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British actor (1906–1978) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Derrick Raoul Edouard Alfred De Marney (21 September 1906 – 18 February 1978) was an English stage and film actor and producer, of French and Irish ancestry.[1]
 | This article includes a list of general references, but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations. (June 2013) |
The son of Violet Eileen Concanen and Arthur De Marney, and the grandson of noted Victorian lithographer Alfred Concanen, he appeared on the London stage from 1922 and films from 1928. It was his performance in the lead role of the play Young Mr Disraeli at the Kingsway and Piccadilly theatres that brought him the offer of a long term film contract from Alexander Korda.[2] He is perhaps best remembered for his starring role as Robert Tisdall, falsely accused of murder in Alfred Hitchcock's Young and Innocent (1937).[3] Other early film roles include Benjamin Disraeli, this time in Victoria the Great (1937) and its sequel, Sixty Glorious Years (1938).[4]
After Young and Innocent, he alternated between leading roles and supporting parts in films. He was cast in the title role of Uncle Silas (1947); a character part in which he played a man formerly suspected of murder who plots against his young niece, an heiress played by Jean Simmons. After a couple of more leads in self-produced films, he tended to concentrate on the theatre, only taking small roles in film and television thereafter. His last role was in the horror film The Projected Man (1966).[5]
Although he had a home in Kensington in London, De Marney was taken ill while staying with friends at Farnham in Surrey. He died of bronchopneumonia and asthma at the nearby Frimley Park Hospital on 18 February 1978. He was buried in the family plot at West Norwood Cemetery in South London.
With his brother, the actor Terence De Marney, he formed Concanen Productions and produced a number of wartime documentaries on the Polish Air Force, including The White Eagle and Diary of a Polish Airman (both 1942), as well as Leslie Howard's film The Gentle Sex (1943).[3] He also produced and starred in the thrillers Latin Quarter (1945), She Shall Have Murder (1950), and Meet Mr. Callaghan (1954), a role he had created on stage. He also produced and wrote No Way Back (1949), which starred his brother Terence.
He directed the documentary shorts Malta G.C. and London Scrapbook in 1942.[6]
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