Basil Sydney
Basil Sydney (23 April 1894 – 10 January 1968) was an English stage and screen actor. Sydney made his name in 1915 in the London stage hit Romance by Edward Sheldon, with Broadway star Doris Keane, and he costarred with Keane in the 1920 silent film of the play. The couple married in 1918, and when Keane revived Romance in New York City in 1921, Sydney made his Broadway debut in the parts. He stayed in New York for over a decade playing classical roles such as Mercutio in Romeo and Juliet (1922), Richard Dudgeon in The Devil's Disciple (1923), the title role in Hamlet (1923), Prince Hal in Henry IV, Part I (1926), and Petruchio in Taming of the Shrew (1927).[citation needed] In 1937 he starred in the murder mystery Blondie White in the West End. He made over 50 screen appearances, most memorably as Claudius in Laurence Olivier's 1948 film of Hamlet. He also appeared in classic films like Treasure Island (1950), Ivanhoe (1952), and Around the World in Eighty Days (1956), but the focus of his career was the stage on both sides of the Atlantic.
Went the Day Well?
(Major Hammond / Kommandant Orlter)
Treasure Island
(Captain Smollett)
Caesar and Cleopatra
(Rufio)
Ivanhoe
(Waldemar Fitzurse)
Salome
(Pontius Pilate)
Meet Me at Dawn
(Georges Vermorel)
Red Hot Romance
(Rowland Stone)
The Hands of Orlac
(Maurice Seidelman)
Simba
(Mr Crawford)
Bits of Our Aircraft are Missing
((uncredited))
Sea Wife
(Bulldog)
Hell Below Zero
(Bland)
Accused
(Eugene Roget)
The Black Sheep of Whitehall
(Costello)
A Story of David
(King Saul)
Mayerling
(The Emperor Franz Joseph)
The Riverside Murder
(Inspector Philip Winton)
Jassy
(Nick Helmar)
The Angel with the Trumpet
(Francis Alt)
Dirty Work
(Hugh Stafford)
The Dam Busters
(Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Harris G.C.B., O.B.E., A.F.C.)
The 3 Worlds of Gulliver
(Emperor of Lilliput)
The Amateur Gentleman
(Louis Chichester)
Blind Man's Bluff
(Dr. Peter Fairfax)
The Midshipmaid
(Cmdr. Fosberry)
The Four Just Men
(Frank Snell)
The Tunnel
(Mostyn)
Hamlet
(Claudius - The King)
Three's Company
(Dr. Graham)
The Third Clue
(Reinhardt Conway)
Rhodes of Africa
(Dr. Jim Jameson)
Spring Meeting
(James)
Ships with Wings
(Capt. Fairfax)
The Next of Kin
(Naval captain)
The Farmer's Wife
(Samuel Sweetland)
Around the World in Eighty Days
(Reform Club Member)
Star of India
(King Louis XIV)
The Magic Box
(William Fox-Talbot)
Crime Over London
('Joker' Finnigan)
The Devil's Disciple
(Lawyer Hawkins)
Talk of the Devil
John Paul Jones
(Sir William Young)
Romance
Island in the Sun
(Julian Fleury)
The Man Within
(Sir Henry Merriman)
A Question of Adultery
(Sir John Loring)
No Hiding Place
Silent Evidence