DB7

I was just wondering, what are the most memorable instances of an actor cast against type? For example, has Basil Radford ever portrayed a baddie? (proper baddie, not just a government official)

CaptainWaggett

Though he's a bit of a racist in Broken Blossoms (Welsh-accented version) but I don't imagine he was meant to be seen as a villain. He did play a fifth columnist on stage though (and taunted Gordon Harker that he wouldn't shoot him in the back. Which Harker promptly did).

How about Nigel Patrick as the tough Sergeant-Major in The Virgin Soldiers.

TimR

Sophisticated Anton Walkbrook as the Hutterite farmer and leader in The 49th Parallel.

English Jean Simmons as the Indian girl in Black Narcissus

Hereafter, in a better world than this,
I shall desire more love and knowledge of you

batman

Maxwell Reed as an honest, upright country doctor in Before I Wake and Donald Sinden as a murdering bastard in Eye Witness.

I wish I had claws.

DB7

I'll have to hold my hands up and admit I've never seen it.

CaptainWaggett

He runs the mission station (I think that's what it is - obviously it's a corner of the Twickenham backlot) and huffs about the foolishness of Emlyn Williams learning English and wanting to preach a lot of nonsense about loving they neighbour. So I suppose it's fortunate he's only in one scene. As I'm sure you know, being completist about one's favourite actors does entail sitting through a certain amount of dross...(though to be fair, Dolly Haas is pretty good, once you try to stop working out what her accent is meant to be)

How about Sybil Thorndike as a working class mill-worker's wife in Hindle Wakes?

Steve Crook

Oh I don't know, I thought he did that one very well. I would imagine him with an old gramophone and a collection of 78s to listen to his music and a pile of books. Being in a farming community doesn't necessarily mean you have to be unsophisticated

She looked lovely, especially when she danced in front of the mirror and when she went down on her knees before Sabu. But any case of white actors "blacking up" like that is embarrassing to our modern sensibilities. She never said a word in the film so I'm sure that there would have been plenty of other people who could have played the part. But Powell always did like a pretty girl

Steve

penfold

This is the thirties remake, not the classic original....and if anything, more racist than Griffiths' version. It's not often shown, partly for that reason, and partly because it's bloody awful even if you overlook that aspect.

Bit of a Bay Window, what??

penfold

Typecast as seedy blackmailing criminal underworld types Donald Calthrop, as a happy skipping Bob Cratchit in the Seymour Hicks version of Scrooge. Brilliant.

Bit of a Bay Window, what??

CaptainWaggett

Would Hutterites have had a gramaphone back in those days? Or non-religious books?

TimR

Oh yes - he did an excellent job. This was a case where casting against type worked very well.

I saw The 49th Parallel as a boy. I did not see him again until The Red Shoes and Colonel Blimp. He seemed to be literally a different person.



Well, yes - it doesn't rule it out.....But I would say the population of Viennese ultra-sophisticates living on Hutterite farms in the Canadian central provinces in 1940 was fairly small.


Yes, she was very beautiful. She didn't seem out of place, and I was sorry when she disappeared. I understand what you mean about "blacking up' - somehow that didn't seem an issue there. I thought "That was quick! She's gone already..."

But Jeans Simmons is always gone too quickly. She did not make nearly enough films.

Hereafter, in a better world than this,
I shall desire more love and knowledge of you

DB7

Alastair Sim as the bomb-making assassin must have been one of his few baddie roles. He was mostly mischievous at worst.

Steve Crook

Yes, I don't see why not. They were Hutterites, not Amish or any of the other groups that eschew technology, as the Wikipedia article you've linked to shows. I said I could imagine him with records and books, I didn't say what was on those records or in those books

Steve

CaptainWaggett

Hutterites avoid technology, just as much as Amish do (my original link was about them). I believe the main difference between them and the Amish is they still mostly speak German (or a form of it), though I assume there are theological differences too, though probably not immediately obvious to an outsider.

As for anti-type casting - it's early in his career so it doesn't really count, but it's quite odd seeing Paul Henreid as a Nazi in Night Train to Munich.

penfold

Roger Livesey as a porn-peddling conman in The League of Gentlemen, and Miles Malleson as a purchaser in Peeping Tom...

Bit of a Bay Window, what??