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form y separately published work icon Diggers in Blighty single work   film/TV   humour  
First known date: 1933 Issue Details: First known date: 1933... 1933 Diggers in Blighty
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Film Details - Pat Hanna Productions , 1933

Producers:

Pat Hanna

Production Companies:

Pat Hanna Productions

Director of Photography:

Arthur Higgins

Production Designers:

W.R. Coleman

Cast:

Incl. Pat Hanna (Chic), George Moon (Joe), Joe Valli (Corporal Joe McTavish), John D'Arcy (Captain Jack Fisher), Norman French (Sir Guy Gough), Prudence Irving (Alison Dennett), Thelma Scott (Judy Fisher), Edwin Brett (The Colonel), Nellie Morlyne (Aunt Martha), Iza Crossley (The Sister), Raymond Longford (Von Schieling), Guy Hastings (Quartermaster Sergeant), Alfred Frith (a 'Tommie'), George Randall (Colonel-Paymaster), Field Fisher (Muddles), Reg Wykeham (W. O. Pay Corps), Sylvia Sterling (French Adventuress).

Release Dates:

11 February 1933 at Hoyts Theatre De Luxe (Melbourne - premiere). Hanna appeared on stage during the course of the evening.

Notes:

1. Associate Director: Raymond Longford.
2. Having made the decision to never again work with F. W. Thring in the aftermath of the producer's decision to reorder the sequence of scenes in Diggers, 1931), Pat Hanna formed his own production company. He nevertheless took advantage of Thring's absence from Australia in 1932 (on a sales mission to the United Kingdom) to utilise Efftee's Melbourne production facilities for the making of this sequel. One interesting production decision was to shoot the French chateau exterior scenes at the Old Melbourne Gaol.
3. Although Hanna had freed himself of F. W. Thring's creative input, he again encountered difficulties, this time with associate director and actor Raymond Longford. According to Eric Reade, Longford failed to adapt to the new demands of the 'talkies', both in his acting and directing, and as a consequence imparted too much melodrama into the film. Hanna was therefore forced to re-shoot many of Longford's scenes (ctd. Cinema Papers April 1974, p. 129).
4. Further reference: Andrew Pike and Ross Cooper. Australian Film 1900-1977, A Guide to Feature Film Production (1980), pp.211-212.

Settings:
  • c
    England,
    c
    c
    United Kingdom (UK),
    c
    Western Europe, Europe,
X