Recently I was thrilled to discover this very rare press picture of Joan Rice with her fiancé Martin Boyce. It was taken at London Airport and dated 14th November 1952.
Joan and Martin Boyce were engaged in July of that year. He was a manager of an auto parts and air compressor factory.
She described him in a magazine article as a, “regular pip of a fellow". She also revealed, “We went together for a year and three months before he proposed." "As I recall it, we held hands after four months, then he kissed me on the sixth month of our meeting each other and things were on a standstill after that, until I got the news I was coming to the States."
The engagement didn’t last long though, and approximately seven months later Joan was dating David Green, a film salesman and son of veteran comedian Harry Green, in London. Joan and David were married on February 16th 1953 at Maidenhead Register Office in Berkshire.
This blog is dedicated to the memory of Joan Rice and there are over 42 pages of pictures and information about the life of this beautiful actress. So to read more information about Walt Disney’s first Maid Marian, please click on the label below or visit here: Joan Rice.
If anybody has any more information on Martin Boyce or Joan Rice please get in touch with me at: disneysrobin@googlemail.com. It would be very much appreciated.
4 comments:
Joan Rice and Martin Boyce
London Airport 14th November 1952.
What a great find this is Clement - I was really thrilled to see this item as it adds just another small amount of detail into Joan Rice's astonishing career around this time. Earlier I had sent in an article from Picturegoer where Joan was writing about her stay in Hollywood on the way to Fiji and that article was published Sept 13th 1952. This photograph must have been taken on her return to England. In the previous article she said that she was looking forward to returning and marrying Martin Boyce probably in the church at Denham. Whatever happend in the next very few months her life changed completely and she married someone else and by the end of the very next year had had a baby. Also her film career, whilst not over, was more or less reduced to run of the mill British films of the time which did not even come close in quality to either The Story of Robin Hood or His Majesty O'Keefe. I was lucky enough to visit Suva in Fiji briefly at the end of last year and the tour guide mentioned at some length the film His Majesty O'Keefe which had been made there. So Joan Rice is still remembered in far off places which is wonderful. I still think though her greatest role was as Maid Marian in the film we all love
Clement - on re reading the item you have posted Joan Rice married David Green in mid Feb 1953 only 3 months to the day from this photograph being taken. Yet judging by earlier articles she had been intending to marry Martin Boyce in mid November. Must have been a whirlwind romance with David Green. She might well have been better marrying Martin Boyce as things turned out - who knows ?
Many thanks Neil. Like you I am always pleased to find out a little more about our 'Maid Marian'.
Looking at the time line of Joan's life I am not sure how accurate the date is of ths photograph! I have known them to be wrong.
It is of course probbaly correct, but I wonder if it might have been taken as she was leaving to film 'O'Keefe'in June/July1952?? and saying goodbye to her fiance.
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