Leslie Howard: The Man Who Gave a Damn

Anyone who knew Leslie Howard, either by reputation or in person, knew he was something rarely seen in the entertainment industry: A man of principle. In 1935, he starred in the stage production of The Petrified Forest with Humphrey Bogart but when it came time to make the movie, Bogart was nixed for not being a big enough name. Howard, with nothing to gain and everything to lose, refused to do the film unless Bogart got the role. He did, and years later, a still grateful Bogart named his daughter Leslie Howard after the man who stood up for him. This anecdote gets to the heart of who Howard was and it's an anecdote that could be told again and again about Howard in a myriad of different situations. In other words, whenever principle was on the line Howard did the right thing. The documentary, Leslie Howard: The Man Who Gave a Damn, explores this side of Howard and how it impacted him and his family. Howard's career in Hollywood was different than other stars in the Hollywood firmament. There was never a sense of Howard looking for the perfect blockbuster to suddenly catapult him to the top of the box office. He went after the role, not the movie. His roles in films like Of Human Bondage (1934), The Petrified Forest (1936) and Pygmalion (1938) all attest to his desire to play characters of depth and complexities, characters he not only understood but enjoyed discovering on his own. Perhaps this is why he was at odds with the character of Ashley Wilkes in Gone with the Wind (1939). Despite the overwhelming success of the film, Howard could never get behind it or Wilkes. In fact, as the documentary points out, Wilkes absolutely confused him. He felt, perhaps accurately, that there was simply nothing to explore. According to Howard, Wilkes did nothing but complain about the Old South being lost forever to no avail. It was a character he felt absolutely nothing for. The movie was another matter. As revealed by his own letters, he was actually quite impressed with the movie, just not his character. And when the movie was finally released, Howard's famous principles came to the forefront once again. He didn't attend the premiere in Atlanta, as he was now back in England when that happened, and he didn't attend the London premiere either. The reason? The studio, out of greed, decided to charge premium prices for tickets just as they had done in America. England, on the other hand, was at war. No, the blitzkrieg hadn't yet begun but the sense of dread was thick and Howard felt that people looking for relief from their daily routine shouldn't be shut out of seeing a popular movie because it was too expensive. He refused to attend. He even refused to see the movie, period, outside of the few reels he had seen in post-production. But that's not all. He asked his family to not see it either. One of the more remarkable things we learn is that 70 years later his daughter had still not seen the film, as he requested. It seems that principle runs strong in the Howard family. And that principle carried through to his own projects, including the occasional direction of his own films. Perhaps his most famous and most successful was the 1938 screen adaptation of George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion, in which Howard starred as Professor Henry Higgins and co-directed the production. Shaw and Howard were both in agreement that Wendy Hiller should be cast as Eliza. But Shaw wanted Charles Laughton for the part of Higgins--a great actor but Howard was better suited as Higgins and Howard knew it. In the end, the film was one of the best of the year and still the best adaptation ever done of the play. But more than his art, Howard was concerned with his friends and family, his country and the world. By 1938, he started spreading the word early to anyone who would listen about fascism taking over Europe. He implored Hollywood to make more propaganda movies, but at the time America wasn't in the war and little attention was paid to Howard's pleas. Eventually, he spent the majority of his time broadcasting about the war back in England doing his part to spread the word, keep up morale and fight the good fight. Howard was killed before the war ended when the civilian flight he was on was shot down in 1943 by German fighter planes. Leslie Howard was a complex man who never fit into a simple blueprint of what a movie star should be. Leslie Howard: The Man Who Gave a Damn, explores the sides of Howard not commonly known by the general public, revealing a deep and generous spirit in constant search of a purposeful life. Director: Thomas Hamilton Written by: Thomas Hamilton, Derek Partridge, Alistair Wyllie Music: Maria Antal Cinematography: Harry Clegg, Tom Ford Film Editor: Bob Cassidy , Thomas Hamilton Cast: Leslie Howard (Himself), Leslie Ruth Howard (Herself), Norman Spencer (Himself), Matthew Sweet (Himself), Nick Cull (Himself), Quentin Falk (Himself), Mark Burgess (Himself),Isabella Rossellini (as the voice of Ingrid Bergman), Irene Howard (Herself), Ronald Howard (Himself), John Houseman (Himself), Michael Powell (Himself), Derek Partridge (Presenter) By Greg Ferrara