This year marks the 50th anniversary of the death of Errol Flynn, a major Hollywood star for over 20 years. He died at the age of 49, after a career in which he was seldom out of the headlines as a result of the many escapades that were a defining feature of his years of hard living and hell-raising. In this age of manufactured instant celebrity he was the genuine article who once described himself as a "colourful fragment in a drab world." Whilst no-one ever considered him as a great actor he came over with a compelling charisma on the screen, one of those personalities whom the camera loved.
Flynn was the product of an old Antrim Catholic family whose forebears lost touch with the faith of their fathers and attached themselves to the Church of Ireland. His father was for a time a Professor of Zoology at Queen's University, Belfast. He had taught in Australia and it was in Hobart, Tasmania that Errol Flynn was born in 1909. He attended the University of Tasmania for a brief while, but his heart, one gathers, was not in his studies. He dropped out of college to become something of a drifter and beachcomber. He appeared in a few low budget Australian movies, one of them a rip-off of 'Mutiny on the Bounty' in 1935. He made his way to England where he worked with several repertory companies. His big break came when the chronically asthmatic Robert Donat could not secure health insurance for the lead role in 'The Captain Blood', a tale of piracy and derring-do. Flynn made a tremendous impact as the eponymous swashbuckling hero. His studio, Warner Brothers, cast him in thrillers and romantic comedies, but the public preferred him as an action hero. The cavalry charge in 'The Charge of the Light Brigade' was one of the most exciting sequences ever put on film. One of his co-stars David Niven, who roomed with Flynn in a beach house which they called "Cirrhosis-by-the-Sea" observed of his old drinking crony, "You always knew precisely where you were with him, he would always let you down." In 1938 Flynn scored one of his biggest successes in 'The Adventures of Robin Hood', made in marvellous colour. No other Robin Hood has ever come near to his performance as the outlaw of Sherwood Forest: energetic, impudent and totally without self-consciousness.
He was a Francis Drake figure in 'The Sea Hawk' (1940), General Custer in 'They Died with Their Boots On' (1941) and the Irish-American boxer James Corbett in 'Gentleman Jim' (1942). He became an American citizen in 1942, but never quite mastered an American accent. He was sometimes depicted on screen as 'Irish', but he did not speak with any trace of an Irish accent. In the Warner years, too, he gave a good account of himself in Westerns such as 'Dodge City', 'Virginia City', 'Santa Fe Trail', 'Silver River' and 'San Antonio'. Classified as unfit for military service he fought World War II on celluloid in 'Northern Pursuit', 'Edge of Darkness' and 'Objective Burma'. This latter movie caused an almighty rumpus in England because it made no mention of the British contribution in that particular theatre of combat, except for a slighting reference to Winston Churchill. Eight years later the picture was eventually released in Britain, with a foreword acknowledging the efforts of Uncle Sam's British allies. §
There were rumours that Flynn was a fellow-traveller of the Nazis. These rumours were based on an allegation that the actor was in the practice of photographing US vessels and naval installations in Los Angeles, the pictures being reportedly forwarded, through secret channels, to Berlin. It is hard to imagine that German intelligence would have placed much dependence on the feckless Flynn. He was given to anti-Semitic utterances, but he was not the only actor in Hollywood to give voice to such views, given that the movie business was run by Jews, and actors were frequently dissatisfied with the money they were paid, and the roles they were offered. Speaking of money, Flynn once remarked that he was embarrassed to take it, but that he did not mind spending it.
He was married three times. His son, Sean, was killed whilst working as a press photographer in the Vietnam war.
By the 1950s Flynn's lifestyle was beginning to catch up with him. He suffered from arthritis, diabetes and a faulty ticker, amongst other complaints induced by his drinking, drug taking and philandering. He was no longer up to the rigours of action pictures. He had planned an epic film about William Tell, but was left in the lurch when his business partners double-crossed him and made off with the cash.
In his later forties he began to appear pretty much as himself, playing dissolute, dissipated types. One of the most memorable performances of his later movie career was as his old drinking buddy, John Barrymore, in a story of the life of Barrymore's daughter. On the night Barrymore died his pals bribed the morgue attendants to let them borrow the corpse, which they then set up in front of a bottle of whiskey in Flynn's living room, to greet Flynn when he came home from his latest drinking bout. That was the sort of company Flynn kept. In the latter 1950s he showed up in Cuba and declared himself an ally of Castro in the incipient revolution. His final pictures were pathetic indeed. At his autopsy it was discovered that his organs and innards were those of a man in his eighties. On his deathbed, he quipped: "I've had an awful lot of fun, and I enjoyed every minute of it." Not the worst way to go.
In evidence the court heard that an action for damages had been initiated by an irate patron against the proprietors of a local restaurant. The plaintiff in the case said that he thought at the time that the food tasted a little peculiar and that it had caused him to feel a little queasy. He took a small portion away with him in a napkin and had it analysed. The tests revealed that the restaurant had been supplying industrial salt, instead of table salt to their diners. The restaurant apologised, explaining that the difficulty had arisen when supplies of domestic salt and an inexperienced chef de cuisine had thought that there would be no harm in using the substitute. "He felt it would do" said the presiding judge, "At a pinch."
The BBC is not the only broadcasting organisation to have sacked presenters in the past week. A celebrity chef on the Belgian state television service had a programme in which he prepares a meal and, at the end of the show, reveals that it was the favourite dish of such historical figures as Napoleon Bonaparte or Julius Caesar. Last week he cooked fresh trout in butter, and announced that it was a favourite meal for the late Fuhrer Adolf Hitler. That was the end of the road for the programme, and its presenter.
A man caused a two hour train delay recently when his arm got stuck down a toilet to retrieve his mobile phone. The passenger's arm became trapped up to the shoulder by the powerful suction flushing system installed in a French TGV train. Rescue workers took over an hour to extricate his arm. It is not known if they were able to rescue the phone.
From the Weakest Link
Q. What event, in religious art, depicts the announcement to the Blessed Virgin Mary that she is to become the mother of the Messiah?
A. Emancipation.
