Royal Film Performance Series: That Forsyte Woman (1949)

This poster proudly heralds the film as "THE CHOICE for the Royal Film Performance."

The fourth Royal Film Performance, which took place at the Odeon Cinema in Marble Arch, London on November 17, 1949, was attended by the King, Queen, and the Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret (Elizabeth had missed the last two events due to her wedding in 1947 and the birth of Prince Charles in 1948. The following day she would leave to join Philip in Malta, where he was stationed).

Shown this year was the American film, That Forsyte Woman (released in the UK as The Forsyte Saga) starring Greer Garson and Errol Flynn. It was based on the first book of the the popular series by John Galsworthy.

Errol Flynn shared stories about That Forsyte Woman in his autobiography My Wicked, Wicked Ways:

I worked hard for this role in That Forsyte Woman. Now I had the opportunity to show maybe that I could do something else. And it was a joy and a delight to have Greer playing opposite of me. I think that that picture is one of the few worth-while vehicles in which I played (256).

The picture was "...a great success and landed us a command performance in England."

Janet Leigh recalls in her autobiography There Really Was a Hollywood meeting Flynn for the first time: 

I actually gasped. He was as beautiful as I could possibly have imagined, and as charming, and as lovable, and as naughty. When I looked at him, I saw Robin Hood and Captain Blood and Essex, and I remembered the nights I had gone home from the theatre and dreamed of him. He was such a gentleman—except when he played his practical jokes (84).

The evening, like in previous years, was a great success and attended by, aside from the Royals, thirty-one movie stars and a crowd 10,000 strong. 

The London Times reported: 

After the white lights and the cheerful din outside, the waiting auditorium was decorously dim until their Majesties appeared, when floodlights in the proscenium wall suddenly illuminated the front of the balcony, the company rose and clapped, and the band played the National Anthem. It was an affair that delighted the audience, and would have seemed heaven to the eager and fascinating throng outside. It was announced that some £30,000 had been raised for the trade charity.

According to A Rose For Mrs. Miniver: The Life of Greer Garson, the "screening was followed by an elaborate live performance by a stellar array of MGM and British celebrities, including Jean Simmons, Richard Attenborough, Moira Lister, Sir Ralph Richardson, Jack Hulbert, Ann Sothern, George Murphy, Michael Wilding, Gregory Peck, and John Mills. Greer appeared with Walter Wanger in a comic version of The Miniver Story'' (231).

The "throng" that appeared outside the theatre to see the Royals and the stars numbered about 10,000, according to this news article in The Daily News:

The article notes that Greer Garson wore "a dress of heavy 

silver satin embroidered at the bodice with pearl and diamond drops.

CLICK HERE to see a three minute video of the stars and Royals arriving. I'm obsessed with Margaret Lockwood's glittering ensemble (insert heart eyes)!

AND HERE is a fifteen minute video. I love the glimpse of the program and outside of the theatre at the beginning of the video! It has nice, long looks at the stars as they arrive. You can see Greer's gown well starting at the 5:14 mark. 

Here are some photos from The Illustrated London News.

The Stars Remember

For Greer Garson, who had recently married Texan cattleman, wildcatter, and lawyer Buddy Fogelson and was in England filming The Miniver Story, the premiere was:

...the most rewarding one she had ever attended. Indeed, it was one of the proudest moments of her career, for the picture was to be honored as a Command Performance... Besides the king and queen, a great number of celebrities from British and American theater and motion pictures would be present. Her escort was Errol Flynn, who had arrived from location work in India for MGM's production of Rudyard Kipling's Kim (A Rose for Mrs. Miniver, 230).

Stars who attended were given a sterling silver commemorative coin with an engraving of the King and Queen on the front and personalized with their name on the back. Here is Rosalind Russell's coin. 

Rosalind Russell recalled her unique encounter with the Queen in her 1977 autobiography Life is a Banquet (173-175):

In 1949 I was summoned to a command performance before King George VI and Queen Elizabeth (now the Queen Mother of England). It wasn't too long after the war, and things were still very grim in Great Britain. ... I wore a metal scull cap [you can see it at the 2:40 mark in the fifteen minute video linked above]. Hundreds of years earlier, a Viking queen had worn that cap to be married in. ... It was light as a feather, and there were little Viking wings on the sides, over each ear, and a split in the back for a bridal veil to come through, and a little chain. It was enchanting. 

At a rehearsal for the command performance, I asked an equerry if it would be suitable to wear something on one's head when meeting the King and Queen. "Of course," he said. "When women are presented at Court, they wear the feathers, the three plumes."

I couldn't wait for the big evening. It came. I dressed, adjusted my silver helmet, told myself, "This'll kill the people," went onstage and launched into one of the Cockney songs Cary Grant had taught me. 

Later, being presented to the Queen, I curtsied, and she smiled sweetly. "Where did you learn that song?"

I told her about Cary's coaching.

"It's a long time since I heard that," she said, "and you sang it very amusingly.

We actors were being presented in alphabetical order, so Walter Pidgeon had gone before me [actually Ralph Richardson was between them], and Jean Simmons was to come after me. As the Queen started toward Jean Simmons, King George approached and I went into another curtsey. All of a sudden the Queen was back, gesturing to me. I came up out of a half crouch, leaving the King standing there. "Yes, ma'am?" I said. 

"Excuse me," said the Queen, "but what is that wonderful thing you have on your head?"

I never think of that moment without delight. It was like "Where did you buy the hat?" or "Is that diamond necklace real?"; it was such a marvelous, feminine thing.  

The chapter was titled: "A Queen May Look at a Cap." Watching the video footage (11:20), it doesn't seem to appear to happen just as Russell described, but it's a marvelous story!

It looks like Russell may have worn her helmet to a charity auction as well. 

I came across this picture in the September 1949 issue of Photoplay. 

George Murphy recalled in a 1988 interview (recounted in Tap! The Greatest Tap Dance Stars and Their Stories, 1900-1955 by Rusty E. Frank):

In the 1940s, I was part of a royal command performance in London. I was kind of the leader of the group. There was Ann Sothern, Errol Flynn, two or three others. In any event, I was the first one on the stage. And I looked down as I came down the stairs; they had carpeted the stage! I said, "Your Majesty. I’ve had some success as a Soft Shoe dancer. But they’ve carpeted the stage. So with your Majesty’s permission, you will see the softest Soft Shoe dance that’s ever been done.” And they had the big BBC orchestra, forty men in the pit. I doubt they could hear any taps. But I could have danced all night.

THE CINEMA Nov. 16, 1949 British Film Magazine | eBay 

Sources:

Flynn, Errol. My Wicked, Wicked Ways. Rowman & Littlefield. 1959.

Frank, Rusty E.  Tap! The Greatest Tap Dance Stars and Their Stories, 1900-1955. De Capo Press. 1990. 

Leigh, Janet. There Really was a Hollywood. Doubleday & Company. 1984. 

Troyan, Michael. A Rose For Mrs. Miniver: The Life of Greer Garson. The University Press of Kentucky. 1999. 

Russell, Rosalind & Chase, Chris. Life is a Banquet. Random House. 1977.