Derrick de Marney — Way for an Actor! (1937) 🇬🇧
You've read that Alfred Hitchcock's new leading man, whom he has chosen to play opposite Nova Pilbeam in "A Shilling for Candles," is Derrick de Marney; and you may be wondering who he is.
Transcriber's note: "A Shilling for Candles" was released under the title "Young and Innocent" in cinemas.
by Max Breen
Not if you're a playgoer, of course; not even if you're a faithful picturegoer, for Derrick is by no means unknown on the screen. But no film role of the magnitude of his present one has so far come his way, and it behoves us to enquire into the matter.
Derrick is 26, and has a sound theatrical background and upbringing.
Of French and Irish ancestry… Wait a moment, let's stop and consider this.
Occasionally it happens, when you get the blood of these two nations mingling in one set of veins, that the French prudence counteracts the Irish recklessness, and the Irish shrewdness damps down the Gallic fire.
This certainly doesn't seem to have happened in the case of Derrick de Marney. And now pray let us proceed.
Of French and Irish ancestry, he comes of a family of well-known actors. His maternal great-grandfather and grandfather were both prominent artistes, Edward and Alfred Concanen, and his grandmother, Nellie Herbert, was a celebrated performer in her day.
His mother, Eileen Concanen, retired from the stage on her marriage to Edward de Marney, who was a London editor.
Young de Marney was caught early — or rather caught himself early; he went on the stage at 16, and during his apprenticeship he played in The Admiral's Lady in Mrs. Patrick Campbell's company, and in Noel Coward's Hay Fever.
"Mrs. Pat gave me a piece of excellent advice," he told me once; "it was 'Spend money in the theatre business — but never your own!'"
Derrick also told me he learned his job principally from actresses; Eva Moore and Kate Cutler (with whom he played, alternately, in Hay Fever), Phyllis Neilson-Terry, Dorothy Gish, and Claire Eames — such were his theatrical "governesses," and no boy could have been better taught… or more eager to learn.
He contacted Dorothy Gish when he and his brother Terence brought her from America to play in Young Love at the Arts Theatre — and Derrick played opposite her. This venture obtained considerable publicity, although (or perhaps partly because!) the Lord Chamberlain would not allow the play to be performed in an ordinary theatre.
Claire Eames was the brilliant American actress whose impersonation of Queen Elizabeth was one of the most distinguished ever seen on the London stage, and whose death some years ago robbed the theatre of a particular ornament. We elder picturegoers remember her as Shayle Gardner's wife in Rex Ingram's "Three Passions."
Derrick de Marney tells me he owes a very great deal to her interest and sympathy.
I saw Derrick first, I think, in the lead in Fata Morgana, and shortly after that in All the King's Horses, and with Owen Nares and Doris Kean in Romance, and he always appealed to me as a sensitive young actor with a peculiarly penetrating sense of character.
I think he probably learned more at the Gate Theatre, London, than anywhere else; there he had opportunity to play widely different roles, in plays that varied from The Pleasure Garden to Eugene O'Neil's The Hairy Ape.
A list of the plays he has been in would provide a kind of thumbnail history of the London stage for the past few years, but outstanding productions in which he has figured are Young Woodley, Byron, Frenzied Finance, Sir James Barrie's Barbara's Wedding, Down Our Street, and The Storm Fighter with Flora Robson.
He was in Bernard Shaw's own production of Candida with Sir Barry Jackson's company at Malvern, and had two seasons in New York — one in The Matriarch with Constance Collier, the other in The Last Enemy.
Other notable plays in which he figured were The Faithful Heart with Godfrey Tearle and Miracle at Verdun, both at the Comedy Theatre, London, and then as Fernando in The Tudor Wench, at the Embassy and Alhambra.
He so impressed the author of this last one, Elswyth Thane, that she wrote a play specially for him, Young Mr. Disraeli, which ran at the Piccadilly and Kingsway Theatres, and proved to be of the utmost importance in his career.
With his brother Terence he produced Rodney Ackland's first play, Improper People, at the Arts Theatre Club; and in this production they introduced to London not only an important playwright but also an important actor — Esmond Knight.
Derrick has made over thirty appearances for charity, and for seven or eight years he has taken part regularly in broadcast plays. But what about films?
Well, for a young actor of such accomplishment and experience he's been curiously absent from the screen; but perhaps it's because he's been so immersed in the theatre — -and also because he's never been content to play "straight juveniles," sacrificing good money in order to play character roles.
Right at the beginning of his career he took part in a number of silent films — about a dozen, if I remember rightly; but not until that monumental production "The Private Life of Henry VIII" did he dabble in talkies.
There followed other Korda pictures in which he took small parts to "get the feel of it" — "Catherine the Great," "Don Juan," "The Scarlet Pimpernel." In this last he wore six or seven different disguises, and every day used to make a point of saying "Good-morning" to Alexander Korda — always noting with satisfaction that he was not recognised.
A recent portrait of the subject of this article.
In fact, I think it would be safe to say that Korda didn't really recognise him — or at any rate his ability — until he saw him in "Young Mr. Disraeli."
The direct outcome of that was a long contract with London Films, his first part being Richard Gordon, the young air-mechanic in "Things to Come."
And that — such is the nature of long contracts — was also his last appearance for London Films, though he was lent to Capitol to play opposite June Clyde in "Land Without Music," in which he made the best of a somewhat nebulous part.
Before that, by the way, he had played in a couple of Fox Quota films. "Once in a New Moon" (opposite Rene Ray) and "The Laughter of Fools" (opposite Pat Paterson). They attracted as much attention as such things usually do — about equivalent to throwing a very small pebble into a very large pond.
"Since Land Without Music" he has played in four films — "Windfall," "Cafe Mascot," "Victoria the Great" (in which he played… the young Mr. Disraeli!) and "Pearls of the Crown."
I'm open to bet you never heard of this last one! It was made in France, and directed by the famous French actor Sacha Guitry, and is a sort of Cavalcade of the Kings and Queens of England.
It is typical of historical films that Derrick played Lord Darnley, who was neither a king nor of England!
So there you are. That brings us to the stage at which Derrick de Marney charges across the South of England in company with Nova Pilbeam, fleeing from the law.
I have a strong feeling that this will be the beginning of big things in the film world for him; he has an engaging personality, great acting experience, and an ability beyond his years. It's time we took advantage of all this.
I believe Hitchcock will.
Collection: Picturegoer Magazine, July 1937