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DARK CORRIDORS VOL. 3, No. 34 |
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FAREWELL HORACE RUMPOLE |
 Leo McKern as Horace Rumpole |
for Rumpole's return to TV
of TheColumnists.com
Many loyal fans of TV's "Mystery!" series had been secretly longing for that moment when actor Leo McKern finally would relent and return to play another season of John Mortimer's "Rumpole of the Bailey," bringing back one of the most beloved characters in the long history of that series.
Now, of course, we all know it won't ever happen. McKern, 82, died on July 23--and nobody ever would have the temerity to cast anyone else in the role that McKern long ago made his permanent property.
The death of McKern, who played Horace Rumpole from 1980 through 1995, further diminishes the family of immortal British "detectives" who came to great popularity in the U.S. via the PBS series that began in 1980--the first American season of Rumpole. Also gone now are Sherlock Holmes (Jeremy Brett) , Miss Marple (Joan Hixson) and Inspector Morse (John Thaw) while Hercule Poirot (David Suchet) has migrated to the rival A&E network and Jane "Prime Suspect" Tennison (Helen Mirren) is only appearing on "Masterpiece Theatre," if and when she works again.
Mortimer had always written his stories about Horace Rumpole, the snoopy, cheap wine-imbibing lawyer of the Old Bailey, after he'd written the teleplays first. When McKern finally decided he'd played Rumpole long enough and declined to go on, Mortimer kept writing the stories, always hoping McKern would give in to public demand and make some more TV episodes.
But McKern stuck to the theatre stage that he loved and made only a few minor screen appearances before illness forced him into a care home near Bath, the community he'd called home for years.
When he died last week, he was truly one of England's most beloved actors--a familiar face who only had to walk on a stage or appear in a moment of screen time to immediately put a smile on everyone's face.
Originally, though, he seemed an unlikely sort to ever become a star, let alone a beloved one. When he first left his native Australia for England after World War II, he had such a thick Aussie accent that it was hard to imagine him ever settling into the role of a British barrister whose special gift was his flowery use of the English language, spoken with a flawless BBC accent.
On top of that, McKern wasn't a very imposing presence and he had a glass eye, the result of an accident that cost him his left eye when he was just 15. As if that weren't enough to hold him back, he also had a tendency to put on weight, so leading man parts weren't offered very often.
McKern had followed actress Jane Holland to England in 1946 because he felt he was falling in love with her. They wound up married forever. They had two daughters. One of them, Abigail McKern, joined her father in "Rumpole of the Bailey," replacing Samantha Bond in the role of lawyer Liz Probert.
In the early 1950s, McKern acted at the Old Vic and the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre, then finally began turning up in supporting parts in movies like "X the Unknown," playing a scientist; "The Mouse That Roared"; "Help!" as the comedy foil to The Beatles; "A Man For All Seasons," as Cromwell; "Ryan's Daughter," as Ryan; and the villainous Basil Zaharov in TV's "Reilly, Ace of Spies," which also had a run on PBS' "Mystery!"
But it was the role of Horace Rumpole that made McKern a star who forever remained in demand.
Mortimer, who was one of England's most prestigious trial lawyers, really modelled Rumpole in part on his own father. In a 1995 interview, Mortimer told me his original first choice for the role of Rumpole was Alistair Sim. Then he found out Sim was dead, so he sat down with the producer and director and came up with a list of names that included McKern, who was "well-known, but not enormously famous." Once McKern was cast, though, Mortimer could see nobody else in the part.
In his TV environment, Rumpole was considered a mediocre lawyer content to handle the cases of minor career criminals, often getting them off after his colorful investigations on their behalf. But his fans loved Rumpole for his deliciously down-to-earth ways and the eloquent manner in which he popped the balloons of his stuffy, aristocratic superiors and pompous colleagues.
In real life, McKern was as conservative as Rumpole was liberal. He often said he and Rumpole were "as different as chalk and cheese." In his later years, after playing the barrister for more than a decade, he began to feel the part was confining him at his most creative time of life and began trying to pull himself away from the steady income and other benefits that made the part so otherwise cozy.
"I'm like a little dogie, struggling to its feet after having the branding iron put on me," he said when he finally broke away from the series.
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of Chateau Fleet Street with wife Hilda (Marion Mathie), "she who must be obeyed." |
Still, his fans really didn't want to part with him and the "Rumpole of the Bailey" episodes continued to play in endless repeats on PBS stations. In the series, Rumpole always referred to his overbearing wife, Hilda, as "she who must be obeyed," a reference not only to her bossiness, but also to the original literary source of the quote, H. Rider Haggard's famous novel "She," about a queen who ruled an underground empire in the heart of colonial Africa. T-shirts with the "She Who Must Be Obeyed" logo continue to be popular giveaway items on PBS pledge nights.
Sadly for me, I never got to interview McKern. He was acting in repertory when I was writing "Mystery! A Celebration," the companion book to the PBS series, and didn't want to do any interviews about Rumpole while he was working on something else.
I'd like to think McKern is now comfortably situated in Heaven, sitting on a cloud, waiting for that glass of Chateau Fleet Street he'd just ordered from the Pearly Gates Wine Bar. He played Rumpole so well that it's now impossible to believe the affable barrister didn't go with him when McKern left us last week.
The bad news is that Rumpole is probably gone for good. But the good news is that nearly all the TV episodes with McKern at his jolly best are now available on video, so we can continue to enjoy them as long as we live.
© 2002 by Ron Miller.
The photos from "Rumpole of the Bailey" are courtesy
of PBS' "Mystery!"
Ron
Miller is a former nationally syndicated television columnist
and the author of "Mystery! A Celebration," the official
companion book to PBS' "Mystery!" series. He currently
teaches classes in mystery and related topics at Whatcom Community
College and Western Washington University in Bellingham, Washington.
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