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Donald Sinden

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Sir Donald Sinden
Production poster for
An Evening with... Sir Donald Sinden
Born
Donald Alfred Sinden

(1923-10-09) 9 October 1923 (age 100)
Plymouth, Devon, England
NationalityEnglish
EducationWebber Douglas Academy of Dramatic Art
OccupationActor
Known forRank Organisation film star & RSC
SpouseDiana Mahony (1948– 2004 [her death])
ChildrenJeremy Sinden (1950–1996)
Marc Sinden (b 1954)
RelativesLeon Sinden (brother) (b 1927)
Joy Sinden (sister [deceased])
AwardsEvening Standard Best Actor; SOLT Best Actor; Tony Award Best Actor nomination etc.

Sir Donald Sinden CBE D.Litt [1] (born October 9, 1923 in Plymouth) is an English actor of stage and screen, who has remained enormously popular[citation needed] with audiences since his days as a film star in the 1950's.

Personal life

He was born Donald Alfred Sinden in Plymouth, England, 9 October 1923, son of Alfred Edward Sinden and his wife Mabel Agnes (Fuller) and lived in the Sussex village of Ditchling where their home ('The Limes') doubled as the local chemist shop. In 1948 he married actress Diana Mahony [2]. One of their sons, Marc Sinden, is the West End theatre producer and actor. Their other son, Jeremy Sinden, was also an actor, but died in 1996. [3]

Early career

He trained as an actor at the Webber Douglas Academy of Dramatic Art and made his first stage appearance at the Brighton Little Theatre (of which he later became President) in January 1941, playing Dudley in George and Margaret. He broke into professional acting after appearing with the Mobile Entertainments Southern Area company in modern comedies for the armed forces during the Second World War. [3]

Rank Organisation

In 1953 he was contracted for seven years to the Rank Organisation at Pinewood Studios and subsequently starred in many outstanding British films of the 1950s including The Cruel Sea, Mogambo, Doctor in the House, Above Us The Waves, Doctor at Large, The Siege of Sidney Street, Twice Round the Daffodils and with a very young Adam Faith in Mix Me a Person. [4]

Royal Shakespeare Company

A Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) stalwart since the 1960s, among many notable stage appearances are The Wars of the Roses opposite Dame Peggy Ashcroft and for the 1976 Stratford season and then at the Aldwych in 1977, he gave an outstanding comedy performance partnered with Dame Judi Dench as Beatrice and Benedick in the 'British Raj' revival of Much Ado About Nothing. He also won the Evening Standard Best Actor award that year for his outstanding performance as King Lear. Other memorable RSC performances were Twelfth Night; The Relapse and London Assurance. [5]

Theatre

Theatre being his first 'love', [6] he is a noted farceur and has won Best Actor awards for his appearances in Ray Cooney farces Not Now Darling; Two Into One and Out of Order. Other memorable productions have been leading performances in There's a Girl in My Soup; An Enemy Of The People; Major Barbara; The Scarlet Pimpernel; That Good Night and Quartet. [5]

TV

He achieved an early wider fame with the non-theatregoing public in 1963 through the Associated Rediffusion series Our Man at St Marks followed by Our Man from St Marks and then again in 1975 through the London Weekend Television situation comedy Two's Company, in which he played an English butler, Robert, to Elaine Stritch's American character, Dorothy. Much of the humour derived from the culture clashes between Robert's very stiff-upper-lip Britishness and Dorothy's devil-may-care New York view on life. Two's Company was exceptionally well-received in Britain, despite being buried in the so-called 'graveyard slot' of Sunday night at 10:30pm. Stritch and Sinden also sang the theme tune to the programme. The format was sold to NBC and made starring Peter Cook. It was a failure and only lasted one season, but due to contractual problems with NBC the English version cannot be repeated. It is however now available on DVD.

From 1981 he was also to star as Simon Peel in the Thames TV situation comedy Never the Twain, in which he played a snooty antiques dealer who had to live next door to Oliver Smallbridge (played by Windsor Davies), who also ran an antique shop. The characters hated each other and were horrified when they discovered that their son and daughter were to be married - thus meaning they were related. Despite the lack of critical acclaim, it achieved huge public popularity and the series was to run for 11 years. One episode had Sinden being literally picked up by two police officers played by his own actor sons Jeremy and Marc.

With many other TV series behind him, including guest starring in the cult series The Prisoner, from 2001 - 2007 he played the part of senior judge (and father-in-law of the title character) Sir Joseph Channing in Judge John Deed and is the voice of Totally Viral. He also appeared frequently on radio, including Sir Charles Baskerville in the Radio 4 adaptation of the Sherlock Holmes story The Hound of the Baskervilles. [3]

He was spoofed mercilessly on Spitting Image (a British satirical television programme in which famous people were usually lampooned by viciously caricatured latex puppets) for his stage-actorly delivery and fruity voice. For example, his puppet, sitting in a restaurant, summons a waiter and asks "Do you serve a ham salad?" the waiter replies "Yes, we serve salad to anyone" and was shown fawning to the Queen and requesting a knighthood from her. He did however receive a knighthood in 1997.

Books

Sinden has written two autobiographical volumes, A Touch of the Memoirs (1982) and Laughter in the Second Act (1985), as well as a collection of "epitaphs and final utterances," The Last Word (1994). He was also a leading figure in the fight to launch the Theatre Museum in London's Covent Garden in the 1980s. [3]

Present

As of 2007, Sir Donald Sinden is on a UK and European tour, taking in various venues to talk about his life, work and anecdotes in An Evening with... Sir Donald Sinden and in 2009 is fronting a new documentary to be released worldwide on DVD, both produced by Marc Sinden. [7]

Filmography

References

  1. ^ www2.le.ac.uk/ebulletin/news/press-releases/2000-2009/2005/06/nparticle-6ch-d3r-kbd
  2. ^ Who's Who (2007)
  3. ^ a b c d Debrett's Distinguished People of Today (2007)
  4. ^ imdb.com
  5. ^ a b Who's Who in the Theatre, 17th edition (1981)
  6. ^ Croydon Life issue 14 June 2008
  7. ^ Debrett's People of Today (2009)
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