Eric Maschwitz

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Albert Eric Maschwitz OBE (10 June 1901 – 27 October 1969),[1] sometimes credited as Holt Marvell, was an English entertainer, writer, editor, broadcaster and broadcasting executive.

Life and work

Born in

Henley in Arden, Repton School and Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge.[3]

As a lyricist, Maschwitz wrote, often credited to his pseudonym "Holt Marvell", the

These Foolish Things" (music by Jack Strachey, reinterpreted in 1973 by Bryan Ferry on his first solo album of the same name).[1] According to the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Maschwitz had a brief romantic liaison with British cabaret singer Jean Ross, and their relationship inspired the lyrics for "These Foolish Things".[4][5] (Other sources have suggested that either Maschwitz's wife Hermione Gingold or American actress Anna May Wong inspired the lyrics,[6] but Maschwitz's autobiography cites "fleeting memories of [a] young love."[7]
)

Maschwitz started his stage acting career in the early 1920s, playing Vittoria in the first successful modern production of Webster's The White Devil (Marlowe Society, Cambridge ADC Theatre, 1920). He joined the BBC in 1926. His first radio show was In Town Tonight. While at the BBC, he wrote a radio operetta Goodnight Vienna, with the popular song of the same title co-written by George Posford. In 1932, it was adapted as a film, Goodnight, Vienna, starring Anna Neagle.[1]

Between 1927 and 1933, Maschwitz was the editor of the weekly broadcast listings magazine

Academy Award
nomination.

From August 1939, he was a postal censor in Liverpool. From November 1939, he served with the

lieutenant-colonel. Maschwitz, along with Major John MacMillan (members of "No 1 Field Broadcasting Unit"), was responsible for taking over the "Reichssender Hamburg" on 3 May 1945.[10]

This requisition enabled the British occupation troops to start broadcasting programmes for their soldiers in northern Germany, and was the nucleus for the British Forces Network (BFN), inaugurated with Maschwitz's help in July 1945, eventually to become the British Forces Broadcasting Service (BFBS).[11]

In 1947, Maschwitz became chairman of the Songwriters' Guild of Great Britain, which was founded by Ivor Novello, Sir Alan Herbert, Eric Coates, Haydn Wood, Richard Addinsell and others, for the encouragement and protection of British popular music.[12] He was the first Vice Chair and Chairman from July 1948 for one year, and again between December 1954 and April 1958.[13]

In 1958, near the start of the BBC/ITV ratings wars, he rejoined the BBC as Head of Television Light Entertainment.[1]

Maschwitz left to join the rival ITV in 1963. During the course of his varied entertainment career, Maschwitz also adapted French comedies such as Thirteen For Dinner; wrote the book and lyrics for numerous musicals, amongst them

George Formby;[1] and he was the creator of the radio series Café Collette. He also edited the Radio Times, and turned his hand to the detective novel: Death at Broadcasting House, co-written with Val Gielgud
and published in 1931, revolves around a radio play disrupted by the murder of one of the cast.

Maschwitz was married twice: first to Hermione Gingold, who was granted a divorce in 1945, and then immediately to Phyllis Gordon, they lived at 12 Dorset House, Gloucester Place, London NW1. She remained his wife until his death at an Ascot Nursing Home in Sunninghill, Berkshire.

His autobiography, No Chip On My Shoulder, was published by Herbert Jenkins in 1957.[14][15]

He was created an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 1936.

Selected filmography

References

  1. ^
    ISBN 0-85112-939-0
    .
  2. ^ "Eric Maschwitz". Spartacus Educational. Retrieved 16 July 2020.
  3. ^ Took, Barry, 'Maschwitz, (Albert) Eric (1901–1969)', Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 Retrieved 19 August 2009.
  4. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/74425. Retrieved 18 June 2017. (Subscription or UK public library membership
    required.)
  5. ^ Frost, Peter (31 December 2013). "Jean Ross: These Foolish Things". Morning Star. London. Retrieved 18 June 2018.
  6. ^ Gingold 1989, p. 54.
  7. ^ Maschwitz 1957, pp. 77–79.
  8. ^ "Radio Times Facts and Figures". Radiotimesarchive.co.uk. Retrieved 15 April 2018.
  9. ^ BFI database page on Eric Maschwitz
  10. ^ See Ahrens, Michael, Die Briten in Hamburg: Besatzerleben 1945 - 1958. München: Döllin und Galitz Verlag, 2011, p. 50.
  11. ^ See Taylor, Doreen, A Microphone and a Frequency: Forty Years of Forces Broadcasting, London: Heinemann, 1983, pp. 36-49

    Zöllner, Oliver, BFBS, "Freund in der Fremde". British Forces Broadcasting Service (Germany) – der britische Militärrundfunk in Deutschland, Göttingen: Cuvillier, 1996, pp. 18–21
  12. ^ "Eric Maschwitz". Spartacus Educational. Retrieved 16 July 2020.
  13. ^ Success Story, 1947-1968. Songwriters' Guild of Great Britain. 1968.
  14. ^ Maschwitz 1957.
  15. ^ "Eric Maschwitz". British Musical Theatre. Archived from the original on 20 August 2008. Retrieved 19 August 2009.

Bibliography

External links

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