The Peterville Diamond was adapted from Hungarian Laszlo Fodor's play Jewel Robbery. Although it had failed on Broadway in 1932, Warner Bros. had picked up the rights, correctly guessing that its risqué plot about a Baroness (Kay Frances) who finds a gentleman thief (William Powell) more attractive than either her husband or her lover would work well in pre-Code Hollywood. For the 1942 remake, the story necessarily had to become more moral. The lover was cut out of the story, and the husband's role elevated to leading man status, putting the focus more on the couple's journey back to each other.
For leading lady, the studio cast Anne Crawford in her first credited film role. The stage actress would be a standby at Warner's Teddington Studios, where she would star in The Dark Tower, The Night Invader (both 1943) and The Hundred Pound Window (1944). She would go on to play the villainous Morgan Le Fay in MGM's Knights of the Round Table (1953), starring Robert Taylor and Ava Gardner. After appearing opposite Alexander Knox in the BBC series Opportunity Murder (1956), she succumbed to leukemia at the age of 36.
As her leading man, Warner's cast Donald Stewart, an American musical performer who had made his film debut as a singer in the Jessie Matthews musical First a Girl (1935), the inspiration for Blake Edwards' Victor/Victoria (1982). Stewart would later star in the influential BBC science fiction series A for Andromeda (1961), co-starring Julie Christie. His wife, Renee Houston, co-stars in The Peterville Diamond as Crawford's best friend, Lady Marjorie. A music hall veteran, she had toured for years in an act with her sister, Billie Houston. The team had appeared in a pioneering sound short, "The Houston Sisters" (1926), made for Lee De Forest a year before Warner's breakthrough with The Jazz Singer (1927). She would move into character roles in the '50s in films such as The Belles of St. Trinian's (1954) and A Town Like Alice (1956), and guested as Little John's mother in the popular 1958 syndicated series The Adventures of Robin Hood.
Keeping the laughs rolling is a trio of popular comic actors. Oliver Wakefield, cast as the jewel thief who insists on calling himself a "robber" because it sounds more civilized, was a stand-up comic who frequently brought his act to the U.S. and Canada. His satire of the British character ("Britain has built herself up from nothing to a state of extreme poverty" was a popular line), was featured in Bette Davis' 1952 Broadway review Two's Company, in which he played "The Voice of Inexperience." He was also a popular attraction at such popular clubs as the Blue Angel in New York and Montreal's Ruby Foos.
Charles Heslop was already a television pioneer when he played Stewart's effeminate assistant in The Peterville Diamond. After years of music hall and theatrical work, he brought his act to the BBC in 1937. In 1939, he launched a prospective comedy series, Percy Ponsonby, in which he played a talkative barber. After a series of special presentations he was poised to become England's first television comedy star when the outbreak of World War II canceled production plans.
The most prominent name in The Peterville Diamond, however, is William Hartnell, who plays Wakefield's scene-stealing partner in crime. Already an experienced stage comic (he had even understudied Heslop), he began doing comic turns in British films in the '30s. He moved over to more dramatic roles with director Carol Reed's World War II drama The Way Ahead (1944). Stardom first came, however, when he played the temperamental sergeant-major in the hit British comedy series The Army Game. The series -- which inspired a spin-off, a feature film and a hit theme-song -- made him a household name. That and his acclaimed performance as a sports agent in This Sporting Life (1963), starring Richard Harris, led to his casting in one of the longest-running weekly series in television history, Doctor Who. Debuting in 1963 as the first Doctor, he was at the birth of a phenomenon that became an international hit. When he left the series after three years, the decision to have his character "regenerate" into another actor set the stage for a 26 year run in which seven different actors played the role, followed by a television movie and the current TV revival now in its third year. Although his earlier adventures were produced inexpensively with rudimentary special effects, he remains fondly remembered as the actor who launched the series in fine style.
Producer: Max Milner
Director: Walter Forde
Screenplay: Gordon Wellesley, Brock Williams
Cinematography: Basil Emmott
Art Direction: Norman G. Arnold
Music: Jack Beaver
Cast: Anne Crawford (Teri), Donald Stewart (Charles), Renee Houston (Lady Margaret), Oliver Wakefield (The Robber), Charles Heslop (Dilfallow), William Hartnell (Joseph), Felix Aylmer (President).
BW-85m.
by Frank Miller
