Over the years, British character actors have made their mark with discerning movie audiences in America and the world over. The likes of Cyril Cusack, Mervyn Johns, John Laurie and many others, became household names.
To this observer, one of the very best was Alastair Sim. Combining a wry sense of humor with a commanding presence, inimitable diction and gestures, a mischievous, charming personality and take-charge manner when needed, he was simply wonderful.
Whether playing a bumbling police official, a clockmaker and incompetent assassin, in drag as a school headmistress, a doting father or Charles Dickens’ miserly Ebenezer Scrooge, the tall, balding, middle-age Sim was a scene stealer. And he was loved by Alfred Hitchcock, who cast him as Jane Wyman’s father in Stage Fright (1950).
From the 1930s into the ’70s, Sim provided riveting performances in more than 50 films, many of which are familiar to viewers of cable TV’s Turner Classic Movies. Included were Inspector Hornleigh (1939), Waterloo Road (1944), Scrooge (1951), Escapade (1955), School for Scoundrels (1960) and The Ruling Class (1972).
In his final movie, Sim is the wizened Earl (Peter O’Toole’s uncle) in the British television film Rogue Male (1976), a nifty remake of Geoffrey Household’s Man Hunt (1941). In the film, sportsman O’Toole, assisted by a lawyer (Harold Pinter) and hounded by a Nazi agent (John Standing), seeks to assassinate Adolf Hitler. An amused Sim—wrapped in a towel in a steam bath—calls O’Toole “Bobbity” and warns him about being “provocative.” After O’Toole leaves, he bores a friend by delightfully describing the failed Hitler escapade.
To many film critics, the highlight of Sim’s movie career was his sterling portrayal of Scrooge in the sparkling 1951 remake of Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. Some feel his stingy Scrooge surpassed masterly work by Reginald Owen in the stunning 1938 original, and in later versions with Albert Finney in 1970 and Jim Carrey in 2009.
But to me, the most memorable performances by the London stage-trained Sim, were the facetious Inspector Cockrill in Green for Danger and the droll assassin Harry Hawkins in The Green Man.
In Green for Danger, a fedora-wearing Sim arrives at a rural British emergency hospital in World War II to investigate the mysterious operating-table death of a postman during attacks by German V-1 rockets. Happily brandishing his Scotland Yard authority, Sim’s Inspector Cockrill suspects the death was murder. As he throws his weight around to prove his theory, he incurs the wrath of the doctors and nurses, including noted actors Trevor Howard and Rosamund John.
After yet another murder, Sim discovers the devious method in a stirring finale, implicating one of the nurses. But he accidentally helps cause her death by stopping her from administering an antidote to a poison pill she took. As a deflated Sim departs, he scurries for cover at the sound of an incoming rocket stumbling over his own feet.
In The Green Man, Sim’s docile Harry Hawkins lives a double-life as a middle-age watchmaker and freelance assassin. Contracted to blow-up a cabinet minister (Raymond Huntley), Sim trails him to the nondescript, countryside Green Man hotel, where he was spending an illicit weekend with a young, female typist.
Hiding a bomb in a small radio, Sim charms and kills time at the bar with a female musical trio. His plot is uncovered by a vacuum cleaner salesman (George Cole), and friend (Jill Adams). Unable to oust the guests—including a befuddled Terry-Thomas—Cole tosses the radio out a window to explode.
Meanwhile, Sim escapes in a car driven by a confederate, only to crash into an oncoming police car, ending his colorful career. And The Green Man lives on.
