Edmund Gwenn

Edmund Gwenn (26 September 1877Birth certificate – 6 September 1959) was an EnglishBerry, David. Wales and Cinema: The First Hundred Years, University of Wales Press, 1994, p. 110. theatre and film actor.Obituary Variety, September 23, 1959, page 87.

Background

Born Edmund John Kellaway in Wandsworth, London (some references suggest he was born in the Vale of Glamorgan, but this is apparently incorrect), and educated at St. Olave's School and later at King's College London, Gwenn began his acting career in the theatre in 1895. Playwright George Bernard Shaw was impressed with his acting, casting him in the first production of Man and Superman, and subsequently in five more of his plays. Gwenn's career was interrupted by his military service during World War I; however, after the war, he began appearing in films in London. (Cecil Kellaway was his cousin and Arthur Chesney was his brother.)

Career

Gwenn appeared in more than eighty films during his career, including the Greer Garson/Olivier version of Pride and Prejudice (1940), Cheers for Miss Bishop, Of Human Bondage, and The Keys of the Kingdom. George Cukor's Sylvia Scarlett (1935) marked his first appearance in a Hollywood movie, as Katharine Hepburn's father; - his final British picture, as a capitalist trying to take over a family brewery in Cheer Boys Cheer (1939) is credited with being the first authentic Ealing...
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