Frederic Mullally (25 February 1918 – 7 September 2014) was a British journalist, public relations executive, and novelist. He was born in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

Career

Mullally's journalism career began in India where, from 1937 to 1949, he was sub-editor on '' The Statesman'' of

Calcutta Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary business, comm ...

, then editor of the ''

Sunday Standard ''The Sunday Standard'' was an English-language weekly newspaper in Sri Lanka published by Standard Newspapers (Private) Limited, part of Communication and Business Equipment (Private) Limited (CBE). It was founded in 2006 and published from Colomb ...

'' of

Bombay Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian state of Maharashtra and the '' de facto'' financial centre of India. According to the United Nations, as of 2018, Mumbai is the sec ...

. Back in London he worked as a sub-editor of ''

The Financial News ''The Financial News'' is a South Korean daily newspaper. The newspaper's motto is "First-Class financial paper". Kwon Seong Cheol, an alumnus of Seoul National University Seoul National University (SNU; ) is a national public research univ ...

'', as co-editor of the weekly ''

Tribune Tribune () was the title of various elected officials in ancient Rome. The two most important were the tribunes of the plebs and the military tribunes. For most of Roman history, a college of ten tribunes of the plebs acted as a check on the ...

'', and finally as political editor and columnist of the ''

Sunday Pictorial The ''Sunday Mirror'' is the Sunday sister paper of the ''Daily Mirror''. It began life in 1915 as the ''Sunday Pictorial'' and was renamed the ''Sunday Mirror'' in 1963. In 2016 it had an average weekly circulation of 620,861, dropping marke ...

''. From 1950 to 1955, he headed the public relations firm of Mullally & Warner, with clients ranging from

Audrey Hepburn Audrey Hepburn (born Audrey Kathleen Ruston; 4 May 1929 – 20 January 1993) was a British actress and humanitarian. Recognised as both a film and fashion icon, she was ranked by the American Film Institute as the third-greatest female screen ...

and Frank Sinatra to

Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. Douglas Elton Fairbanks Jr., (December 9, 1909 – May 7, 2000) was an American actor, producer and decorated naval officer of World War II. He is best known for starring in such films as ''The Prisoner of Zenda'' (1937), ''Gunga Din'' (1939) a ...

Paul Getty Jean Paul Getty Sr. (; December 15, 1892 – June 6, 1976) was an American-born British petroleum industrialist who founded the Getty Oil Company in 1942 and was the patriarch of the Getty family. A native of Minneapolis, he was the son of pio ...

Frankie Laine Frankie Laine (born Francesco Paolo LoVecchio; March 30, 1913 – February 6, 2007) was an American singer, songwriter, and actor whose career spanned nearly 75 years, from his first concerts in 1930 with a marathon dance company to his final p ...

, the

Festival Ballet English National Ballet is a classical ballet company founded by Dame Alicia Markova and Sir Anton Dolin as London Festival Ballet and based in London, England. Along with The Royal Ballet, Birmingham Royal Ballet, Northern Ballet and Scottish ...

and

Picture Post ''Picture Post'' was a photojournalistic magazine published in the United Kingdom from 1938 to 1957. It is considered a pioneering example of photojournalism and was an immediate success, selling 1,700,000 copies a week after only two months. ...

. Others included;

Vera Lynn Dame Vera Margaret Lynn (; 20 March 191718 June 2020) was an English singer and entertainer whose musical recordings and performances were very popular during World War II. She is Honorific nicknames in popular music, honorifically known as ...

Yvonne De Carlo Margaret Yvonne Middleton (September 1, 1922January 8, 2007), known professionally as Yvonne De Carlo, was a Canadian-American actress, dancer and singer. She became a Hollywood film star in the 1940s and 1950s, made several recordings, and late ...

Guy Mitchell Guy Mitchell (born Albert George Cernik; February 22, 1927 – July 1, 1999) was an American pop singer and actor, successful in his homeland, the UK, and Australia. He sold 44 million records, including six million-selling singles. In the fa ...

Sonja Henie Sonja Henie (8 April 1912 – 12 October 1969) was a Norwegian figure skater and film star. She was a three-time Olympic champion (1928, 1932, 1936) in women's singles, a ten-time World champion (1927–1936) and a six-time European champion ...

, Line Renaud,

Johnnie Ray John Alvin Ray (January 10, 1927 – February 24, 1990) was an American singer, songwriter, and pianist. Highly popular for most of the 1950s, Ray has been cited by critics as a major precursor to what became rock and roll, for his jazz and bl ...

Jo Stafford Jo Elizabeth Stafford (November 12, 1917July 16, 2008) was an American traditional pop music singer, whose career spanned five decades from the late 1930s to the early 1980s. Admired for the purity of her voice, she originally underwent classi ...

Les Paul and Mary Ford Les Paul and Mary Ford were a popular 1950s husband-and-wife musical duo who performed and recorded during 1945–1963. They both sang and played guitars. Ford and Paul were music superstars during the first half of the 1950s, putting out 28 hit ...

, and the

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the university press of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world, and its printing history dates back to the 1480s. Having been officially granted the legal right to print book ...

and its counterpart,

Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press is the university press of the University of Cambridge. Granted letters patent by Henry VIII of England, King Henry VIII in 1534, it is the oldest university press in the world. It is also the King's Printer. Cambr ...

, as well as the

Hulton Press Sir Edward George Warris Hulton (29 November 1906 – 8 October 1988) was a British magazine publisher and writer. Early life Hulton was born to Sir Edward Hulton, 1st Baronet, a newspaper publisher and racehorse owner originally from Manchest ...

. In 1956, he was the only person to receive an interview with the newly married

Prince Rainier of Monaco Rainier III (Rainier Louis Henri Maxence Bertrand Grimaldi; 31 May 1923 – 6 April 2005) was Prince of Monaco from 1949 to his death in 2005. Rainier ruled the Principality of Monaco for almost 56 years, making him one of the longest-ruling m ...

and his new wife,

Grace Kelly Grace Patricia Kelly (November 12, 1929 – September 14, 1982) was an American actress who, after starring in several significant films in the early to mid-1950s, became Princess of Monaco by marrying Prince Rainier III in April 1956. Kell ...

, then on their honeymoon on the Prince's yacht while anchored off the Mediterranean island of Ibiza, a request granted to Mullally as, apart from being a resident of the island himself, he had been the only one of a pack of journalists to show appropriate respect for the feelings of the couple on their special occasion. Mullally's first novel was the 1958 world best-seller ''Danse Macabre''. This was followed by eleven more titles. His semi-autobiographical novel ''Clancy'' was dramatised by the BBC in five one-hour television episodes in 1975 and 1977 under the title '' Looking for Clancy'', starring

Robert Powell Robert Powell (; born 1 June 1944) is an English actor who is known for the title roles in '' Mahler'' (1974) and ''Jesus of Nazareth'' (1977), and for his portrayal of secret agent Richard Hannay in '' The Thirty Nine Steps'' (1978) and its s ...

and

Keith Drinkel Keith Drinkel (born 14 November 1944) is an English actor. Drinkel was born in York, educated at St Michael's College, Leeds, and is now based in Brighton. His notable appearances in film and television include ''A Family at War'' (1970), ...

. Between books, Mullally compiled and wrote with the collaboration with the BBC an album, ''The Sounds of Time'' a dramatised history of Britain (1933–45) and the long running ''

Penthouse Penthouse most often refers to: *Penthouse apartment, a special apartment on the top floor of a building * ''Penthouse'' (magazine), a British-founded men's magazine *Mechanical penthouse, a floor, typically located directly under a flat-roof, tha ...

'' magazine's erotic strip cartoon " Oh Wicked Wanda!". In 1949, he abandoned a prospective candidature of the Labour Party for the parliamentary constituency of Finchley and

Friern Barnet Friern Barnet is a suburban area within the London Borough of Barnet, north of Charing Cross. Its centre is formed by the busy intersection of Colney Hatch Lane (running north and south), Woodhouse Road (taking westbound traffic towards North Fi ...

. Late in his life he contributed occasional freelance journalism. He died in 2014 at the age of 96.

Personal life

He was married to the actress

Rosemary Nicols Rosemary Nicols (born Rosemary Claxton; 28 October 1941, in Bradford, England) is a British actress. She comes from a theatrical family and was the author of the 1967 book ''The Loving Adventures of Jaby''. Biography She was educated at Haberd ...

from 27 September 1971 until his death on 7 September 2014.

Selected bibliography

Fiction

* ''Danse Macabre'' (1958) published as ''Marianne'' in the US * ''Man with Tin Trumpet'' (1961) published as ''Sara'' in the US * ''Split Scene'' (1963) * ''The Assassins'' (1964) * ''No Other Hunger'' (1966) * ''The Prizewinner'' (1967) * ''The Munich Involvement'' (1968) * ''Clancy'' (1971) * ''The Malta Conspiracy'' (1972) * ''Venus Afflicted'' (1973) * ''Hitler Has Won'' (1975) * ''The Deadly Payoff'' (1976) * ''The Daughters'' (1988)

Non-fiction

* ''Death Pays a Dividend'' (1944) with

Fenner Brockway Archibald Fenner Brockway, Baron Brockway (1 November 1888 – 28 April 1988) was a British socialist politician, humanist campaigner and anti-war activist. Early life and career Brockway was born to W. G. Brockway and Frances Elizabeth Abbey ...

* ''Fascism Inside England'' (1946) * ''The Penthouse Sexicon'' (1968) humorous guide * ''The Silver Salver: The Story of the Guinness Family'' (1981) * ''Primo: The Story of Man-Mountain Carnera'' (1991).

References

External links

* John Simkin:
Frederic Mullally
',

Spartacus Educational Spartacus Educational is a free online encyclopedia with essays and other educational material on a wide variety of historical subjects principally British history from 1700 and the history of the United States. Based in the United Kingdom, Spa ...

, 1997, 2014 (per 2018) * *
Frederic Mullally Official Website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mullally, Frederic 1918 births 2014 deaths English non-fiction writers English male journalists English male novelists 20th-century English novelists 20th-century English male writers British erotica writers British comics writers Writers from London British people in colonial India