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Leslie Howard: Berkeley Square
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Howard appeared in 25 films in 13 years, giving his most acclaimed performances in Berkeley Square (nominated for the 1933 Academy Award), Of Human Bondage, The Scarlet Pimpernel, and Pygmalion (nominated for the 1938 Academy Award). Yet he viewed acting principally as a financial means for engaging in other pursuits—writing plays, directing plays and films (Pygmalion, Pimpernel Smith, and Spitfire), and producing (Intermezzo, Pimpernel Smith). He intended, after the war, to give up acting and to produce and direct both plays and films. But on 1 June 1943, returning from a trip to Lisbon (to lecture on the theater and indirectly on the war), he was shot down by the Nazis, who believed Churchill was on board his commercial airliner. Britain had lost a fine actor and a great patriot. According to David Shipman, "it is no exaggeration to say that no figure in British show business was so deeply mourned, or missed, during this century."
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Howard often played stiff-upper-lipped Englishmen in films such as the movie version of his great stage success Berkeley Square (1933), for which he was nominated for a Academy Award for Best Actor. He played The Scarlet Pimpernel in 1934 and in 1938 played Professor Higgins in Pygmalion, which earned him another Oscar nomination. He appeared in the film version of Outward Bound but in a different role from the one he'd portrayed in the Broadway cast.
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Adapted from John Balderston's successful stage fantasy (itself based on a story by Henry James), Berkeley Square is the story of a modern-day London scientist (Leslie Howard), who is romantically fascinated by the 18th century. A freak accident propels Howard back to 1784, where he assumes the identity of one of his own ancestors. Howard falls in love with his distant cousin Helen (Heather Angel), while his other relatives regard the time-traveller as a "sorcerer" due to his disturbing knowledge of future events. Gradually, Howard is disillusioned by the squalor and bigotry of the 18th century. He bids farewell to Helen, explaining that he will actually be born years after her death but that they will be reunited "in God's time". Returning to the present, Howard discovers that Helen died young without ever marrying. He renounces his own fiancee and determines to live out his life as a bachelor, to be united with his true love in death.
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Synopsis: Adapted from John Balderston's successful stage fantasy (itself based on a story by Henry James), Berkeley Square is the story of a modern-day London scientist (Leslie Howard), who is romantically fascinated by the 18th century. A freak accident propels Howard back to 1784, where he assumes theRead More
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Berkeley Square