Irene Handl (27 December, 1901-29 November, 1987) was an English film actress.
She was born in Maida Vale, London, the daughter of an Austrian banker father and French mother. She took to acting at the relatively advanced age of 36, and studied at the acting school run by the sister of Dame Sybil Thorndike. She made her London stage debut in February 1937.
She went on to appear in over a hundred British films in supporting roles, mostly in comedy character parts as slightly eccentric mothers, grannies, landladies, and servants, most notable was her her appearance in the ITV Children's comedy show Metal Mickey, as Nan, broadcast in the early 1980s.
Handl had very minor roles in such landmark films as Spellbound and Brief Encounter. Her notable appearances included I'm All Right Jack as the wife of Peter Sellers' union leader Fred Kite, Tony Hancock's landlady in The Rebel and Sherlock Holmes' housekeeper Mrs. Hudson in The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes. She had small roles in...
Created by dipity on Feb 7, 2008
Last updated: 06/10/11 at 11:32 AM
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Irene Handl died
The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle (1980) is a fictional "documentary" (a "mockumentary") film directed by Julien Temple about the seminal British punk rock band Sex Pistols. It starred the band: singer Johnny Rotten as "The Collaborator", guitarist Steve Jones as "The Crook", bassist Sid Vicious as "The Gimmick", drummer Paul Cook as "The Tea-Maker", and the band's infamous manager, Malcolm McLaren, as "The Embezzler". It also features original bassist Glen Matlock, who appears briefly in some live scenes.
The film tells the story of the rise and fall of the Sex Pistols from the viewpoint of their manager Malcolm McLaren. This is done by footage shot by director Julien Temple of the band from their beginnings, live and interview footage from various sources, animated sequences, as well as scenes featuring McLaren explaining his own personal philosophy behind the band.
As the film was made after the break up of the band, no participation from Johnny Rotten occurred (he only is...
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0080813
Morgan! (also known as Morgan: A Suitable Case for Treatment) is a 1966 film made by the British Lion Films Corporation. It was directed by Karel Reisz and produced by Leon Clore from a screenplay by David Mercer.The film stars David Warner, Vanessa Redgrave and Robert Stephens with Irene Handl and Bernard Bresslaw.It tells the story of working-class artist Morgan Delt (David Warner), obsessed with Karl Marx and gorillas, who tries to stop his ex-wife (Vanessa Redgrave) from remarrying.The film was nominated for Academy Awards for Best Actress in a Leading Role (Vanessa Redgrave) and Best Costume Design, Black-and-White.American 80's icon Morgan Fairchild took her first name from this film....
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0060714
Two-Way Stretch is a British comedy film of 1960, about a group of prisoners who plan to break out of jail, commit a robbery, and then break back into jail again, thus giving them the perfect alibi - that they were behind bars when the robbery occurred. However, their plans are disrupted by the arrival of a strict new Chief Prison Officer, played by Lionel Jeffries.
It was directed by Robert Day from a screenplay by John Warren and Len Heath. The film boasts a rich cast of characters played by, among others, Peter Sellers, Bernard Cribbins.
...,
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0054417
I'm All Right Jack is a British comedy film directed and produced by John and Roy Boulting.
Released in 1959, it is a satire on British industrial life in the 1950s in which the trade unions, workers and bosses are all seen to be incompetent or corrupt to varying degrees. The film is one of a number of satires made by the Boulting Brothers between 1956 and 1963, and is a sequel to their 1956 film Private's Progress. Ian Carmichael, Dennis Price, Richard Attenborough, Terry-Thomas and Miles Malleson all return as the same characters from the earlier film. Peter Sellers also played one of his best-known roles, as the trade union shop steward Fred Kite, and won a Best Actor Award from the British Academy.
The rest of the cast included many well-known English comedy actors of the time.
Curiously, some trade unionists have rather enjoyed it in an ironic way, since the shop steward Fred Kite is the most interesting character, and it was one of the few films of that time to deal even...,
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0052911
A Kid for Two Farthings is a 1953 novel by the British writer Wolf Mankowitz, based on the author's experiences of growing up within a Jewish community in London's East End. It was translated into a film by Carol Reed in 1955. Mankowitz himself wrote the screenplay.In a lower-class London community of small shops, open-air vendors and flea-marketers, Joe, a small boy, lives with his mother, Joanne, who works in and rooms above the Kandinsky tailor shop. Joe is innocently and earnestly determined to help realize the wishes of his poor, hard-working neighbours. Hearing from Mr. Kandinsky the tale that a captured unicorn will grant any wish, Joe uses his accumulated pocket change to buy a kid with an emerging horn, believing it to be a unicorn. His subsequent efforts to make dreams come true exemplify the power of hope and will amidst hardship....
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0048250
Irene Handl was born
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