Trivia: British actor Trevor Howard trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, and while there he made his London stage debut in 1934; however, his subsequent work onstage gained little attention until the mid-'40s. While fighting World War II with the Royal Artillery, he was injured and discharged. Howard made his feature film debut in 1944; soon he attained star status as the result of playing the romantic lead in David Lean's Brief Encounter (1945). Thus began a long and consistently successful film career. At first, Howard was cast in romantic leads, but then began playing more heroic leads before eventually moving into character roles. Regardless of his role, he was known as a consistent, polished actor with an understated, true-to-life style. At first appearing exclusively in British films, he began appearing occasionally in Hollywood productions in the mid-'50s. For his performance as the father in Sons and Lovers (1960) he received a Best Actor Oscar nomination. He was married to actress Helen Cherry, with whom he appeared in A Soldier for Christmas (1944).

Trivia: Though she made comparatively few screen appearances, Celia Johnson was, during the war years, one of England's favorite film actresses. An alumnus of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, Johnson made her first professional stage appearance in 1928. She would not appear in a film until 1942's In Which We Serve, and then only by special request of director Noel Coward; as the steadfast spouse of a British naval officer (Coward), the actress was the apotheosis of all gallant British war wives. In 1945, she co-starred with Trevor Howard in another Noel Coward effort, Brief Encounter, arguably the best of the tear-stained British romance films of the 1940s (with requisite classical-music score). After a handful of subsequent films, Johnson returned full time to the stage, returning to movies in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, for which she received a British Film Academy award. Knighted in 1981, the actress was billed as Dame Celia Johnson for her last appearance in the British TV drama Staying On, where she was reunited with Trevor Howard. Celia Johnson was the widow of actor Peter Fleming.

Trivia: The daughter of stage favorite Lillian Brainwaithe, Joyce Carey made her first theatrical appearance at age 18. In films from 1942, Carey made her mark in incisive character roles, playing everything from warmhearted lower-class types (Brief Encounter) to bitchy bourgeoisie (Way to the Stars). In her 70th year, she launched a new phase of her career as a co-star on the TV sitcom Father Dear Father. Active well into her eighties, Joyce Carey died just a month away from her 95th birthday.

Trivia: British entertainer Stanley Holloway tried to make a go of his first job as a clerk in a Billingsgate fish market, but the call of the theatre was loud and strong. Originally planning an operatic career, Holloway studied singing in Milan, but this came to an end when World War One began. Finishing up his service with the infantry, Holloway headed for the stage again, making his London premiere in 1919's Kissing Time. His first film was The Rotters (1921), and the first time the public outside the theatres heard his robust voice was on radio in 1923. Holloway toured the music hall-revue circuit with his comic monologues, usually centered around his self-invented characters "Sam Small" and "The Ramsbottoms." Holloway's entree into talking pictures was with a 1930 film version of his stage success, The Co-Optimist. The British film industry of the '30s was more concerned in turning out "quota quickies" so that Hollywood would send over an equal number of American films, but Holloway was able to survive in these cheap pictures, occasionally rising to the heights of such productions as Squibs (1935) and The Vicar of Bray (1937). In 1941, Holloway was cast in one of the prestige films of the season, George Bernard Shaw's Major Barbara; this led to top-drawer film appearances throughout the war years, notably This Happy Breed (1944), The Way to the Stars (1945) and Brief Encounter (1947). Though he'd had minimal Shakespearian experience, Holloway was selected by Laurence Olivier to play the Gravedigger in Olivier's filmization of Hamlet (1947), a role he'd forever be associated with and one he'd gently parody in 1969's Private Life of Sherlock Holmes. Gaining an American audience through repeated showings of his films on early-'50s TV, Holloway took New York by storm as Alfred P. Doolittle in the stage smash My Fair Lady - a role he'd repeat in the 1964 film version (after James Cagney had turned it down), and win an Oscar in the bargain. Continuing his activities in all aspects of British show business -- including a 1960 one-man show, Laughs and Other Events -- Holloway decided he'd take a whack at American TV as the butler protagonist of the 1962 sitcom Our Man Higgins. It's difficult to ascertain the quality of this series, since it had the miserable luck of being scheduled opposite the ratings-grabbing Beverly Hillbillies. Stanley Holloway perservered with stage, movie, and TV appearances into the '70s; in honor of one of his two My Fair Lady songs, he titled his 1981 autobiography Wiv a Little Bit of Luck.

Trivia: British actor Valentine Dyall was a well-known radio performer of the '40s, introducing a weekly "scare" series with "This is your storyteller....the Man in Black." In films, Dyall looked more like a bank president than the voice of doom, and was cast accordingly. On stage since 1930 and films since 1942, Dyall remained busy into the '80s. Some of Dyall's best-known films include The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943), Henry V (1945) (as the Duke of Burgundy), Caesar and Cleopatra (1946), Brief Encounter (1946), The Haunting (1963), The Wrong Box (1967) and Casino Royale (1967). Valentine Dyall made many of his final appearances where he began, on radio: he was indispensable to many Halloween broadcasts of the '70s and '80s, sometimes nostalgically recreating "The Man in Black."

Trivia: One of British filmdom's most beloved interpreters of cockneys and eccentrics, pleasantly plump Irene Handl didn't begin her acting career until she was approaching middle age. For nearly five decades, Handl delighted her fans in a multitude of plays, films, and TV series. Her first movie was 1937's Believed Married, and her last was 1980's Hound of the Baskervilles; in between, she sparkled in such productions as Millions Like Us (1943), Great Day (1946), Adam and Evelyne (1949), Meet Mr. Lucifer (1953), Brothers in Law (1958) and Next to No Time (1960). She even found time to write two popular novels. On British television, Irene Handl starred in the weekly efforts For Love of Amy (1970-72) and Maggie and Her (1978-79).

Trivia: British character actor Sydney Bromley was especially known for his theatrical appearances and was a member of the Royal Shakespeare Company. He also appeared on television and in a few films where he usually portrayed small character roles as old men and toothless vagabonds.

Trivia: Character actor Jack May is best-remembered for playing Nelson Gabriel on the popular BBC radio series The Archers for over 45 years. He made his feature film debut in Give Me the Stars (1944). His subsequent screen appearances have run the gamut from science fiction, romance, and drama, to historical and animated television series. May first appeared on television in the movie One (1956).

Trivia: Cockney of birth and Cockney in nature, actor Alfie Bass made his first stage appearance in 1939, in the Unity Theatre production Plant in the Sun. Bass began acting before the camera in wartime British documentaries. While his stage career embraced Shakespeare and Shaw, Bass usually showed up in films as slang-spewing, pragmatic working class types. His movie credits include The Boys in Brown (1950) The Hasty Heart (1950), The Night My Number Came Up (1952), Help (1965), Alfie (1966), A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (1966) and Moonraker (1979). Alfie Bass was starred in the award-winning 1955 short subject The Bespoke Overcoat, and in 1967's The Fearless Vampire Killers he raised many a chuckle as the Jewish vampire who is impervious to the traditional crucifix.