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The Independent (22/Feb/2007) - From Hollywood to hospitals: West Brom's Hollywood heroine

(c) The Independent (22/Feb/2007)

From Hollywood to hospitals: West Brom's Hollywood heroine

Madeleine Carroll had the film world at her feet but gave it up to volunteer in war-torn Europe. Now, after a two-year campaign, her bravery is finally being recognised in Britain. By Louise Jury

She was the first of Alfred Hitchcock's ice-cool blondes when she starred in the thriller "The 39 Steps" and went on to become the highest-paid actress of her age.

But when her sister was killed in the Blitz, Madeleine Carroll lost her taste for movies. She began volunteering for the Red Cross during the war and later became an active campaigner for children through the United Nations' agency Unicef.

Honoured by the French with the Légion d'Honneur and the Americans with a Medal of Freedom presented by President Harry S Truman, her life and work went unrecognised in Britain - until now.

About 500 people turned out yesterday for the unveiling of a £17,000 commemorative monument to the actress-turned-war nurse in her home town of West Bromwich, near Birmingham.

It was the triumphant end to a two-year campaign by Terry Price, 68, an amateur historian who had been staggered to discover her life story when he was researching his latest book, West Bromwich Memories.

"I obviously knew of her film career - my mother and father always told me about it. But I didn't know until I started the research about all her humanitarian work," he said.

"At the peak of her career, in 1943, she volunteered for the Red Cross and went overseas to Europe and stayed there with the troops working as a nurse until the war ended. She gave her chateau in France to be an orphanage and funded another one after the war. She was one of the first ambassadors for Unicef. But she was a very private person and didn't give interviews and I think probably she put some of the media off."

It was "absolutely wonderful" to see her recognised at last, Mr Price said. "It's a very emotional time for me, to think that someone who has been honoured all over the world, but forgotten by this country and by West Bromwich for 60 years, has now been formally recognised."

The unveiling came just a few days short of what would have been her 101st birthday.

Madeleine Carroll, who died in Spain of pancreatic cancer in 1987, was born in West Bromwich in 1906. She was the elder of two daughters to an Irish professor of languages and his French wife.

The professor intended she should be a French teacher, but his daughter opted for drama instead when she won a part in a student play while at Birmingham University.

"Everything indicated that I would spend the rest of my days teaching," she said later. "I was shy, nervous ... all through college. My father had set his heart on my getting an MA and all would have gone well if I had not joined a drama society in my senior year. In March 1926 and then a student in French, I got a leading part in the annual play called Selma, and somehow I did it as if I had been acting all my life. I understood then how people get 'a call'."

The head of the Birmingham Repertory Theatre offered her a contract on the strength of her performance, but she turned it down to finish her honours degree. She then went off to Paris for graduate study, but returned almost immediately having decided on theatre instead.

Carroll won a small part in a touring play and her beauty and sophistication soon won her parts in three silent movies. But it was her speaking voice, honed in elocution lessons while at school, that secured her fame when the "talkies" arrived.

She rapidly rose to fame in films including "Madame Guillotine" and "Kissing Cup's Race" and by 1931 she was the top female star in Britain.

She briefly retired after marrying a member of the King's Guard, Philip Astley, but returned two years later with "Sleeping Cars", opposite Ivor Novello, and "I Was a Spy". British Film Weekly named her actress of the year.

With offers flooding in from Hollywood, Carroll made her US debut in a John Ford film, "The World Moves On". But it wasn't until 1935, when Alfred Hitchcock cast her as his first ice-cool blonde in "The 39 Steps", that she secured her place in film history.

Handcuffed to her handsome co-star, Robert Donat, and trading double entendres, she - and the film - were a sensation.

More productions followed and by 1938 she was among the highest-paid stars in the industry, making more than $250,000 a year. Her co-stars included Gary Cooper, Douglas Fairbanks Jr and Bob Hope, and she married another of her leading men, Sterling Hayden, soon after divorcing Astley. She also became a popular guest on radio programmes, whose listeners were won over by her beautiful speaking voice.

But when war broke out and her sister, Marguerite, known as Guigette, was killed in the London bombings, Carroll agitated to get out of her Hollywood film contracts.

Her sister's death played "a significant part" in her desire to join the war effort, Mr Price said. "She volunteered for overseas work as soon as she was released from her contract and she did fundraising work for charity in the intervening years."

As a Red Cross volunteer, she served in France and at the 61st Field Hospital at Bari in Italy, treating wounded American airmen. She took the name Madeline Hamilton to mask her fame.

After the war, she stayed in Europe, making radio programmes designed to improve Franco-American relations and helped in the rehabilitation of concentration camp victims - through which she met her third husband, Henri Loveral. They were not married long.

She returned to film-making, made her Broadway debut and was married, for a fourth time, to the publisher of Life magazine Andrew Heiskell with whom she had a daughter, Anna Madeleine.

Her focus was increasingly on children. After her experience of the devastation in Europe, she proposed a resolution to the American committee of Unicef that there should be an International Children's Day and made impassioned speeches for child rights in what she called "a one-woman children's crusade".

Later in life, she was asked about her career, which included 43 films, enough to warrant a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. "Movies?" she said. "Just say I got out when the going was good."

Terry Price thought this was a story that should be told. He gave his own money towards the statue and as long ago as July 2005 persuaded Adrian Bailey, West Bromwich's MP, to raise the profile of the forgotten star in Parliament, ahead of the series of events honouring those who contributed to the Allied victory half a century earlier.

Sandwell Council, the local authority, agreed that it would back a monument in West Bromwich's new town square and asked Mr Price to join the design committee.

Ciaran O'Carroll, the actress's cousin, who knew her well and attended yesterday's ceremony, said the memorial was fittingly distinctive. In contrasting shades of grey and black granite with bronze inlaid panels setting out details of her life and achievements, the monument's reverse side features a profile of her face.

"I think Madeleine would have loved it because of its wonderful position in the heart of West Bromwich. She spent her early years in the town and had an affection for it," he said.

Bill Thomas, the council leader, said it was an appropriately warm tribute. "I take great pride in her achievements, not just in film, memorable though they were, but also in her humanitarian work."

Blue plaques have been also mounted at Carroll's former homes in Herbert Street and Jesson Street in the town.

Although she took American citizenship and lived in Paris and in Spain after her final film, Otto Preminger's "The Fan" in 1949, Mr Price's view is that Carroll remained a local girl.

"Even when she lived in Hollywood, she lived modestly. She didn't get in with the jet-set," he said. "I like to think it was her Black Country upbringing that made her appreciate the value of money."

Screen highlights

The Guns Of Loos (1928)

Carroll was first seen on screen in UK cinemas playing the role of Diana Cheswick in this war drama directed by Sinclair Hill. She starred alongside Hermione Baddeley, Adeline Hayden Coffin and Tom Coventry.

Madame Guillotine (1931)

Playing the part of Lucille de Choisigne in the Reginald Fogwell film based on the French Revolution, Carroll was by then considered to be Britain's top female actress.

The 39 Steps (1935)

Alfred Hitchcock's critically acclaimed film based on the John Buchan novel, starring Carroll - in her best-known role - as the cool blonde handcuffed to Robert Donat. She was praised by The New York Times for her "charming and skilful" performance, and the dynamic between Donat and Carroll was replicated in Hitchcock's later spy thrillers including Saboteur and Foreign Correspondent.

The Prisoner Of Zenda (1937)

Adapted from the novel by Anthony Hope, Carroll plays Princess Flavia alongside Ronald Colman as Rudolph Rassendyll - and his identical cousin Rudolph V. David Niven and Raymond Massey also feature in this swordfight-filled hit adventure film directed by John Cromwell.

Lady Windermere's Fan/The Fan (1949)

Carroll's final film, based on Oscar Wilde's comedy. She plays Mrs Erlynne, who attempts to lure Lord Windemere, played by Richard Greene, away from his role as perfect husband to Lady Windemere, played by Jeanne Craine. The hit film was directed by Otto Preminger, who also directed Anatomy of a Murder and Bonjour Tristesse.

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