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Kenneth Griffith (born Kenneth Reginald Griffiths, 12 October 1921 – 25 June 2006) was a Welsh actor and documentary filmmaker. His outspoken views made him a controversial figure, especially when presenting documentaries which have been called "among the most brilliant, and controversial, ever made in Britain".
He passed the Eleven-plus exam and attended Greenhill Grammar School in Tenby, where he met English literature teacher Evelyn Ward, who recognised his writing and acting talent. Before Kenneth left school, his headmaster J. T. Griffith suggested that he drop the "s" from his surname so it would sound less English.
He became a regular jobbing repertory actor, making his West End theatre debut in 1938 with a small part in Thomas Dekker's The Shoemaker's Holiday.
Griffith was conscripted into the Royal Air Force during World War II. Before training in Canada, he returned to see his grandparents in Tenby, who, at his request, gave him an English translation of Hitler's book, Mein Kampf so he could better understand the origins of the war. He caught scarlet fever while on his training and was invalided out of the service in 1942, which resulted in his taking up stamp collecting. The first stamp he collected was the Siege of Ladysmith, South Africa.
In 1941, he made his debut in the first of more than 80 films, being Love on the Dole. He joined the Liverpool, Lancashire-relocated Old Vic, and in repertory.
He appeared in many British films between the 1940s and 1980s, notably as Archie Fellows in The Shop at Sly Corner, Jenkins in Only Two Can Play (1962), the wireless operator Jack Phillips on board the Titanic in A Night to Remember (1958), in the crime caper Track the Man Down (1955) and especially in the comedies of the Boulting brothers, including Private's Progress (1956) and I'm All Right Jack (1959). Other notable film roles included the murderous paedophile Seely in Revenge (1971), the gay medic Witty in The Wild Geese (1978) and a whimsical mechanic in The Sea Wolves (1980).
He appeared in the episodes "The Girl Who Was Death" and "Fall Out" of the 1967–68 TV series The Prisoner. Subsequent TV appearances included episodes of Minder and Lovejoy, and critically acclaimed performances in War and Peace (1963), The Perils of Pendragon, Clochemerle and The Bus to Bosworth, where his personification of a Welsh schoolteacher out on a field trip won him many accolades back in his homeland of Wales.
His later film roles included the "mad old man" in Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994), Reverend Jones in The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill But Came Down a Mountain (1995) and the minister in Very Annie Mary (2001).
In 1973, Griffith made a documentary film about the life and death of Irish military and political leader Michael Collins titled Hang Up Your Brightest Colours (a line taken from a letter from George Bernard Shaw to one of Collins' sisters after Collins' assassination) for ATV, but the Independent Broadcasting Authority did not permit it to be screened (it was not shown until the BBC broadcast it in 1993).
In 1974, for a programme titled Curious Journey, he interviewed nine surviving IRA members from the Irish revolutionary period; they were Maire Comerford, Joseph Sweeney, Sean Kavanagh, John O'Sullivan, Brigid Lyons Thornton, Sean Harling, Martin Walton, David Neligan and Tom Barry. His sympathetic portrayal caused concern in the context of the Northern Ireland Troubles, and ATV boss Sir Lew Grade decided to withdraw the film, which was not shown publicly until 1994. In response Griffith made a documentary, The Public's Right to Know, for Thames TV. He was allowed to buy back Curious Journey, as long as he did not mention who had commissioned it (the Welsh TV company HTV).
At one point in his career, Griffith accused the anti-censorship group Index of censoring him by delaying the publication of two book reviews he had written for its magazine. The political troubles left him "a frustrated and bemused figure". Screenonline described Griffith as "a world class documentary film-maker" who knew that "refusing to compromise his views has damaged his career".
His autobiography, The Fool's Pardon, was published in 1994 by Little, Brown. BBC Wales presented a retrospective season of five of his documentaries in 1993, including the suppressed Michael Collins work, opening the season with a biographical study of Griffith called The Tenby Poisoner in which Peter O'Toole, Martin McGuinness and Jeremy Isaacs paid tribute. BBC Wales screened a film on Griffith's life in the "Welsh Greats" Series Two, shown in 2008. In 1994, Griffith was given a Cymru lifetime achievement award by BAFTA.
A Boer War historian, Griffith was sympathetic to the in South Africa. His documentary, Emily Hobhouse: The Englishwoman (1984), sympathised with Afrikaner women and children over their brutal treatment during the war, which was suppressed by the British media at the time.. He also made a BBC2 documentary on runner Zola Budd, which purported to reveal injustices done to her by left-wing demonstrators and organisations during a tour of England in 1988. True to his beliefs, WalesOnline, 28 June 2006.
He named his home (110 Englefield Road, Islington, London) as Michael Collins' House. In later life, Griffith said: "In my time I've been accused of being a Marxist, a fascist, a traitor and, probably worst in most people's eyes, inconsistent. I was a radical Socialist. I'm now a radical Tory. It has been a very painful journey".
Documentaries and political activity
In 1965, Huw Wheldon and the director of BBC Two, David Attenborough, asked Griffith if he would like to make a film for the BBC on any subject that he chose. This resulted in a series of BBC films on subjects as diverse as the Boer War in Soldiers of the Widow (1967), Cecil Rhodes in A Touch of Churchill, a Touch of Hitler (1971), the controversial story of Thomas Paine in The Most Valuable Englishman Ever, David Ben-Gurion ( The Light), Napoleon Bonaparte ( The Man on the Rock), Jawaharlal Nehru, Roger Casement ( Heart of Darkness, 1992) and on one occasion a film commissioned by Thames Television on the story of the Three Wise Men of the New Testament, A Famous Journey (1979). Griffith was expelled from Iran by the country's Foreign Minister while making the documentary.
Personal life
Griffith was married and divorced three times, and had five children:Barker 2011.
Death and burial
Griffith died in London on 25 June 2006, aged 84. His coffin was decorated with the flags of Wales, Israel and the Irish tricolour. Griffith was interred beside his grandparents, Emily and Ernest in the churchyard adjoining St Nicholas and St Teilo Church in Penally.
Legacy
Tenby Museum and Art Gallery in Pembrokeshire houses an archive of Griffith's papers and documentaries, and a cabinet containing a collection of personal memorabilia.
Filmography
Sources
External links
Categories: People From Tenby, Royal Air Force Personnel Of World War Ii, Welsh Activists, Welsh Male Film Actors, Welsh Male Stage Actors, Welsh Male Television Actors, Welsh Television Presenters, Welsh Methodists, Deaths From Alzheimer's Disease In England, Deaths From Dementia In England, 1921 Births, 2006 Deaths, British Philatelists, Male Actors From Pembrokeshire
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