Joan Dowling

Infobox Actor
bgcolour = Silver
name = Joan Dowling


imagesize = 180px
caption =
birthdate = birth date|1928|1|6|mf=y (Some sources say 1927 and 1929)
location = flagicon|England
height =
deathdate = death date and age|1954|3|31|1928|1|6|mf=y aged Age at date|1928|1|6|1954|3|31
deathplace = London, England
birthname = Joan Dowling
othername =
homepage =
notable role = Clarry in "Hue and Cry"
spouse = Harry Fowler

Joan Dowling (6 Jan 1928 (Some sources say 1927 and 1929) –31 Mar 1954) was an English character actress.

Biography

Joan Dowling was an English Actress of the 1940–50s era. She was the illegitimate daughter of Vera Dowling and was brought up by her great grandmother (Elizabeth Dowling) in Uxbridge. She had a passion for acting, although she was never formally trained, and took roles in small plays, pantomimes and other productions whenever she could. At the age of 14, she approached a London acting agency and was given her first 'proper' part in a small production (title unknown). Her major acting debut came when producer Robert Atkins cast her in the role of Norma Bates in the Joan Temple play "No room at the Inn". The play's first performance was at the Winter Garden Theatre, Drury Lane circa 1946 but the exact date is unknown. She also played the same role in the 1948 film version, with the screenplay co-written by the famous Welsh author Dylan Thomas and Ivan Foxwell. She signed her first film contract at the age of 17 for Associated British Pictures.

She was perhaps best known for her role as the tomboy Clarry in the 1947 Ealing Studios production "Hue and Cry", a story set among the rubble and buildings of post-War London about a group of school children who discover that crooks have been sending coded messages to their gang about upcoming jobs using the pages of a children's comic book. In 1951 she married "Harry Fowler" - another actor on the cast of "Hue and Cry".

Joan Dowling committed suicide (gas poisoning) in 1954. It has been alleged by a relative that the suicide may have been accidental and that she was only trying to scare her husband because he was seeing other women.

Filmography

*"Hue and Cry" (1947)
*"No Room at the Inn" (1948)
*"Bond Street" (1948)
*"A Man's Affair" (1949)
*"For Them That Trespass" (1949)
*"Train of Events" (1949)
*"Landfall" (1949)
*"Murder Without Crime" (1950)
*"Pool of London" (1951)
*"The Magic Box" (1951)
*"24 Hours of a Woman's Life" (1952)
*"Women of Twilight" (1953)

Plays

*"No Room at the Inn" (circa 1946)
*"Robinson Crusoe" (1952)

This is an incomplete list.

Please help to add to it if you can.

Radio

*"Meet the Huggetts" (1953, series 1. Replaced after her death by Vera Day)

External links

*
* [http://www.britishpathe.com/thumbnails.php?id=60236&searchword=joan%20dowling&searchword=joan%20dowling Video footage and Stills of Joan Dowling at British Pathe News]
* [http://www.britishpictures.com/photos2/photo120.htm Picture: Joan Dowling and Harry Fowler on the set of Hue and Cry]
* [http://movies2.nytimes.com/gst/movies/movie.html?v_id=104174 No Room at the Inn - Film synopsis]
* [http://www.winchesterfilmsociety.co.uk/messages/285.html Discussion thread at Winchester Film Society about Joan Dowling with a comment from a relative on her suicide]