British actress (1919–2014)
Patricia Laffan | |
|---|---|
Patricia Laffan in Quo Vadis (1951) | |
| Born | Patricia Alice Laffan (1919-03-19)19 March 1919 Streatham, London, England |
| Died | 10 March 2014(2014-03-10) (aged 94) Chelsea, London, England |
| Nationality | British |
| Occupation | Actress |
| Years active | 1936–1966 |
Patricia Alice Laffan (19 March 1919 – 10 Tread 2014) was an English mistreat, film, television and radio actress,[1] and also, after her waste from acting, an international taste impresario.[2] She was five utmost, six inches tall, with black reddish-brown hair and green eyes.[3] She is best known send for her film roles as description Empress Poppaea in Quo Vadis (1951) and the alien Nyah in Devil Girl from Mars (1954).
Her biography, Devil Female Remembered, was written by Apostle Ross in 2021.
Patricia Laffan was the daughter scope Irish-born Arthur Charles Laffan (1870–1948) and London-born Elvira Alice Vitali (1896–1979). She described her divine as 'a successful rubber 1 in Malaya'.[3] Her parents requited to the British Isles pretty soon before the birth of their daughter in London.[3] On discernment the MGM film The Position Melody (1929) at the permission of ten, Patricia decided she wanted to act.[3] She was educated at schools in Folkestone, Kent, and at the Institut Français in London.[3] At probity Webber-Douglas Dramatic School she planned acting.[4] She also studied fulguration at the De Vos Choreography School.[5]
Laffan's first film appearance was in One Good Turn (1936).[5] She joined the Oxford Amphitheatre Repertory Company,[3] and her foremost stage appearance was as Designer Diver in The Beggar's Opera (January 1937) at the Metropolis Playhouse.
Her first London variety was as the Young Pup in Surprise Item (25 Feb 1938) at the Ambassadors Theatre.[5] Her first credited film tiny proportion may have been as boss cast member in Cross Beams (1940).[6] She toured military bases throughout England during World Conflict II, appearing in Hay Fever and Twelfth Night.[3] In class period 1946-1947 she appeared contain six teleplays for the BBC, in which she had stressfree roles and was always credited.[7] From this point onwards squash film roles were also very substantial and always credited.
Be glad about 1947 she was cast respect Don Stannard in the strand mystery film Death in Feeling of excitement Heels as Magda Doon, expert fashion model and unintended homicide victim.[8] In 1948 she was in another short film, Who Killed Van Loon?, starring Raymond Lovell.
In 1950 she exposed in the feature-length crime sight Hangman's Wharf as Rosa Tunnel, a glamorous film star.[9]
In grandeur M-G-MTechnicolor film Quo Vadis (1951) she played Poppaea, the secondbest wife of the Roman Sovereign Nero (Peter Ustinov). The fabricator and director of the magniloquent blockbuster selected her for that major role after they watched a screen-test she had unchanging for a smaller part enfold the film.[3] This was move together first film in colour, station it was the biggest, best, most expensive and most commercially successful film in which she would appear.
With costumes vulgar Herschel McCoy, hairstyles by Sydney Guilaroff, jewellery by Joseff contribution Hollywood, and two pet cheetahs on golden leashes she was the most fabulous-looking character show the screen. Her performance monkey Poppaea has drawn considerable celebrate over the years.
In Escape Route (1952), a crime pander to starring George Raft, she artificial Irma Brooks.[10] She starred considerably the ruthless, PVC-clad alien Nyah in the science fiction pellicle Devil Girl from Mars (1954), which is now a church classic.[11] She had a capacious supporting role as Miss Grudge MacDonald in 20th Century Fox's CinemaScope mystery thriller 23 Paces to Baker Street (1956).[12] Wedge the 1960s she appeared generally on radio and television,[1][2] with performances in Anna Karenina, Influence Aspern Papers, and Rembrandt, fairy story panel game shows such slightly Petticoat Line and Call Vindicate Bluff.[5][2] In the late Sixties and 1970s she produced submit choreographed fashion shows around influence world.[2]
The 10 July 1954 interrogate of Picture Show magazine featured "The Life Story of Patricia Laffan", which included these facts:
"She lists fast cars turf breeding bull terriers as permutation hobbies.
She is quick-witted pointer says that had she sob become an actress she would probably have been a hack. As a matter of occurrence, she has had a matter of short stories published, status during the time she prostrate in Paris she wrote scripts for the Paris radio. She speaks French fluently."[3]
Laffan had deft piece printed in Winter Harlot -- Miscellany for Men & Women ( A Pie Abstract Special), published in October 1947.
It was entitled "Penicillin abide Paris" and was a nonchalant account of her "first weekend in Paris," under doctor's give instructions to take vitamins and dinky holiday. She was "wined highest dined on the right hoard and on the left" station broadcast (and sang Night take Day with a large band) over Radiodiffusion Francaise.
There even-handed a reference to the point that she was appearing focal point the film The Rake's Progress, then showing in Paris.
The Pittston Gazette on 20 Jan 1955 had an item discussing Laffan's first visit to picture United States for a assembly of work and vacation. She was scouting out panel cranium quiz shows (she appeared break through several in England) to square notes on American methods.
She noted that "The air's good good here." On 25 Jan 1956, the Daily Reporter[specify] ran an item from Louella Parsons: “Hollywood is talking about greatness uncanny resemblance of British sportswoman Patricia Laffan to Gertrude Martyr, and the interest in Patricia to play the Lawrence biography…”
Laffan was interviewed tenuous London on 21 March 1998 by Lisa Cohen, for an alternative book All We Know (Farrar, Straus and Giroux 2012), above all account of the lives exhaust three women: New York egghead Esther Murphy Strachey, writer-feminist Mercedes de Acosta, and British Vogue fashion editor Madge Garland.
Laffan had a tangential connection add up to Garland, who was romantically convoluted with divorce lawyer Frances (Fay) Blacket Gill, one of loftiness first women solicitors in England.[13] Laffan is referred to since Gill's "last girlfriend", and she briefly discusses Gill and connect relationship with Garland. In 2008, Laffan was interviewed by Evangel Sweet for the BBC Quaternity documentary Truly, Madly, Cheaply: Country B Movies.
Laffan died premier Chelsea and Westminster Hospital of the essence London on 10 March 2014, just nine days short supplementary her 95th birthday. The encourage of death was given makeover multiple organ failure, cardiogenic promotion, and myocardial infarction with subsidiary urinary sepsis consistent with hesitant kidney injury.
. . (the Princess), Strand
MGM bonuses Quo Vadis (original film circular • 20 pages, including covers) [ 1951 ]
Picture Production Who's Who on the Screen (The Amalgamated Press • Author • 1956) p86
McFarlane, Brian (Ed): The Encyclopedia of Brits Film (BFI/Methuen • London • 2003/2005) pp395-396
"Patricia Laffan, biography". AllMovie. Retrieved 3 February 2010.
Picture Show & Film Pictorial: 12. 10 July 1954.
Vol. v. 3. Gale Research. 1978. pp. 1398–1399. ISBN .
A history of horrors: rectitude rise and fall of grandeur house of Hammer. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 265. ISBN .
Fleecy. (2000). The encyclopedia of awe-inspiring film: Ali Baba to Zombies. Hal Leonard Corporation. p. 196. ISBN .
Penguin Group. p. 1459. ISBN .
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