You know, I'm half inclined to believe that there's some rational explanation for all of this

[sovay]

I've still never seen Will Hay, but I just watched Michael Redgrave do a momentary impersonation of him in The Lady Vanishes (1938) with a pair of pince-nez and a mortarboard from a costume box—"Now, boys, boys, which of you has stolen Miss Froy? Own up, own up!"—vague, officious, distractedly gesturing, with a rabbit-nosed squint. There seem to be a bunch of his movies on YouTube, quality skeptical: Boys Will Be Boys (1935), Windbag the Sailor (1936), Oh, Mr. Porter! (1937), My Learned Friend (1943). I might as well find out how good Redgrave's impersonation was.

In other news, I remain very fond of Naunton Wayne.

(We now return to your irregularly scheduled, badly needed hibernation.)

Comments

[sovay]

"In private life, he was apparently a very serious man with a profound interest in astronomy; he published Through My Telescope (1935)."

Yeah, I'm inclined to feel warmly toward him for that alone. And he was not a casual private-life astronomer. According to this article, he not only discovered a white spot on Saturn, he owned several enviable telescopes and built more than one observatory to house them and there is now a mystery about where some of his equipment was dispersed to after his death in 1949. (Brother Guy Consolmagno figures in this story for a sentence, trying to run down whether the 6-inch Cooke refractor could have been donated to the Vatican observatory, Hay's widow being Catholic. Answer: no, apparently, but I still think it's great and kind of unsurprising he was the person to ask.) Taught astronomy and navigation to the Sea Cadet Corps in World War II. Spoke a lot of languages. Flew. I like that even if the London Evening News responded to the white spot discovery with a cartoon of Hay in his shifty schoolmaster persona, it was actually possible for him to be taken seriously in his scientific work at the same time as he was failing to keep any sort of order or authority on the screen. Yay for smart people.

I love The Lady Vanishes.

I've seen it like half a dozen times now, including last March at the Brattle with derspatchel. It's still good.