The Royal Film Performance E-Book

Robert Sellers

• Herausgeber: The History Press
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 303

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2025

Beschreibung

Celebrating eighty years of Royal Film Performances, mixing Royal elegance with celebrity glamour and showcasing the pinnacle of film arts. For nearly eight decades, the Royal Family has been gracing the red carpet to see the most eagerly anticipated film of the year. Since 1946, the Royal Film Performance has been an annual highlight of the entertainment social calendar, where cinema's most famous icons have come face to face with royalty. With authors Gareth Owen and Robert Sellers, dive into the glitz, glamour and regal encounters of each Royal Film Performance, the memorable moments and the fascinating stories. From Marilyn Monroe's nervous encounter with Queen Elizabeth II to the cheeky remarks of Jayne Mansfield, witness the intersection of cinema's luminaries and royalty. Inside The Royal Film Performance: A Celebration: - Lavishly illustrated with colour and black-and-white photographs and illustrations - Photographs of celebrities such as Diana Dors, Meryl Streep, and Ian McKellen, and royalty such as Queen Elizabeth II, King Charles III and Princess Diana - A full history of the Royal Film Performance, from its origins to today - Covers the history of every performance, including such hits as Gladiator II, James Bond movie Spectre and Chariots of Fire As the curtain rises on this cinematic celebration, The Royal Film Performance: A Celebration pays homage to the stars, the royals and the unsung heroes of the industry, sure to delight fans of the Royal Family and cinema aficionados alike.

Leseprobe

The Royal Film Performance

The Royal Film Performance

A CELEBRATION

ROBERT SELLERS AND GARETH OWEN

Please note that quotations and press excerpts duplicated in the following

pages are from sources dating back to the late nineteenth century onwards,

and consequently the language and attitudes of the day do not necessarily

reflect those of the charity or the authors today.

First published 2025

The History Press

97 St George’s Place, Cheltenham,

Gloucestershire, GL50 3QB

www.thehistorypress.co.uk

© Robert Sellers and Gareth Owen, 2025

The right of Robert Sellers and Gareth Owen to be identified as the

Authors of this work has been asserted in accordance with the

Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted

or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic,

mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented,

including photocopying and recording, or in any information

storage or retrieval system, without the permission in writing

from the Publishers.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN 978 1 80399 825 1

Typesetting and origination by The History Press

Printed and bound in Turkey by Imak

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Contents

Foreword

7

Introduction

9

Part I: e Royal Film Performance: A History

10

1

e Royal Film

11

2

Foundations (1895–1939)

14

3

War and Peace (1939–45)

23

4

e First Royal Command Film Performances (1946–49)

25

5

Premieres and Television (1950s)

30

6

Evolving Times (1960s and 1970s)

36

7

Flying the Flag (1980s)

44

8

Changing Times (1990–2010)

48

9

Changing and Evolving (2010–24)

59

10 In Focus

68

Part II: Royal Film Performances

72

Appendix: e Film & TV Charity Governance

239

Acknowledgements

240

Foreword

7

of them as special as a festival screening at

Cannes, but only once have I had the privilege

of producing a film selected for the Royal Film

Performance: an experience which honestly

outdoes all the rest of them.

It was 1981, and the film was

Chariots of Fire

,

with the late Queen Mother in attendance. I

have a clear memory of sitting next to her in

the balcony of the Odeon Leicester Square and

being aware of a slightly theatrical ‘shudder’

when David Yelland, playing the then Prince of

Wales, made his first appearance on the screen

– obviously old memories die hard!

It was in every way a totally amazing even-

ing, topped off by a dinner at the Savoy with

a performance by the Cambridge Footlights,

starring, believe it or not, a young Emma

ompson, Stephen Fry, Hugh Laurie and

Tony Slattery.

at was in every sense a Royal Film

Performance to remember, but each year offers

a new film and another special evening at

which the industry gathers with members of

the royal family to celebrate and support the

wonderful world of cinema.

David Puttnam CBE, HonFRSA,

HonFRPS, MRIA,

2025

THE ROYAL FILM PERFORMANCE has always

been a special occasion – I can’t remember

a star, a director, a producer or a writer who

wouldn’t bust a gut to be present, and very

few studio executives who weren’t prepared to

cross the Atlantic to be there. It’s as if an extra

layer of tinsel is added to Tinseltown!

e silent beneficiaries of the evening are

not those who actually meet a member of the

royal family, or whose names or logos are on

the movie, but the hundreds, indeed thou-

sands, of their fellow workers who have fallen

on tougher times. Royal Film Performances

have been held in support of a Film and TV

Charity ever since the very first such occa-

sion in 1946. en called a Royal Command

Performance, that first event was a screening

of Powell and Pressburger’s

A Matter of Life and

Death

, attended by His Majesty King George VI,

as well as Queen Elizabeth and the young prin-

cesses Elizabeth and Margaret.

Since then, there have been a further sev-

enty such events over the years, ranging from

classics like

To Catch a ief

and

West Side Story

to more recent hits like

Titanic

and

Spectre

,

and, most recently, the world premiere of Sir

Ridley Scott’s

Gladiator II

.

I’ve been fortunate to have enjoyed being

part of half a dozen royal premieres, every one

Foreword

Introduction

9

Some of the previous Royal Film

Performances have included memorable titles

such as

Scott of the Antarctic

(1948),

To Catch

a ief

(1955),

West Side Story

(1962),

Born Free

(1966),

Love Story

(1971),

Kramer vs. Kramer

(1979),

Chariots of Fire

(1981),

A Passage To India

(1985),

Titanic

(1997),

Casino Royale

(2006),

e

Hobbit

(2012) and

Top Gun: Maverick

(2022).

It was the centenary of the Film &

Television Charity in 2024 and this book,

which has the full backing of the charity along

with exclusive access to their archives, is a

celebration and testament to the great British

institution and sets out the story in words and

pictures of each Royal Film Performance, while

offering a glimpse into the work of the charity

and its many significant achievements along

the way.

FOR EIGHT DECADES, members of the British

royal family have graced the red carpet to see

the most eagerly anticipated films of the year.

Since 1946, the Royal Film Performance™ has

been an annual highlight of the entertain-

ment social calendar with cinema’s most

famous icons coming face to face with roy-

alty, and it is all organised by the Film and

Television Charity, formerly known as the

Cinematograph Trade Benevolent Fund and

later the Cinema & Television Benevolent

Fund (CTBF). Proceeds from Royal Film

Performances as well as income from other

fundraising events over the decades, such as

cinema garden parties, Filmharmonic movie

music concerts, London (fancy dress) par-

ties, BAFTA comedy lunches, the

Daily Express

Balls, Christmas raffles and much more, have

all helped those working behind the scenes

in film, television and cinema with a range of

practical, financial and mental health support.

Introduction

Part I: The Royal Film

Performance: A History

e Facts of Life

(1961): e Queen Mother meets Peter

Sellers, Brenda de Banzie and, far left, stage-show

producer Vivian Cox.

The Royal Film

11

1971

Love Story

1972

Mary, Queen of Scots

1973

Lost Horizon

1974

e ree Musketeers

1975

Funny Lady

1976

e Slipper and the Rose

1977

Silver Streak

1978

Close Encounters of the ird Kind

1979

California Suite

1980

Kramer vs. Kramer

1981

Chariots of Fire

1982

Evil Under the Sun

1983

Table for Five

1984

e Dresser

1985

A Passage to India

1986

White Nights

1987

84 Charing Cross Road

1988

Empire of the Sun

1989

Madame Sousatzka

1990

Always

1991

Hot Shots!

1992

Chaplin

1993

e Man Without a Face

1994

Miracle on 34th Street

1995

French Kiss

1996

True Blue

1997

Titanic

1998

e Parent Trap

1999

Star Wars: Episode I – e Phantom Menace

2000

How the Grinch Stole Christmas

2001

Ali

2002

Die Another Day

THE ROYAL FILM Command Performance

was introduced as an annual event in 1946,

and aside from a few exceptional years, it

has remained such. Over seventy Royal Film

Performances (as the event is now known)

have taken place since, raising millions of

pounds for the charity:

1946

A Matter of Life and Death

1947

e Bishop’s Wife

1948

Scott of the Antarctic

1949

e Forsyte Saga

1950

e Mudlark

1951

Where No Vultures Fly

1952

Because You’re Mine

1953

Rob Roy: e Highland Rogue

1954

Beau Brummell

1955

To Catch a ief

1956

e Battle of the River Plate

1957

Les Girls

1959

e Horse’s Mouth

1960

e Last Angry Man

1961

e Facts of Life

1962

West Side Story

1963

Sammy Going South

1964

Move Over, Darling

1965

Lord Jim

1966

Born Free

1967

e Taming of the Shrew

1968

Romeo and Juliet

1969

e Prime of Miss Jean Brodie

1970

Anne of the ousand Days

1

The Royal Film

the royal film performance

12

Six months earlier Acres, an American

photographer and pioneering cinematographer

who later developed the first 35mm film

camera, gave a display of moving pictures to

the Lyonsdown Photographic Society at the

Lytton Road Assembly Rooms in his adopted

London suburbs home of New Barnet. It was

the first public film show to an audience in

the United Kingdom. He went on to make

several silent film shorts, including one

about the Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race of

1895, but most significantly, in June 1896, he

filmed Princess Maud’s parents (then Prince

and Princess of Wales) attending the huge

Cardiff Industrial & Maritime Exhibition. e

prince commanded Acres to bring the film to

his home so that it could be screened for the

extended family in a specially erected garden

marquee. at, and twenty other shorts (many

running just a few seconds), including

Tom

Merry – Lightning Cartoonist

,

e Arrest of a

Pickpocket

and

e Boxing Kangaroo

, proved

so popular with the eager audience that they

were run twice. is screening was termed

‘e Royal Film’ by the press of the day.

A year later, on 23 November 1897, the

manager of the Empire Variety eatre,

H.J. Hitchens, presented a selection of

Diamond Jubilee procession films, taken for

the Lumière Cinématographe, to Her Majesty,

Queen Victoria at Windsor Castle, accompa-

nied by a full orchestra conducted by Leopold

Wenzel. e programme comprised fifteen

2003

Master and Commander: e Far Side of

the World

2004

Ladies in Lavender

2005

e Chronicles of Narnia: e Lion, the

Witch and the Wardrobe

2006

Casino Royale

2008

e Other Boleyn

Girl

2008

A Bunch of Amateurs

2009

e Lovely Bones

2010

e Chronicles of Narnia: e Voyage of the

Dawn Treader

2011

Hugo

2012

e Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

2013

Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom

2015

e Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel

2015

Spectre

2019

1917

2022

Top Gun: Maverick

2024

Gladiator II

ough the origins of the Royal Film

Performance can be traced half a century

earlier to 21 July 1896, when – during the

infancy of the moving picture and long before

the introduction of sound – forty royal guests

gathered for the impending marriage of

Princess Maud, the youngest daughter of King

Edward VII and Queen Alexandra, to Prince

Charles of Denmark. On the eve of her wed-

ding, they assembled at Marlborough House in

London’s Pall Mall for a film show presented

by Mr Birt Acres.

The Royal Film

13

of

Comin’ rough the Rye

can be seen in the

Peter Sellers comedy movie

e Smallest Show

on Earth

(1957), in which the elderly staff of

the old ‘kinema’ tearfully watch silent films on

their evenings off.

e first full-length feature film to be pre-

sented by command of the sovereign took

place six months later, on 24 February 1917,

when Lew Waren presented

Tom Brown’s

Schooldays

for King George V and Queen Mary

at Buckingham Palace. Appropriately, the film

had been made at Windsor Studios in south-

east London.

It wasn’t until three decades later that the

Royal Film Command Performance was offi-

cially established. e charitable event was

staged in aid of the Cinematograph Trade

Benevolent Fund (CTBF, the forerunner of

the Film & TV Charity). Although it had been

first suggested in 1939, growing hostilities in

Europe prevented it taking place and it wasn’t

until after the war, in 1946, that the idea was

resurrected with Michael Powell and Emeric

Pressburger’s patriotic

A Matter of Life and Death

being chosen. e event was declared a huge

success, and it was agreed it should become an

annual addition to the royal calendar.

Of course, there have been many film prem-

ieres attended by members of the monarch’s

family over the years, but they are not to be

confused with the Royal Film Performance,

as there is – and can only ever be – one Royal

Film of the year.

short films, including

e Czar of Russia in Paris

,

Spanish Dancers in Castille

,

Carnival at Nice

and

A

Scene Taken from a Moving Train Near Clapham

Junction.

Queen Victoria thus became the first

sovereign to ‘command’ a film performance.

e Diamond Jubilee footage was distributed

throughout Britain and the distant territories

of the Empire and quickly demonstrated

just how powerfully film could show the

monarchy in a new, exciting – and immedi-

ate – medium. Queen Victoria’s successors,

Edward VII and George V, both came to the

throne having grasped the potential of film.

In fact, on 13 September 1902, the recently

crowned King Edward VII and his wife, Queen

Alexandra, welcomed their family to Balmoral

Castle to enjoy an evening of Cinematograph

Entertainment short films as part of their

post-coronation summer holiday.

However, it was on 4 August 1916 that the

first full-length feature film was presented

by Royal Command. Cecil Hepworth’s

Comin’

rough the Rye

was shown before Queen

Alexandra in the State Dining Room of

Marlborough House, featuring stars Alma

Taylor and Ralph Forbes in a story based on

the 1875 novel of the same name by Helen

Mathers, the title of which alluded to the 1782

Robert Burns poem ‘Comin’ rough the Rye’.

Coincidentally, Cecil Hepworth had been pres-

ent at the very first ‘Royal Film’ twenty years

earlier, when he was assistant to Birt Acres.

Eagle-eyed film fans might notice that a clip

the royal film performance

14

Palace, adopted the American Biograph system

in March 1897.

e new marvel of ‘animated pictures’

spread rapidly through travelling fairs, show-

men hiring local halls for special shows and

music halls everywhere. Once film had dem-

onstrated its lasting appeal, businessmen

began taking over shops, halls and railway

arches, painting over the windows and other-

wise rather crudely converting them into

full-time cinemas. A slightly more elaborate

variation involved an auditorium resembling

a railway carriage, presenting moving views

(‘Tours of the World’) that had been photo-

graphed along railway lines.

e new medium’s popularity exploded

exponentially across the world, and in Britain,

commercial-traveller-turned-film-pioneer Will

Barker purchased two houses on Ealing Green

in 1902 and created Ealing Studios. is first

purpose-built – and now the oldest – British

film production facility featured original

stages constructed from very tall glass walls

and roofs to make the most of the available

light while keeping out the inclement British

weather. Within ten years, it became the larg-

est film studio in Britain – possibly Europe

– and scores of films were released by Barker’s

Bulldog Films, leading the charge in quality

British movies. Barker paid stage legends a

small fortune to appear in his films, hired a

composer to write music especially for them

and was heralded as a ‘big ideas man’.

THE BIRTH OF CINEMA can be traced to the

Lumière brothers’ Cinématographe in 1895.

French-born Auguste Marie Louis Nicolas

Lumière and Louis Jean Lumière were manu-

facturers of photography equipment who had

patented several processes, most notably ‘film

perforations as a means of advancing film

through a camera’

. ey then devised and built

a camera that could record, develop and project

film, though at the time they regarded their new

creation as little more than a curious novelty!

After they screened a forty-six-second

film,

Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory

, on

22 March 1895 to a private audience of 200

members of the Society for the Development

of the National Industry in Paris, they

next organised a paid public screening on

28 December consisting of ten of their short

films, each running for approximately fifty sec-

onds, and cinema as we know it was born.

e first public performances of films to a

paying audience in Great Britain were at the

Polytechnic in Upper Regent Street, central

London, on 21 February 1896. Consisting of

short films by the Lumière brothers, the pro-

gramme was so successful that it transferred

to the Empire Music Hall in Leicester Square

as one of the top items on the bill. A British

inventor, R.W. Paul, showed films at Olympia

the following month via his rival system,

which was booked into the Alhambra Music

Hall in Leicester Square and elsewhere. e

third major variety theatre in London, the

2

Foundations (1895–1939)

Foundations (1895–1939)

15

reduced prices for children. e best view in

the house, with padded ‘tip-up’ seats, cost four

times as much as the cheapest, basic wooden

benches. However, common to all were

unpleasant odours, dense cigarette smoke and

a lack of fresh air. ese issues were usually

alleviated by opening windows and sometimes

a ceiling dome or sliding roof during intervals.

A cinema-operator licence was not just

based on issues of health and safety; it also

allowed councils to grant or refuse cinemas

according to the content of the films they

presented, thereby indirectly – and, arguably

accidentally – introducing censorship. In 1912,

the British Board of Film Censors (BBFC) was

set up by members of the film industry who

had become frustrated by local government

censorship, which had come to a head with

the release of

From the Manger to the Cross

(1912), following a public and press outcry

about how the life of Jesus should be treated

as sacred and not used for commercial gain

and entertainment – despite many of the

complainants not actually having seen the

film. In fact, when members of the clergy were

invited to a private screening, they said there

was nothing offensive or morally questionable

in it. It was therefore agreed that a profes-

sional industry censorship body was urgently

needed. Within a year of the BBFC’s forma-

tion there were 3,000 cinemas in operation in

Britain and new film studios were poised to

open in Twickenham, Walthamstow, Isleworth,

Meanwhile, to accommodate the picture-

going public’s demand for his and other films,

makeshift cinemas popped up everywhere

from church halls and theatres to some more-

unsuitable structures such as shops and even

fairgrounds, which led to the government

introducing the Cinematograph Act of 1909

requiring premises to be licensed by local

authorities, particularly after nitrate film

fire incidents increased – nitrate film when

projected was highly flammable, and the Act

required the construction of fire-resistant

projection booths (occasionally positioned

behind the screen, thus providing rear pro-

jection). is legislation saw purpose-built

picture houses appearing in almost every

town and village, many with flamboyant

exteriors to catch the eye of passers-by and

with box offices open to the street to take full

advantage of impulse buying. e use of the

word ‘electric’ in some of their names, such

as the Electric Cinema in Notting Hill and the

Electric Birmingham, was also a reminder that

electricity was something of a novelty too –

making a visit doubly appealing.

Performances were usually made up of

short films, including travelogues and news

items, and ran for anywhere between an hour

to ninety minutes (feature films didn’t arrive

until 1914). Seating in these picture houses

rarely accommodated more than a few hun-

dred patrons and offered a range of prices,

commonly starting at 3

d

and rising to 1

s

, with

the royal film performance

16

Provident Institution which was constituted

in February 1924, and just over a year later,

on Tuesday, 7 April 1925 at 3 p.m., the first

General Meeting of the Cinematograph Trade

Benevolent Fund took place at No. 33 Soho

Square, London.

Twenty-five leading members of the film

industry, along with trade press representa-

tive

Kine Weekly

, were present at the meeting,

where Reginald C. Bromhead was appointed

chairman. Bromhead reported:

Subscribers to the Benevolent Fund,

convened for the purpose of formally

adopting the rules which have been

prepared by Mr Brooke-Wilkinson and

myself and approved by the Hon. Legal

Advisers and of electing the Council and

Trustees of the Fund. e Cinematograph

Trades Council has been formed primar-

ily with the object of fostering a Trade

Provident Institution to which employers

would subscribe and to supplement-

ing the benefits to be given thereunder

[…] we are very much indebted to Sir

William Jury as a result of whose dona-

tion of £1000 we were able to hold a

Garden Party last July, which proved

very successful.

e first garden party, the CTBF’s inaugural

event, was held in the Royal Botanical Gardens

on 19 July 1924 and proved a great success.

Catford and Borehamwood to cater for the

public’s growing appetite for moving pictures.

Aside from the BBFC, the fast-growing

film industry was largely unregulated and

quite fragmented, leading in 1915 to the

Cinematograph Exhibitors Association (CEA)

being formed, which was swiftly followed

by the Kinematograph Renters Society

(KRS) coming into being, along with the

Incorporated Association of Kinematograph

Manufacturers (KMA) – all to help co-ordinate

and supervise specific areas of the film

and distribution industry. It soon became

apparent to the organisations’ executives

that thousands of people working in the film

industry, many of whom were described as

‘gifted amateurs’, were on low pay and often

lived in poor conditions.

It was certainly not the wealthy or glamor-

ous business it is today and there were no

trade unions either – not until 1933 – and

mindful of this, three senior members of

the CEA, KRS and KMA decided to formulate

a plan to establish a charitable organisa-

tion, similar to that of the Variety Artistes’

Benevolent Fund (later, the Entertainment

Artistes’ Benevolent Fund), which had been

founded in 1908 to ‘provide care for enter-

tainers who had fallen on hard times or

were suffering ill health’. ose three execu-

tives – E.W. Pashley Peall, Reginald Charles

Bromhead and J. Brooke-Wilkinson – drew

up rules for a National Benevolent Fund and

Foundations (1895–1939)

17

Garden Party) being presented at the meeting,

which itself included a £1,000 donation from

Sir William Jury, head of Jury Imperial Pictures,

a production company and leading renter

(distributor) of British and American films

throughout the colonies.

At the second Annual General Meeting in May

1926, the management of the CTBF was regular-

ised and the first trustees were formally elected:

Sir William Jury, President and Trustee

Reginald Charles Bromhead, Chairman

and Trustee

Alfred Claude Bromhead, Trustee

Headley M. Smith, Trustee

J. Brooke-Wilkinson, Hon. Treasurer

Reginald C.O. Vivash, Secretary

At the fund’s first meeting, nine vice presi-

dents, six life members and eleven annual

subscribers were secured, with subscriptions

varying from 1 guinea to £250. Each of the

three trade organisations became vice presi-

dents, along with a ‘considerable number’ of

local branches of the CEA, with whom the

management and control of the fund was to be

entrusted. It was agreed that vice presidents

would remain in office until the next Annual

General Meeting, where management would

be more formally established, and further-

more it was agreed that ‘the Fund should offer

financial relief without loss of self-respect and

make a sincere effort to help those willing to

help themselves’. A bank balance of £3,676 13

s

2

d

was reported, with a further £2,551 13

s

10

d

(the proceeds from the first Cinematograph

the royal film performance

18

British firm, with film studios at Lime Grove

in Shepherd’s Bush. By 1929, their company

had become a conglomerate, controlling dis-

tribution and exhibition at 300 of their own

cinemas. Incidentally, in 1956, a cinema was

named after Reginald Bromhead inside the

grounds of the Military College at Watchfield

(Shrivenham) in recognition of his service to

the Army Kinema Corporation as chairman.

Reginald C.O. Vivash, meanwhile, had

joined the industry in 1910, first as an exhib-

itor and then in 1913 as a distributor with

Gaumont-British. J. Brooke-Wilkinson was

one of the founders of the Incorporated

Association of Kinematograph Manufacturers,

who was later appointed the first secretary of

the British Board of Film Censors. Sadly, not

much is known about Headley Smith apart

from him being a member of the Cinema

Exhibitors Association. In 1930, John Maxwell,

founder of Associated British Pictures at

Borehamwood, also joined as a trustee.

Meanwhile, in the first year of the CTBF’s

operation, seventy-nine people were awarded

grants. e largest group of recipients were

widows whose husbands had served in relatively

lowly positions such as projectionists, door

A couple of months later, the fund’s second

garden party was publicised in cinema news-

reels with the tagline, ‘Come to the Cinema

Garden Party the jolliest Fete of the Year. You

may be the lucky one to win this Clyno Motor

Car for 2’6.’ e car was raffled by Rootes Ltd of

No. 141 New Bond Street, London, world export-

ers and distributors of the popular Clyno.

Post-event, the British Pathé silent newsreel

reported, ‘eatrical stars give an excellent

entertainment’, in a short film featuring an

audience sitting in the garden as the camera

panned across them, to ladies dancing on the

stage, then around a maypole with ribbons. It

next focused on an actress reciting some prose

on stage, before declaring one of the highlights

to be a ‘film face competition’, the winner of

which was a Miss Henchie, who was described

as having ‘big dark eyes and short dark hair

under a cloche hat’. ough it’s not clear if she

was ever offered a film contract!

e officers of the CTBF were all wealthy,

philanthropic film and distribution executives

who drew no salaries or expenses from the

charity. e Bromhead brothers established the

British subsidiary of the French film company

Gaumont and founded early newsreel Gaumont

Graphic in 1910. Two years later, they opened

a large factory in Shepherd’s Bush, which sup-

plied most positive prints of American and

foreign films for the British market, and within

a decade, the brothers had bought out the

French interests, thus becoming an entirely

Foundations (1895–1939)

19

consistently increased, particularly from the

thirty individual CEA regional branches and

KRS members with renters (distributors)

making handsome and regular donations of

anywhere between £50 and £500.

Yet, as income increased, so did the number

of beneficiaries, and fundraising became

uppermost in trustees’ minds. To this end,

on 10 March 1929, a Sunday benefit concert

was held at the London Palladium and raised

approximately £700; a Trade Carnival was held

at the Astoria Dance Salon on 10 October, rais-

ing some £202 5

s

7

d

, while a second Palladium

Sunday concert took place on 19 January 1930,

generating a further £324 15

s

7

d

.

On 5 November 1930, the film division of

the Federation of British Industries invited

the CTBF to be co-beneficiary with the Royal

National Lifeboat Institution of a gala perfor-

mance of British films showcased for prime

ministers at the annual British Empire and

Dominions conference, which raised a further

£817 2

s

10

d

.

A Sunday evening entertainment pro-

gramme was suggested as a next project

to the fund by the manager of the London

Hippodrome, but the Lord Chamberlain –

mindful of the restrictive Sunday opening

regulations of the time – refused permission,

albeit ‘with regret’.

In the 1931 annual report, salaries of £506

appeared for the first time in the accounts.

is was no doubt due to the need for more

attendants and even a ‘title writer’

. ey received

cash gifts ranging from a few shillings to £5.

e third and last garden party took place

in 1926 – the following year, it wasn’t consid-

ered viable due to the underlying economic

conditions in the UK. Instead, in 1927, the

fund launched a raffle to win ‘hundreds of

prizes’ with the top reward being a Morris

car. Newsreel segments in cinemas sug-

gested audiences could buy a ticket from the

theatre manager or alternatively could send

a postal order for 1

s

to the CTBF’s address in

Shaftesbury Avenue, London, W1.

In that same year, the Film Quota Act

was introduced as a ten-year plan to reduce

American dominance of UK cinemas by

requiring 20 per cent of the films screened to

be British-produced. e Act certainly came

along with the best of intentions, but it was

not a success and was in fact largely criticised

within the industry for the emergence of

opportunistic ‘quota quickies’ – mostly low-

cost, low-quality and quickly produced films,

commissioned by American distributors active

in the UK or by British cinema owners purely

to satisfy the quota requirements. It was

often joked that only the cleaners and cinema

ushers watched them!

Within two years of the Act, the whole busi-

ness saw a massive change with the advent of

‘talkies’ introduced to the UK industry with

Alfred Hitchcock’s

Blackmail

(1929). Cinemas

opened apace and donations to the CTBF

the royal film performance

20

In the meantime, other small fundraising

events took place, and then, on 15 March 1934,

the biggest event to benefit the fund was held.

‘Midnight with the Stars’ was a stage show

featuring film personalities of the day with a

live orchestra at the Empire eatre, Leicester

Square. In a filmed promotion that was run in

cinemas ahead of the event, actor Sir Cedric

Hardwicke said it would feature ‘the great-

est assembly of stage and screen stars ever

gathered together’, and for those unable to

attend, he added, ‘we have prepared a special

gramophone record made by 24 stars, English

and American … the price is one shilling

and sixpence of which one shilling goes to

the Cinematograph Benevolent Fund. ese

records are on sale now at this theatre.’

e event and records raised approximately

£14,000 and it was hoped it might become

a regular extravaganza thereafter. Indeed, a

second ‘Midnight with the Stars’ event was

staged on Wednesday, 8 May 1935 at the

Dominion eatre in London’s Tottenham

Court Road and raised £7,111 14

s

1

d

, including

proceeds from gramophone record No. 2, ‘fea-

turing 27 front rank stars in excerpts from some

of this season’s outstanding successes’. Income

prospects certainly seem bright for that year

with £2,500 arriving in donations too.

By 1935, twenty-nine long-term beneficiaries

appeared in the CTBF’s annual accounts. ese

were people in sufficient need to receive regu-

lar, long-term payments.

staff to help administer the growing numbers

of beneficiaries – again, the vast majority were

widows, receiving single ‘one-off ’ grants.

In 1932, the Federation of British Industries

and the Trades Union Congress both expressed

concern about ‘the menace of Americanisation

by means of film’, suggesting that Hollywood

imports acted as a threat to both Britain’s finan-

cial interests and to ‘English speech, customs,

and cultural standards’ – the very things the

Quota Act of 1927 was supposed to prevent.

In fact, it had already been suggested that

the government should increase the mini-

mum quota of British films to at least 50 per

cent of all cinema presentations to prevent

the majority of box-office takings going to

‘American Syndicates’ – particularly as the

development of sound had already caused

unemployment of artistes, orchestra mem-

bers and theatre stage staff with the rapid

decline of variety theatre. However, with

5,300 cinema screens to fill, it was wisely

suggested that excluding more American

products would leave a massive shortfall in

available films – plus cinemagoers actually

enjoyed seeing lavish American movies.

In February 1935, ‘e Power of Cinema as a

Cultural and Propagandist Force’, a talk chaired

by the trade union leader (and future Foreign

Secretary) Ernest Bevin, suggested that ‘cinema

is one of the most potent instruments for good

or evil that man has invented, so powerful as to

release a cultural force of unrivalled possibilities’.

Foundations (1895–1939)

21

in Twickenham, described as being ‘a place of

safety, peace, happiness and tranquillity set

within over three acres of land’. During the

summer of 1935, Sir William Jury suggested to

Reginald Bromhead that there was a need for

such a convalescence and residential home

for people in the film and cinema business

who were either recovering from serious ill-

ness or might otherwise be made homeless,

particularly by the death of a spouse. e two

men visited Wokingham in September to view

a large house that was for sale. Impressed by

Glebelands and its 15 acres of grounds, and

seeing its potential for perfectly fitting his

brief, the generous Sir William Jury immedi-

ately made an offer to purchase the property

and then gifted it to the fund in perpetuity.

Alterations and improvements were made,

such as central heating being installed, all

supervised by Frank Verity and Sam Beverley,

renowned cinema and theatre architects, who

were behind designs for the Plaza in Lower

Regent Street and the Carlton in Haymarket,

along with the eatre Royal Windsor and

many Paramount cinemas around the UK.

ey carried out work without any cost or

charge to the fund.

Keen that the running costs of Glebelands

should not be a drain on the CTBF itself,

the trustees launched a campaign to raise a

separate income purely for the upkeep and

maintenance of the house and estate. Many

existing donors contributed a few shillings

King George V had been royal patron of the

Variety Artistes’ Benevolent Fund since 1921 and

had stated, ‘e Monarch or a senior member

of the Royal Family, would attend an annual

Performance, in aid of Brinsworth House and

the Royal Variety Charity, once a year there-

after, to demonstrate the Royal family’s love

and support for the entertainment industry and

its associated charity.’

It seemed a natural progression, as the CTBF

and its work grew in stature and awareness, that

the fund should seek a similar royal patronage.

In 1935, Edward, Prince of Wales (later King

Edward VIII) agreed to become patron. However,

by the end of the following year he abdicated,

leading to King George VI ascending the throne,

and he immediately offered his patronage to

the fund.

is exciting news coincided with more

money-raising ideas coming from the trus-

tees including releasing a series of 78rpm

gramophone records called ‘Voice of the

Stars’, between 1935 and 1937, containing vocal

contributions of leading film actors of the

time. Shirley Temple, Will Hay, Jean Harlow,

Max Miller, Jessie Matthews along with Gary

Cooper, Spencer Tracy, Clark Gable, Bette

Davis, Errol Flynn and Bing Crosby appeared,

among many others.

As mentioned, the Variety Artistes’

Benevolent Fund had been established in the

decade before the CTBF, and at its heart was a

beautiful care home named Brinsworth House

the royal film performance

22

to a few pounds, but there were some more

sizeable individual gifts: £3,500 from the

Gaumont-British Picture Corporation Ltd, plus

Mr and Mrs A.C. Bromhead donated £1,000

personally. e CEA offered £1,170 towards

running costs and distributors Columbia

Pictures, Fox, MGM, Paramount, Radio

Pictures, United Artists, Universal Pictures

and Warner Brothers all donated £1,000 each.

Another £1,500 was donated by Associated

British Cinemas and the charity’s own fund-

raising subcommittees. All in all, £27,992 was

raised to comfortably cover the £5,834 annual

operating cost.

Nine months after its purchase, in June

1936 residents were accepted, and a few weeks

later, the Lord Mayor of London Sir Percy

Vincent officially cut the ribbon at Glebelands.

He announced there were already fourteen

occupants (with a capacity for seventy)

and added, ‘e very name of the home so

generously provided by Sir William Jury,

suggests peace and rest and shelter amongst

natural beauty so fitting for the aged.’

In the

Cine-Technician

newspaper, Frank

Canham, one of those first residents, wrote a

letter asking to be remembered by all his old

colleagues, and added how much he would

appreciate visits from any who happened to be

that way (Wokingham).

In further fundraising, the Broadway Melody

Film Ball was held at the Wallington Public

Hall by the South London Branch of the CEA

in April 1936, featuring David Hayes and his

ten Varsity Boys, while 2,500 collection boxes

were distributed to cinemas the following year,

with the tins being passed from row to row,

raising £1,037 during the first year and up to

£11,000 in loose change a decade later.

A further ‘Midnight with the Stars’ gala

was staged on 6 May 1937 at the Empire

eatre, Leicester Square, as well as a regional

performance organised by the Manchester

branch of the CEA at the Paramount eatre,

Manchester, on 2 June the same year.

In 1938, a film-star jigsaw puzzle was adver-

tised in cinemas to benefit the CTBF and paved

the way for plans to be announced for an