I just heard on the news that Deborah Kerr died yesterday.



I will never forget the triple role she played of the loves of Major General Clive Wynne-Candy in the The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943).

Here's a fragment from that beautiful film:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-60VqEycr4



They don't make 'em like this any more.

This is sad.  She was one of my favourites, very attractive and totally competent in her roles.
I remember her in Bonjour Tristesse and Night of the Iguana. 

For all her other wonderful performances,  I think the one which leaves the greatest impression on me is still the one I saw her in first...


Deborah Kerr in Black Narcissus

  At 86, Deborah Kerr managed to achieve longevity as well as a distinguished innings in the cinema.     I was a schoolboy when I first saw her in "The Life & Death of Col Blimp" (1943) and TV has transmitted two of her early films during the past year:  her debut in 'Major Barbara' (1941), only a few weeks ago, and "Love on the Dole" (1941) some months earlier.   She had a similar feisty spirit and radiance to Wendy Hiller.     Her Hollywood career, circa 1950, looked like confining her to the roles of the English rose but, a few years later in 1953, her spirit ignited the role of Karen in 'From Here to Eternity'.   In 1957, she joined Cary Grant in "An Affair to Remember" - how well they sparked off each other in light comedy and they even managed to make the sentimentality tolerable in the later part of the film.   Among many outstanding performances, I think my favourite is her repressed governess in Jack Clayton's "The Innocents" (1961) reissued on DVD last year by the BFI.

I've been trying to recall the title of the play in which Deborah Kerr returned to the British theatre in the early 80s.    I saw it at The Richmond Theatre, Surrey, and, although the script was mediocre, her charisma and stage technique were both intact and the production enjoyed a modest success when it  transferred to the Haymarket Theatre.        Richmond Theatre also attracted Celia Johnson in her final stage role, around this time, and Googie Withers - still with us, bless 'er -  played Ranevsky in "The Cherry Orchard". A formidable trio of lasses unparallel'd.

RIP Deborah Kerr - and thank you for sharing your talent with us for so long.

I hadn't realized, until picking up current news stories, that her surname is supposed to rhyme with star. I had a friend called Kerr and his name rhymed with stir.

Deborah Kerr starred in the Haymarket production of Ustinov's "Overheard" in 1981, Stanley. I read about it in an obituary from the Telegraph:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/10/18/db1804.xml

She starred in a play by Albee in 1975: the Broadway production of "Seascape".

Thank you, Pim.            "I think he's got it.    By George, he's got it."     I've been rummaging through my programmes all weekend, frequently using expletives as I could feel the "shape" of the title in my noodle.  And, indeed, it was Ustinov!

And even "Seascape" caused confusion, as I felt I'd seen it but with Peggy Ashcroft in the title role.   Remembered that it was Pinter's "Landscape" at the RSC, Aldwych Theatre.

"For this relief much thanks." 

And there's Judith Kerr, author of children's books such as The Tiger Who Came to Tea and the Mog stories - her Kerr rhymes with star. Which reminds me I must get hold of a copy of her biography of childhood wartime memories, When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit, as mentioned on R4 in a programme about her a while ago. Please excuse my being off-topic but has anyone here read it?