Mother Riley Meets the Vampire

Arthur Lucan - Mrs. Riley
Bela Lugosi - Von Housen
Dora Bryan - Tilly
Philip Leaver - Anton Daschomb
Richard Wattis - Police Constable Freddie
Graham Moffatt - Yokel
María Mercedes - Julia Loretti
Roderick Lovell - Douglas
David Hurst - Mugsy
Judith Furse - Freda
Hattie Jacques - Mrs. Jenks

Poorly scripted lowbrow comedy that brought an end to the long-running series of fourteen Old Mother Riley tales, all of which featured music hall entertainer Arthur Lucan in drag. Bela Lugosi had come to Britain to revive his stage version of Dracula, but when the play flopped, Lugosi had no money with which to return to the US so accepted the part of The Vampire to cover the cost of his fare home. Lugosi’s part wasn’t included in the original script and his addition gave the film a fractured structure and a peculiar clash of genres which fails to bond successfully.

Van Housen (Boris Karloff), a sinister foreign scientist known as ‘The Vampire’ is wanted by Scotland Yard for questioning in connection with a number of mysterious disappearances. Van Housen is in search of uranium to fuel his monster robots so he can rule the world, and has kidnapped a scientist’s daughter who possesses maps of South American uranium deposits. But the Yard cannot track him down, so when a crate containing Van Housen’s prototype robot is mistakenly delivered to Mrs. Riley (Arthur Lucan), Van Housen orders the fiendish robot to return – and bring Mother Riley with him. Van Housen subsequently offers Mother Riley the job of housekeeper, but once in his service the old Irish maid discovers the kidnapped girl and sets about rescuing her.