa Sullivan Lanchester (28 October 1902 – 26 December 1986) was a British actress with a long career in theatre, film and television.Obituary '' Variety'', 31 December 1986. Lanchester studied dance as a child and after the First World ...

and

Charles Laughton Charles Laughton (; 1 July 1899 – 15 December 1962) was a British and American actor. He was trained in London at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and first appeared professionally on the stage in 1926. In 1927, he was cast in a play wi ...

; ''

The Silent Passenger ''The Silent Passenger'' is a British black-and-white mystery film produced in 1935 at Ealing Studios, London. It is based on an original story written by Dorothy L. Sayers specifically for the screen. Her amateur sleuth, Lord Peter Wimsey, was ...

'' (1935); ''

As You Like It ''As You Like It'' is a pastoral Shakespearean comedy, comedy by William Shakespeare believed to have been written in 1599 and first published in the First Folio in 1623. The play's first performance is uncertain, though a performance at Wil ...

'' (1936), starring

Laurence Olivier Laurence Kerr Olivier, Baron Olivier ( ; 22 May 1907 – 11 July 1989) was an English actor and director. He and his contemporaries Ralph Richardson and John Gielgud made up a trio of male actors who dominated the British stage of the m ...

; '' Knight Without Armour'' (1937), starring

Marlene Dietrich Marie Magdalene "Marlene" DietrichBorn as Maria Magdalena, not Marie Magdalene, according to Dietrich's biography by her daughter, Maria Riva ; however, Dietrich's biography by Charlotte Chandler cites "Marie Magdalene" as her birth name . (, ; ...

; ''

The Nursemaid Who Disappeared ''The Nursemaid Who Disappeared'' is a 1939 British crime film directed by Arthur B. Woods and starring Ronald Shiner, Ian Fleming, Arthur Margetson, Peter Coke and Edward Chapman. Based on a 1938 Philip MacDonald novel, it was produced by ...

'' (1939); '' Stolen Life'' (1939); ''John Smith Wakes Up'' (1940); and ''The Skin Game'' (1951). On Broadway, she had one credit, for ''Payment Deferred'' (1931), again with Elsa Lanchester and Charles Laughton as fellow cast members."Payment Deferred: Who's Who in the Cast"
''Playbill'' (1931).

Personal life

Fordred died in 1980, in London, aged 77 years.

References

External links

* *
Dorice Fordred's listing at the British Film Institute websitePhotograph of Dorice Fordred and Charles Laughton
in a scene from ''Payment Deferred'' (1931), in the New York Public Library Digital Collections {{DEFAULTSORT:Fordred, Dorice 1902 births 1980 deaths South African stage actresses Actors from Gqeberha South African film actresses South African expatriates in the United Kingdom