Actor found Hollywood 'all too silly'

It's now 40 years since the death of one of the greatest British actors of the 20th century, and certainly the greatest Bristol-born actor in living memory. Eugene Byrne looks at the life of Sir Michael Redgrave.

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ONE of the things that most longstanding Bristolians know is that Sir Michael Redgrave has some sort of association with the city. Born here, wasn't he? Famous actor? And that Redgrave Theatre up in Clifton's named after him, isn't it?

Yes, yes and yes, but 40 years on from his death his name is probably more recognisable than his face would be, even though he was one of the most distinguished actors of his day, up there with Gielgud, Guinness and Olivier.

The list of movies he appeared in is a very long one, but in many he was playing relatively small parts. Perhaps the one most of us know him from is 1955's The Dam Busters in which he played "bouncing bomb" inventor Barnes Wallis.

As a newspaper article had it shortly after he died, "a whole generation has grown up unaware, except through glimpses in old late-night films, of his nobility as an actor."

If, however, you were a big fan of the theatre, you'd not consider Redgrave to be obscure for one moment. It was the stage, rather than the screen, which was his natural environment. He had been to Hollywood, but found the hype and glitz uninviting. "All too silly," he said.

What many also know about him is that he fathered a famous acting dynasty, including his children Vanessa, Corin and Lynn, grandchildren Natasha and Joely Richardson and Jemma Redgrave. Among his great-grandchildren are two more actors, Micheál Richardson and Daisy Bevan.

All of this from the birth of a baby at 4 Horfield Road, Kingsdown above a newspaper shop (it's a running gear shop nowadays). There's a blue plaque.

Redgrave would always reject, sometimes quite irritably, the notion that he was some sort of patriarch of a grand line, saying that in fact his own parents were the ones who bequeathed the genes.

Daisy "Margaret" Scudamore (1881-1958) was the daughter of a Portsmouth shipwright who enjoyed a successful stage career, and would appear in a few silent films and, later, talkies.