The columnist and historian Simon Heffer resumes his series of Essays celebrating mid-20th century British film with a new focus on five popular comic actors.

In exploring five British comic film actors from the mid-20th century, Simon Heffer's gaze has never strayed far from the British obsession with class. The double-barrelled, single-named actor Terry-Thomas - with his monocle, his cigarette holder and the hallmark gap between his two front teeth - perfected the role of a particular type of British toff. Taking star billing in a series of films such as Private's Progress, I'm All Right, Jack, and Carlton-Browne of the FO in the mid-1950s, his timing was perfect too. Simon Heffer argues that whether playing a cad, a rotten bounder or a charmer, Terry-Thomas came to represent the louche and degenerate side of the upper classes at a time when the class system was coming under full attack. With his trademark mix of celebration and historical analysis, Simon Heffer sheds fresh light on a series of once hugely popular but now often forgotten or overlooked performances.

Producer : Beaty Rubens.