Alan Wheatley
Alan Wheatley | |
---|---|
Born | |
Died | 30 August 1991 Westminster, London, England | (aged 84)
Occupation(s) | Actor and radio announcer |
Alan Wheatley (19 April 1907 – 30 August 1991) was an English actor. He was a well known stage actor in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s, appeared in forty films between 1931 and 1965 and was a frequent broadcaster on radio from the 1930s to the 1990s, and on television from 1938 to 1964. His most prominent television role was the Sheriff of Nottingham in the 1950s TV series The Adventures of Robin Hood, with Richard Greene as Robin Hood; Wheatley played the sheriff in 54 episodes between 1955 and 1959. Earlier, he had played Sherlock Holmes in the first television series featuring the great detective.
In addition to acting, Wheatley was a radio announcer during the
Life and career
Early years
Wheatley was born in Tolworth, Surrey, on 19 April 1907, the son of William Henry Wheatley and his wife Rose Eva (née Towers). He was educated at Tiffin School, and was then employed in industrial psychology.[1] He made his first appearance on the stage at the Festival Theatre, Cambridge in October 1928, as Randall Utterword in Heartbreak House, after which he was a member of the repertory company at that theatre and later in Hull. In 1930 he toured as Sir Roger Fairfax in Sweet Nell of Old Drury with Fred Terry, and in 1931 in The Quaker Girl.[1]
In November 1931 Wheatley performed in London at the Embassy and St Martin's theatres, as the Journalist in Britannia of Billingsgate.[1] In other London productions in 1932–33 he played the Guide in Miracle at Verdun, Master Klaus in The Witch and Godfrey Perry in Wild Justice. He appeared at the Malvern Festival in August 1933,[1] before returning to the West End, where his roles included Edgar in King Lear to the Lear of William Devlin.[2]
For nine months in 1934–35 Wheatley was leading man at the Croydon Repertory Theatre,[1] and in 1936 he made his first appearance with the Old Vic company. He made his Broadway debut in the same year, in the Old Vic's production of St Helena, playing Las Cases to the Bonaparte of Maurice Evans.[3] He subsequently toured in Scandinavia and adjoining countries, as Major Petkoff in Arms and the Man and Arnold Champion-Cheney in The Circle.[1]
After returning to London, Wheatley's last stage roles of the 1930s were Disraeli in Mr Gladstone, with Devlin; Mosca in Volpone, with
War and post-war
In September 1939 at the time of the outbreak of the
While serving with the European Service Wheatley met Rafael Nadal, a friend of Federico García Lorca, and developed an interest in the poet's works.[7] He made English translations of several of them; "Lament on the Death of a Bullfighter" was the first to be completed, and was broadcast by the BBC in 1946.[7] He recorded nine of his translations for the gramophone in 1953, released in Britain on the Argo label and in the US by Westminster Records.[8]
When BBC television resumed after its suspension during the war, Wheatley played a wide range of characters, from
In 1945 Wheatley rejoined the Old Vic company, touring as Mercutio in Romeo and Juliet. At the end of the year he joined the company at the Mercury Theatre, London, where his roles included the Greek and Tegeus in a double bill of W. B. Yeats's The Resurrection and Christopher Fry's A Phoenix Too Frequent,[11] Julian in Ronald Duncan's This Way to the Tomb (which the cast also played at the Studio Champs-Elysées in Paris and the Garrick Theatre, London), and Harry in T. S. Eliot's The Family Reunion.[1] In 1949 he played the title role in Hamlet at the Richmond Theatre. The reviewer in The Stage thought Wheatley displayed "a good voice and presence" in the role but was "rather lightweight".[12]
1950s
In 1951 Wheatley played Sherlock Holmes in a series of six televised dramatisations of Conan Doyle stories. Holmes had been played on television before, in one-off adaptations, but this was the first series to feature him.[13] Wheatley's co-stars were Raymond Francis as Dr Watson and Bill Owen as Inspector Lestrade. The Times commented that as Holmes, Wheatley "catches the essential character. He is a figure, not merely of wonder or of fun, but of romantic possibility".[14] No audio or video recordings of the productions are known to exist.
Between 1955 and 1959 Wheatley is recorded by the British Film Institute as appearing in 54 episodes of the ABC television series The Adventures of Robin Hood as the Sheriff of Nottingham, the perpetual adversary of Robin (Richard Greene).[9] He played the role "with many a villainous smile", as The Times said, but eventually withdrew from it.[6] His colleague Peter Cotes said that the part made him into a well known "personality",[13] and although he was regarded by colleagues as "the best high comedy actor in Britain",[15] and "daring", "haunting" and "moving" in various roles,[16] nonetheless, after the Robin Hood series he was, in the words of an obituarist, "more inclined to be cast as a suave villain than as a hero".[6] Concurrently with some of the Robin Hood series, Wheatley played Pontius Pilate in a BBC television religious drama series, Jesus of Nazareth first shown in 1956.[17] His other television roles of the 1950s included Rupert Cadell in Rope (1953) and the murderous Jonathan Brewster in the comedy Arsenic and Old Lace (1958).[9] His film roles included Inspector Braddock in The Limping Man (1953) and Inspector MacLennan in The House Across the Lake (1954).[9]
Wheatley's entry in Who's Who in the Theatre records no stage appearances by him between 1952 and 1959.
Later years
In the 1960s, Wheatley continued to broadcast frequently on television and radio. He played Richard D'Oyly Carte in a three-part BBC television series Gilbert and Sullivan: The Immortal Jesters (1961), and appeared in episodes of Maigret (1962 and 1963), Doctor Who, where his character was the first ever to be seen being killed by a dalek and Compact, both in 1964.[17] In the same year he played Prince Rohat, Minister of the Interior, in Victor Canning's six-part drama The Midnight Men.[17] His last cinema role listed by the British Film Institute was Major Ronald Grey-Simmons in Clash by Night (1965).[19]
In later years, Wheatley worked mostly on radio, as narrator and poetry-reader as well as actor. In 1975, he played
Wheatley died of a heart attack in Westminster, London on 30 August 1991, aged 84.[6][20]
Filmography
Year | Title | Role | Notes |
---|---|---|---|
1931 | Out of the Blue | Extra | Uncredited |
1931 | The Love Race | Extra | Uncredited |
1936 | The Conquest of Air | Borelli | |
1937 | William Tindale | William Tindale | |
1944 | Love Story | Partygoer | Uncredited |
1945 | The Rake's Progress | Edwards | |
Caesar and Cleopatra | Persian | ||
1946 | Appointment with Crime | Noel Penn | |
Spring Song | Menelli | ||
1947 | Jassy | Sir Edward Walker | |
The End of the River | Irygoyen | ||
Brighton Rock | Fred Hale | ||
1948 | Corridor of Mirrors | Edgar Orsen | |
Counterblast | M.W. Kennedy | ||
Calling Paul Temple | Edward Lathom | ||
Sleeping Car to Trieste | Karl / Charles Pool | ||
1949 | It's Not Cricket | Felix | |
For Them That Trespass | Librarian | Uncredited | |
1951 | Home to Danger | Hughes | |
1952 | Whispering Smith Hits London | Reith | |
The Pickwick Papers | Fogg | ||
1953 | Spaceways | Dr Smith | |
The Limping Man | Inspector Braddock | ||
Small Town Story | Nick Hammond | ||
1954 | The Javenese Dagger | Victor | Short |
The Diamond | Thompson Blake | ||
The House Across the Lake | Inspector MacLennan | ||
Delayed Action | Mark Cruden | ||
Elizabethan Express | Narrator | Voice | |
1955 | Simon and Laura | Adrian Lee | |
1958 | The Duke Wore Jeans | King of Ritallia | |
1960 | Inn for Trouble | Harold Gaskin | |
1961 | Frederic Chopin | Unknown | short film |
The Shadow of the Cat | Inspector Rowles | ||
1963 | Master Spy | Paul Skelton | |
Tomorrow at Ten | Assistant Commissioner Bewley | ||
1964 | A Jolly Bad Fellow | Epicene | |
Clash By Night | Ronald Grey-Simmons |
References and sources
References
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Herbert, p. 1243
- ^ "A Young King Lear", The Illustrated London News, 27 October 1934, p. 666
- ^ St Helena, Internet Broadway Database. Retrieved 25 September 2020
- ^ "The Importance of Being Earnest", BBC Genome. Retrieved 25 September 2020
- ^ "Bardell against Pickwick", British Film Institute. Retrieved 25 September 2020
- ^ a b c d "Alan Wheatley", The Times, 4 September 1991, p. 16
- ^ OCLC 20976258
- OCLC 62429183
- ^ a b c d e "Alan Wheatley", British Film Institute. Retrieved 25 September 2020
- ^ "King Richard II", The Manchester Guardian, 8 November 1950, p. 3
- ^ "The Mercury", The Stage, 2 May 1946, p. 7
- ^ "At Richmond", The Stage, 16 June 1949, p. 7
- ^ a b Cotes, Peter. "Holmes and Machiavelli", The Guardian, 3 September 1991, p. 35
- ^ "Return of Sherlock Holmes", The Times, 23 October 1951, p. 6
- ^ Basil Ashmore, quoted in "Entertainment", Buckinghamshire Examiner,14 November 1975, p. 12
- ^ a b Gauld, Graham. "Alan Wheatley", The Times, 22 October 1991, p. 16
- ^ a b c d "Alan Wheatley", BBC Genome. Retrieved 26 September 2020
- ^ "Aladdin at the Coliseum", The Sphere, 26 December 1959, p. 28
- ^ "Clash by Night (1965)", British Film Institute. Retrieved 29 September 2020
- ^ GRO Register of Deaths; SEP 1991 15; 1514 Westminster; Alan Wheatley; DoB = 19 Apr 1907; aged 84
Sources
- Herbert, Ian, ed. (1977). Who's Who in the Theatre (sixteenth ed.). London and Detroit: Pitman Publishing and Gale Research. ISBN 978-0-273-00163-8.
External links
- Alan Wheatley at IMDb