Heading a large cast of mostly British actors is Kenneth More, playing Second Officer Charles Lightoller, the real hero of the TITANIC disaster. (In the Cameron film, Lightoller appears only briefly and is inaccurately portrayed, probably deliberately, as an upper crust snob who is not particularly competent.) While many of the TITANIC’s actual passengers and crew are portrayed under their own names, Albert A. Stewart is not among them. |
Saturday, April 14, 2012
Night To Remember #2
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The real Charles Lightoller had a far more adventurous life than James Cameron’s fictional Jack Dawson. In his younger days, he had been shipwrecked on a deserted island, prospected for gold in the Yukon and worked as a cowboy in the Canadian West. Refusing to enter a lifeboat, he stayed with the TITANIC until she sunk from under him. His experiences from the time he entered the water until he was picked up by the rescue ship CARPATHIA were far more exciting than anything shown in the Cameron film. In 1940, and at considerable personal risk, he used his own boat to help evacuate British soldiers trapped on the beaches of Dunkirk by the advancing Germans. During the production of A NIGHT TO REMEMBER, Lightoller’s son visited the set and coached Kenneth More on how to portray his father.
Another real life person who receives an ample amount of screen time in A NIGHT TO REMEMBER is Mrs. J. J. Brown of Denver. She was later immortalized in Meredith Willson’s hit Broadway musical (and hit movie) THE UNSINKABLE MOLLY BROWN. Incidentally, I played in the pit orchestras for two different professional productions of THE UNSINKABLE MOLLY BROWN that were given in San Diego. One of them was an outdoor production starring Peter Palmer and his wife Aniko Farrell. At the time, Meredith Willson was still among the living and, after the performance, was brought out on stage by Peter Palmer to say a few words. The other production starred Debbie Reynolds (reprising her movie role) and Harve Presnell who was in both the original Broadway cast AND the movie. By then, Debbie was a little too old to still be playing Molly Brown, and the book had to be rewritten slightly to account for this.
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