Esmond's 1928 West End debut as Hobart in a melodrama called Contraband - he is centre stage front in an embrace with
Gwen Ffrangcon-Davies. To his delight Esmond received his first good review from critic James Agate who wrote:
"I admire Mr Knight's courage in affecting so much crepe hair, but unless I am mistaken he has the makings of an actor."
(Right) - engaging in fisticuffs in Fashion, also at the Gate Theatre. (Esmond is on the right.) (1929).
(Right) - Esmond in The Return of the Puritan at the Golders Green Hippodrome, one of half a dozen stage parts he played in 1929.
77 Park Lane (1931) - from left to right: Esmond, Betty Stockfield, Molly Johnson and Malcolm Keen.
This is the film (now lost) in which Michael Powell, who wrote the screenplay, first noticed Esmond and his potential.
(Right) - a still from an early Esmond Knight film, The Ringer (1931).
(Right) - portrait of Esmond in the programme of the stage musical Wild Violets (1932)
(Right) - knocking out a new waltz - as Johann Strauss the Younger in Waltzes From Vienna (1933), overlooked by Jessie Matthews as Resi Ebezeder.
(Right) - as Eddie Martin in The Bermondsey Kid (1933), the film that won him a contract with Warner Brothers.
(Right) - as Michael Bolton in the "quota quickie" Father and Son (1934).
(Right) - 1934 - a proud father - Esmond holding Rosalind (born 3rd December 1933) in the garden of Uncle Chas's
home near Sevenoaks. On the right is Philip Glasier, a family friend who became a professional falconer.
Jessie Matthews and Esmond on set with director Alfred Hitchcock
during the filming of Waltzes From Vienna (1933).
(Right) - a publicity shot taken in 1935.
(Right) - Rosalind aged two in a scene from Sweeper of the Skies, a film by Captain Chas Knight (1935).
(Right) - 1930s studio shot for LIFE magazine.
(Right) - 1930s studio shot for LIFE magazine.
(Right) - a set of lobby cards for Dandy Dick (1935).
Studio portraits of Esmond from the mid-1930s
(Right) - on stage as murderer Dan in Night Must Fall (1936)
(Right) - Pagliacci (1936) which Esmond (far right) filmed by day whilst performing on stage at night as a murderer in Night Must Fall.
A signed "camera study" of Esmond with a falcon. 1930s
(Right) - from the programme for The Insect Play (1936) in which Esmond played The Parasite and The Chief Engineer.
(Right) - from the programme for The King and Mistress Shore (1936) in which Esmond played Richard, Duke of Gloucester / Richard III.
play of that name. Reflected in the mirror is Wilson Barrett who played Vincent's brother, Theo.
What Men Live By (1938)
(Above) - stills from the 1938 film What Men Live By directed by Vernon Sewell and adapted by Michael Powell
from a short story by Leo Tolstoy. Esmond plays an angel banished to Earth as a punishment by God.
The Drum (1938)
(Above) - stills from The Drum in which Esmond appeared briefly in an uncredited role as a soldier
in a battalion of the Scottish Gordon Highlanders.
(Above) - with artist Alexander Christie admiring Christie's portrait of Esmond in traditional
falconer's dress at an exhibition held by the Royal Society of Portrait Painters in November 1939.
(Right) - 193, on stage with Nora Swinburne in the play which brought them together - Wise Tomorrow (the couple on the left).
(Right) - 1939, on stage with Nora Swinburne in Autumn Crocus at the King's Theatre, Hammersmith.
(Right) - Esmond onstage with George Larchet in Through the Night - King's Theatre, Hammersmith (April 1940).
(Right) - in the cast of A Midsummer Night's Dream, Regents Park, August 1940. Esmond was awaiting his call-up papers to join the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve.
Contraband (1940)
(Above) Stills from Contraband - here Esmond is paired with Valerie Hobson as British agents making their escape from the lair
of London-based German spies, aided and abetted by Conrad Veidt (at the window) as a Danish sea captain.
(Right) - 1941 - recuperating in the grounds of Helgafell Army Hospital near Reykjavik, Iceland, with his guide, Nurse Thorday, or "Sister Toby", as Esmond called her.
(Right) - learning to type at St Dunstan's in Church Stretton, Shropshire, with his instructor, Tommy Rogers, a First World War veteran blinded at Amiens in 1918.
(Right) - reading John Masefield's poem in Trafalgar Square,
22nd October 1943.
Fran is to his left
holding the text.
(Right) - as Gestapo officer Von Schiffer in The Silver Fleet (1943), the only film Esmond appeared in whilst totally blind.
With Ralph Richardson in a scene from the The Silver Fleet (1943). This image has all the appearance of
direct eye contact between the two actors, but Esmond was in fact still totally blind when it was filmed.
A Canterbury Tale (1944)
(Right) - as David Davies in The Halfway House (1944).
(Right) - with Glynis Johns in a scene from The Halfway House (1944).
Note Esmond's thick lensed glasses.
More scenes from Three Waltzes …
(Right) - as The Old General - a publicity still from Powell and Pressburger's Black Narcissus (1947).
(Right) - at Pinewood Studios whilst filming Powell and Pressburger's Black Narcissus (1947). Michael Powell is in the centre, and to his right actor Anton Walbrook who was visiting the set.
(Above) As Livingstone Montague ("Livy"), the orchestral conductor of the Ballet Lermontov, in The Red Shoes (1948).
(Above) Publicity shots of Esmond (left) on stage as Mercutio in Romeo and Juliet at the King's Theatre, Hammersmith (1946)
and on film as The Old General in Black Narcissus (1947)
(Above) Esmond with Rosalind and Nora arriving at the Old Vic Theatre - 3rd January 1949.
(Left) - as Bernardo in Laurence Olivier's film version of Hamlet (1948). Bernardo is one of the captains of the guard who reports sightings of the ghost of Hamlet's father. He in fact speaks the very first line of the play - "Who's there?" Hamlet takes pride of place as the first British production ever to win an Academy Award Oscar for Best Picture (at the 1949 ceremony for the previous year's films). Olivier also won an Oscar for Best Actor, as did Jean Simmons (Best Actress), Roger Furse and Carmen Dillon (Best Art Direction), and Roger Furse again (Best Costume Design). As well as Esmond, the hugely impressive cast includes (in no particular order) … Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing, Felix Aylmer, John Laurie, Stanley Holloway, Anthony Quayle, Niall McGinnis, Patrick Macnee, Patrick Troughton, Desmond Llewelyn, Basil Sydney, Harcourt Williams, Russell Thorndike, Anthony Quinn and John Gielgud. Laurence Olivier was knighted whilst the film was in production - still being filmed in fact - and he attended the investiture ceremony, which took place on 8th July 1947 at Buckingham Palace, with his hair still dyed blonde for the part.
(Right) - making as Abel Woodus in the
Powell & Pressburger film of Mary Webb's Shropshire
novel Gone To Earth (1950).
(Right) - with Jennifer Jones in Gone To Earth (1950). Esmond played her father.
(Left) - with Mary Kerridge in The Compelled People (TV)(1950).
(Left) - as Abel Woodus in Gone To Earth (1950).
(Above) Nora and Esmond during the filming of The River in India in 1951.
(Image source: eBay UK)
(Right) - as the Father in Jean Renoir's film of The River (1951)
(Right) - as Menas in Olivier's 1951 production
of Antony and Cleopatra.
(Right) - father and daughter at Shepperton Studios. Esmond with Rosalind during the filming of Richard III (1955).
(Right) - as Sir Richard Ratcliffe in Richard III (1955).
The autographed "Esmond Knight" page from a film fan's 1950s photo album I picked up on eBay.
(Right) - as Bubnov in the 1958 TV production of The Lower Depths by Maxim Gorky.
(Right) - Esmond as the subject of a This is Your Life programme (18th Feb 1957)
(Above) As the High Priest in Helen of Troy (1956). Nora was cast in the film - Esmond joined her in Italy merely
as a guest and ended up taking over the role from an actor who couldn't remember his lines!
(Above) As Gustav Lichtenburg in an episode of the 1956 TV series The Count of Monte Cristo, with Allan Cuthbertson.
This Is Your Life (1957)
(Above) A lobby card from The Battle of the V1 (1958) in which Esmond again played a Nazi, Stricker, as he had done so memorably in
The Silver Fleet (1944). Both films were directed by his friend Vernon Sewell. Unusually for an internationally released British production,
it was not filmed in any of the major English studios in and around greater London, but at the little-known Brighton Studios in Brighton,
Sussex, with location work at nearby Shoreham-on-Sea.
(Above) Sink The Bismarck! (1960) Playing Captain John Leach, his own commanding officer,
at Pinewood Studios whilst recreating the moment in which Esmond himself was blinded
on board HMS Prince of Wales nearly twenty years earlier.
Right) - Esmond in the Walt Disney production, The Third Man On The Mountain (1959). Nora and he both worked on the film including on location in Switzerland.
Right) - as General von Schreiber the TV series Interpol Calling - this episode was The Sleeping Giant, first broadcast in 1959.
(Right) - as Dennis the Hangman in the BBC's 1960 production of Barnaby Rudge.
(Right) - in Vacation, episode 20 of the TV series Danger Man, broadcast in 1961.
(Right) - in theTV series The Saint - an episode broadcast in 1962 called The Covetous Headsman.
(Right) - 1963, as Springwood, a sleazy Welsh journalist, in the TV play To Bury Caesar.
(Right) - 1965, in an episode of The Third Man (TV) called The Trial of Harry Lime, loosely based on the 1949 film.
(Right) - 1965, in Left-handed Liberty, Mermaid Theatre. Esmond is behind Patrick Wymarck who plays King John.
(Right) - on stage at the Mermaid Theatre in 1965 with Sonia Dresdel in Dandy Dick.
(Right) - 1965, Four Thousand Brass Halfpennies, Mermaid Theatre, with Jennifer Clulow and Freddie Jones.
(Right) - in The Parachute (1968), a BBC Play of the Month. Esmond is reflected in the mirror; in the foreground, John Osborne.
(Right) - in a TV play, The Parachute, (1968) as Helmut.
(Right) - as Dom Issigri in a 1969 episode of Dr Who called The Space Pirates. Patrick Troughton played the Doctor at the time.
(Right) 1969 - on stage at The Hampstead Theatre Club in The Black Swan Winter. On the far left is Eric Thompson (father of Emma Thompson).
(Above) - Anne of the Thousand Days (1969). Nora and Esmond together on the right of the scaffold, as Anne Boleyn
(played by Genevieve Bujold) is executed.
(Right) - Esmond just visible centre on the set of Mister at the Lyceum Theatre (1970).
(Right) 1971 - as the Bishop of Quadra in Elizabeth R with Glenda Jackson as Queen Elizabeth 1.
(Right) - as Captain Cutler in The Affair of the Tortoise, an episode of the ITV series The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes (1971).
(Right) - in Cousin Bette as Marshal Hulot (1971).
(Right) - as the retired spy Mundt in Yellow Dog (1973).
(Right) - as Mister Justice Ruddy in an episode of Softy Softly (1973).
(Right) 1975 - as General Pickford in Quiller - episode 8 (The Thin Red Line).
(Right) 1976 - as the Troll King in the BBC production of Peer Gynt, starring Patrick Mower in the title role.
In character for Agincourt - The Archer's Tale, the one-man show devised, written and acted by Esmond, first performed
on 23rd October 1973 at The Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester, and subsequently performed many times
over the next few years all over the country.
As Armand with Jenny Agutter in the TV movie The Man in the Iron Mask (1977)
(Right) - as Sir Charles in an episode of the TV series Supernatural called Dorabella / Viktoria (1977).
(Right) - as Sir Charles in an episode of the TV seriesSupernatural called Dorabella / Viktoria (1977).
(Right) - as Osbourne in Element of Crime (1985) - his performed his part with "ailing charm" as one critic described it.
(Right) - in Dutch director Lars von Trier's Element of Crime (1985) - a complex crime thriller also starring Michael Elphick.
(Right) - as the second Ancien in Superman IV: The Quest for Peace (1987).
(Right) - Esmond's final role - as Liversage in Fortunes of War (broadcast posthumously)(1987).
