The green man film alastair sim biography
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Alastair Sim
Scottish actor (–)
Not to be confused with Alastair Simms.
Alastair Sim CBE | |
|---|---|
Sim as the Laird in Geordie, | |
| Born | Alastair George Bell Sim ()9 October Edinburgh, Scotland |
| Died | 19 August () (aged&#;75) London, England |
| Alma&#;mater | University of Edinburgh |
| Occupation | Actor |
| Years&#;active | – |
| Spouse | |
| Children | 1 |
Alastair George Bell Sim (9 October &#; 19 August ) was a Scottish actor, who began his theatrical career at the age of thirty. He quickly became established as a popular West End performer, remaining so until his death in Starting in , he also appeared in more than fifty British films, including an iconic adaptation of Charles Dickens’ novella A Christmas Carol, released in as Scrooge in Great Britain and as A Christmas Carol in the United States. Though an accomplished dramatic actor, he is often remembered for his comically sinister performances.
After a series of false starts, including a spell as a jobb
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Alastair Sim was a memorable character player of faded Anglo-Scottish gentility, whimsically put-upon countenance, and kuslig, sometimes minatory, laugh.
He was on scen first in (a bit part in Robeson's Othello), and in films from By the mid s he was a (slightly decaying) national institution. The American sociologists Wolfenstein and Leites (circa ) noted the prominent place of father figures in British as opposed to American cinema. Sim proved their point.
A never-youthful character, he attained star status through portraying eccentric authority: doctors (Waterloo Road (d. Sidney Gilliat, ); The Doctor's Dilemma (d. Anthony Asquith, )); schoolteachers (The Happiest Days of Your Life (d. Frank Launder, ); The Belles of St Trinian's (d. Launder, ), in drag); gentlemen of the cloth (Folly To Be Wise (d. Launder, )); policemen (Green For Danger (d. Gilliat, )); lairds and lords (Geordie (d. Launder, ); Left, Right and Centre (d. Gilliat, )).
Where the so
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A very silly but enormously entertaining farce that dutifully ticks all the genre's expected boxes (mistaken identities, compromising positions, much panicking and slamming of doors), The Green Man (d. Robert Day, ) was based on the play Meet A Body by Frank Launder and Sidney Gilliat, who produced and adapted this big-screen version.
Although he's nominally the villain, it's very clear from his self-justifying voiceover introduction that we're expected not only to sympathise with professional assassin Harry Hawkins (Alastair Sim) but also to actively cheer him on - his crusade to rid the world of pompous frauds, be they headmasters, dictators or elected politicians, is presented as an entirely reasonable and even noble endeavour.
While he inevitably meets a sticky end (the censors of the time wouldn't have permitted anything else) it's not without a note of regret, as he's so much more attractive a personality than the self-important Sir Gregory Upshott (Raymond Hun