Oscar Wilde **** (1960, Robert Morley, Phyllis Calvert, Ralph Richardson, John Neville, Dennis Price, Alexander Knox, Edward Chapman) – Classic Movie Review 7236

The smooth and satisfying 1960 biopic Oscar Wilde stars Robert Morley as the playwright and Ralph Richardson as the ruthless prosecuting counsel Sir Edward Carson at his trial.

Director Gregory Ratoff’s smooth and satisfying 1960 biopic Oscar Wilde stars Robert Morley (reprising his stage role in the play by Leslie Stokes and Sewell Stokes) as Oscar Wilde and Ralph Richardson as the ruthless prosecuting counsel Sir Edward Carson at his trial.

Morley and Richardson score strongly in this engrossing, decent looking film of the Victorian scandal that follows the course of the playwright’s romantic friendship with Lord Alfred ’Bosie’ Douglas, eventually leading to Wilde’s conviction for sodomy, disgrace, and jail with hard labour.

Wilde recklessly sues Bosie’s father, the Marquis of Queensberry, for libel after he has publicly insulted Wilde by leaving a visiting card at his club on which he had written ‘For Oscar Wilde posing as a somdomite’, but in court Carson forces him to admit his homosexuality, leading to the fatal second trial.

John Neville makes an effective screen début as ’Bosie’ and Phyllis Calvert is good as Oscar’s wife, Mrs Constance Wilde. The rather oddly cast Dennis Price and Edward Chapman are awkward and less effective as Robbie Ross and the equally ruthless Marquess of Queensberry, Bosie’s father.

The black-and-white, low-budget film Oscar Wilde slightly shows that it was made in great haste at the same time as Peter Finch’s lavish Technicolor and Technirama The Trials of Oscar Wilde in order to beat it to the cinema in Britain, which it managed to do by a few days. Both were released in the last week of May 1960. It was made by Vantage Films and had the advantage of being released by Twentieth Century Fox in the UK. The two movies were announced, began filming and were released almost simultaneously. Both films failed at the box-office.

Oscar Wilde is directed by Gregory Ratoff, runs 98 minutes, is produced by William Kirby for Vantage Films, is shot by Georges Périnal at Walton-on-Thames Studio and released by 20th Century Fox, from a screenplay by Jo Eisinger, based on the play Oscar Wilde by Leslie Stokes and Sewell Stokes, with an original music score by Kenneth V Jones.

The film had a charity gala at the Carlton cinema, London, on 22 May 1960. The Trials of Oscar Wilde was released at midnight on Saturday 28 May 1960 at Studio One in London before its general release on 30 May 1960.

Morley made his name on the stage playing Oscar Wilde at the London Gate Theatre in 1936 and made his Broadway debut in the part on 10 October 1938. Morley said he was too young for the part in 1936 and too old in this film.

Also in the cast are Alexander Knox as Sir Edward Clarke, Martin Benson as George Alexander, Robert Harris, Henry Oscar, William Devlin, Ronald Leigh Hunt, Tom Chatto, Stephen Dartnell, Martin Boddey, Leonard Sachs and Tony Doonan.

It is Ratoff’s last film.

A scene was filmed at Walton Studios where Morley (as Wilde) attempted to pick up a newspaper boy on a foggy London street, but the attempted seduction scene was cut from the final version of the film.

The subject continues to fascinate. The memory of Oscar Wilde continues to be honoured. Stephen Fry’s Wilde (1997) and Rupert Everett’s The Happy Prince (2018) followed.

The cast are Robert Morley as Oscar Wilde, Ralph Richardson as Sir Edward Carson, Phyllis Calvert as Constance Wilde, John Neville as Lord Alfred Douglas, Alexander Knox as Sir Edward Clarke, Dennis Price as Robbie Ross, Edward Chapman as the Marquess of Queensberry, Martin Benson as George Alexander, Robert Harris, Henry Oscar, William Devlin, Ronald Leigh Hunt, Tom Chatto, Stephen Dartnell, Martin Boddey, Leonard Sachs and Tony Doonan.

© Derek Winnert 2018 Classic Movie Review 7236

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