Basil Dearden  

From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia

Related e

Wikipedia Wiktionary Shop Featured: Rhombicuboctahedron by Leonardo da Vinci

Basil Dearden (1 January 1911 – 23 March 1971), was an English film director, born Basil Dear in Westcliff-on-Sea, Essex.

Dearden graduated from theatre direction to film, working as an assistant to Basil Dean. He later changed his own name to Dearden to avoid confusion with his mentor.

He first began working as a director at Ealing Studios, co-directing comedy films with Will Hay, including The Goose Steps Out (1942) and My Learned Friend (1943). In 1945, he co-directed the influential chiller compendium Dead of Night. One of his last Ealing films was The Blue Lamp (1950), a police drama which first introduced audiences to "Dixon of Dock Green".

In later years he became associated with the writer and producer Michael Relph, and the two made films on subjects not generally tackled by films in the 1950s and early-1960s. These included homosexuality (Victim) and race relations (Pool of London, Sapphire). In the late 1960s Dearden also made some big-scale epics including Khartoum, with Charlton Heston, and the Victorian era black comedy The Assassination Bureau, again for Michael Relph.

His last film was The Man Who Haunted Himself with Roger Moore, with whom he had also made three episodes of the television series The Persuaders!: Overture, Powerswitch and To the Death, Baby. Dearden was killed in a car accident in 1971.

He has two sons, Torquil Dearden and the screenwriter and director James Dearden (born September 14, 1949, London).

Selected filmography

• This Man Is News (1938) (writer)
• Let George Do It (1940) (writer)
• Spare a Copper (1941) (writer, producer)
• Turned Out Nice Again (1941) (writer, producer)
• The Black Sheep of Whitehall (1942) (co-director)
• The Goose Steps Out (1942) (co-director)
• The Bells Go Down (1943) (director)
• My Learned Friend (1943) (co-director)
• The Halfway House (1944) (director)
• They Came to a City (1945) (writer, director)
• Dead of Night (1945) (director, segments \"Hearse Driver\" and \"Linking Narrative\")
• The Captive Heart (1946) (director)
• Frieda (1947) (director)
• Saraband for Dead Lovers (1948) (director)
• Train of Events (1949) (writer, director; segments \"The Actor\" and \"The Prisoner-of-War\")
• The Blue Lamp (1950) (director)
• Cage of Gold (1950) (director)
• Pool of London (1951) (director)
• I Believe in You (1952) (writer, director)
• The Gentle Gunman (1952) (director)
• The Square Ring (1953) (director, producer)
• The Rainbow Jacket (1954) (director)
• Out of the Clouds (1955) (director)
• The Ship That Died of Shame (1955) (writer, director, producer)
• Who Done It? (1956) (director, producer)
• The Smallest Show on Earth (1957) (director)
• Rockets Galore! (1957) (producer)
• Davy (1957) (producer)
• Violent Playground (1958) (director)
• Nowhere to Go (1958) (director)
• The League of Gentlemen (1959) (director)
• Desert Mice (1959) (producer)
• Sapphire (1959) (director)
• Man in the Moon (1960) (writer, director)
• All Night Long (1961) (director, producer)
• Victim (1961) (director, producer)
• The Secret Partner (1961) (director)
• Life for Ruth (1962) (director, producer)
• A Place to Go (1963) (director)
• The Mind Benders (1963) (director)
• Woman of Straw (1964) (director)
• Masquerade (1965) (director)
• Khartoum (1966) (director)
• Only When I Larf (1968) (director)
• The Assassination Bureau (1969) (director)
• The Man Who Haunted Himself (1970) (writer, director)