Celia Johnson, a great Dame

[stuart.uk]

She didn't make many films, but Celia Johnson made a handful of classics. she played the supportive stiff upper lip wife of naval Captain Noel Coward in In Which We Serve.

She was brilliant as the young woman aging to middle-age In This Happy Breed with Robert Newton, in film about a so called working class family ( i say so called because they could afford a housekeeper and Newton's right hand political views were at odds with his socialist son's)

Celia's most famous film was of course Brief Encounter with a married woman falling in love with a married man, but it also showed two people behaving responsibly. they never had an affair. the other great thing about it was both Celia and co-star Trevor Howard wern't what you would call hearthrobs, but that only enhanced a great film.

Celia played a school headmistress at odds with teacher Maggie Smith in The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie. in the end Celia won the day because Maggie's Brodie was exposed ass a dangerous facist

in her latter yrs she was reunited with Trevor Howard as an elderly couple in Staying On, a British tv movie. She also played the wife of Prime Minister William Gladstone in Number 10.

[charliechaplinfan]

I'm so fond of Celia Johnson and Brief Encounter. They don't make them like that anymore, it's very true. She's also a revelation in The Happy Breed. To me she encapsulates the 'make do and mend' British woman of the war years than Hollywood's Greer Garson.

[stuart.uk]

I agree. as much as I like Greer Garson i believe Mrs Miniver to be overrated. while Celia played a working class wife in and mum in THB, Greer played a wife of a well off Walter Pidgeon. i thought it weird their son was marrying above himself with Teresa Wright when his own family was loaded.

[mrsl]

There is something about Celia that is very attractive. I don't mean as in a beautiful face, but as a restful, or comfortable person to be with. It's what Trevor was attracted to at first in Brief Encounter. Also, she is really the quiet glue that holds the family together in Happy Breed.

I would love to see her in the Holly and the Ivy. Stuart, have you seen that? Although I hate to do it, I think I'll go over to TCM and request it next year, or has BBC/America ever shown it?

Anne

[charliechaplinfan]

It's not a film I've ever seen although if it were shown I'd make a point of recording it. She was unique.

[feaito]

Celia Johnson gave one of the most poignant, unaffected, sincere, honest performances ever given by an actress in the wondrous "Brief Encounter" -words are not enough to praise this masterpiece- and I would like to see more of her.

The other day I came across an imported edition (European I believe) of the film "This Happy Breed" and I would have bought it, but it was being sold at a ridiculously expensive price (around US$ 37).

[Sue Sue Applegate]

I also agree with all the praise given to Celia Johnson in Brief Encounter.

Both Johnson and Trevor Howard made such a memorable classic. I saw that film in my early teens, and then started playing way too much Rachmaninoff on the piano!

[Libertine]

I've seen Celia only two times so far. Of course, I've seen her in the wonderful Brief Encounter. One of my favorite movies, her portrayal was so sensitive, believable.. she was absolutely brilliant. The other movie I've seen was A Kid for Two Farthings where she played the mother of the child. It's a very nice British movie.

There are actors you immediately like, she is one of these, you know? And those eyes, so expressive. She really impressed me as an actress, and I'd like to see more of her work.

Does anyone have the biography written by her daughter Kate Fleming? I wonder if anyone has read it and could tell us a bit more about Celia's life and personality.

[moira finnie]

Does anyone have the biography written by her daughter Kate Fleming? I wonder if anyone has read it and could tell us a bit more about Celia's life and personality.

Our fellow member, charliechaplinfan (Alison) has read this book and mentions it here in a thread about David Lean.

[Libertine]

Thanks moira! I am going to check it out!!!

[charliechaplinfan]

It's wonderful Libertine, I would recommend it, it contains letters written by Celia and her husband Peter, she was a very down to earth person, not at all showbizzy. She pitched in with war work, working at a police station and had most of her extended family staying with her during the war, she had children everywhere. Brief Encounter remains one of my favorite films and Celia one of my favorite actresses despite her not making many movies. She's even convincing as Noel Coward's wife in In Which We Serve, no easy job.

[Libertine]

Thanks so much ccfan!!! (btw, may I call you Alison?) Nah, another book for my list. I read the story you posted in the Lean thread, about her doing a very emotional scene and then just look at her watch and go home, switch her emotions on and off. It's amazing.

You know, I didn't know her until I saw her in A Kid for Two Farthings. I liked her in it already, but with Brief Encounter she just wowed me.

Do you know if she did mainly theater, or how comes that she did, in the end, only a few movies?

[charliechaplinfan]

I think the theatre was her home, she never really considered movies at first, they sought her out, In Which We Serve was her first, then Lean used her again in This Happy Breed and again in Brief Encounter. I don't think she liked herself on screen, Lean asked her to do these three movies not the other way around. She lived fairly close to London and starred regularly in the theatre ad later in in television. She was a homebody who stayed close to her children who varied in ages and also durig the war she got immersed in war work and running the farm. The book is really unlike others I have read, although written by her daughter it's not a glossed over picture of her. She comes across not quite like Laura Jesson but possessed the stiff upper lip and buckle down and get on with it mentality.

Course you can call me Alison

[RedRiver]

This is like falling in love with somebody you hardly know. I may have seen Ms. Johnson in three movies. But she's so good I can't take my eyes off her. She climbs inside a characer and brings it to life, the way only the very best actors do.

THIS HAPPY BREED, IN WHICH WE SERVE, BRIEF ENCOUNTER. That's just about the extent of my familiarity with this fine artist. It's enough.

[feaito]

Another absolutely recommended film, in which she stars opposite Alec Guinness and Yvonne De Carlo, is "The Captain's Paradise", an excellent & offbeat comedy, which I enjoyed recently thanks to Moira's recommendation.