A Jolly Bad Fellow [They All Died Laughing] **** (1964, Leo McKern, Janet Munro, Maxine Audley, Dennis Price) – Classic Movie Review 8330

Director Don Chaffey’s 1964 British comedy A Jolly Bad Fellow [They All Died Laughing] stars Leo McKern as a philandering English chemistry don, Professor Kerris Bowles-Ottery, who develops an undetectable poison to bump off those who stand in the way of his professorship. But it’s a laughing gas and at least they will all die laughing.

There is a dark comedy script by Robert Hamer with some of the sharpness and style of his 1949 Kind Hearts and Coronets, and its star Dennis Price is here too, playing Dr John Hughes.

The rumpled McKern has just enough cheek and style to bring off a tricky, difficult-to-pull-off black comedy. Janet Munro and Maxine Audley also star as Delia Brooks and Clarinda Bowles-Ottery.

Also in the cast are Duncan Macrae, Miles Malleson, Leonard Rossiter, George Benson, Mark Dignam, Patricia Jessel, Joyce Carey, Mervyn Johns, Ralph Michael, Cliff Michelmore, Wally Patch, Alan Wheatley and Jerome Willis.

 © Derek Winnert 2019 Classic Movie Review 8330

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