Noel Howlett
Encyclopedia
Noel Howlett was an English actor, principally remembered as the incompetent headmaster, Morris Cromwell, in the ITV 1970s cult television programme Please Sir!
. He was the subject of infatuation by Deputy Head Doris Ewell, played by Joan Sanderson
.
Howlett was born in Maidstone
, Kent
, and began his career as Richard Greatham in Noel Coward
's Hay Fever
. At Northampton Repertory Theatre in 1930 he played Sherlock Holmes
. He also appeared as Mr Williams in the 1948 film The Winslow Boy
, starring Robert Donat
. At Stratford-on-Avon in 1953, he played Old Gobbo (father to Donald Pleasence
's Launcelot Gobbo) in The Merchant of Venice
, Edward IV (brother to Marius Goring
's Richard III
), Baptista in The Taming of the Shrew
and Gloucester in King Lear
.
He appeared as Professor Rushton in a one-off 1967 edition of the The Avengers
entitled 'Mission Highly Improbable' and also as the Reverend Simon Blanding in a one-off 1967 edition of Man in a Suitcase
called 'Dead Man's Shoes'. Other screen appearances include Softly, Softly
and Danger Man
, both 1960s TV shows. He also appeared in one 1976 episode ('I Talk to the Trees') of the BBC situation comedy 'The Good Life' as slightly eccentric allotment gardener Mr Wakeley.
He also frequently broadcast and did a spell for the BBC as a member of their Drama Repertory Company (now the Radio Drama Company).
Please Sir!
Please Sir! was a London Weekend Television produced situation comedy, created by writers John Esmonde and Bob Larbey and featured the actors John Alderton, Deryck Guyler, Joan Sanderson, Noel Howlett, Erik Chitty and Richard Davies...
. He was the subject of infatuation by Deputy Head Doris Ewell, played by Joan Sanderson
Joan Sanderson
Joan Sanderson was an English television and stage actress. During a long career she invariably played dragonish dowagers, stuck-up spinsters and suburban matrons.-Theatre:...
.
Howlett was born in Maidstone
Maidstone
Maidstone is the county town of Kent, England, south-east of London. The River Medway runs through the centre of the town linking Maidstone to Rochester and the Thames Estuary. Historically, the river was a source and route for much of the town's trade. Maidstone was the centre of the agricultural...
, Kent
Kent
Kent is a county in southeast England, and is one of the home counties. It borders East Sussex, Surrey and Greater London and has a defined boundary with Essex in the middle of the Thames Estuary. The ceremonial county boundaries of Kent include the shire county of Kent and the unitary borough of...
, and began his career as Richard Greatham in Noel Coward
Noël Coward
Sir Noël Peirce Coward was an English playwright, composer, director, actor and singer, known for his wit, flamboyance, and what Time magazine called "a sense of personal style, a combination of cheek and chic, pose and poise".Born in Teddington, a suburb of London, Coward attended a dance academy...
's Hay Fever
Hay Fever
Hay Fever is a comic play written by Noël Coward in 1924 and first produced in 1925 with Marie Tempest as the first Judith Bliss. Laura Hope Crews played the role in New York...
. At Northampton Repertory Theatre in 1930 he played Sherlock Holmes
Sherlock Holmes
Sherlock Holmes is a fictional detective created by Scottish author and physician Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The fantastic London-based "consulting detective", Holmes is famous for his astute logical reasoning, his ability to take almost any disguise, and his use of forensic science skills to solve...
. He also appeared as Mr Williams in the 1948 film The Winslow Boy
The Winslow Boy (1948 film)
The Winslow Boy is a 1948 film adaptation of Terence Rattigan's play The Winslow Boy. It was made by De Grunwald Productions and distributed by the British Lion Film Corporation. It was directed by Anthony Asquith and produced by Anatole de Grunwald with Teddy Baird as associate producer. The...
, starring Robert Donat
Robert Donat
Robert Donat was an English film and stage actor. He is best-known for his roles in Alfred Hitchcock's The 39 Steps and Goodbye, Mr...
. At Stratford-on-Avon in 1953, he played Old Gobbo (father to Donald Pleasence
Donald Pleasence
Sir Donald Henry Pleasence, OBE, was a British actor who gained more than 200 screen credits during a career which spanned over four decades...
's Launcelot Gobbo) in The Merchant of Venice
The Merchant of Venice
The Merchant of Venice is a tragic comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1596 and 1598. Though classified as a comedy in the First Folio and sharing certain aspects with Shakespeare's other romantic comedies, the play is perhaps most remembered for its dramatic...
, Edward IV (brother to Marius Goring
Marius Goring
Marius Goring CBE was an English stage and cinema actor. He is most often remembered for the four films he did with Powell & Pressburger, particularly as Conductor 71 in A Matter of Life and Death and as Julian Craster in The Red Shoes...
's Richard III
Richard III of England
Richard III was King of England for two years, from 1483 until his death in 1485 during the Battle of Bosworth Field. He was the last king of the House of York and the last of the Plantagenet dynasty...
), Baptista in The Taming of the Shrew
The Taming of the Shrew
The Taming of the Shrew is a comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1590 and 1591.The play begins with a framing device, often referred to as the Induction, in which a mischievous nobleman tricks a drunken tinker named Sly into believing he is actually a nobleman himself...
and Gloucester in King Lear
King Lear
King Lear is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. The title character descends into madness after foolishly disposing of his estate between two of his three daughters based on their flattery, bringing tragic consequences for all. The play is based on the legend of Leir of Britain, a mythological...
.
He appeared as Professor Rushton in a one-off 1967 edition of the The Avengers
The Avengers (TV series)
The Avengers is a spy-fi British television series set in the 1960s Britain. The Avengers initially focused on Dr. David Keel and his assistant John Steed . Hendry left after the first series and Steed became the main character, partnered with a succession of assistants...
entitled 'Mission Highly Improbable' and also as the Reverend Simon Blanding in a one-off 1967 edition of Man in a Suitcase
Man in a Suitcase
Man in a Suitcase is a 1967 television series produced by Lew Grade's ITC Entertainment.-Origins and overview:Man in a Suitcase was effectively a replacement for Danger Man, whose production had been curtailed when its star Patrick McGoohan had decided to create his own series, The Prisoner...
called 'Dead Man's Shoes'. Other screen appearances include Softly, Softly
Softly, Softly (TV series)
Softly, Softly is a British television drama series, produced by the BBC and screened on BBC 1 from January 1966. It centred around the work of regional crime squads, plain-clothes CID officers based in the fictional region of Wyvern - supposedly in the Bristol and Chepstow area of the UK...
and Danger Man
Danger Man
Danger Man is a British television series that was broadcast between 1960 and 1962, and again between 1964 and 1968. The series featured Patrick McGoohan as secret agent John Drake. Ralph Smart created the program and wrote many of the scripts...
, both 1960s TV shows. He also appeared in one 1976 episode ('I Talk to the Trees') of the BBC situation comedy 'The Good Life' as slightly eccentric allotment gardener Mr Wakeley.
He also frequently broadcast and did a spell for the BBC as a member of their Drama Repertory Company (now the Radio Drama Company).
Selected filmography
- A Yank at OxfordA Yank at OxfordA Yank at Oxford is a 1938 British film, directed by Jack Conway from a screenplay by John Monk Saunders and Leon Gordon. It was produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer British Studios...
(1938) - The Proud ValleyThe Proud ValleyThe Proud Valley is a 1940 Ealing Studios film starring the African-American actor Paul Robeson. Filmed on location in the South Wales coalfield the heart of the main coal mining region of Wales, the film tells the story of a Black American miner and singer who gets a job in a mine and joins a male...
(1940) - The CalendarThe Calendar (1948 film)The Calendar is a 1948 British drama film directed by Arthur Crabtree and starring Greta Gynt, John McCallum, Raymond Lovell and Leslie Dwyer...
(1948) - Saraband for Dead LoversSaraband for Dead LoversSaraband for Dead Lovers is a 1948 British historical drama film directed by Basil Dearden and starring Stewart Granger and Joan Greenwood. It is based on the novel by Helen Simpson...
(1948) - The Winslow BoyThe Winslow Boy (1948 film)The Winslow Boy is a 1948 film adaptation of Terence Rattigan's play The Winslow Boy. It was made by De Grunwald Productions and distributed by the British Lion Film Corporation. It was directed by Anthony Asquith and produced by Anatole de Grunwald with Teddy Baird as associate producer. The...
(1948) - Once Upon a DreamOnce Upon a Dream (1949 film)Once Upon a Dream is a 1949 British comedy romance film directed by Ralph Thomas in his debut and starring Googie Withers, Griffith Jones, Guy Middleton, and Maurice DenhamTime: 1 hour 30 minutes-Plot:...
(1949) - The Perfect WomanThe Perfect WomanThe Perfect Woman is a comedy, 1949 British film directed by Bernard Knowles and written by George Black, Jr and J. B. Boothroyd, based upon a play by Wallace Geoffrey and Basil Mitchell. A scientist creates what he considers the perfect woman in his lab...
(1949) - Your WitnessYour Witness (film)Your Witness is a 1950 British drama film directed by and starring Robert Montgomery. It also featured Leslie Banks, Felix Aylmer and Andrew Cruickshank. A leading American lawyer travels to London to defend an old friend from the Second World War who is facing a charge of murder...
(1950) - Cloudburst (1951)
- Laughter in ParadiseLaughter in ParadiseLaughter in Paradise is the title of a British comedy film released in 1951. The film stars Alastair Sim, Fay Compton, George Cole, and Guy Middleton...
(1951) - One Good TurnOne Good Turn (1955 film)One Good Turn is a 1955 British comedy film directed by John Paddy Carstairs and starring Norman Wisdom, Joan Rice, Shirley Abicair and Thora Hird...
(1955) - Lust for LifeLust for Life (film)Lust for Life is a MGM biographical film about the life of the Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh, based on the 1934 novel by Irving Stone and adapted by Norman Corwin.It was directed by Vincente Minnelli and produced by John Houseman...
(1956) - Serious Charge (1959)
- The Scapegoat (1959)
- The Battle of the SexesThe Battle of the Sexes (1959 film)The Battle of the Sexes is a 1959 British comedy film starring Peter Sellers and directed by Charles Crichton, based on the short story The Catbird Seat, by James Thurber. The story was adapted by Monja Danischewsky.-Cast:* Peter Sellers as Mr...
(1959) - Victim (1961)
- Mary Had a Little...Mary Had a Little...Mary Had a Little... is a 1961 British comedy film directed by Edward Buzzell and starring Agnès Laurent, Hazel Court and Jack Watling. It takes its title from the nursery rhyme Mary Had a Little Lamb, and is sometimes credited as Britain's first sex comedy....
(1961) - Murder at the GallopMurder at the GallopMurder at the Gallop is the second of four films made by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, based on the novel After the Funeral by Agatha Christie, and starring Margaret Rutherford as Miss Jane Marple, Charles "Bud" Tingwell as Inspector Craddock and Stringer Davis as Mr. Stringer. The film changes the action...
(1963) - The Kiss of the VampireThe Kiss of the VampireThe Kiss of the Vampire also known as Kiss of Evil, is a 1963 British vampire film made by the film studio Hammer Film Productions...
(1963) - Woman of StrawWoman of StrawWoman of Straw is a 1964 British crime thriller starring Gina Lollobrigida and Sean Connery. It was directed by Basil Dearden and written by Robert Muller and Stanley Mann, adapted from the 1964 novel by Catherine Arley.- Plot :...
(1964) - Tomorrow at TenTomorrow at TenTomorrow at Ten is a 1964 British thriller film directed by Lance Comfort and starring John Gregson, Robert Shaw, Kenneth Cope and William Hartnell in his final film appearance.-Plot:...
(1964) - The BushbabyThe BushbabyThe Bushbaby is a 1969 film based on the novel The Bushbabies by William Stevenson and adapted by Robert Maxwell. It was directed and produced by John Trent and stars Margaret Brooks and Lou Gossett in the title roles, also starring Donald Houston and Laurence Naismith.The film tells an episode...
(1969) - Some Will, Some Won'tSome Will, Some Won'tSome Will, Some Won't was a 1970 British comedy film directed by Duncan Wood. It was a remake of Laughter in Paradise. It starred an ensemble British cast, including Michael Hordern, Ronnie Corbett, Dennis Price, Leslie Phillips and Arthur Lowe....
(1970) - Please Sir!Please Sir! (film)Please Sir! is a 1971 British comedy film starring John Alderton, spun off from the television series Please Sir!.-Cast:* John Alderton as Bernard Hedges* Deryck Guyler as Norman Potter* Noel Howlett as Maurice Cromwell...
(1971)