Sam Kydd

Sam Kydd (February 15, 1915 – March 26, 1982) was a British actor.

An army officer's son, Kydd was born in Belfast, but moved to England when he was a child. He was educated at Dunstable Grammar School in Dunstable, Bedfordshire, England. In his twenties, he looked for all-round entertainment jobs, such as MC for the Oscar Rabin Band.

Early in WWII, he went to France with the British Expeditionary Force but was quickly captured, spending the rest of the war in Stalag XX-A, a camp near Thorn in German-occupied western Poland.^[1] After the war he wrote a book about his experience.^[2]

During his internment in the Polish prisoner-of-war camp, where he remained for the next five years, he took command of the camp's theatrical activities - devising and staging plays. He felt so strongly about his work there that, when he was offered repatriation after three years, he turned it down to continue with his theatrical work. In recognition of his valuable services during these years, he was awarded a pair of drama masks made by the Red Cross from barbed wire.

Returning to Britain after the War, Kydd resumed a budding film career, which had started back in 1940 with They Came by Night. He went on to appear in many more films, including such memorable movies as The Blue Lamp, Father Brown, The 39 Steps and I'm All Right Jack. He often played the part of a strong and resilient cockney. He is best remembered as a character actor in films such as Chance of a Lifetime, The Cruel Sea, Sink the Bismarck, Too Late the Hero, The Yangtse Incident, Reach for the Sky, Eye of the Needle and Steptoe and Son Ride Again.

He married Pinkie Barnes, an ex-international tennis champion. She was also one of England's first women advertising copywriters. She was called 'Pinkie' apparently because she was a very pink baby. But in reality she didn't like the abbreviations of all her names. She was named Lavender Rosamund Marguerite Barnes and hated being called Lav, Ros and Marge, so was keen to be called a nickname. She played for England 11 times between 1946 and 1950 and won various trophies including the Championship of the Netherlands. She was British Doubles Finalist with the then World Champion, Hungary's Guysey Farkas.

Kydd took part in more than 100 films and TV plays/series including, 'Pickwick Papers', Mess Mates, Arthur Askey, Benny Hill, Charlie Drake, Harry Worth, The Expert, Dixon of Dock Green, Crane and Orlando in 1963. In Crane Kydd had appeared as the lovable smuggler Orlando O'Connor. The programme starred Patrick Allen, as a Briton who moved to Morocco to run a cafe and had an aversion to smuggling. Kydd's character was so popular that when 'Crane' finished he was given his own programme, Orlando, a children's adventure series.

He also appeared in the Fossett Saga, and Curry and Chips, as well as the big-screen versions of Dad's Army and Till Death Do Us Part. Amongst his innumerable television appearances were The Tony Hancock Show, critically acclaimed series Minder, Orlando, Crane, Crossroads, Coronation Street (playing the part of Mike Baldwin's father, Frankie), The Eric Sykes Show, and Follyfoot.

Kydd died of a respiratory ailment. His son, Jonathan Kydd, has followed him into the acting profession.

Selected filmography

• Dead Lucky (1960)

References

1. ^ Letter and photo in camp magazine 1942 [1]
2. ^ For You The War Is Over by Sam Kydd - Futura, London, 1974. ISBN 0-85974-005-6

External links

• Sam Kydd at the Internet Movie Database
• Sam Kydd on Jonathan Kydd's website
• Sam Kydd's profile on the Cherished Television website
• Cherished television: Crane