Picture Strip 13 : Walt Disney's Story of Robin Hood

Part 13 of Laurence's fabulous picture strip of Walt Disney's original movie the Story of Robin Hood and his Merrie Men (1952). To see previous pages of the picture strip, please click on the label below.

If you want to learn more about the making of this wonderful film, its production crew and the lives of the legendary actors that appeared in it, please click on the relevant subjects in the sidebar.

A Rare Treat Tomorrow!

One of the most underrated films of all time will be shown on British television tomorrow, Monday 18^th October on Channel 4 at 1.15 pm. It was Walt Disney’s second live-action movie in this country, using RKO’s frozen profits after the War and has been described at the best British Technicolor film ever made. Disney’s ‘Story of Robin Hood and his Merrie Men’ (1952) uses a whole multitude of emerging talent behind, and in front of the camera, including stars like Richard Todd, Joan Rice, Peter Finch, James Robertson Justice, Hubert Gregg, James Hayter, Patrick Barr, Elton Hayes and Martitia Hunt. Please let me know what you think of it!

Richard Todd as Robin Hood by Laurence

I am sure you will agree that this is yet another stunning piece of artwork by Laurence.  The light and the colour are beautiful and the tension, as Robin (Richard Todd) draws his bow, is captured superbly. I do hope he can share some more paintings with us in the future.

Joan Rice's Obituary

This was Joan’s obituary in The Daily Telegraph, which was very kindly sent to me by her nephew, Richard Keeble:

“Joan Rice who has died aged 66 [1997], was a Rank starlet of the 1950’s; her best remembered role was Maid Marian in Disney’s Robin Hood (1952) opposite Richard Todd.

Hers was a Cinderella story without the glass slipper. She was discovered as a waitress at the former Lyons Corner House in Piccadilly and signed to a film contract after winning the Lyons ‘Miss Nippy’ contest of 1949.

With no formal acting training, she was sent to the Rank charm school and rushed into a stream of mostly minor roles in British films of the day. One ‘His Majesty O’Keefe,’ (1953) was a Hollywood production set in the South Seas, with Burt Lancaster, but it made little impact at the box office.

Joan Rice never found the big role that might have established her on the international scene. She dropped out of the cinema in the 1960’s to build a less glamorous life in provincial repertory.

She claimed never to miss her movie career, and later in life, at the instigation of her father-in-law, she took up live acting to repair the omissions of youth. She toured in ‘Rebecca’ and ‘A View from the Bridge,’ her favourite play. She never attracted bad notices, but none of these productions reached the West End and she became a forgotten figure to many of the cinemagoers of the 1950’s who fondly recalled her English rose complexion and shapely contours.

After seven years she abandoned acting completely because she disliked being away from home for such long periods. She was tempted into television only once – as a contributor to a ‘This Is Your Life’ show for Richard Todd, but dried up before the cameras and had to be steered through the programme by Michael Aspel.

Joan Rice was born in Derby on February 3rd 1930, one of four sisters from a broken home. Her father was imprisoned for child abuse and she was brought up for eight years in a convent orphanage in Nottingham. After early experience as a lady’s maid and a housemaid, she left for London with half a crown in her purse and took a job as a waitress with Lyons at £3 a week.

Balancing tea trays and negotiating obstacles gave a natural poise that stood her in good stead in the company’s in-house beauty contest. The prize was a week’s promotional tour in Torquay ( a town to which she returned 20 years later in a revival of ‘The Reluctant Debutante’ at the Princess Theatre).

As winner of the ‘Miss Nippy’ contest, she was introduced to the theatrical agent Joan Reese, who went to work on her behalf and secured a screen test and a two-line bit part in the comedy, ‘One Wild Oat.’ Her first substantial role, however, was in ‘Blackmailed’ (1950), a hospital melodrama, starring Mai Zetterling and Dirk Bogarde, in which Joan Rice played a good time girl.

It caught the eye of Disney and led to the role of Maid Marian, in which she was hailed as the “new Jean Simmons.” Rank however, seemed unable to capitalise on this. In the 11 years that she was active in British films, Rank offered her only supporting roles in films dependant on a large cast of character actors.

‘Curtain Up’ (1952), for example was about a seaside repertory company, ‘A Day to Remember’ (1953), about a darts team on a one day excursion to France, ‘The Crowded Day,’ (1954) about the staff of a department store coping with the Christmas rush and ‘Women without Men,’ (1956) about a breakout from a women’s prison.

Only ‘Gift Horse’ (1952), a traditional wartime naval picture, had quality, yet her role as a Wren was subsidiary to Trevor Howard, Richard Attenborough and Sonny Tufts. In ‘One Good Turn’ (1954), she was wasted as a stooge to Norman Wisdom. After ‘Payroll’ in 1961, she effectively called it quits, returning for only one last picture, ‘The Horror of Frankenstein’ in 1970.

After leaving show business, she lived quietly with her beloved Labradors, Jessie and Sheba, took work as an insurance clerk and later set up an estate agent, letting accommodation in Maidenhead through the Joan Rice Bureau, though she had only one member of staff.

She smoked heavily and suffered from asthma and emphysema, which kept her largely housebound for the last six years.

She married first, in 1953 (dissolved in 1964), David Green, son of the American comedian, Harry Green; they had one son. She married secondly, in 1984, the former Daily Sketch journalist Ken McKenzie, who survives her [1997].”

This blog is dedicated to the memory of Joan Rice, so if you met her, or have any information about her you would like to share,
please get in touch at disneysrobin@gmail.com.

Picture Strip 12 : Walt Disney's Story of Robin Hood

Part 12 of Laurence's fabulous picture strip of Walt Disney's original movie the Story of Robin Hood and his Merrie Men (1952). In this we see Peter Ellenshaw’s very atmospheric interpretation of Sherwood Forest, which both Laurence and I admire very much.

To see previous pages of the Picture Strip, please click on the label below.

Mickey Wood's Tough Guys Agency

This was a small article I found in the Super Cinema Annual 1954. It featured a piece on Mickey Wood (1897-1963), the self-defence and physical training expert who was manager of the agency Tough Guys Limited which provided stunt people for films, including Disney’s Story of Robin Hood (1952).

"Through the leafy green thicket of Sherwood Forest came a wiry little man on a shaggy forest pony. Without pausing, the rider galloped the pony straight into a wide and deep stream which cut its meandering way through the trees. The spray shot up around them, hiding them from view for an instant. Then came the deep twang of a bow string. A long slender arrow sped through the air. With a sickening thud, it caught the rider full in the chest, even as he reached mid-stream.

He threw up his arms and fell from the pony, to land with a splash in the water. The frightened animal was left alone to struggle to the other side. The body of the man floated downstream, face upwards, arms outstretched, with the deadly arrow sticking up from his chest for all the world like a sail-less mast of some stricken ship-

Recognise this scene?

Well it was taken from ‘Robin Hood,’ that wonderful R.K.O. film which so faithfully portrayed the adventures of England’s ever-green hero of Sherwood Forest.We went to interview Mickey Wood and found him in his office in Wardour Street, the centre of all the world’s film companies in England. He is a quiet, unassuming man in his early fifties and his office walls are filled with pictures of the many hair-raising stunts which his own tough experts have performed, or have taught well known film stars to do.

Yes we can hear you saying, “I suppose that was a dummy which a good marksman shot off the pony. It was jolly well done though.”

It certainly was well done! But that dramatic scene was no fake-the man on the pony was alive and surprisingly enough, has lived to perform many other daring stunts. For the rider was none other than Mickey Wood, principal of the ‘Tough Guys Stage and Screen Agency.’

Rupert Evans with James Hayter

And yet Mickey had an operation when he was a boy which would have been enough to kill many people, if not make them permanently disabled. He was trepanned and to this day [1954] he carries in his head a silver plate as a grim relic of this operation.


But Mickey Wood refused to let this put him off. At school he became the schoolboy boxing champion, took up wrestling and self defence and later on became the light-weight champion of Great Britain. Besides self-defence, he became an expert in swimming, diving, swordsmanship and riding.

During the last War, Mickey taught the Commando troops all he knew about self-defence and many of them must have found that knowledge invaluable when they came to grips with the enemy.

Peter Finch with Rupert Evans

Today, his ‘Tough Guys Agency’ has about three hundred and fifty people on its books, all of them experts in their various ways-ranging through boxers, wrestlers, high-divers, fencers, archers, car-crashers, circus acrobats and many other “tough guys.” But not only men-for Mickey has a number of extremely able young ladies who are willing to risk life and limb in the cause of stunting.

Micky’s first film-fight came in a film of George Formbey’s called ‘George in Civvy Street,’ when he worked with Kid Lewis, the famous boxer. Recent films in which Mickey has taken part are ‘Robin Hood,' already mentioned, ‘High Treason,’ ‘The Wooden Horse,’ and ‘Ivanhoe.’ The latter being the most spectacular and the one in which a big team of Mick’s people were engaged.

They had to leap from the castle battlements. Take part in fierce fights with swords, maces and all amidst clouds of arrows. But don’t run away with the idea that the fights such as you see here are haphazard affairs-not a bit of it!

These stunt men and women are tough, but they have no wish to throw their lives away just for the sake of a good picture. Every fight is carefully rehearsed and, very often, when two men are engaged in combat, practically every blow is planned beforehand. This is absolutely necessary; otherwise it could easily lead to serious injury or perhaps the death of one of the combatants.

Ivanhoe (1952)

A good example of this spectacular combat was the fierce fight between Ivanhoe and the Norman knight before Prince John. The heavy battle axe and the ball-and-chain mace were no toys as you will probably realise if you saw the film and the dents the two men put in each other’s shields!"

Super Cinema Annual 1954

Picture Strip 11 : Walt Disney's Story of Robin Hood

Part 11 of Laurence's fabulous picture strip of Walt Disney's Story of Robin Hood and his Merrie Men (1952). To see previous pages, please click on the label below.

Elton Hayes

Elton Hayes entertaining by his fireplace! I expect they were magical times, listening to the balladeer as he sang, 'with his small guitar,' through his repertoire.

Hubert Gregg by Laurence

This is another work of art by Laurence, who says:

"I was up in the loft earlier, and dug out some of my movie actors drawings. Thought you might like to see this pencil drawing that I made of Hubert Gregg back in the seventies; plus the accompanying letter with his very kind comments. I do have one or two others from The Story of Robin Hood. (I think I may have mentioned this before.)"

We look forward to seeing some more of your fine artwork, Laurence!