Ian Dalrymple

Biography

British writer-producer, educated at Rugby and at Trinity College, Cambridge. 'Dal', as he came to be known, began in the industry as a cutter and assistant director under Michael Balcon. He was promoted to supervising editor, in which capacity he worked at Gaumont-British and Gainsborough from the late 1920's to the mid-1930's. Among the classic films that fell under his purview were Rome Express (1932) and The Ghoul (1933). He also collaborated on several of the screenplays during this period. From the second half of the decade, he concentrated more and more on writing scripts. Between 1940 and 1943, held the position of executive producer for the Crown Film Unit (under the Minstry of Information), turning out wartime documentaries. After 1945, he briefly joined Alexander Korda as a producer and a year later set up his own production company at Pinewood Studios, Wessex Films. This organisation turned out such features as The Woman in the Hall (1947), Maniacs on Wheels (1949) and the wartime prisoner-of-war drama The Wooden Horse (1950), which was a notable box-office hit. Dalrymple became considerably less active during the 1960's, though, for several years, he did consulting work for the record company Decca on movie projects. He was a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and Chairman of BAFTA from 1957 to 1958.