Miles Mander | |
|---|---|
 Miles Mander in about 1922 | |
| Born | Lionel Henry Mander (1888-05-14)14 May 1888 Wolverhampton, Staffordshire, England |
| Died | 8 February 1946(1946-02-08) (aged 57) Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Other names | Luther Miles |
| Years active | 1920–1946 |
| Spouses | |
| Children | 1 |
Miles Mander (bornLionel Henry Mander; 14 May 1888 – 8 February 1946), was an English character actor, writer, director and producer in the post-war period of early British cinema during the 1920s to mid-1930s, as well as a playwright and novelist.
From a privileged upper middle-class background, as a young man Mander engaged in motor sports, aviation and ballooning. InWorld War I he served in France with tetheredkite balloons used for military observation. From 1920 to 1936 Mander was involved in the British film industry in various capacities. He acted in both silent and sound films and was involved with several film production companies. He began writing screenplays and directing in the mid-1920s, working on earlysound films. Mander directed his first feature film in 1928. With the advent of sound films he established an international reputation as a character actor. After directingThe Flying Doctor in Australia in 1936, Mander lived and worked inHollywood, where he was cast in over 60 feature films until his death in 1946.
Lionel Henry Mander was born on 14 May 1888 atWolverhampton inStaffordshire, the second son of S. Theodore Mander and Flora (née Paint). The family lived atWightwick Manor; his father was a paint manufacturer who served as mayor of Wolverhampton, a member of the prominentMander family, industrialists and public servants of theMidlands region.[1][2][A] His father died in September 1900, when Lionel was aged twelve, and his mother died in April 1905.[3]
From 1901 to early 1903 Mander was educated atHarrow School inGreater London, where he resided atThe Groveboarding house.[B] After leaving Harrow Mander was educated inCanada, where his mother had family connections. He attended the Loretto School andMcGill University inMontreal.[4][5] Mander had early acting experience in musical comedy, including tours in Canada and the United States.[5]
By 1907 Mander was employed as a mechanic in theDaimler workshops in London. He showed an early interest in driving automobiles at speed and was a competitor in the first race meeting at the motor racing circuit at Brooklands, nearWeybridge inSurrey, the first purpose-built 'banked' racing track which opened in June 1907. Mander drove a 60 horse-power Mercedes on the Brooklands racing circuit.[6][5]
In 1908 Mander visited his uncle Martin Mander inNew Zealand and for a short period took up sheep farming on his uncle's station.[7][8] Martin Mander had emigrated to New Zealand in 1890 and established the 'Horoeka-Waimata' sheep station in theWaimata Valley, nearGisborne on the north-east coast of New Zealand's North Island.[3] In early 1909 Lionel Mander lived briefly in Australia.[9] He left Australia aboard theR.M.S. India, which departed from Sydney for London in May 1909.[10]
After returning to Britain Mander took an interest in aviation. He attendedLouis Blériot's pilot training school atPau in southern France and purchased aBlériot XImonoplane.[11] In early 1910 Mander took flying lessons withClaude Grahame-White at theBrooklands aerodrome (adjoining the motor racing circuit). His aircraft crashed at Brooklands requiring a new wing to be fitted. In May 1910 a man named Alfred Hooper was riding his bicycle to work when a car driven by Mander "ran into him and knocked him down". Mander was living at Wolverhampton at the time. Hooper was injured to such an extent that he was absent from work for twelve weeks. In October 1910 he was awarded £60 damages in aWest Bromwich court.[12]
Mander was an entrant in the first all-British aviation meeting at Dunstall Park in Wolverhampton, held from 27 June to 2 July 1910.[13] He was one of four novice pilots yet to receive their aviator's certificate from theRoyal Aero Club, necessary for participation in the events. In the end Mander did not qualify in time and had to withdraw. On the second day of the meeting strong winds demolished Mander's temporary canvas hangar housing his monoplane.[14]
Mander invested in Grahame-White's company that developed theHendon Aerodrome in London.[7][6]
Mander also engaged in boxing promotions during this period.[15]
On 21 February 1912 Mander andPrativa Sundari Devi were married atCalcutta in India.[16] Prativa was an Indian princess of theprincely state ofCooch Behar,British India, the second daughter ofMaharajaNripendra Narayan andMaharaniSuniti Devi of Cooch Behar.[17][18] The couple celebrated their marriage at the residence of the bride's father, dressed in Indian costume and married in the HinduBrahmo Samaj rites.[19] After the marriage the couple returned to England, initially living inBuckingham Gate in London. Mander later claimed that the marriage was "unhappy owing to his wife's violent temper".[16] In 1914 Mander's brother Alan married Princess Sudhira, Prativa's sister, in Calcutta.[20][21]
Mander beganfree ballooning in 1912. In early 1913 Mander, in company with the aviator Claude Grahame-White, made his first ascent in agas balloon, launched fromSaint-Cloud in the western suburbs ofParis.[22] He received hisaeronaut's certificate from the Royal Aero Club in June 1913.[11][3]
In late September 1914 Lionel Henry Mander was declared to be bankrupt. He was described as a financier of Trafalgar House in Regent Street, London.[23]
Mander enlisted in the British armed forces (Royal Marines) on 20 September 1914. He was promoted to sergeant soon after enlisting. He was promoted to sub-lieutenant in February 1915 in theRoyal Naval Division (RND), made up of volunteers and reservists not needed for service at sea. A month later Mander was commissioned as a lieutenant in the Supply and Transport Company of the RND.[24][5]
In the autumn of 1915 responsibility forkite balloons in France was transferred from the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) to the Royal Flying Corps (RFC).[25] In 1915 Mander was transferred to theRoyal Army Service Corps.[26] Mander served with tethered kite balloons, which were extensively used for military observation during World War I.[11]
After he was demobilised from the armed services Mander made a living by selling motor vehicles.[9] His wife Prativa Mander had travelled to India in 1916; she returned to England in 1919, but she and Mander did not at first live together. Mander later claimed that the reason they lived apart was that "he had heard a report about her conduct while she was in India".[16]
In March 1920 Mander participated in the Kop Hill Trial, organised by the Essex Motor Club, driving aMathis automobile.[27] A year or two after the war ended, Mander travelled inAlbania after which he was elected as a fellow of theRoyal Geographical Society.[28] In 1925 he publishedAlbania Today, a book based on his travels in that country.[29]
With the motor industry in the doldrums in the immediate post-war years, at the suggestion of a friend Mander found occasional work in the British film industry, initially as an extra.[9] Mander made his credited film acting debut in a small role inTestimony, a drama released in September 1920 by George Clark Productions. The film featuredIvy Duke andDavid Hawthorne in the leading roles and was directed by the actorGuy Newall (his directorial debut).[30] In 1921 Mander appeared in two films produced byStoll Pictures, credited under the name ofMiles Mander. He played the role of 'Lieutenant Devereaux' inThe Place of Honour (released in June 1921) and as 'Godfrey Norton' inA Scandal in Bohemia (released in July 1921), the seventh in aseries of films based on SirArthur Conan Doyle's 'Sherlock Holmes' stories.[31][32]
In June 1921 Mander petitioned for the dissolution of his marriage to Prativa "on the ground of her adultery with Mr. Reginald de Beer" (described as a clerk "employed in a Government office"). Mander gave evidence in the divorce court of having observed, in August 1920, Prativa and De Beer in bed together through the window of Prativa's flat in Wellington Court,Knightsbridge.[16] Adecree nisi was granted in about June 1922 (in which Mander was described as "a motor salesman" of High Street, St. John's Wood).[33]
Mander was the general manager of Solar Films Ltd, a company with directors that includedAdrian Brunel.[5][34] Early in 1922 Solar Films took a twelve month lease of the Philharmonic Hall in order to present a series of travel film-lectures. The films were produced by "expert photographers on expeditions carried out on behalf of the company by distinguished travellers and explorers". The company planned to present the films accompanied by a lecture delivered by a traveller associated with the actual expedition.[34] In February 1922 Solar Films Ltd. presented the first in a series of "film-lectures" at the Albert and Philharmonic Halls, on the subject ofBurma delivered byMajor-General Dunsterville.[35] The film-lectures were not a success.[36]
In 1922 Mander played roles in two films directed bySinclair Hill,Half a Truth released in June 1922 andOpen Country released in December 1922.[37][38] In the early 1920s Mander was a member of a group described by the film producerMichael Balcon as "the Pack". The group, which includedAlfred Hitchcock andAdrian Brunel, often "assembled at the Legrain coffee shop in Brewer Street, Soho, on the days we were not working (which were all too frequent)".[15]
In about October 1922 Mander, together with Brunel,Hugo Rumbold andIvor Novello, formed a film production company called the Atlas Biocraft Company Ltd., financed byJimmy White.[9][39] The company's first film wasThe Man Without Desire, filmed in Italy and directed by Brunel, with Novello in the lead male role.[40][41] Atlas Biocraft made a series of "ultra-cheap" short films during 1923 and 1924.[42]
In 1923 Mander married for a second time. His second wife was Kathleen ('Bunty') French, of Sydney, Australia.[43][C] The couple had a son named Theodore, born in 1926.[3]
In 1924 Mander played a lead role inLovers in Araby, an Atlas Biocraft film directed by Adrian Brunel. Mander and Brunel wrote the screenplay and much of the film was shot on location inNorth Africa.[44][45] In 1925 Kathleen Mander appeared alongside her husband in a short comedy film,Cut It Out: A Day in the Life of a Censor, another Atlas Biocraft production directed by Brunel, in which she was credited as 'Mrs. Miles Mander'.[46][47][42]
In 1925 Mander was cast inThe Prude's Fall, directed byGraham Cutts, withAlfred Hitchcock as scenario writer, art director and assistant director.[48][49] He was then cast as one of the male leads inThe Pleasure Garden, Hitchcock's first feature film as director. The film was a collaboration betweenGainsborough Pictures and the GermanEmelka Studios and was filmed on location in Italy and in the studio inMunich.[50][51]
In late 1926 Mander joined the staff of De Forest Phonofilms, initially operating from a small studio inClapham, and managed by the West End showmanVivian Van Damm. The company was producing shortsound films called 'phonofilms', using anopticalsound-on-film system developed in the early 1920s by the American inventorsLee de Forest andTheodore Case. Phonofilms, comprising mainly music hall sketches, songs and extracts from plays, began to be shown in the supporting programmes of British cinemas from October 1926.[15] De Forest Phonofilms was later acquired by British Talking Pictures, with studios atWembley.[15] Mander was employed to write and direct a series of short 'talkie' films at the Wembley studios, being paid ten pounds for a screenplay and twenty pounds for directing.[9] The sound quality of phonofilms was poor and was soon superseded by the superiorVitaphone process, used for early sound films from the late 1920s.[52]
Mander directed and acted in the first London performances of his own plays,Those Common People in 1927 andIt's a Pity About Humanity in 1930.[7][53] He established a reputation as a film actor "by his studies of dissipated characters, such as drunkards or dope-addicts" in such films asThe Fake (1927) andThe Physician (1928).[7]
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In 1928 Mander collaborated withAlma Reville, Hitchcock's wife, on the script ofThe First Born, the scenario of which was based on Mander's stage playThose Common People and his novelOasis.[54][55]The First Born was directed by Mander, his first major film as director, and he also played the lead male role as the dissolute 'Sir Hugo Boycott', alongsideMadeleine Carroll as his wife.[56] The film criticPaul Rotha wrote thatThe First Born "provided evidence of his wit and intelligence in filmic expression... being almost entirely the product of Mander's creative mentality". However in the copy of the film released to the public, "much of Miles Mander's original conception was destroyed" when the film was edited by the distributing firm without the director's control.[57]
In late 1930 and 1931 Mander directed two films forBritish International Pictures, both of them sound films made at the company'sElstree Studios nearLondon.The Woman Between, adapted from a play byMiles Malleson, was released in January 1931.[58] In the filmFascination, released in July 1931, Mander once again directed Madeleine Carroll as the female lead.[59]
In 1933 Miles and Kathleen Mander were living in Knightsbridge, with a "week-end place" in Kent.[53] In late 1934 Mander directedYouthful Folly forSound City Films.[60] Soon afterwards, atJulius Hagen'sTwickenham Studios, he directedThe Morals of Marcus (released in February 1935).[61]
In 1935 Mander travelled to the United States and lived in Hollywood for nine months, during which he acted inHere's to Romance for theFox Film Corporation andThe Three Musketeers forRKO Radio Pictures.[9]The Three Musketeers was the first Americansound film adaptation ofAlexandre Dumas' 1844 novel. Mander played the role of 'KingLouis XIII' in the film, directed byRowland V. Lee.[62]
Soon after Mander returned to Britain from Hollywood, he was asked by theGaumont-British Picture Corporation to undertake direction ofThe Flying Doctor, to be filmed in Australia.[9] Gaumont-British had links to the Australian company National Productions Ltd., which was to produce the film with the assistance of production personnel from Gaumont-British.[63] Mander arrived in Sydney aboard theStrathnaver on 12 November 1935, accompanied by Gaumont-British staff membersJohn O. C. Orton (scenario department) and Thomas D. Connochie (production manager). They were later joined by Derek Williams, a lighting and camera expert. Another technician, Leslie Fry, was already in place at thePagewood studios of National Studios Ltd. where the interior filming forThe Flying Doctor was to take place.[64] In late December 1935 it was announced that the Hollywood actor,Charles Farrell would play the lead in the film.[65] Farrell arrived in Sydney on 27 January and shooting commenced onThe Flying Doctor soon afterwards.[66]
By early January 1936 Mander was driving in Sydney in aV-8 Vauxhall automobile.[67] During his time in Sydney Mander was charged on two separate occasions with "driving at a speed dangerous to the public", on 3 February 1936 onParramatta Road and on 10 March "in the vicinity ofBankstown,Warwick Farm andLiverpool". On the first occasion Mander had been driving the car with the female leadMary Maguire as a passenger, returning fromLeura filming location scenes forThe Flying Doctor. He was convicted of the charges on 31 March 1936 and fines were imposed.[68] The final day of shooting for the film was on 28 March.[69] On 1 April 1936 Mander, together with Farrell and Orton, departed from Sydney for the United States aboard theMonterey.[70][71]
Miles and Kathleen Mander divorced in 1936.[72] In 1936 Mander left Britain to live in America, relocating toHollywood.[7]
Mander was cast in more than 60 feature films after he went to live in Hollywood in 1936.[73] Soon after his arrival he played a role in the historical dramaLloyd's of London, released in November 1936.[74] The film featured Madeleine Carroll in the female lead, an actress Mander had earlier directed inThe First Born (1928) andFascination (1931).[47] Mander was given opportunities to act in British roles in American films such as playingBenjamin Disraeli inSuez (1938) and KingHenry VI inTower of London (1939). He acted alongsideMerle Oberon andLaurence Olivier in theSamuel Goldwyn Productions filmWuthering Heights (1939).[47] In 1939 Mander played pivotal dual roles inDaredevils of the Red Circle, a twelve-chaptermovie serial made byRepublic Pictures.[75] During his career in Hollywood he was often given character roles playing unctuous villains, many of them of the unprincipled English upper-class type.[73]
In addition to his film output, Mander became well known as a radio commentator with his own popular programme.[55][7]
By 1943 Mander was a member of the British Consulate War Services Advisory Board along with other members of the expatriate film community in Hollywood, includingBrian Aherne,Ronald Colman,Cedric Hardwicke,Herbert Marshall,Basil Rathbone and the writerR. C. Sherriff.[55]
Miles Mander died on 8 February 1946 at his home at 7231 Pacific View Drive in Hollywood, aged 57. His death was attributed to "a heart attack".[76][77][D]
