Sheridan Morley
Encyclopedia
Sheridan Morley was an English
author, biographer, critic, director, actor and broadcaster. He was the eldest son of actor Robert Morley
and grandson of actress Dame Gladys Cooper
, and wrote biographies of both. Nicholas Kenyon
called him a "cultural omnivore" who was "genuinely popular with people".
, in a nursing home opposite Ascot Racecourse
. He was named after Sheridan Whiteside, the title role his father was playing in a long-running production of The Man Who Came to Dinner
at the Savoy Theatre in London.
He had close family connections with stars of the stage: in addition to his father and his maternal grandmother, his aunt married actor Robert Hardy
, and Joanna Lumley
was a cousin. His maternal grandfather, Herbert Buckmaster, founded the Buck's Club where his bartender McGarry invented the Buck's Fizz cocktail. His godparent
s were dramatist Sewell Stokes
and actor Peter Bull
; his son Hugo was one of Noël Coward
's many godchildren.
Morley grew up in Wargrave
in Berkshire
, and in Hollywood and New York
, where his father was working. His father placed an advertisement in The Times, seeking a suitable school for his son: "Father with horrible memories of own schooldays at Wellington is searching for a school for his son, where the food matters as much as the education and the standards are those of a good three-star seaside hotel."
The successful reply came from Sizewell Hall
in Suffolk
, a coeducational preparatory school. This was owned and run in laissez-faire style by a Dutch Quaker, Harry Tuyn, although the story told in Morley's obituaries that subjects such as maths and Latin were not taught at Sizewell Hall on the grounds that they were too boring is untrue. Morley was well taught there in the full range of subjects and remained as a private pupil after the school closed in 1955. After attending a crammer, Morley went on to read modern languages at Merton College, Oxford
, from 1960, and became involved in student drama alongside Michael York
, David Wood
, Sam Walters
, and Oliver Ford Davies
. He graduated with third class honours, and then spent a year teaching drama at the University of Hawaii
.
to present Late Night Line-Up
for BBC Two
from 1967 to 1971, alongside Joan Bakewell and Tony Bilbow. He also presented Film Night for BBC Two in 1971 and 1972. He presented Kaleidoscope for BBC Radio 4
, and an innovatory arts programme for BBC Radio 2
from 1990 to 2004.
He had begun The Radio Two Arts Programme in April 1990. At first it consisted of three two-hour programmes a week: one a regional show, followed by a midweek arts documentary covering a single subject, then at weekends the show which was to become the flagship of the series, a magazine programme tackling eight different subjects in every show, interspersed with at least eight related musical recordings. He then moved to a new programme format of Melodies For You in 2004, again on BBC Radio 2. He broadcast his last Melodies programme in November 2006 three months before his death in February 2007.
He also made frequent appearances as the guest in the Dictionary Corner for the Channel 4
game show Countdown
.
His best-known work was the biography of Noël Coward
, A Talent to Amuse, first published in 1969. Coward gave his full blessing, providing Morley with a list of his friends, and another of his enemies, telling him to start with the second first — which would make for a better book.
Morley joined The Times
as deputy features editor in 1973, and then joined Punch
in 1975 as its drama critic and arts editor, remaining with the magazine until 1989. In the late 1980s, he became a regular arts diarist for The Times and was its TV critic from 1989 to 1990. He then worked as drama critic for The Spectator
from 1990; he was replaced in 2001 by Toby Young
. Then, after a short period at the New Statesman
, where he was replaced by Michael Portillo
, he joined the Daily Express
in 2004, where he remained until 2007. Meanwhile, he was also a drama critic for the International Herald Tribune
from 1979 to 2005, and film critic for the Sunday Express from 1992 to 1995. In 1990, he was Arts Journalist of the Year, and was also nominated for a Grammy.
For a while in the 1990s Viz
magazine ran a strip named after and featuring a hypochondriac character called Sheridan Poorly, an obvious skit on his name, although the character bore no other resemblance to him.
His play, Noël and Gertie, about Noël Coward and Gertrude Lawrence
, opened in London in 1983, starring Simon Cadell
and Joanna Lumley
, and ran for nine years. It was performed in the US with Twiggy
in the lead role. He also wrote a show based on the songs of Vivian Ellis
, Spread a Little Happiness, which played in 1992.
Morley's last work as theatre director was in 1999 with a revival of Noël Coward's A Song at Twilight
, first at The King's Head Theatre
in Islington
, and then at the Gielgud Theatre
in a West End run from October 1999 to March 2000, starring Kika Markham
, Mathew Bose
, Corin Redgrave
, and Vanessa Redgrave
.
His life was posthumously celebrated on 22 May 2007 with a gala afternoon performance at the Gielgud Theatre, organised by his widow Ruth Leon,with contributions and performances by friends and colleagues, including Liz Robertson
, Edward Fox
, Jenny Seagrove
, Cameron Mackintosh
, Patricia Hodge
, Michael Law and Annabel Leventon
. Morley's archive is now held by Kingston University
in Surrey
.
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
author, biographer, critic, director, actor and broadcaster. He was the eldest son of actor Robert Morley
Robert Morley
Robert Adolph Wilton Morley, CBE was an English actor who, often in supporting roles, was usually cast as a pompous English gentleman representing the Establishment...
and grandson of actress Dame Gladys Cooper
Gladys Cooper
Dame Gladys Constance Cooper, DBE was an English actress whose career spanned seven decades on stage, in films and on television....
, and wrote biographies of both. Nicholas Kenyon
Nicholas Kenyon
Sir Nicholas Roger Kenyon CBE is an English music administrator, editor and writer on music. He was responsible for the BBC Proms 1996-2007 following which he was appointed Managing Director of the Barbican Centre, Europe's largest multi-arts centre.-Education and career:After attending St Bede's...
called him a "cultural omnivore" who was "genuinely popular with people".
Early life
Sheridan Morley was born in Ascot, BerkshireAscot, Berkshire
Ascot is a village within the civil parish of Sunninghill and Ascot, in the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead, Berkshire, England. It is most notable as the location of Ascot Racecourse, home of the prestigious Royal Ascot meeting...
, in a nursing home opposite Ascot Racecourse
Ascot Racecourse
Ascot Racecourse is a famous English racecourse, located in the small town of Ascot, Berkshire, used for thoroughbred horse racing. It is one of the leading racecourses in the United Kingdom, hosting 9 of the UK's 32 annual Group 1 races...
. He was named after Sheridan Whiteside, the title role his father was playing in a long-running production of The Man Who Came to Dinner
The Man Who Came to Dinner
The Man Who Came to Dinner is a comedy in three acts by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart. It debuted on October 16, 1939 at the Music Box Theatre in New York City. It then enjoyed a number of New York and London revivals. The first London production was staged at The Savoy Theatre starring Robert...
at the Savoy Theatre in London.
He had close family connections with stars of the stage: in addition to his father and his maternal grandmother, his aunt married actor Robert Hardy
Robert Hardy
Timothy Sydney Robert Hardy, CBE, FSA is an English actor with a long career in the theatre, film and television. He is also an acknowledged expert on the longbow.-Early life:...
, and Joanna Lumley
Joanna Lumley
Joanna Lamond Lumley, OBE, FRGS is a British actress, voice-over artist, former-model and author, best known for her roles in British television series Absolutely Fabulous portraying Edina Monsoon's best friend, Patsy Stone, as well as parts in The New Avengers, Sapphire & Steel, and Sensitive...
was a cousin. His maternal grandfather, Herbert Buckmaster, founded the Buck's Club where his bartender McGarry invented the Buck's Fizz cocktail. His godparent
Godparent
A godparent, in many denominations of Christianity, is someone who sponsors a child's baptism. A male godparent is a godfather, and a female godparent is a godmother...
s were dramatist Sewell Stokes
Sewell Stokes
Francis Martin Sewell Stokes was an English novelist, biographer, playwright, screenwriter, broadcaster and prison visitor. He collaborated on a number of occasions with his brother, Leslie Stokes, an actor and later in life a BBC radio producer, with whom he shared a flat for many years...
and actor Peter Bull
Peter Bull
Peter Cecil Bull, DSC was a British character actor.- Biography :He was the fourth and youngest son of Hammersmith MP Sir William James Bull, 1st Bt..Bull was educated at Winchester College...
; his son Hugo was one of Noël Coward
Noël Coward
Sir Noël Peirce Coward was an English playwright, composer, director, actor and singer, known for his wit, flamboyance, and what Time magazine called "a sense of personal style, a combination of cheek and chic, pose and poise".Born in Teddington, a suburb of London, Coward attended a dance academy...
's many godchildren.
Morley grew up in Wargrave
Wargrave
Wargrave is a large village and civil parish in the English county of Berkshire, which encloses the confluence of the River Loddon and the River Thames. It is in the Borough of Wokingham...
in Berkshire
Berkshire
Berkshire is a historic county in the South of England. It is also often referred to as the Royal County of Berkshire because of the presence of the royal residence of Windsor Castle in the county; this usage, which dates to the 19th century at least, was recognised by the Queen in 1957, and...
, and in Hollywood and New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
, where his father was working. His father placed an advertisement in The Times, seeking a suitable school for his son: "Father with horrible memories of own schooldays at Wellington is searching for a school for his son, where the food matters as much as the education and the standards are those of a good three-star seaside hotel."
The successful reply came from Sizewell Hall
Sizewell Hall
Sizewell Hall is a Christian conference centre in Sizewell on the Suffolk coast, England. It is owned by the Ogilvie family. It was for some time the home of a progressive school. It has historic connections with a classic taxidermy collection....
in Suffolk
Suffolk
Suffolk is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in East Anglia, England. It has borders with Norfolk to the north, Cambridgeshire to the west and Essex to the south. The North Sea lies to the east...
, a coeducational preparatory school. This was owned and run in laissez-faire style by a Dutch Quaker, Harry Tuyn, although the story told in Morley's obituaries that subjects such as maths and Latin were not taught at Sizewell Hall on the grounds that they were too boring is untrue. Morley was well taught there in the full range of subjects and remained as a private pupil after the school closed in 1955. After attending a crammer, Morley went on to read modern languages at Merton College, Oxford
Merton College, Oxford
Merton College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. Its foundation can be traced back to the 1260s when Walter de Merton, chancellor to Henry III and later to Edward I, first drew up statutes for an independent academic community and established endowments to...
, from 1960, and became involved in student drama alongside Michael York
Michael York (actor)
Michael York, OBE is an English actor.-Early life:York was born in Fulmer, Gerrards Cross, Buckinghamshire, the son of Florence Edith May , a musician; and Joseph Gwynne Johnson, a Llandovery born Welsh ex-Royal Artillery British Army officer and executive with Marks and Spencer department stores...
, David Wood
David Wood (actor)
David Wood OBE is an English-born actor and writer, called "the National Children's Dramatist" by The Times.He was educated at Chichester High School For Boys and Worcester College, Oxford....
, Sam Walters
Sam Walters
Sam Walters MBE is a British theatre director and Artistic Director of the Orange Tree Theatre in Richmond, London, specialising in theatre-in-the-round productions...
, and Oliver Ford Davies
Oliver Ford Davies
-Biography:From the King's School, Canterbury, he won a scholarship to Merton College, Oxford, where he read History and became President of the Oxford University Dramatic Society . He was awarded the Laurence Olivier Award in 1990 for Best Actor in a New Play for Racing Demon...
. He graduated with third class honours, and then spent a year teaching drama at the University of Hawaii
University of Hawaii
The University of Hawaii System, formally the University of Hawaii and popularly known as UH, is a public, co-educational college and university system that confers associate, bachelor, master, and doctoral degrees through three university campuses, seven community college campuses, an employment...
.
Career
Sheridan Morley worked as a late-night newscaster for ITN from 1965, before moving to the BBCBBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
to present Late Night Line-Up
Late Night Line-Up
Late Night Line-Up was a pioneering British television discussion programme broadcast on BBC2 between 1964 and 1972. Late Night Line-Up returned for a special one-off edition on BBC Parliament in 2008.-Background:...
for BBC Two
BBC Two
BBC Two is the second television channel operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It covers a wide range of subject matter, but tending towards more 'highbrow' programmes than the more mainstream and popular BBC One. Like the BBC's other domestic TV and radio...
from 1967 to 1971, alongside Joan Bakewell and Tony Bilbow. He also presented Film Night for BBC Two in 1971 and 1972. He presented Kaleidoscope for BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4 is a British domestic radio station, operated and owned by the BBC, that broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history. It replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. The station controller is currently Gwyneth Williams, and the...
, and an innovatory arts programme for BBC Radio 2
BBC Radio 2
BBC Radio 2 is one of the BBC's national radio stations and the most popular station in the United Kingdom. Much of its daytime playlist-based programming is best described as Adult Contemporary or AOR, although the station is also noted for its specialist broadcasting of other musical genres...
from 1990 to 2004.
He had begun The Radio Two Arts Programme in April 1990. At first it consisted of three two-hour programmes a week: one a regional show, followed by a midweek arts documentary covering a single subject, then at weekends the show which was to become the flagship of the series, a magazine programme tackling eight different subjects in every show, interspersed with at least eight related musical recordings. He then moved to a new programme format of Melodies For You in 2004, again on BBC Radio 2. He broadcast his last Melodies programme in November 2006 three months before his death in February 2007.
He also made frequent appearances as the guest in the Dictionary Corner for the Channel 4
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...
game show Countdown
Countdown (game show)
Countdown is a British game show involving word and number puzzles. It is produced by ITV Studios and broadcast on Channel 4. It is presented by Jeff Stelling, assisted by Rachel Riley, with regular lexicographer Susie Dent. It was the first programme to be aired on Channel 4, and over sixty-five...
.
His best-known work was the biography of Noël Coward
Noël Coward
Sir Noël Peirce Coward was an English playwright, composer, director, actor and singer, known for his wit, flamboyance, and what Time magazine called "a sense of personal style, a combination of cheek and chic, pose and poise".Born in Teddington, a suburb of London, Coward attended a dance academy...
, A Talent to Amuse, first published in 1969. Coward gave his full blessing, providing Morley with a list of his friends, and another of his enemies, telling him to start with the second first — which would make for a better book.
Morley joined The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
as deputy features editor in 1973, and then joined Punch
Punch (magazine)
Punch, or the London Charivari was a British weekly magazine of humour and satire established in 1841 by Henry Mayhew and engraver Ebenezer Landells. Historically, it was most influential in the 1840s and 50s, when it helped to coin the term "cartoon" in its modern sense as a humorous illustration...
in 1975 as its drama critic and arts editor, remaining with the magazine until 1989. In the late 1980s, he became a regular arts diarist for The Times and was its TV critic from 1989 to 1990. He then worked as drama critic for The Spectator
The Spectator
The Spectator is a weekly British magazine first published on 6 July 1828. It is currently owned by David and Frederick Barclay, who also owns The Daily Telegraph. Its principal subject areas are politics and culture...
from 1990; he was replaced in 2001 by Toby Young
Toby Young
Toby Young, MA, FRSA is a British journalist and the author of How to Lose Friends and Alienate People, the tale of his stint in New York as a contributing editor at Vanity Fair magazine...
. Then, after a short period at the New Statesman
New Statesman
New Statesman is a British centre-left political and cultural magazine published weekly in London. Founded in 1913, and connected with leading members of the Fabian Society, the magazine reached a circulation peak in the late 1960s....
, where he was replaced by Michael Portillo
Michael Portillo
Michael Denzil Xavier Portillo is a British journalist, broadcaster, and former Conservative Party politician and Cabinet Minister...
, he joined the Daily Express
Daily Express
The Daily Express switched from broadsheet to tabloid in 1977 and was bought by the construction company Trafalgar House in the same year. Its publishing company, Beaverbrook Newspapers, was renamed Express Newspapers...
in 2004, where he remained until 2007. Meanwhile, he was also a drama critic for the International Herald Tribune
International Herald Tribune
The International Herald Tribune is a widely read English language international newspaper. It combines the resources of its own correspondents with those of The New York Times and is printed at 38 sites throughout the world, for sale in more than 160 countries and territories...
from 1979 to 2005, and film critic for the Sunday Express from 1992 to 1995. In 1990, he was Arts Journalist of the Year, and was also nominated for a Grammy.
For a while in the 1990s Viz
Viz (comic)
Viz is a popular British comic magazine which has been running since 1979.The comic's style parodies British comics of the post-war period, notably The Beano and The Dandy, but with incongruous language, crude toilet humour, black comedy, surreal humour and either sexual or violent storylines...
magazine ran a strip named after and featuring a hypochondriac character called Sheridan Poorly, an obvious skit on his name, although the character bore no other resemblance to him.
His play, Noël and Gertie, about Noël Coward and Gertrude Lawrence
Gertrude Lawrence
Gertrude Lawrence was an English actress, singer and musical comedy performer known for her stage appearances in the West End theatre district of London and on Broadway.-Early life:...
, opened in London in 1983, starring Simon Cadell
Simon Cadell
Simon John Cadell was an English actor.Born in London, he was the grandson of the Scottish character actor Jean Cadell, the brother of the actress Selina Cadell, and the cousin of the actor Guy Siner. He was educated at Bedales School at Petersfield where his close friends included Gyles...
and Joanna Lumley
Joanna Lumley
Joanna Lamond Lumley, OBE, FRGS is a British actress, voice-over artist, former-model and author, best known for her roles in British television series Absolutely Fabulous portraying Edina Monsoon's best friend, Patsy Stone, as well as parts in The New Avengers, Sapphire & Steel, and Sensitive...
, and ran for nine years. It was performed in the US with Twiggy
Twiggy
Lesley Lawson née Hornby known as Twiggy is an English model, actress, and singer. In the early-1960s she became a prominent British teenage model of swinging sixties London with others such as Penelope Tree....
in the lead role. He also wrote a show based on the songs of Vivian Ellis
Vivian Ellis
Vivian Ellis was an English musical comedy composer best known for the song "Spread a Little Happiness" and the theme "Coronation Scot".-Life and work:...
, Spread a Little Happiness, which played in 1992.
Morley's last work as theatre director was in 1999 with a revival of Noël Coward's A Song at Twilight
A Song at Twilight
A Song at Twilight is a play in two acts by Noël Coward. It is one of a trio of plays collectively entitled Suite in Three Keys, all of which are set in the same suite in a luxury hotel in Switzerland...
, first at The King's Head Theatre
The King's Head Theatre
The King's Head Theatre, founded in 1970 by Dan Crawford, is an Off-West End venue in London. It was the first pub theatre in the UK. Adam Spreadbury-Maher became Artistic Director in March 2010 .-Background:...
in Islington
Islington
Islington is a neighbourhood in Greater London, England and forms the central district of the London Borough of Islington. It is a district of Inner London, spanning from Islington High Street to Highbury Fields, encompassing the area around the busy Upper Street...
, and then at the Gielgud Theatre
Gielgud Theatre
The Gielgud Theatre is a West End theatre, located on Shaftesbury Avenue in the City of Westminster, London, at the corner of Rupert Street. The house currently has 889 seats on three levels.-History:...
in a West End run from October 1999 to March 2000, starring Kika Markham
Kika Markham
Kika Markham is an English actress.Markham was born in Macclesfield, Cheshire. She is a daughter of actor David Markham and writer Olive Dehn . She has led a long career in the cinema, television, and theatre as an actress...
, Mathew Bose
Mathew Bose
Mathew Bose is an English actor, best known for his role as Paul Lambert in the television series Emmerdale.-Biography:Mathew Bose was born 3 July 1973 in south east London. He has an older brother, Shuvro, who lives in London, and a sister, Shuva, who lives in India. When he was young, Mathew's...
, Corin Redgrave
Corin Redgrave
Corin William Redgrave was an English actor and political activist.-Early life:Redgrave was born in Marylebone, London, the only son and middle child of actors Michael Redgrave and Rachel Kempson...
, and Vanessa Redgrave
Vanessa Redgrave
Vanessa Redgrave, CBE is an English actress of stage, screen and television, as well as a political activist.She rose to prominence in 1961 playing Rosalind in As You Like It with the Royal Shakespeare Company and has since made more than 35 appearances on London's West End and Broadway, winning...
.
His life was posthumously celebrated on 22 May 2007 with a gala afternoon performance at the Gielgud Theatre, organised by his widow Ruth Leon,with contributions and performances by friends and colleagues, including Liz Robertson
Liz Robertson
Liz Robertson is an English actress and singer. She is the widow of Playwright and lyricist Alan Jay Lerner.Robertson began training at the Finch Stage School at the age of three. Her first professional employment was as a cabaret dancer at London's Savoy Hotel at the age of sixteen...
, Edward Fox
Edward Fox (actor)
Edward Charles Morice Fox, OBE is an English stage, film and television actor.He is generally associated with portraying the role of the upper-class Englishman, such as the title character in the film The Day of the Jackal and King Edward VIII in the serial Edward & Mrs...
, Jenny Seagrove
Jenny Seagrove
Jennifer Ann Seagrove is an English actress. She trained at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School and rose to fame playing the lead in a TV dramatisation of Barbara Taylor Bradford's A Woman of Substance and the 1983 film Local Hero...
, Cameron Mackintosh
Cameron Mackintosh
Sir Cameron Anthony Mackintosh is a British theatrical producer notable for his association with many commercially successful musicals. At the height of his success in 1990, he was described as being "the most successful, influential and powerful theatrical producer in the world" by the New York...
, Patricia Hodge
Patricia Hodge
Patricia Ann Hodge is an English actor.-Early life:The daughter of the Royal Hotel owner/manager Eric and his wife Marion , Hodge attended Wintringham Girls' Grammar School on Weelsby Avenue in Grimsby and then St...
, Michael Law and Annabel Leventon
Annabel Leventon
Annabel Leventon is an English actress. Leventon has acted in various roles on stage and in film-Selected filmography:- External links :...
. Morley's archive is now held by Kingston University
Kingston University
Kingston University is a public research university located in Kingston upon Thames, southwest London, United Kingdom. It was originally founded in 1899 as Kingston Technical Institute, a polytechnic, and became a university in 1992....
in Surrey
Surrey
Surrey is a county in the South East of England and is one of the Home Counties. The county borders Greater London, Kent, East Sussex, West Sussex, Hampshire and Berkshire. The historic county town is Guildford. Surrey County Council sits at Kingston upon Thames, although this has been part of...
.
Family
Morley married twice: first to Margaret Gudejko, whom he met in Hawaii, in 1965; and then to Ruth Leon, the critic and television producer, in 1995, whom he had known since his days at Oxford. He suffered depression and then a stroke in his later years. He was survived by Ruth, his brother Wilton, sister Annabel, and son Hugo, and by two daughters of his first marriage, which was dissolved in 1990.Biographies
- A Talent to Amuse: A Biography of Noël CowardNoël CowardSir Noël Peirce Coward was an English playwright, composer, director, actor and singer, known for his wit, flamboyance, and what Time magazine called "a sense of personal style, a combination of cheek and chic, pose and poise".Born in Teddington, a suburb of London, Coward attended a dance academy...
, Heinemann, London,1969. ISBN 0434478954. Revised edition 1974; re-issued with a new Prologue, 1985. Later subtitled 'The First Biography of Noël Coward.' - Oscar WildeOscar WildeOscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde was an Irish writer and poet. After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of London's most popular playwrights in the early 1890s...
(1976) - Marlene DietrichMarlene DietrichMarlene Dietrich was a German-American actress and singer.Dietrich remained popular throughout her long career by continually re-inventing herself, professionally and characteristically. In the Berlin of the 1920s, she acted on the stage and in silent films...
(1977) - Sybil ThorndikeSybil ThorndikeDame Agnes Sybil Thorndike CH DBE was a British actress.-Early life:She was born in Gainsborough, Lincolnshire to Arthur Thorndike and Agnes Macdonald. Her father was a Canon of Rochester Cathedral...
: A Life in the Theatre (1977) - Gladys CooperGladys CooperDame Gladys Constance Cooper, DBE was an English actress whose career spanned seven decades on stage, in films and on television....
: Biography (1979) - Gertrude LawrenceGertrude LawrenceGertrude Lawrence was an English actress, singer and musical comedy performer known for her stage appearances in the West End theatre district of London and on Broadway.-Early life:...
: A Bright Particular Star, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1981, ISBN 029777882X - Katharine HepburnKatharine HepburnKatharine Houghton Hepburn was an American actress of film, stage, and television. In a career that spanned 62 years as a leading lady, she was best known for playing strong-willed, sophisticated women in both dramas and comedies...
, (1984) - Ingrid BergmanIngrid BergmanIngrid Bergman was a Swedish actress who starred in a variety of European and American films. She won three Academy Awards, two Emmy Awards, and the Tony Award for Best Actress. She is ranked as the fourth greatest female star of American cinema of all time by the American Film Institute...
(1985) - Other Side of the Moon: The Life of David NivenDavid NivenJames David Graham Niven , known as David Niven, was a British actor and novelist, best known for his roles as Phileas Fogg in Around the World in 80 Days and Sir Charles Lytton, a.k.a. "the Phantom", in The Pink Panther...
(1985) - Elizabeth TaylorElizabeth TaylorDame Elizabeth Rosemond "Liz" Taylor, DBE was a British-American actress. From her early years as a child star with MGM, she became one of the great screen actresses of Hollywood's Golden Age...
(1988) - Odd Man Out: The Life of James MasonJames MasonJames Neville Mason was an English actor who attained stardom in both British and American films. Mason remained a powerful figure in the industry throughout his career and was nominated for three Academy Awards as well as three Golden Globes .- Early life :Mason was born in Huddersfield, in the...
(1989) - RobertRobert MorleyRobert Adolph Wilton Morley, CBE was an English actor who, often in supporting roles, was usually cast as a pompous English gentleman representing the Establishment...
: My Father, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, London (1993). - Audrey HepburnAudrey HepburnAudrey Hepburn was a British actress and humanitarian. Although modest about her acting ability, Hepburn remains one of the world's most famous actresses of all time, remembered as a film and fashion icon of the twentieth century...
(1993) - Shall We Dance: The Life of Ginger RogersGinger RogersGinger Rogers was an American actress, dancer, and singer who appeared in film, and on stage, radio, and television throughout much of the 20th century....
(1995) - Gene KellyGene KellyEugene Curran "Gene" Kelly was an American dancer, actor, singer, film director and producer, and choreographer...
(1996) - Dirk BogardeDirk BogardeSir Dirk Bogarde was an English actor and novelist. Initially a matinee idol in such films as Doctor in the House and other Rank Organisation pictures, Bogarde later acted in art-house films such as Death in Venice...
: Rank Outsider, (1996) - Marilyn MonroeMarilyn MonroeMarilyn Monroe was an American actress, singer, model and showgirl who became a major sex symbol, starring in a number of commercially successful motion pictures during the 1950s....
(1998) - Hey, Mr Producer (Cameron MackintoshCameron MackintoshSir Cameron Anthony Mackintosh is a British theatrical producer notable for his association with many commercially successful musicals. At the height of his success in 1990, he was described as being "the most successful, influential and powerful theatrical producer in the world" by the New York...
) (1998, with Ruth Leon) - Judy GarlandJudy GarlandJudy Garland was an American actress and singer. Through a career that spanned 45 of her 47 years and for her renowned contralto voice, she attained international stardom as an actress in musical and dramatic roles, as a recording artist and on the concert stage...
: Beyond The Rainbow (1999, with Ruth Leon) - John GielgudJohn GielgudSir Arthur John Gielgud, OM, CH was an English actor, director, and producer. A descendant of the renowned Terry acting family, he achieved early international acclaim for his youthful, emotionally expressive Hamlet which broke box office records on Broadway in 1937...
: The Authorized Biography, Hodder & Stoughton, London, 2001. ISBN 0340368039
Theatre retrospectives and collected reviews
- Theatre 71: Plays, Players, Playwrights, Opera, Ballet, edited by Sheridan Morley (Hutchinson, 1971) ISBN 0091092108
- Theatre 72, edited (Hutchinson, 1972) ISBN 0091137802
- Theatre 73, edited (Hutchinson, 1973) ISBN 0091179203
- Theatre 74, edited (Hutchinson, 1974) ISBN 0091222907
- Review Copies: Plays & Players in London 1970-74 (Robson Books 1974). ISBN 0903895250
- Shooting Stars: Plays and Players,1975-1983 (Quartet Books 1983). ISBN 0704323885
- Spread A Little Happiness: The First Hundred Years of the British Musical (Thames & Hudson, 1987). ISBN 0500013985
- Our Theatre in the Eighties (John Curtis/Hodder & Stoughton, 1990) ISBN 0340509791
- A Century of Theatre, with Ruth Leon (Oberon Books, 2000) ISBN 184002058X
- Spectator at the Theatre: A decade of First Nights 1990-1999 (Oberon Books, 2002) ISBN 1840022477
Other works
- The Stephen SondheimStephen SondheimStephen Joshua Sondheim is an American composer and lyricist for stage and film. He is the winner of an Academy Award, multiple Tony Awards including the Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre, multiple Grammy Awards, a Pulitzer Prize and the Laurence Olivier Award...
Songbook (Chappel/Elm Tree Books, 1979) ISBN 024110176X - The Brits in Hollywood: Tales from the Hollywood Raj (UK: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1983) ISBN 0297782894, also published as Tales From The Hollywood Raj: The British, the Movies, and Tinseltown (New York: Viking, 1983), ISBN 0-670-69162-3
- The Noel CowardNoël CowardSir Noël Peirce Coward was an English playwright, composer, director, actor and singer, known for his wit, flamboyance, and what Time magazine called "a sense of personal style, a combination of cheek and chic, pose and poise".Born in Teddington, a suburb of London, Coward attended a dance academy...
Diaries (with Graham PaynGraham PaynGraham Payn was a South African-born English actor and singer, also known for being the life partner of the playwright Noël Coward. Beginning as a boy soprano, Payn later made a career as a singer and actor in the works of Coward and others...
; Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1982) ISBN 0297781421 - The Great Stage Stars (Angus & Robertson, Australia and UK, 1986) ISBN 0207149704. Dedicated: "For Margaret whose book this really is.'"
- Theatrical Companion to Coward (second edition, with Barry Day, Oberon Books, 2000) ISBN 1840020547
- Asking For Trouble, memoirs. (Hodder & Stoughton, 2002) ISBN 0340820578
- An Evening with Sheridan Morley & Michael Law with Judy CampbellJudy CampbellJudy Campbell was an English light comedy actress and occasional playwright, Noël Coward's muse. Her daughter is the actor and singer Jane Birkin, her son the screenwriter and director Andrew Birkin, and among her grandchildren are the actresses Charlotte Gainsbourg and Lou Doillon, the poet Anno...
(CD). http://pdo.org.uk/recordings.html