Sunday 25 April 2021

Lassie Come Home (1943 Fred M Wilcox)

As well as well-known cast, have to acknowledge the old couple. She's Dame Mae Whitty (of course) from The Lady Vanishes with her real life husband Ben Webster (one of whose films is The Gay Lord Quex!*) Love the way she calls the dog 'Herself' and Gwenn 'Your Highness' - neither want to name her.

Also Arthur Shields familiar from Ford - he is in fact the brother of Barry Fitzgerald, who I was only thinking about when cutting the grass. J. Pat O'Malley is the horrible Hynes. Batman's Alan Napier also in cast.

Pal was about three here, lived to the ripe old age of 17 - not bad for a rough collie (particularly one that had had so much exertion), died at the home of his trainer Rudd Weatherwax, who then couldn't bear to watch another Pal film.

* The 1917 version, obviously. 'An affianced Lord tries to compromise a maid, the witness to his affair with a Duchess.' Remade for the BBC in 1983. An 1899 comedy play by Arthur Wing Pinero.

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